Detained at Falmouth.—Navigation at a stop.—An evening ramble.
Falmouth, March 6, 1787.
THE glass is sinking; the west wind gently breathing upon the water, the smoke softly descending into the room, and sailors yawning dismally at the door of every ale-house.
Navigation seems at a full stop. The captains lounging about with their hands in their pockets, and passengers idling at billiards. Dr. V—— has scraped acquaintance with a quaker, and went last night to one of their assemblies, where he kept jingling his fine Genevan watch-chains to their sober and silent dismay.
In the intervals of the mild showers with which we are blessed, I ramble about some fields already springing with fresh herbage, which slope down to the harbour: the immediate environs of Falmouth are not unpleasant upon better acquaintance. Just out of the town, in a sheltered recess of the bay, lies a grove of tall elms, forming several avenues carpeted with turf. In the central point rises a stone pyramid about thirty feet high, well designed and constructed, but quite plain without any inscription; between the stems of the trees one discovers a low white house, built in and out in a very capricious manner, with oriel windows and porches, shaded by bushes of prosperous bay. Several rose-coloured cabbages, with leaves as crisped and curled as those of the acanthus, decorate a little grass-plat, neatly swept, before the door. Over the roof of this snug habitation I spied the skeleton of a gothic mansion, so completely robed with thick ivy, as to appear like one of those castles of clipped box I have often seen in a Dutch garden.
Yesterday evening, the winds being still, and the sun gleaming warm for a moment or two, I visited this spot to examine the ruin, hear birds chirp, and scent wall-flowers.
Two young girls, beautifully shaped, and dressed with a sort of romantic provincial elegance, were walking up and down the grove by the pyramid. There was something so love-lorn in their gestures, that I have no doubt they were sighing out their souls to each other. As a decided amateur of this sort of confidential promenade, I would have given my ears to have heard their confessions.
LETTER II.
Mines in the parish of Gwynnap.—Piety and gin.—Rapid progress of Methodism.—Freaks of fortune.—Pernicious extravagance.—Minerals.—Mr. Beauchamp’s mansion.—Beautiful lake.—The wind still contrary.
Falmouth, March 7, 1787.