In S. Mellion parish, on the Tamar, finely situated, is Pentillie Castle.
The original name of the place was Pillaton, but it was bought by a man of the name of Tillie in the reign of James II., who called it after his own name. He was a self-made man, who was knighted, and not having any right to arms of his own, assumed those of Count Tilly, of the Holy Roman empire. But this came to the ears of the Herald's College, and an inquisition into the matter was made, and Sir James was fined, and his assumed arms were defaced and torn down.
He died in 1712, and by will required his adopted heir, one Woolley, his sister's son, not only to assume his name, but also not to inter his body in the earth, but to set it up in the chair in which he died, in hat, wig, rings, gloves, and his best apparel, shoes and stockings, and surround him with his books and papers, with pen and ink ready; and for the reception of his body to erect a walled chamber on a height, with a room above it in which his portrait was to be hung; and the whole was to be surmounted by a tower and spire.
About two hours before he died Sir James said, "In a couple of years I shall be back again, and unless Woolley has done what I have required, I will resume all again."
Mr. Woolley accordingly erected the tower that still stands above Sir James' vault. But the knight did not return. He crumbled away; moth and worm attacked his feathers and velvets; and after some years nothing was left of him but a mass of bone and dust that had fallen out of the chair.
CHAPTER VIII.
CAMELFORD
A rotten borough--Without a church or chapel-of-ease--History of the borough--Contest between the Earl of Darlington and Lord Yarmouth--Brown Willy and Rough Tor--Helborough--S. Itha--Slaughter Bridge--King Arthur--The reason for the creation of the Arthur myth--Geoffrey of Monmouth--The truth about King Arthur--The story of his birth--Damelioc and Tintagel--How it is that he appears in so many places--King Arthur's Hall--The remains of Tintagel--The Cornish chough--Crowdy Marsh--Brown Willy and the beehive cottages on it--Fernworthy--Lord Camelford--His story--Penvose--S. Tudy--Slate monuments--Basil--S. Kew--The Carminows--Helland--A telegram--Battle.
That this little town of a single street should have been a borough and have returned two members to Parliament is a surprise. It is a further surprise to find that it is a town without a church, and that no rector of Lanteglos, two miles distant, should have deemed it a scandal to leave it without even a chapel-of-ease is the greatest surprise of all.