and all arthurian days, so i will condense them into one chapter, and not spin out the hours that were flying so fast. yet we hardly wished to stop them; for pleasant as travelling is, the best delight of all is—the coming home.
walking, to one more of those exquisite autumn days, warm as summer, yet with a tender brightness that hot summer never has, like the love between two old people, out of whom all passion has died—we remembered that we were at tintagel, the home of ygrayne and arthur, of king mark and tristram and iseult. i had to tell that story to my girls in the briefest form, how king mark sent his nephew, sir tristram, to fetch home iseult of ireland for his queen, and on the voyage bragswaine, her handmaiden, gave each a love-potion, which caused the usual fatal result; how at last tristram fled from tintagel into brittany, where he married another iseult "of the white hands," and lived peacefully, till, stricken by death, his fancy went back to his old love, whom he implored to come to him. she came, and found him dead. a tale—of which the only redeeming point is the innocence, simplicity, and dignity of the second iseult, the unloved breton wife, to whom none of our modern poets who have sung or travestied the wild, passionate, miserable, ugly story, have ever done full justice.
these sinful lovers, the much-wronged but brutal king mark, the scarcely less brutal uther pendragon, and hapless ygrayne—what a curious condition of morals and manners the arthurian legends unfold! a time when might was right; when every one seized what he wanted just because he wanted it, and kept it, if he could, till a stronger hand wrenched it from him. that in such a state of society there should ever have arisen the dimmest dream of a man like arthur—not perhaps tennyson's arthur, the "blameless king," but even sir thomas malory's, founded on mere tradition—is a remarkable thing. clear through all the mists of ages shines that ideal of knighthood, enjoining courage, honour, faith, chastity, the worship of god and the service of men. also, in the very highest degree, inculcating that chivalrous love of woman—not women—which barbaric nations never knew. as we looked at that hoar ruin sitting solitary in the sunny sea, and thought of the days when it was a complete fortress, inclosing a mass of human beings, all with human joys, sorrows, passions, crimes—things that must have existed in essence, however legend has exaggerated or altered them—we could not but feel that the mere possibility of a king arthur shining down the dim vista of long-past centuries, is something to prove that goodness, like light, has an existence as indestructible as him from whom it comes.
we looked at tintagel with its risky rock-path. "it will be a hot climb, and our bathing days are numbered. let us go in the opposite direction to bossinney cove."
practicality when weighed against poetry is poor—poetry always kicks the beam. we went to bossinney.
yet what a pretty cove it was! and how pleasant! while waiting for the tide to cover the little strip of sand, we re-mounted the winding path, and settled ourselves like seabirds on the furthermost point of rock, whence, just by extending a hand, we could have dropped anything, ourselves even, into a sheer abyss of boiling waves, dizzy to look down into, and yet delicious.
so was the bath, though a little gloomy, for the sun could barely reach the shut-in cove; and we were interfered with considerably by—not tourists—but a line of donkeys! they were seen solemnly descending the narrow cliff-path one by one—eleven in all—each with an empty sack over his shoulder. lastly came a very old man, who, without taking the least notice of us, disposed himself to fill these sacks with sand. one after the other the eleven meek animals came forward and submitted each to his load, which proceeding occupied a good hour and a half. i hardly know which was the most patient, the old man or his donkeys.
we began some of us to talk to his beasts, and others to himself. "yes, it was hard work," he said, "but he managed to come down to the cove three times a day. and the asses were good asses. they all had their names; lucy, cherry, sammy, tom, jack, ned;" each animal pricked up its long ears and turned round its quiet eyes when called. some were young and some old, but all were very sure-footed, which was necessary here. "the weight some of 'em would carry was wonderful."
the old man seemed proud of the creatures, and kind to them too in a sort of way. he had been a fisherman, he said, but now was too old for that; so got his living by collecting sand.
"it makes capital garden-paths, this sand. i'd be glad to bring you some, ladies," said he, evidently with an eye to business. when we explained that this was impracticable, unless he would come all the way to london, he merely said, "oh," and accepted the disappointment. then bidding us a civil "good day," he disappeared with his laden train.
poor old fellow! nothing of the past knightly days, nothing of the busy existing modern present affected him, or ever would do so. he might have been own brother, or cousin, to wordsworth's "leech-gatherer on the lonely moor." whenever we think of bossinney cove, we shall certainly think of that mild old man and his eleven donkeys.
the day was hot, and it had been a steep climb; we decided to drive in the afternoon, "for a rest," to boscastle.
artists and tourists haunt this picturesque nook. a village built at the end of a deep narrow creek, which runs far inland, and is a safe shelter for vessels of considerable size. on either side is a high footpath, leading to two headlands, from both of which the views of sea and coast are very fine. and there are relics of antiquity and legends thereto belonging—a green mound, all that remains of bottrieux castle; and ferrabury church, with its silent tower. a peal of bells had been brought, and the ship which carried them had nearly reached the cove, when the pilot, bidding the captain "thank god for his safe voyage," was answered that he "thanked only himself and a fair wind." immediately a storm arose; and the ship went down with every soul on board—except the pilot. so the church tower is mute—but on winter nights the lost bells are still heard, sounding mournfully from the depths of the sea.
as we sat, watching with a vague fascination the spouting, minute by minute, of a "blow-hole," almost as fine as the kynance post-office—we moralised on the story of the bells, and on the strange notions people have, even in these days, of divine punishments; imputing to the almighty father all their own narrow jealousies and petty revenges, dragging down god into the likeness of men, such an one as themselves, instead of striving to lift man into the image of god.
meantime the young folks rambled and scrambled—watched with anxious and even envious eyes—for it takes one years to get entirely reconciled to the quiescence of the down-hill journey. and then we drove slowly back—just in time for another grand sunset, with tintagel black in the foreground, until it and all else melted into darkness, and there was nothing left but to
"watch the twilight stars come out
above the lonely sea."
next morning we must climb tintagel, for it would be our last day.
and what a heavenly day it was! how softly the waves crept in upon the beach—just as they might have done when they laid at merlin's feet "the little naked child," disowned of man but dear to heaven, who was to grow up into the "stainless king."
he and his knights—the "shadowy people of the realm of dream,"—were all about us, as, guided by a rheumatic old woman, who climbed feebly up the stair, where generations of ghostly feet must have ascended and descended, we reached a bastion and gateway, quite pre-historic. other ruins apparently belong to the eleventh or twelfth centuries. but to this there is no clue. it may have been the very landing-place of king uther or king mark, or other cornish heroes, who held this wonderful natural-artificial fortress in the dim days of old romance.
"here are king arthur's cups and saucers," said the old woman, pausing in the midst of a long lament over her own ailments, to point out some holes in the slate rock. "and up there you'll find the chapel. it's an easy climb—if you mind the path—just where it passes the spring."
that spring, trickling down from the very top of the rock, and making a verdant space all round it—what a treasure it must have been to the unknown inhabitants who, centuries ago, entrenched themselves here—for offence or defence—against the main-land. peacefully it flowed on still, with the little ferns growing, and the sheep nibbling beside it. we idle tourists alone occupied that solitary height where those long-past warlike races—one succeeding the other—lived and loved, fought and died.
the chapel—where the high altar and a little burial-ground beside it can still be traced—is clearly much later than arthur's time. however, there are so few data to go upon, and the action of sea-storms destroys so much every year, that even to the learned archæologist, tintagel is a great mystery, out of which the imaginative mind may evolve almost anything it likes.
we sat a long time on the top of the rock—realising only the one obvious fact that our eyes were gazing on precisely the same scene, seawards and coastwards, that all these long-dead eyes were accustomed to behold. beaten by winds and waves till the grey of its slate formation is nearly black; worn into holes by the constant action of the tide which widens yearly the space between it and the main-land, and gnaws the rock below into dangerous hollows that in time become sea-caves, tintagel still remains—and one marvels that so much of it does still remain—a landmark of the cloudy time between legend and actual history.
whether the ruin on the opposite height was once a portion of tintagel castle, before the sea divided it, making a promontory into an island—or whether it was the castle terrabil, in which gorlois, ygrayne's husband, was slain—no one now can say. that both the twin fortresses were habitable till elizabeth's time, there is evidence to prove. but since then they have been left to decay, to the silent sheep and the screeching ravens, including doubtless that ghostly chough, in whose shape the soul of king arthur is believed still to revisit the familiar scene.
we did not see that notable bird—though we watched with interest two tame and pretty specimens of its almost extinct species walking about in a flower-garden in the village, and superstitiously cherished there. we were told that to this day no cornishman likes to shoot a chough or a raven. so they live and breed in peace among the twin ruins, and scream contentedly to the noisy stream which dances down the rocky hollow from trevena, and leaps into the sea at porth hern—the "iron gate," over against tintagel. otherwise, all is solitude and silence.
we thought we had seen everything, and come to an end, but at the hotel we found a party who had just returned from visiting some sea-caves beyond tintagel, which they declared were "the finest things they had found in cornwall."
it was a lovely calm day, and it was our last day. a few hours of it alone remained. should we use them? we might never be here again. and, i think, the looser grows one's grasp of life, the greater is one's longing to make the most of it, to see all we can see of this wonderful, beautiful world. so, after a hasty meal, we found ourselves once more down at porth hern, seeking a boat and man—alas! not john curgenven—under whose guidance we might brave the stormy deep.
it was indeed stormy! no sooner had we rounded the rock, than the baby waves of the tiny bay grew into hills and valleys, among which our boat went dancing up and down like a sea-gull!
"ay, there's some sea on, there always is here, but we'll be through it presently," indifferently said the elder of the two boatmen; and plied his oars, as, i think, only these cornish boatmen can do, talking all the while. he pointed out a slate quarry, only accessible from the sea, unless the workmen liked to be let down by ropes, which sometimes had to be done. we saw them moving about like black emmets among the clefts of the rocks, and heard plainly above the sound of the sea the click of their hammers. strange, lonely, perilous work it must be, even in summer. in winter—
"oh, they're used to it; we're all used to it," said our man, who was intelligent enough, though nothing equal to john curgenven. "many a time i've got sea-fowls' eggs on those rocks there," pointing to a cliff which did not seem to hold footing for a fly. "we all do it. the gentry buy them, and we're glad of the money. dangerous?—yes, rather; but one must earn one's bread, and it's not so bad when you take to it young."
nevertheless, i think i shall never look at a collection of sea-birds' eggs without a slight shudder, remembering those awful cliffs.
"here you are, ladies, and the sea's down a bit, as i said. hold on, mate, the boat will go right into the cave."
and before we knew what was happening, we found ourselves floated out of daylight into darkness—very dark it seemed at first—and rocking on a mass of heaving waters, shut in between two high walls, so narrow that it seemed as if every heave would dash us in pieces against them; while beyond was a dense blackness, from which one heard the beat of the everlasting waves against a sort of tunnel, a stormy sea-grave from which no one could ever hope to come out alive.
"i don't like this at all," said a small voice.
"hadn't we better get out again?" practically suggested another.
but no sooner was this done than the third of the party longed to return; and begged for "only five minutes" in that wonderful place, compared to which dolor ugo, and the other lizard caves, became as nothing. they were beautiful, but this was terrible. yet with its terror was mingled an awful delight. "give me but five, nay, two minutes more!"
"very well, just as you choose," was the response of meek despair. so of course, poetry yielded. the boatmen were told to row on into daylight and sunshine—at least as much sunshine as the gigantic overhanging cliffs permitted. and never, never, never in this world shall i again behold that wonderful, mysterious sea-cave.
but like all things incomplete, resigned, or lost, it has fixed itself on my memory with an almost painful vividness. however, i promised not to regret—not to say another word about it; and i will not. i did see it, for just a glimpse; and that will serve.
two more pictures remain, the last gorgeous sunset, which i watched in quiet solitude, sitting on a tombstone by tintagel church—a building dating from saxon times, perched on the very edge of a lofty cliff, and with a sea-view that reaches from trevose head on one side to bude haven on the other. also, our last long dreamy drive; in the mild september sunshine, across the twenty-one miles of sparsely inhabited country which lie between tintagel and launceston. in the midst of it, on the top of a high flat of moorland, our driver turned round and pointed with his whip to a long low mound, faintly visible about half-a-mile off. "there, ladies, that's king arthur's grave."
the third, at least, that we had either seen or heard of. these varied records of the hero's last resting-place remind one of the three heads, said to be still extant, of oliver cromwell, one when he was a little boy, one as a young man, and the third as an old man.
but after all my last and vividest recollection of king arthur's country is that wild sail—so wild that i wished i had taken it alone—in the solitary boat, up and down the tossing waves in face of tintagel rock; the dark, iron-bound coast with its awful caves, the bright sunshiny land, and ever-threatening sea. just the region, in short, which was likely to create a race like that which arthurian legend describes, full of passionate love and deadly hate, capable of barbaric virtues, and equally barbaric crimes. an age in which the mere idea of such a hero as that ideal knight
"who reverenced his conscience as his god:
whose glory was redressing human wrong:
who spake no slander, no, nor listened to it:
who loved one only, and who clave to her—"
rises over the blackness of darkness like a morning star.
if arthur could "come again"—perhaps in the person of one of the descendants of a prince who was not unlike him, who lived and died among us in this very nineteenth century—
"wearing the white flower of a blameless life—"
if this could be—what a blessing for arthur's beloved england!
