Part 14

"And after this, God's severe but righteous judgments fell upon Tregoss's family. For his son Walter, one day riding upon a Horse in a fair way, the horse threw him, and broke his neck: and some of his issue came to untimely ends, and it is observed that a curse hath remained ever since: and this Mr. Tregoss of whom we write was so sensible of it, that it cost him many fervent prayers to God for the removal of that dreadful curse, as himself assured a bosom friend"--but it does not seem to have occurred to him to give up the heritage to the Roscaddens--that is, if he were the possessor.

The family of Tregose, or Tregosse, was one of the oldest in the neighbourhood of S. Ives. The names of Clement and John Tregose of S. Ives appear in the Subsidy Roll of 1327. In the list of _circa_ 1520, Thomas Tregoos' lands in Towednack were assessed at the yearly value of 13s. 4d., and those of John Tregoz, in the parish of S. Ives, at 11s.; but Thomas also had lands at S. Ives, valued the same as those of John.

In 1641, William Tregose, gent., had at S. Ives goods to the annual value of £3.

Thomas Tregoss, the subject of this notice, was the son of William Tregoss of S. Ives. His parents were strong Puritans and very austere, and they hedged about their son with restrictions, not suffering him to partake in games or any childish relaxations from the strain of study or the contemplation of religious themes. At first he seemed to be of poor capacity, but at the age of seven years he began to show that he had a quick apprehension and a retentive memory. Cut off from all worldly distractions, he was allowed but one direction in which his faculties and his ambitions could stretch and expand. He had not the force of character and strength of will to revolt against the numbing restraints that bound him in. His only play as a boy was standing on a chair and preaching to his fellow pupils.

He was sent to Oxford and admitted into Exeter College, and after a few years spent there, returned to S. Ives; and as the Parliamentary Commissioners had ejected the vicar, he was thrust in as Puritan preacher in 1657, and he then married a Margaret Sparrow of the same way of thinking.

The life of Thomas Tregoss, as given by Samuel Clark in his _Lives of Some Eminent Persons_, 1683, is interspersed with Remarkable Providences and Extraordinary Judgments, but for the most part they are neither remarkable nor interesting.

The following is, perhaps, an exception:--

Shortly after his arrival at S. Ives, in the summer, the greater portion of the fishing season had passed without the pilchards appearing, and this to the great distress of the people. By the advice of Tregoss a day was set apart for humiliation and prayer, and next day a shoal of pilchards arrived.

In the ensuing summer the fishermen, having taken a great number of fishes on the Saturday, wanted to spread and dry their nets on the Sunday. Tregoss learning this, came forth and rebuked and denounced God's judgment on them if they should profane the "Sabbath" in this manner. They did not hearken to him, observing that their nets must be dried or would rot. From that day no more pilchards visited the bay during that season.

From S. Ives Tregoss was transferred to Mylor in October, 1659, but was ejected from the living on August 24th, 1660, as not ordained, and unwilling to receive ordination, and to subscribe to the articles and confirm to the liturgy. However, he continued to preach to a privately assembled number of puritanically minded people, and he was proceeded against and committed to the custody of the marshal in Launceston gaol, where he remained for three months, and was then released by order of the Deputy Lieutenant.

In September, 1663, he removed to Kigilliath, near Penryn. On October 1st, 1664, whilst he and his wife were lying awake in bed, they experienced an earthquake shock, and this he held to be "a symbolick image of that trembling Heartquake which he shortly felt in his conversion."

On January 1st ensuing, he fell into deep despondency and the spirit of bondage--his liver being probably out of order--till he fancied himself relieved by receiving the spirit of adoption. He had been converted half a dozen times before, but never before preceded by an earthquake, so that there could be no mistake about its reality this time.

Fired with new zeal, he broke into Mabe church at the head of a number of his adherents, mounted the pulpit, and harangued his congregation. For this he was arrested and imprisoned again in Launceston gaol, but was shortly released, July 29th, 1665; and he had the pleasing satisfaction of knowing that a bull had gored Justice Thomas Robinson, who had sent him to prison.

Undeterred by what he had gone through, he again invaded Mabe church, and was again committed to gaol on September 18th, but was once more released, on December 14th.

On February 4th, 1666, he once more broke into the parish church of Mabe at the head of a body of Puritans, and was again arrested and sent to the marshal at Bodmin, but by the order of the King was at once set free.

In 1669 he was at Great Torrington, where he preached, and was sent to Exeter gaol, but was at once bailed out. He died at Penryn in January, 1672.

On September 4th, 1775, John Wesley preached at S. Ives "in the little meadow above the town." He wrote in his diary that "the people in general here (excepting the rich) seem almost persuaded to be Christians. Perhaps the prayer of their old pastor, Mr. Tregoss, is answered even to the fourth generation."

ANTHONY PAYNE

Anthony Payne, the "Falstaff of the West," was born in the manor house, Stratton, the son of a tenant farmer, under the Grenvilles of Stowe. The registers do not go back sufficiently far to record the date of his birth. The Tree Inn is the ancient manor house in which the giant first saw the light. He rapidly shot up to preternatural size and strength. So vast were his proportions as a boy, that his schoolmates were accustomed to work out their arithmetic lessons in chalk on his back, and sometimes even thereon to delineate a map of the world, so that he might return home, like Atlas, carrying the world on his shoulders for his father with a stick to dust out.

It was his delight to tuck two urchins under his arms, one on each side, and climb, so encumbered with "his kittens," as he called them, to a height overhanging the sea, to their infinite terror, and this he would call "showing them the world." A proverb still extant in Cornwall, expressive of some unusual length, is "As long as Tony Payne's foot."

At the age of twenty-one he was taken into the establishment at Stowe. He then measured seven feet two inches in height without his shoes, and he afterwards grew two inches higher. He was not tall and lanky, but stout and well proportioned in every way. The original mansion of the Grenvilles at Stowe still in part remains as a farmhouse. The splendid house of Stowe, built by the first Earl of Bath, was pulled down shortly after 1711, and it was said that men lived who had seen the stately palace raised and also levelled with the dust. This was at a little distance further inland than the old Stowe that remains. The Grenvilles had also a picturesque house at Broom Hill, near Bude, with fine Elizabethan plaster-work ceilings, now converted into labourers' cottages.

At Stowe Anthony Payne delighted in exhibiting his strength. In the hurling-ground a rough block of stone is still pointed out as "Payne's cast," lying full ten paces beyond the reach whereat the ordinary player could "put the stone."

It is said that one Christmas Eve the fire languished in the hall. A boy with an ass had been sent into the wood for faggots. Payne went to hurry him back, and caught up the ass and his burden, flung them over his shoulder, and brought both into the hall and cast them down by the side of the fire.

On another occasion, being defied to perform the feat, he carried a bacon-hog from Kilkhampton to Stowe. Then came the Civil War, when Charles I and his Parliament sought to settle their differences on the battlefield. Cornwall went for the King, and Anthony Payne had the drilling and manœuvring of the recruits from Kilkhampton and Stratton. At one time Sir Beville Grenville had his head-quarters at Truro, but the great battle of Stamford Hill, May 16th, 1643, was fought but eight miles from Stowe, and on the night preceding it Sir Beville Grenville slept in his house at Broom Hill. The battle was desperate, the Royalist soldiers being outnumbered, and attacked; amidst them was Anthony Payne, mounted on his sturdy cob Samson, rallying his troopers and terrorizing the enemy, who fled. At the next pitched battle at Lansdown, near Bath, the forces of the King were defeated and Sir Beville was killed. Anthony Payne, having mounted John Grenville, then a youth of sixteen, on his father's horse, had led on the Grenville troops to the fight. The Rev. R. S. Hawker gives a letter from the giant to Lady Grace Grenville, conveying to her the news of the death of her husband; but it is more than doubtful whether this be genuine. He says of it: "It still survives. It breathes, in the quaint language of the day, a noble strain of sympathy and homage." It does not exist except in Mr. Hawker's book, and is almost certainly a fabrication by him.

At the Restoration, Sir John Grenville was created Earl of Bath, and was made governor of the garrison of Plymouth, and he then appointed Payne halberdier of the guns. The King, who held Payne in great favour, made him a yeoman of his guards, and Sir Godfrey Kneller, the Court artist, was employed to paint his portrait.

Whilst in Plymouth garrison an incident occurred that has been recorded by Hawker. At the mess-table of the regiment, during the reign of William and Mary, on the anniversary of the day when Charles I had been beheaded, a sub-officer of Payne's own rank had ordered a calf's head to be served up. This was a coarse and common annual mockery of the beheaded king indulged in by the remnants of the old fanatical Puritan party. When Payne entered the room his comrades pointed out the dish to him. Anthony flared up, and flung the plate and its contents out of the window. A quarrel and a challenge ensued, and at break of day Payne and his antagonist fought with swords on the ramparts, and Anthony ran the offender through the swordarm and disabled him, as he shouted, "There's sauce for thy calf's head."

Hawker, who tells the story, supposed that the incident occurred during the reign of George I. But Anthony died at an age little short of eighty, and was buried at Stratton July 13th, 1691, and William of Orange did not die till 1702.

After his death at Stratton, which took place in the house where he was born, neither door nor stairs would afford egress for the large coffined corpse. The joists had to be sawn through, and the floor lowered with rope and pulley, to enable the giant to pass out to his last resting-place, under the south wall of Stratton Church.[12]

The history of the vicissitudes through which went the painting by Kneller is peculiarly interesting.

When Stowe was dismantled, on the death of the Earl of Bath, the picture was removed to Penheale, another Cornish residence of the Grenville family.

But here the portrait of him who had done so much for the house was not valued, and was soon forgotten. Gilbert, the Cornish historian, in one of his rambles, whilst staying at an old inn in Launceston, was informed that this painting was still extant, and he went to Penheale, where the farmer's wife occupying the house said that she did indeed possess "a carpet with the effigy of a large man on it," that had been given to her husband by the steward on the estate. It was rolled up, and in a bad and dirty condition. She gladly sold it to C. S. Gilbert for £8. On Gilbert's death his effects were sold at Devonport, and a stranger bought it for £42. In London it was recognized as the work of Kneller, and was resold for the sum of £800. It next appeared amongst the effects of the late Admiral Tucker, at Trematon Castle; and when the sale took place this picture was bought by a gentleman in Devon. Finally Mr. (now Sir) Robert Harvey purchased it, and most generously presented it to the Royal Institution of Cornwall.

The authorities for Anthony Payne are Hawker's _Footprints of Former Men in Cornwall_; the _Journal of the R. Inst. of Cornwall_, Vol. X, 1890-1; Wood (E. J.), _Giants and Dwarfs_, 1868.

Next in size to Anthony Payne among big Cornishmen was Charles Chilcott, of Tintagel, who measured 6 feet 4 inches high, and round the breast 6 feet 9 inches, and who weighed 460 pounds. He was almost constantly occupied in smoking, three pounds of tobacco being his weekly allowance. His pipe was two inches long. One of his stockings would contain six gallons of wheat. He was much gratified when strangers came to visit him, and to them his usual address was, "Come under my arm, little fellow." He died in his sixtieth year, 5th April, 1815.

FOOTNOTE:

[12] The hole is still shown in the Tree Inn, Stratton.

NEVIL NORTHEY BURNARD

Was the son of George Burnard, a stonemason, who lived at Penpont, Altarnon, in a house with mullioned windows and a newel staircase, said to have been the old manor house of Penpont. He was born in 1818, and was baptized on November 1st in that year.

The only education Nevil received was from his mother, who kept a dame's school and made straw bonnets in her spare time.

He was mortar-boy to his father, and would often slip away and cut figures of men and animals on an old oak door, getting many a "lacing" for not minding his proper work. His earliest tools were nails, which he sharpened on a grinding-stone, before he had any chisels.

There was at that time no machinery for facing slate slabs; so he used an old French "burr"--i.e. part of a French millstone. Such millstones were constructed in four parts, cemented together. This "burr" he put into a rough frame of wood, and used it like a plane over the face of the slate, which was laid on a bench, or "horse." The existing examples of slabs worked in this way are most excellent, in flatness and in smoothness.

The Delabole slate had been employed for many centuries for tombstones and monuments, and lent itself surprisingly to being sculptured. In the North Cornish churches are numerous examples of monuments richly sculptured with heraldic figures of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, all on slate, and sharp to this day as when they left the workshop.

At the age of fourteen Nevil cut a tombstone to his grandfather; that is now in Altarnon churchyard, and affords evidence of skill, artistic sense, and fineness of detail. There are other stones of his in the same churchyard; also one or two by his brother George. An old man is still alive in Altarnon who used to sharpen the nails on a grindstone for Burnard, with which he did his carving on slate.

At fifteen he left Altarnon. Wesley's head, over the porch of the old Meeting-house, Penpont, was cut by him when he was sixteen.

From Altarnon he went to Fowey, and the late Sir Charles Lemon, of Carclew, took him by the hand. At the age of sixteen he carved in slate the group of Laocoon, sent in 1834 to the Exhibition of the Royal Cornwall Polytechnic Society at Falmouth. This carving in bass-relief, executed by a boy from a wild moorland village, without instruction, copied from a wood-cut in the _Penny Magazine_, and with tools of his own making, was considered so very remarkable a production that the Society awarded him a silver medal. Nevil was sent to London, and through Sir Charles Lemon's influence was presented to the Queen and Prince Consort, and he was allowed to cut a profile of the Prince of Wales, then a boy, and this portrait was sent to Osborne, and was approved by the Royal parents. Sir Charles Lemon further introduced the lad to Chantrey, who secured for him employment as a carver in one of the most celebrated ateliers in London.

Burnard reproduced his profile of the Prince of Wales in marble for the Public Hall at Falmouth, and the general opinion expressed upon it was that it amply sustained the early expectation which had been formed of his talents.

Thus fairly launched in his profession as a carver in London, he found employment in the studios of the best sculptors of the day, as Bailey, Marshall, and Foley; and there was no lack of work, and no falling short of pay.

Caroline Fox, in her _Memories of Old Friends_, says:--

"1847, October 4th.--Burnard, our Cornish sculptor, dined with us. He is a great, powerful, pugilistic-looking fellow at twenty-nine; a great deal of face, with all the features massed in the centre; mouth open, and all sorts of simplicities flowing out of it. He liked talking of himself and his early experiences. His father, a stonemason, once allowed him to carve the letters on a little cousin's tombstone which would be hidden in the grass; this was his first attempt, and instead of digging in the letters he dug around them, and made each stand out in relief. His stories of Chantrey very odd: on his death Lady Chantrey came into the studio with a hammer and knocked off the noses of many completed busts, so that they might not be too common--a singular attention to her departed lord. Described his own distress when waiting for Sir Charles Lemon to take him to Court: he felt very warm, and went into a shop for some ginger-beer; the woman pointed the bottle at him, and he was drenched. After wiping himself as well as he could he went out to dry in the sun. He went first to London without his parents knowing anything about it, because he wished to spare them anxiety, and let them know nothing until he could announce that he was regularly employed by Mr. Weekes. He showed us his bust of the Prince of Wales--a beautiful thing, very intellectual, with a strong likeness to the Queen--which he was exhibiting at the Polytechnic, where it will remain."

"1849, March 1st.--Found a kindly note from Thomas Carlyle. He has seen 'my gigantic countryman,' Burnard, and conceives that there is real faculty in him; he gave him advice, and says he is the sort of person whom he will gladly help if he can. Burnard forwarded to me, in great triumph, the following note he had received from Carlyle with reference to a projected bust of Charles Buller: '_February_ 25th, 1849.... Nay, if the conditions _never_ mend, and you cannot get that Bust to do at all, you may find yet (as often turns out in life) that it was _better_ for you you did not. Courage! Persist in your career with wise strength, with silent resolution, with manful, patient, unconquerable endeavour; and if there lie a talent in you (as I think there does), the gods will permit you to develop it yet.--Believe me, yours very sincerely, T. Carlyle.'"

On the return of Richard Lander from Africa, after having traced the Niger through a great part of its course, Burnard was commissioned to execute a statue of the explorer for the column erected in Lander's honour at Truro. His only other public work of any consequence was the statue of Ebenezer Elliott, the Corn-law Rhymer, for the market-place of Sheffield; but he was employed in executing portrait busts of many men of importance, as General Gough, Professor John Couch Adams, his fellow-Cornishman, Professor Ed. Forbes, and one of Makepeace Thackeray, which Burnard gave as a present to the Cottonian Library at Plymouth, where it now stands above the door.

He exhibited in the Royal Academy in 1855, 1858, 1866, and 1867. He married in London, but lost his wife, and then took to drink. The boys, as he said, jeered at him, and called him "Old Burnard."

As a man, he was tall and big, with an enormous head which no ordinary hat would fit; so that his hats had to be made for him.

Eventually he went "on tramp," paying periodical visits to old friends at Altarnon. He would make sketches, draw portraits, at farms and in public-houses; was ready to write an article for a newspaper, or to make an election squib, for either side; and was, in fact, as clever with his pen and pencil as he was with chisel.

He was a most entertaining companion, and able to converse on any subject.

Thus he lived by his wits, mixing with the highest, but by preference with the lowest. The last time he visited Altarnon was in 1877, three years before his death; he remained there on that occasion for a week, with hardly any clothes to his back, and was boarded by his old playmate, Mr. S. Pearn, and slept in the common lodging-house, Five-lanes. After having been fitted out with fresh clothes by some friends he proceeded to the west of the county.

During this last visit at Altarnon he drew some large pencil heads, which show a firm and delicate hand, but he delighted in minute execution. There is also evidence that his mind at this time was as steady as his hand, for he composed a poem on the death of Mr. F. Herring, one or two verses of which may be given.

I stood beside the spot where late you laid him, The spot to each of us most hallowed ground; After the angels had in white array'd him, And his smooth brows with flowers immortal crown'd.

* * * * *

Who in the wilderness would wish to wander, Whose feet have trodden once the promised land? Believe that all is well, nor pause to ponder On things that mortals cannot understand. He is most bless'd that is the firmest trusting, Believing One that's wiser far than he,-- Is, for his good, the balance still adjusting; So--tell my parents not to mourn for me. I now can see what might have been my story, Had I remained through man's allotted day: (Sorrow for joy, dark age for youth and glory:) And bless the love that hastened me away. And wafted me across the mystic river, Where all discords and elements agree, Calmed by His word, that can from death deliver, So tell my loved ones not to mourn for me.

He was equally ready to lampoon any one, whether friend or foe; probably accommodating his muse to the humour of those with whom he happened to be.

One day he had been making a sketch of a farmer called Nicoll, and resorted to the public-house in Liskeard with his patron. Whilst there he scribbled on a piece of paper and handed to his friend Nicoll:--

Cash is scarce, and fortune's fickle; I should like to draw some silver now, As I've all day been drawing nickel.

There is at Penpont House, Altarnon, a small profile head of Burnard executed by himself. It is a cameo in plaster of Paris. He is said to have sketched his face by looking in a mirror, and then cut an intaglio in slate from his drawing.

Nevil N. Burnard died in the Union, Redruth, of heart and kidney complaint, 27th November, 1878.

SIR GOLDSWORTHY GURNEY, KNT., INVENTOR

This man of remarkable versatility and genius was the fourth son of John Gurney, of Trevargus; he was born at Treator, near Padstow, on February 14th, 1793, and was baptized at Padstow on the ensuing 26th June.