Neither Joseph nor the servant ever returned alive. They were seen standing together upon a rock, stooping to gather oranges as they came with each wave up to their feet, when one of the heavy swells—the lingering undulations of a tempest, so well known on this coast—came sweeping onward, and carried them both away in its cave of waters, as the wave curved to ingulf them.
The undertow of the tidal current was so strong that, though powerful men and good swimmers, they were carried at once beyond all human aid, and speedily perished.
The house of joy became a house of mourning, and sadness rested on it for years. Day after day passed by, and, although a constant watch was kept along the coast, it was not until the fated ninth day that the bodies were discovered, and they were then found in a sadly mutilated state.
Often after long years, and when the consolations derivable from pure religious feeling had brought that tranquillity upon the mind of this loving mother,—which so much resembles the poetical repose of an autumnal evening,—has she repeated to me the sad tale.
Again and again have I heard her declare that she saw Joseph, her son, as distinctly as ever she saw him in her life, and that, as he passed the parlour windows, he looked in upon her and smiled.
This is not given as a superstition belonging in any peculiar way to Cornwall. In every part of the British Isles it exists; but I have never met with any people who so firmly believed in the appearance of the phantoms of the dying to those upon whom the last thoughts are centred, as the Cornish did.
Another case is within my knowledge.
A lady, the wife of an officer in the navy, had been with her husband’s sister, on a summer evening, to church. The husband was in the Mediterranean, and there was no reason to expect his return for many months.
These two ladies returned home, and the wife, ascending the stairs before her sister-in-law, went into the drawing-room—her intention being to close the windows, which, as the weather had been warm and fine, had been thrown open.