There are the sands below us, the little bay in the curve of the cliff, the transparent sea that brought the mysterious King to his kingdom.
And because all is mystery here, because behind the veil there is so little that is solid, so little that we know, it is not in the sunshine of a summer day that Tintagel has the most meaning. It is when the mists are trailing on the sea, and the dark rock is wrapped in a cloud as impenetrable as the legends that shroud Arthur, and for a moment a passing gleam lightens the fog above our heads and shows the pale ghost of a castle-wall uplifted against the sky—it is then that Tintagel seems indeed to be the heart of the world of dreams, the most perfect symbol of the mingled mystery and truth of the story of Arthur.
TINTAGEL.
More than three hundred years ago Carew gave his impressions of the island fortress. “In passing thither,” he says, “you must first descend with a dangerous declining, and then make a worse ascent by a path as everywhere narrow so in many places through his stickleness occasioning, as through his steepness threatening, the ruin of your life with the failing of your feet. At the top two or three terrifying steps give you entrance to the hill.” Those who suffer from unsteady heads will feel this lively description to be most accurate as regards the island; but the castle on the mainland may be reached by a path which, though narrow and tortuous enough, does not occasion, nor even threaten, the ruin of one’s life. And from those crumbling twelfth-century walls we may walk along the cliff to the little grey church that has stood here, buffeted by every wind of heaven, since the days of the Saxons. Part of the Saxon masonry is still here, and an old font green with moss, and various ancient stones. What this bleak cliff has to bear in the way of sea-winds may be seen in the churchyard, where all the tombstones—thin slabs of slate—are strongly buttressed by masonry three times as thick as themselves. In a corner is the poetical grave of an Italian sailor drowned on this shore: an ordinary ship’s life-buoy nailed to a rough wooden cross.
We drive away through the pretty village of Trevena, dip into the wooded and flowery dell of Bossiney on a steep and rather rough road, and soon run down into Boscastle among the orchards. The narrow gorge, where the village lies smothered in trees, ends in a little landlocked harbour, and high up on the hill to the left stands the church of Forrabury—the church whose bells, says the legend, are lying at the bottom of the sea with the bones of the blasphemous skipper who was bringing them to Boscastle. R. S. Hawker tells the story in “The Silent Tower of Bottreaux.” We cross the stream and begin a very long climb. This hill has a bad reputation; but its steepest gradient—one in six—is quickly past, and above it there is nothing very serious. After three miles of climbing we find some fine wide views; and as we drive between the high hedges on the rough road to Bude, catch glimpses of sea and headland on the left.
The charm of Bude, I imagine—and many people find it very charming—lies more in its surroundings than itself, more in the splendid coast and rolling sea than in the rather dull little town. The sands and boats at the river-mouth are picturesque, and so is the “cross-pool,” where Hawker in his sealskin coat once masqueraded as a mermaid (of a somewhat full habit), to the sad confusion of the youth of Bude.
Far more attractive in itself is Stratton, hard by, with the dark church-tower raised above the street, and half its houses hidden by the trees. In this church with the fine roof and the granite pillars is buried, under a black marble slab elaborately inlaid with brasses, a Sir John Arundel of the sixteenth century; the father, I believe, of John-for-the-King. And in the north aisle, with no stone to tell the tale of his brave and faithful service, lies Anthony Payne, the tender-hearted giant who taught little boys to fish, and fought with the strength of ten by Bevill Grenville’s side, and wrote a letter for which alone, if for nothing else, he deserves an epitaph. When Sir Bevill died at Lansdowne Hill it was Anthony Payne who broke the news to Lady Grenville. “You know, as we all believe,” he wrote, “that his soul was in heaven before his bones were cold. He fell, as he did often tell us he wished to die, in the great Stewart cause, for his country and his King. He delivered to me his last commands, and with such tender words for you and for his children as are not to be set down with my poor pen, but must come to your ears upon my heart’s best breath. Master John, when I mounted him upon his father’s horse, rode him into the war like a young prince as he is.… I am coming down with the mournfullest load that ever a poor servant did bear, to bring the great heart that is cold to Kilkhampton vault. O! my lady, how shall I ever brook your weeping face?”[12]
Down in the street we may find the house where this servant with the heart and tongue of gold was born and died. It was once a manor-house of the Grenvilles, but is now the “Tree” Inn, and shows little sign of age. Until lately there was a hole still in the ceiling through which Anthony Payne’s huge body was lowered after his death, since it was impossible to bring it down the narrow stairs; but now this room has been rebuilt. Fixed in the outer wall of the inn, however, is a relic of the battle on Stamford Hill, where “ye army of ye rebells … receiued A signall ouerthrow by ye Valor of Sir Bevill Granville and ye Cornish army,” and where Anthony Payne was valiant as his master. Once this stone was on the battle-field, but the owner of the land was so greatly harassed by sightseers that in his rage he dug out the memorial and built a house upon the spot!
Here, as we drive out of Stratton on a fine curving road, is the green slope on our left where the desperate battle of Stamford Hill, and the landlord’s desperate act of self-defence, took place. It was on that hilltop that Sir Bevill’s valour won him a personal letter from the King, the letter that was found in his pocket when he was dead. “Keep this safe,” he had written on it; for the Grenvilles were “King’s men,” not perfunctorily but passionately. It is but a few miles, on rather a rough road, to Kilkhampton, where Sir Bevill and most of his house are buried.