So I preached to my incredulous juniors, who threw overboard King Arthur and took to blackberry-gathering; and to conversation with a most comely Cornishwoman, milking the prettiest of Cornish cows in the lonely farm-yard, which was the only sign of humanity for miles and miles. We admired herself and her cattle; we drank her milk, offering for it the usual payment. But the picturesque milkmaid shook her head and demanded just double what even the dearest of London milk-sellers would have asked for the quantity. Which sum we paid in silence, and I only record the fact here in order to state that spite of our foreboding railway friend at Falmouth, this was the only instance in which we were ever "taken in," or in the smallest degree imposed upon, in Cornwall.
Another hour, slowly driving down the gradual slope of the country, through a mining district much more cheerful than that beyond Marazion. The mines were all apparently in full work, and the mining villages were pretty, tidy, and cosy-looking, even picturesque. Approaching St. Ives the houses had quite a foreign look, but when we descended to the town, its dark, narrow streets, pervaded by a "most ancient and fish-like smell," were anything but attractive.
As was our hotel, where, as a matter of duty, we ordered tea, but doubted if we should enjoy it, and went out again to see what little there seemed to be seen, puzzling our way through the gloomy and not too fragrant streets, till at last in despair we stopped a bland, elderly, Methodist-minister-looking gentleman, and asked him the way to the sea.
He eyed us over. "You're strangers here, ma'am?"
I owned the humbling fact, as the inhabitant of St. Ives must doubtless consider it.
"And is it the pilchard fishery you want to see? It is just beginning. A few pilchards have been seen already. There are the boats, the fishermen are all getting ready. It's a fine sight to see them start. Would you like to come and look at them?"
He had turned back and was walking with us down the street, pointing out everything that occurred to him as noticeable, in the kindest and civilest way. When we apologised for troubling him, and would have parted company, our friend made no attempt to go.
"Oh, I've nothing at all to do, except"—he took out the biggest and most respectable of watches—"except to attend a prayer-meeting at half-past six. I should have time to show you the town; we think it is a very nice little town. I ought to know it; I've lived in it, boy and man for thirty-seven years. But now I have left my business to my sons, and I just go about and amuse myself, looking into the shop now and then just for curiosity. You must have seen my old shop, ladies, if you came down that street."
