into king arthurs land—tintagel his birth-place, and camelford, where he fought his last battle—the legendary region of which one may believe as much or as little as one pleases—we were going to-day. with the good common sense which we flattered ourselves had accompanied every step of our unsentimental journey, we had arranged all before-hand, ordered a carriage to meet the mail train, and hoped to find at tintagel—not king uther pendragon, king arthur or king mark, but a highly respectable landlord, who promised us a welcome at an inn—which we only trusted would be as warm and as kindly as that we left behind us at marazion.
the line of railway which goes to the far west of england is one of the prettiest in the kingdom on a fine day, which we were again blessed with. it had been a wet summer, we heard, throughout cornwall, but in all our journey, save that one wild storm at the lizard, sunshine scarcely ever failed us. now—whether catching glimpses of st. ives bay or sweeping through the mining district of redruth, and the wooded country near truro, grampound, and st. austell, till we again saw the glittering sea on the other side of cornwall—all was brightness. then darting inland once more, our iron horse carried us past lostwithiel, the little town which once boasted joseph addison, m.p., as its representative; gave us a fleeting vision of ristormel, one of the ancient castles of cornwall, and on through a leafy land, beginning to change from rich green to the still richer yellows and reds of autumn, till we stopped at bodmin road.
no difficulty in finding our carriage, for it was the only one there; a huge vehicle, of ancient build, the horses to match, capable of accommodating a whole family and its luggage. we missed our compact little machine, and our brisk, kindly charles, but soon settled ourselves in dignified, roomy state, for the twenty miles, or rather more, which lay between us and the coast. our way ran along lonely quiet country roads and woods almost as green as when queen guinevere rode through them "a maying," before the dark days of her sin and king arthur's death.
here it occurs to me, as it did this day to a practical youthful mind, "what in the world do people know about king arthur?"
well, most people have read tennyson, and a few are acquainted with the "morte d'arthur" of sir thomas malory. but, perhaps i had better briefly give the story, or as much of it as is necessary for the edification of outsiders.
uther pendragon, king of britain, falling in love with ygrayne, wife of the duke of cornwall, besieged them in their twin castles of tintagel and terrabil, slew the husband, and the same day married the wife. unto whom a boy was born, and by advice of the enchanter merlin, carried away, from the sea-shore beneath tintagel, and confided to a good knight, sir ector, to be brought up as his own son, and christened arthur. on the death of the king, merlin produced the youth, who was recognized by his mother ygrayne, and proclaimed king in the stead of uther pendragon. he instituted the order of knights of the round table, who were to go everywhere, punishing vice and rescuing oppressed virtue, for the love of god and of some noble lady. he married guinevere, daughter of king leodegrance, who forsook him for the love of sir launcelot, his bravest knight and dearest friend. one by one, his best knights fell away into sin, and his nephew mordred raised a rebellion, fought with him, and conquered him at camelford. seeing his end was near, arthur bade his last faithful knight, sir bedevere, carry him to the shore of a mere (supposed to be dozmare pool) and throw in there his sword excalibur; when appeared a boat with three queens, who lifted him in, mourning over him. with them he sailed away across the mere, to be healed of his grievous wound. some say that he was afterwards buried in a chapel near, others declare that he lives still in fairy land, and will reappear in latter days, to reinstate the order of knights of the round table, and rule his beloved england, which will then be perfect as he once tried to make it, but in vain.
camelford of to-day is certainly not the camelot of king arthur—but a very respectable, commonplace little town, much like other country towns; the same genteel linendrapers' and un-genteel ironmongers' shops; the same old-established commercial inn, and a few ugly, but solid-looking private houses, with their faces to the street and their backs nestled in gardens and fields. some of the inhabitants of these said houses were to be seen taking a quiet afternoon stroll. doubtless they are eminently respectable and worthy folk, leading a mild provincial life like the people in miss martineau's deerbrook, or miss austen's pride and prejudice—of which latter quality they have probably a good share.
we let our horses rest, but we ourselves felt not the slightest wish to rest at camelford, so walked leisurely on till we came to the little river camel, and to slaughter bridge, said to be the point where king arthur's army was routed and where he received his death-wound. a slab of stone, some little distance up the stream, is still called "king arthur's tomb." but as his coffin is preserved, as well as his round table, at winchester; where, according to mediæval tradition, the bodies of both arthur and guinevere were found, and the head of guinevere had yellow hair; also that near the little village of davidstow, is a long barrow, having in the centre a mound, which is called "king arthur's grave"—inquiring minds have plenty of "facts" to choose from. possibly at last they had better resort to fiction, and believe in arthur's disappearance, as tennyson makes him say,
"to the island-valley of avillion ...
where i may heal me of my grievous wound."
dozmare pool we found so far out of our route that we had to make a virtue of necessity, and imagine it all; the melancholy moorland lake, with the bleak hill above it, and stray glimpses of the sea beyond. a ghostly spot, and full of many ghostly stories besides the legend of arthur. here tregeagle, the great demon of cornwall, once had his dwelling, until, selling his soul to the devil, his home was sunk to the bottom of the mere, and himself is heard of stormy nights, wailing round it with other ghost-demons, in which the cornish mind still lingeringly believes. visionary packs of hounds; a shadowy coach and horses, which drives round and round the pool, and then drives into it; flitting lights, kindled by no human hand, in places where no human foot could go—all these tales are still told by the country folk, and we might have heard them all. might also have seen, in fancy, the flash of the "brand excalibur"; heard the wailing song of the three queens; and pictured the dying arthur lying on the lap of his sister morgane la faye. but, i forgot, this is an un-sentimental journey.
the delabole quarries are as un-sentimental a place as one could desire. it was very curious to come suddenly upon this world of slate, piled up in enormous masses on either side the road, and beyond them hills of debris, centuries old—for the mines have been worked ever since the time of queen elizabeth. houses, walls, gates, fences, everything that can possibly be made of slate, is made. no green or other colour tempers the all-pervading shade of bluish-grey, for vegetation in the immediate vicinity of the quarries is abolished, the result of which would be rather dreary, save for the cheerful atmosphere of wholesome labour, the noise of waggons, horses, steam-engines—such a contrast to the silence of the deserted tin-mines.
but, these delabole quarries passed, silence and solitude come back again. even the yearly-increasing influx of tourists fails to make the little village of trevena anything but a village, where the said tourists lounge about in the one street, if it can be called a street, between the two inns and the often-painted, picturesque old post-office. everything looked so simple, so home-like, that we were amused to find we had to get ready for a table d'hôte dinner, in the only available eating room where the one indefatigable waitress, a comely cornish girl, who seemed argus and briareus rolled into one, served us—a party small enough to make conversation general, and pleasant and intelligent enough to make it very agreeable, which does not always happen at an english hotel.
then we sallied out to find the lane which leads to tintagel castle, or castles—for one sits in the sea, the other on the opposite heights in the mainland, with power of communicating by the narrow causeway which now at least exists between the rock and the shore. this seems to confirm the legend, how the luckless husband of ygrayne shut up himself and his wife in two castles, he being slain in the one, and she married to the victorious king uther pendragon, in the other.
both looked so steep and dangerous in the fast-coming twilight that we thought it best to attempt neither, so contented ourselves with a walk on the cliffs and the smooth green field which led thither. leaning against a gate, we stood and watched one of the grandest out of the many grand sunsets which had blessed us in cornwall. the black rock of tintagel filled the foreground; beyond, the eye saw nothing but sea, the sea which covers vanished lyonesse, until it met the sky, a clear amber with long bars like waves, so that you could hardly tell where sea ended and sky began. then into it there swam slowly a long low cloud, shaped like a boat, with a raised prow, and two or three figures sitting at the stern.
"king arthur and the three queens," we declared, and really a very moderate imagination could have fancied it this. "but what is that long black thing at the bow?"
"oh," observed drily the most practical of the three, "it's king arthur's luggage."
sentiment could survive no more. we fell into fits of laughter, and went home to tea and bed.
