From a Cornish Window / A New Edition - Arthur Quiller-Couch

And yet… It seems to a Cornishman so easy to get at Cornish hearts— so easy even for a stranger if he will approach them, as they will at once respond, with that modesty which is the first secret of fine manners. Some years ago I was privileged to edit a periodical—though short-lived not wholly unsuccessful—the Cornish Magazine. At the end of each number we printed a page of 'Cornish Diamonds,' as we called them—scraps of humour picked up here and there in the Duchy by Cornish correspondents; and in almost all of them the Cornishman was found gently laughing at himself; in not one of them (so far as I remember) at the stranger. Over and over again the jest depended on our small difficulties in making our own distinctions of thought understood in English. Here are a few examples:—

(1) "Please God," said Aunt Mary Bunny, "if I live till this evenin' and all's well I'll send for the doctor."
(2) "I don't name no names," said Uncle Billy "but Jack Tremenheere's the man."
(3) "I shan't go there nor nowhere else," said old Jane Caddy, "I shall go 'long up Redruth."
(4) "I thought 'twere she, an' she thought 'twere I," said Gracey Temby, "but when we come close 'twadn't narry wan o' us."
(5) A crowd stood on the cliff watching a stranded vessel and the lifeboat going out to her.
"What vessel is it?" asked a late arrival.
"The Dennis Lane."
"How many be they aboord?"
"Aw, love and bless 'ee, there's three poor dear sawls and wan old Irishman."
(6) Complainant (cross-examining defendant's witness): "What colour was the horse?"
"Black."
"Well, I'm not allowed to contradict you, and I wouldn' for worlds: but I say he wasn't."
(7) A covey of partridges rose out of shot, flew over the hedge, and was lost to view.
"Where do you think they've gone?" said the sportsman to his keeper.
"There's a man digging potatoes in the next field. Ask if he saw them."
"Aw, that's old Sam Petherick: he hasna seed 'em, he's hard o' hearin'."
(8) Schoolmaster: "I'm sorry to tell you, Mr. Minards, that your son Zebedee is little better than a fool."
Parent: "Naw, naw, schoolmaster; my Zebedee's no fule; only a bit easy to teach."

[I myself know a farmer who approached the head master of a Grammar School and begged for a reduction in terms: "because," he pleaded, "I know my son: he's that thick you can get very little into en, and I believe in payment by results.">[

Here we pass from confusion of language into mere confusion of thought, the classical instance of which is the Mevagissey man who, having been asked the old question, "If a herring and a half cost three-halfpence, how many can you buy for a shilling?'" and having given it up and been told the answer, responded brightly, "Why, o' course! Darn me, if I wasn' thinkin' of pilchards!" I met with a fair Devon rival to this story the other day in the reported conversation of two farmers discussing the electric light at Chagford (run by Chagford's lavish water-power). "It do seem out of reason," said the one, "to make vire out o' watter." "No," agreed the other, "it don't seem possible: but there,"—after a slow pause—"'tis bütiful water to Chaggyford!"

It was pleasant, while the Magazine lasted, to record these and like simplicities: and though the voyage was not long, one may recall without regret its send-off, brave enough in its way:—

"'WISH 'EE WELL!'

"The ensign's dipped; the captain takes the wheel.
'So long!' the pilot waves, and 'Wish 'ee well!'
Go little craft, and with a home-made keel
'Mid loftier ships, but with a heart as leal,
Learn of blue waters and the long sea swell!
"Through the spring days we built and tackled thee,
Tested thy timbers, saw thy rigging sound,
Bent sail, and now put forth unto the sea
Where those leviathans, the critics, be,
And other monsters diversely profound.
"Some bronzed Phoenician with his pigmy freight
Haply thy herald was, who drave of yore
Deep-laden from Bolerium by the Strait
Of Gades, and beside his city's gate
Chaffered in ingots cast of Cornish ore.
"So be thou fortunate as thou art bold;
Fare, little craft, and make the world thy friend:
And, it may be—when all thy journey's told
With anchor dropped and tattered canvas rolled,
And some good won for Cornwall in the end—
"Thou wilt recall, as best, a lonely beach,
And a few exiles, to the barter come,
Who recognised the old West-country speech,
And touched thee, reverent, whispering each to each—
'She comes from far—from very far—from home.'"

I have a special reason for remembering The Cornish Magazine, because it so happened that the first number (containing these hopeful verses) was put into my hands with the morning's letters as I paced the garden below this Cornish Window, careless of it or of anything but a doctor's verdict of life or death in the house above. The verdict was for life.…