Cornish Saints & Sinners

by J. Henry Harris

The true story of the saints is a little mixed; the giants and the piskies come in, and wherever the saints went there was sure to be trouble. We picked up a few stories, not all in one place, but here and there. Those already published we weeded out, together with some which appeared doubtful. Some needed a little patching up in places, and the Bookworm said the most imperfect were the most genuine. The following were thought worthy of survival.

KING TEWDRIG AND THE SAINTS.

King Tewdrig and the Saints.

Irish saints swarmed as thick as flies in summer in the reign of Tewdrig the King, who built his castle on the sands at Hayle, wherein it now is, only the X-rays are not strong enough to make it visible. This Tewdrig was a good old sort, and was called Theodore by the saints as long as he had anything to give. But the saints letting it be known in the distressful land that they had struck oil, their friends and relatives swarmed across the Channel in such crowds that the King was in danger of being eaten out of house and home. He summoned the Keeper of the Victuals, and asked for a report. He had it; and it was short and sad—as sad in its way as an army stores inquiry. Every living thing in air and field and wood had been devoured. All the salted meats in the keeves had disappeared, "and if you don't stop this immigration of Irish saints," said the unhappy official, "we shall be eaten up alive." The good King became serious. Whilst they were talking, a messenger came with the news that a great batch of saints had come ashore. The King and his Keeper of the Victuals—when there were any to keep—looked at each other solemnly. "Put the castle in mourning," said the King. When the new arrivals danced up to the gate, with teeth well set for action and stomachs empty, the Keeper of the Victuals spoke sadly. "The good King died," he said, "the moment he heard that more saints had arrived. Those who came first ate all his substance and emptied his keeves, and there was nothing left of him now but bones. The last words of the good King were, 'Give them my bones.'" The Keeper of the Victuals turned, as though to fetch the good King's bones for the saints to feast on; but they one and all departed and spread the story. The King played the game and ordered his own funeral; and when the time came, he got up and looked through a peep-hole to see the procession. "The saints," said he, "have spared my bones, but they will surely come and see the last of me." But he was mistaken. The story that all the keeves were empty spread, and there wasn't a "saint" left in the land on the morrow. Then the King showed himself to his own people, and a law was passed, intituled "An Act against Alien Saints' Immigration." The country recovered its ancient prosperity, and the Keeper of the Victuals filled the keeves with salted meats, and there were wild birds in the air, and beasts in the field, and the King once more feasted in his own hall.

St. Ia came across the Channel on a cabbage leaf, and the wind and tide carried her gaily to King Tewdrig's shore, but when the Customs asked her what she had to declare, she only held up the cabbage leaf. As she was a princess in her own right, and good-looking for an emigrant, the Customs officers were sad, but showed her a printed paper, rule xli, which stated that "foreigners without luggage, or visible means of subsistence, must not be allowed to land." The saint pointed to the cabbage leaf, and argued that it was "luggage" and "visible means of subsistence," and would have made good her point but for the King's Chancellor, who said that the cabbage leaf, being "pickled," was a manufactured article, and liable to duty under the new fiscal regulations. St. Ia always left her purse at home when she travelled, so she was unable to pay the duty. Once more she committed herself to the mercies of the sea on her cabbage leaf, and was carried to St. Ives, where she landed, and was made much of. She stayed there for a time, planted her leaf, and was blessed with a wonderful crop of pickled cabbages, the like of which had never before been seen or heard of. But she revenged herself upon King Tewdrig by writing to all the papers, and the saints, who deserted the King when they had almost eaten him up, made a fine how-de-doo, and an "Irish grievance," and the bad name which they gave the King stuck to him. The saints wrote the books in those days, and those who came after repeated what they wrote, until the people believed, and called it "history."

ST. IA.