"Mrs. C.: 'I had a little matter to attend to as well as to see the Exhibition. I was there yesterday, and mean to go again to-morrow.'
"The Lord Mayor: 'What do you think of it?'
"Mrs. C.: 'I think it very good.'"
She then said that all her money was spent but 5-1/2d. After a little further conversation, which caused considerable merriment, the Lord Mayor made her a present of a sovereign, telling her to take care of it, there being a good many thieves in London. The poor creature, on receiving the gift, burst into tears and said, "Now I will be able to get back."
She was afterwards received by the Lady Mayoress, with whom she remained some time, and having partaken of tea in the housekeeper's room, which she said she preferred to the choicest wine in the kingdom (which latter beverage she had not tasted for sixty years), she returned thanks for the hospitality she had received and left the Mansion House.
Her next visit was to the Exhibition.
She was also presented to the Queen and to Prince Albert, and there is mention of this presentation in Sir Theodore Martin's Life of the Prince Consort (1876), II, p. 405.
In the notice in the Illustrated London News it is said: "Our portrait of the Cornish fish-wife has been sketched from life at her abode, Homer Place, Crawford Street, Mary-le-bone. She was born in the parish of Paul, by Penzance, on Christmas Day, 1766, so that she has nearly completed her eighty-fifth year. To visit the present Exhibition, she walked the entire distance from Penzance, nearly three hundred miles; she having 'registered a vow' before she left home, that she would not accept assistance in any shape, except as regarded her finances. She possesses her faculties unimpaired; is very cheerful, has a considerable amount of humour in her composition; and is withal a woman of strong common sense, and frequently makes remarks that are very shrewd, when her great age and defective education are taken into account. She is fully aware that she has made herself somewhat famous; and among other things which she contemplates, is her return to Cornwall, to end her days in 'Paul parish,' where she wishes to be interred by the side of old Dolly Pentreath, who was also a native of Paul, and died at the age of 102 years."
Mary Kelynack died in Dock Lane, Penzance, 5th December, 1855, and was buried in S. Mary's churchyard.
Messrs. Routledge published the story of her walk to London and back in one of Aunt Mavor's Storybooks, with illustrations.