ST. MICHAEL'S MOUNT FORMERLY SIX MILES FROM THE SEA.

Of this several persons have informed me, who have, as they said, often seen the same."*

But whether the record of Mr. Scawen be deemed genuine or fabulous, concerning the subsidence of the land between the Ramehead and Looe, the evidence which applies to the inundation of the sea on the western shores is not liable to such uncertainty. Dr. Borlase, in his Natural History, marks with precision the very year and day when the remains of the wood in Mount's Bay made their appearance, in the following words :-"On the strand of Mount's Bay, midway between the piers of St. Michael's Mount and Penzance, on the 10th of January, 1757, the remains of the wood, which according to tradition, covered anciently a large tract of ground on the edge of Mount's Bay, appeared."+

But amidst these corroborating accounts, which seem to place the fact on a ground which no inundation can overwhelm, it is natural to inquire how far that land extended, which is now inevitably lost. On this point we must be satisfied with the records of historical testimony, since no natural vestiges remain to guide us in our researches.

"The Mount, says a celebrated historian, was formerly no less than five miles from the sea." We can confirm the circumstance by an evidence which is clear and certain, yet carries the distance to a still greater length. "St. Michael's Mount, we are informed by Worcester himself, was originally inclosed with a very thick wood, distant from the ocean six miles. The Cornish name of it is Carreg Lúg en Kúg. Worcester is the oldest writer who gives the signification of it; he informing us, that the Mount was formerly denominated Le Hore Rok in the Wodd. The ravages made by the sea are not merely the silent encroachments, and slow depredations of the waters upon the land, but the sudden impression given to the whole weight of the Atlantic, in sending it with a hasty violence upon our south western coasts at one particular period, and in keeping it to bear with a regular violence upon them ever since." +

Next to the certainty of knowing that a catastrophe, similar to that which has been described, did happen to a large tract of country, is the solicitude which it excites within us, to know at what period this melancholy event took place. But this period can no more be known with certainty, than the number of acres can be ascertained with accuracy, which the restless ocean has torn with violence from the diminished land.

* Scawen's MS. pp. 9, 10, cited by Borlase, Scilly Islands, p. 94.

+ Borlase's Natural History, p. 222.

+ Supplement to Polwhele's History of Cornwall, by Mr. Whitaker, pp. 16, 17.

PETITION FROM THE MONKS OF SCILLY TO EDWARD I.

It is well known, that several inundations have happened at distinct periods, which have considerably affected various parts of the adjacent shores; but to which of these, the subsidence of the land, both in Mount's Bay, and in the Scilly Islands, ought to be attributed, no historian has attempted positively to determine. That such an event should happen, of which no written particulars are extant, is exceedingly strange; but that such a tradition should prevail, and that so many evidences in favour of its certainty should exist, if no such event did take place, is not only exceedingly strange, but utterly unaccountable.

In the days of Edward I. there was a great subsidence of the land on some of the southern coasts of England, in consequence of which, Winchelsea, near Rye, in Sussex, a town said to contain sixteen churches, was totally swallowed up, and its ruins are now no less than three miles from the shore.* It was to repair in some measure, the effects of this disaster, that Edward I. purchased for the unfortunate inhabitants, that land on which the present Winchelsea stands.

But this calamity, Dr. Borlase is decidedly of opinion, could not be that which so fatally overwhelmed the Cornish shores, because no memorial of the disaster is preserved in any of the ancient records of the Mount, which refer to this period. And on the same principle we may be assured, that the catastrophe in question could not have happened at any subsequent period, because no record of such an event having recently taken place, is any where extant.

It is highly probable, at what period soever it happened, that the Scilly Islands and the western shores of Cornwall were involved in the same catastrophe; since visible remains of a similar disaster are conspicuous in both, even to the present day. It seems however, quite certain, that no such calamity had recently happened at this period, because the monks who inhabited the islands, on presenting a petition to Edward I. setting forth their calamitous condition, and praying for his protection against pirates, say nothing respecting any inundation of the sea, either in the Scilly Islands, or on any part of the Cornish shores; which in all probability they would have done, if any event of this kind had happened so recently as the submersion of Winchelsea implies.

In the Saxon Chronicle, another great inundation of the sea is said to have happened in the year 1014; and, from the singular nature of the phenomenon, and the place in which it most probably occurred, it seems to direct our views to the period after which we inquire. "In this year, says the Chronicle, in the watchings, stations, or posts of St. Michael, a great inundation of the sea, which

* Norden's Survey of Cornwall.

ST. KEYNA, A HOLY VIRGIN, VISITS ST. MICHAEL'S MOUNT.

1

flowed farther over this extensive country than it ever had before, overwhelmed many towns and an inexpressible number of men."

But how much soever this description may coincide with the loss which we suppose Cornwall to have sustained, and although the watchings, stations, or posts of St. Michael, perfectly agree with the Cornish Mount, considerable doubts have been entertained respecting its application. Dr. Borlase thinks that the calamity must have happened at a still earlier period; and he founds his supposition on the same principle which prevents us from admitting the calamity which destroyed Winchelsea.

The monks, Dr. Borlase observes, were placed in the Scilly Islands about the year 938, and as they continued there for several centuries, they must have known if any such phenomenon had occurred in 1014, as that which is mentioned in the Saxon Chronicle; and if they knew, it is highly probable that they would have recorded it. These islands of Scilly appear to have been united to the Abbey of Tavistock so early as 961; but no memorial whatever of this calamity, appearing in any papers belonging either to the abbey or the islands, induces Dr. Borlase to conceive, that it must have happened long before the days of Athelstan. And if this be admitted, the reason why it is passed over in silence, must have arisen from its having happened a considerable time before, without ceasing to be notorious.

But if Dr. Borlase's objections be valid against the Saxon Chronicle, because the monks of Scilly who must have resided on the islands at that time are totally silent. on the subject, they will acquire an additional strength when we apply them to St. Michael's Mount. When this celebrated rock was first consecrated to religious purposes, we have no means of knowing with certainty. The earliest time in which as a place of devotion it appears on record, is in the fifth century. But even then it appears to have been a place of much renown, since the record states that St. Keyna, a holy virgin of the ancient British royal blood, daughter of Braganus, prince of Brecknockshire, visited it as a place of no common sanctity. From this period, until the dissolution of monasteries took place, this singular rock continued to be inhabited, by men who must have known, and who in all probability would have recorded the circumstance, if such an event as we have supposed, had actually occurred during their long residence on it.

It is obvious from hence, according to the principle of Dr. Borlase's objection, that no inundation could probably have taken place, during the period that St. Michael's Mount was inhabited, which will carry us from the fifth century down to the dissolution of monasteries; and if we add to this, the silence of public records, from the dissolution to the present time, we are furnished with a sweeping

INUNDATION ON THE IRISH COAST.

principle, which bears down every inundation, from the fifth century to the present hour.

But whatever weight may be attached to Dr. Borlase's objection, Florence of Worcester has specified the time, when an extraordinary inundation of the sea took place. He informs us, that "on the third of the nones of November, in 1099, the sea came out upon the shore, and buried towns and men very many, and oxen and sheep innumerable." Another account relating to the same event is still more circumstantial. It is recorded in the Saxon Chronicle under the year 1099, in the following words :-" This year eke, on St. Martin's Mass Day, the 11th of November, sprang up so much the sea flood, and so myckle harm did, as no man minded that it ever afore did, and there was this ylk day a new moon.' These testimonies are certainly sufficient to substantiate the facts which they record, although they are silent as to the minuter circumstances which associated with these phenomena. And we have no more reason to infer from the silence of the inhabitants of the Mount, that no disaster took place during their long residence on it, than we have to infer from the records which have reached us, that no circumstances of an extraordinary nature were connected with the phenomena, which they respectively attest, because their authors have not given them to us in detail.

But although Dr. Borlase has expressed his doubts, that either the Scilly Islands or the lands in Mount's Bay, were injured by any of those inundations which have been mentioned, he is willing to admit, that in both places the catastrophe has been produced by the operation of a cause which strongly resembles those that we have been called to contemplate; with this additional circumstance, that the period in which the disaster happened, lies buried more deeply in antiquity. But his observations and authorities shall appear in his own words.

"I conjecture that this inundation must have happened before Athelstan's time; and by the Irish annals, I find an inundation which might probably have affected the south of Ireland, and at the same time have reached Scilly and the coast of Cornwall, which are not above fifty leagues distant from it to the east, nor much more than a degree to the south of it." After having made the preceding. remarks, Dr. Borlase then introduces the following quotation from Smith's History of Cork:

"In the end of March, A. D. 830, Hugh Dorndighe being monarch of Ireland, there happened such terrible shocks of thunder and lightning, that above a thousand persons were destroyed between Corca-Bascoin, a part of the county of

* Cited by Mr. Whitaker, in his Supplement to Polwhele's History of Cornwall.