The harbour is barred with banks of sand, made (through vniting their weak forces) sufficiently strong, to resist the Oceans threatening billows, which (diuorced from their parent) find their rage subdued by the others lowly submission.
M. Nicholas Prideaux, from his new and stately house, thereby taketh a ful and large prospect of the towne, hauen, & countrey adioyning, to all which, his wisdome is a stay, his authority a direction. He maried one of Viels coheires; and though endowed with fayre reuenues in Deuon, maketh Cornwall beholden to his residence. He beareth A. a Cheuron S. in chief a fyle with three Lambreaux G.
The salt water leauing Padstowe, floweth up into the countrey, that it may embrace the riuer Camel, and hauing performed this naturall courtesie, ebbeth away againe, to yield him the freer passage, by which meanes they both vndergoe Wade bridge, the longest, strongest, and fayrest that the Shire can muster. It tooke his name of a foorde adioyning, which affoordeth a way, not so safe, as compendious, when the tyde is out.
Wade bridge delivereth you into a waste ground, where 9. long and great stones, called The sisters, stand in a ranke together, and seeme to haue bene so pitched, for continuing the memory of somewhat, whose notice is yet enuied vs by time.
Neere to Belowdy, commonly, & not vnproperly, termed Beelowzy, the top of a hill is enuironed with deep treble trenches, which leaue a large playne space in the midst: they call it Castellan Danis, of which my former booke maketh mention; and it seemeth (in times past) to haue bin a matter of moment, the rather, for that a great cawsey (now couered with grasse) doth lead vnto it.
Saint Colombs is a bigge parish, and a meane market towne, subiect to the Lordship and patronage of the Lanhearn Arundels, who for many descents, lye there interred, as the inscriptions on their graue stones doe testify.
Theire name is deriued from Hirundelle, in French, a Swallow, & out of France, at the conquest they came, & sixe Swallowes they giue in Armes. The Countrey people entitle them, The great Arundels: and greatest stroke, for loue, liuing, and respect, in the Countrey heretofore they bare.
Their sayd house of Lanhearne, standeth in the next parish, called Mawgan: Ladu is Cornish for a bank, and on a banke the same is seated, what hearne may mean, ignorance bids mee keepe silence. It is appurtenanced with a large scope of land, which (while the owners there liued) was employed to franke hospitality; yet the same wanted wood, in lieu whereof, they burned heath, and generally, it is more regardable for profit, then commendale for pleasure. The Gent. now liuing, maried Anne the daughter of Henry Gerningham: his father (a man of a goodly presence and kinde magnanimity) maried the daughter of the Earle of Darby, and widdow to the L. Stourton. He beareth S. 6. Swallowes in pile A.
Little Colan hath lesse worth the obseruation, vnlesse you will deride, or pity, their simplicity, who sought at our Lady Nants well there, to foreknowe what fortune should betide them, which was in this maner:
Vpon Palm Sunday, these idle-headed seekers resorted thither, with a palme crosse in one hand, & an offring [145] in the other: the offring fell to the Priests share, the Crosse they threwe into the well; which if it swamme, the party should outliue that yeere; if it sunk, a short ensuing death was boded: and perhaps, not altogether vntruely, while a foolish conceyt of this halfening might the sooner helpe it onwards. A contrary practise to the goddess Iunoes lake In Laconia: for there, if the wheaten cakes, cast in vpon her festiuall day, were by the water receiued, it betokened good luck; if reiected, euill. The like is written by Pausanias, of Inus in Greece, and by others touching the offrings throwne into the fornace of mount Etna in Sicill.