A FEW SEVENS 66 319 her life. It takes Eirek, the Norseman, seven years to reach home after his visit to the terrestrial paradise, when he relates his adventures, to the confusion of the heathen, and to the delight and edification of the faithful." Our own St. George is said to have been tortured by the Emperor Dacian during seven years, though, according to other accounts, he suffered seven martyrdoms, reviving after each except the last. There were seven champions of Christendom. When St. Patrick and his retinue were travelling in the southern part of what is now County Kildare, he sent for his seven deer-nets to capture the gigantic wild deer which was devastating the country. And Goethe, in his False Lover, tells how a gallant from France, having won the affections of a fair girl, afterwards cruelly forsook her, and how, in the same hour when he deserted her, "With bloody spurs and visage pale He dashed on fast and faster, Now here, now there, up hill, down dale, Seven days, seven nights, he rides amain, Even history, which should be the antithesis of legend, has condescended to fix its dates into the mould of seven. We have the Seven Days' War, the Seven Weeks' War, and the Seven Years' War, though it is notorious that the second of these events can only by the most liberal historian be squeezed into the necessary period. In short, mankind has fixed upon this number with a sort of dogged determination, and if seven will not square with facts, then facts must square with seven. If the whole world were full of wonders, as we believe is literally the case, mankind would consider until the crack of doom that their number was only seven. From this point of view we should hardly be disposed to consider the end of all things to be a genuine Eighth Wonder of the world. So associated is seven with what is fortunate, interesting, and lasting, that most of us may congratulate ourselves to have lived in the reign of King Edward the Seventh, the Peacemaker, and St. Ives may rejoice that its fame and prestige have been made everlasting by a similar association with the mystic number. ? Of course there are those who hold that the time-honoured children's rhyme applies to the other St. Ives; but this is very doubtful, at any rate, and I see no reason why the Cornish seaport should not be associated with it, and share in the lustre and reflected brilliancy of its renown. CHAPTER XXXIII LELANT, BRUNNION, DING DONG MINE, NANCLEDREA, ROGER'S TOWER, CHYSAUSTER, LANYON QUOIT ELANT lies two and a half miles south-east of St. Ives, among the sand-banks which line the southern shore of St. Ives Bay. The village is pretty, the little gardens in front of the cottages being full of flowers, which bloom here with nearly subtropical luxuriance. The church is approached by a long avenue of trees, and is certainly admirably placed for artistic effect. Just before reaching the edifice, on the left-hand side, is an old mounting-block of four steps at the door of a house which in former times was an inn, where persons coming to divine service from a distance could stable their horses and find refreshment, and then, mounting the steps, get on horseback and so home. The church contains considerable Norman remains-an entire arch, pier, and half-pier, forming the second bay on the north side of the nave. The springing of a second arch to the east is to be seen on the south side. In the graveyard around the church is a tall, plain, embossed old cross, 6 feet 4 inches high; and in the new cemetery adjoining the churchyard is another old cross displaying a much weather-worn crucifixion on one side. There is still another in this cemetery with a cross next the church, and on the reverse an even more weather-worn figure representing the crucifixion, 3 feet high. On the right side of the churchyard on entering is an old Celtic cross, lying prone on the ground, doubtless having been used as a tombstone. The entrance-gate has a stone seat on either side, but is without the usual stepping-stone stile, and the stones are of granite and black slag. |