on the right hand you see the boldest Rocky shore glistning with spars and mundicks, and enamelled with a thousand different hues. Under these Rocks the Sea has formed Cavities large enough to admit of twenty People commodiously in each Cove; from one you see a little arm of the Sea, which at low Water comes within less than twenty Yards of you, dashing its waves against a vast Rock that stands entirely detach'd from any other. From another Cove you have sight of the Ocean but agreeably interrupted on the right hand by an immense high broken Rock detached, like the former, from the Rocks which join the mainland; and this Rock, as well as all the others, is alike enamell'd with the most beautiful Colours, and decorated with Samphire and other Sea Plants which hang down from several parts of it. It is impossible, without you are a Poetical Genius, to do justice to this singular scene, for there are a Thousand Beautys still to be described, which a dull narration will give you no Idea of. The excessive shining Whiteness of the Sand, and several small Basons full of Limpid Sea Water, which the Tide leaves behind when the Sea is out, the various Windings and Turnings which the different Groups of Rocks oblige you to make in traversing this splendid Court of Neptune, ought all to be taken into the Description, but the Task is too great for me.

The central island of the cove is called Asparagus Island, from the plant which grows upon it. This steep islet can be reached over the sand when the tide is low, and it has upon it a sort of blow-hole leading down to a cave within, through which the waves dash and blow out of the aperture. The holes, for they are two in number, close together, are called the Bellows and the Post Office. If a sheet of paper be held near the narrow slit-about 6 inches by 3 inches-it is violently torn from the hand and carried inwards, which, of course, means that an outgoing wave within has required air to be drawn in through the slit to prevent, what Nature abhors, a vacuum. The Devil's Bellows is another of these queer openings into an interior cave through which the enclosed air is expelled, at certain states of tide and weather, with violence. Jose told me at low water and at spring tides the noise from this orifice has been heard four and a half miles away, which I quite believe.

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Then, farther out to sea on Asparagus Island, is the Devil's Throat, through which the sea is belched forth in masses of some twenty tons at a time in certain states of the tides. Surely if ever the awfully ghastly imagery of Dante's dream were realised on earth it is here at Kynance Cove. Some of Doré's pictures might well have originated in this abode of the unreal and at the same time yet terribly real.

A more quietly pleasing spectacle it is to drop small cut-up bits of a limpet into the natural fish-ponds on the lower part of Asparagus Island, and watch the "bull-heads," or wrasse, rush out from the surrounding lining seaweed and snatch them. It is a sight and amusement of absorbing interest to the grown-ups as well as to the little ones. The pools are clear as crystal and a foot or two deep, and all the manœuvring of the little fish can be seen.

Some deep, wide caves with lofty roofs face Asparagus Island. That immediately fronting it is called the Parlour; that a little to the west the Drawing-room. These are all floored with a carpet of invitingly smooth and white sand in the summer, but in the winter the sand is scoured away and the beach is then composed of huge highly polished stones. Then the archways are consequently many feet higher and the caves infinitely grander, though not so easy of access. A fine view it is to stand in the Parlour and look out seaward to the Rill Point and Smugglers' Cave, which cross the opening on the sea-line.

In 1846, Prince Albert and the royal children landed at Kynance from a yacht, Queen Victoria remaining on board. Jose's father took the royal party round the cove just as the son did our humble selves, and he told us his father did not know till the royal party had nearly completed their tour of inspection who the visitors were.

Unfortunately little accommodation is to be had at Kynance Cove. There are apparently no cottages to let, and the one place of refreshment has a monopoly and charges very high prices for meals. This is unfortunate, as many would like to stay a considerable time at this beauty spot.

Returning from this interesting excursion Jose brought us back by a more direct route across country to Lizard Town, over the moor and then for a quarter of a mile at

least along the top of a stone wall quite four feet wide— a "double hedge," as it is called, by the side of the golflinks.

No doubt these hedges originated in the making of enclosures to shield the flocks and shelter them from the inclement weather. This accounts, and this only, for the immense amount of labour expended in their construction. If these hedges had been needed merely to mark off property, a very much less elaborate boundary would have sufficed. The tops of many of these Cornish "hedges" are planted with vigorous additional hedges of beech, ash, and oak, which most annoyingly often limit the wayfarer's view. As a protection in old days against the ravages of wild animals these high and strong walls—for such they really are-must have been of great value.

One of the family of the Joses, not the guide I have been speaking of, told me a well-authenticated and curious story concerning Kynance Cove. An old lady dreamt that she saw some guineas buried beneath the sand at one particular spot in the cove. She was then living at Mullyon, and in the morning related her dream, which was simply treated as a dream and as of no account by the other members of the family at the breakfast-table. The next morning on coming down she said that last night she had again dreamed the same dream and was pooh-poohed by the younger members of the circle. On the third morning she most positively asserted that she had again seen a number of guineas buried at one particular spot at Kynance Cove, which she for the third time described with detail. This most positive third reiteration of the dream upset the scoffers and with the old lady they set off for the cove. Before she approached the spot she described it, and when the party got near they saw a man digging in the sand, and sure enough he was there and then unearthing a mass of guineas, no doubt the buried wealth of some old wrecker. Facts are stubborn things, and this undoubtedly true story may be merely one of those very extraordinary coincidences which nearly every living being comes across sooner or later in his or her experience.

We returned to Helston by the same route by the Great Western Railway motor, the fare being 1s. 3d., with 4d. for

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each piece of baggage carried on top. Connecting 'buses meet the motor for other coves of beauty spots on the way, such as Mullyon.

Helston lies in a hollow. It is a small town with good shops, and rows of houses many of which have porches of glass before their front doors in which flowers grow in brilliant profusion, and in which I noticed that coloured glass is much used-vivid blue, red, and orange.

Helston holds high festival on May 8th. The day is called "Furry Day," and is doubtless a remnant of the ancient festival in honour of the goddess Flora. The word "furry is derived from the old Celtic word feur, a fair holiday. All work stops. Subscriptions are collected, flowers and green boughs too are obtained by forages into the country, and on the return of the party music and dancing in the streets commence.

It is customary to have all street doors open, so that the couples can dance in and out of the houses as they will. In 1907 the Lord Mayor of London, Sir W. P. Treloar, born of a Helston stock and a freeman of Helston, led off the dance down the street with the daughter of a townsman, and ended up with a waltz in the Assembly Rooms.

The Furry Dance is performed to a sprightly tune, used also in common by the Celtic races of Wales and Brittany. This is interesting, as affording another link in the common Celtic origin of the three peoples.

In the days of close or pocket boroughs Helston was a very close or pocket borough indeed. The corporation had a charter granted by Queen Elizabeth and confirmed by Charles I, and at the General Election in 1790 one Richard Penhall, who united in his own solitary person the whole corporation under this old charter, all the other

members of that body being dead, claimed the sole power of electing two members to represent his individual person in the House of Commons! The Mayor at that time, the Rev. John Pasmore, contested this right under another charter granted by George III, and the committee of the House of Commons to which the contest was referred decided in favour of the new charter; but at the former General Election in 1774 a committee of the House of Commons had held that it was under the old charter that the right of electing members of Parliament lay. It was therefore a mere turn of the judicial scale that prevented one man returning two members of Parliament !

The notorious Attorney-General Noy, to whose advice Charles I was mainly indebted for the loss of his head, sat for this borough (see page 120).