Part 9

'At last the mighty distress broke out in these words: "Oh, Aspasia!"' (Mrs. Delany's assumed name), '"take care of Bassanio; he is a cunning, treacherous man, and has been the ruin of one woman already, who was wife to his bosom friend!" and then he burst into tears. I was so struck with this caution, and his behaviour, that I could not for some time speak; at last I said, "I am miserable indeed, if you can be jealous of this ugly man. What am I for the future to expect?" I was so much surprised and vexed, that it threw me into an agony of tears. He assured me all the time that he had nothing to charge me with; that my behaviour was just what he wished it to be, but he could not help seeing how much Bassanio was charmed with everything I said or did, and he knew him to be a man not to be trusted. By this time I was a little recovered, and entreated him to return to Averno (Roscrow); but he said, "No; to convince me he had no doubt of my conduct, he would not go before the time he had first proposed."'

And so it seems the party did not break up for a week or ten days; Gromio grumbling; Bassanio vainly trying to make himself extremely agreeable during their walks and drives in that 'very romantic part of the country,' as Mrs. Delany well calls it; Fulvia as dull as ever; and Aspasia untouched by the flattery and gallantries of her would-be lover. At length she had to write 'that Bassanio was too quick-sighted not to perceive Gromio's suspicions and my great dislike of his behaviour; and, as it was his interest to keep in favour with his uncle, he was upon his guard, and never gave either of us reason to be offended with him any more. Soon after (in 1721) he was seized with terrible fits, that ended his life a year and half after I married.'[56]

There is yet another entry in Mrs. Delany's diary which refers to the Tehidy family. In June, 1756, she writes: 'I am going into mourning for my great-great-nephew Basset, who died last week. I pity his unhappy mother extremely. She has gone through much care and anxiety on his account.'

John Basset, the son of the Rev. John Basset, rector of Illogan and Camborne, now claims a passing notice before we come to the last and perhaps most illustrious member of this family. He was born on 17th November, 1791, and was elected member of Parliament for Helston in 1840, failing, however, to retain his seat at the election in the following year; but he chiefly distinguished himself by the zealous interest which he took in the welfare of Cornish mining and the Cornish miner. In 1836 he published some treatises on the 'Mining Courts of the Duchy of Cornwall,' and, in the same year, 'Thoughts on the' (then) 'New Stannary Bill.' Three years afterwards appeared the 'Origin and History of the Bounding Act;' and, after another similar interval, in 1842--the year before his death at Boppart, on the Rhine--his 'Observations on Cornish Mining.'

But perhaps his most valuable contribution to Cornish literature was a treatise published in 1840, having for its humane object the amelioration of the physical condition of the miner--viz., 'Observations on the Machinery used for Raising Miners in the Hartz.' There can be little doubt that this work tended in no small degree to direct public attention to the great and avoidable exhaustion caused to the miner by his having to ascend many fathoms of ladders after long and laborious work in the heated and vitiated atmosphere of many of our deep mines. The result was the invention of an ingenious machine known as the steam man-engine, by means of which two huge vertical poles, with foot-rests at intervals, are set in motion side by side the whole depth of the mine-shaft. As one pole ascends, the other descends, and thus, by changing from one to the other by help of the foot-rests, the miner is enabled to ascend from his work, or descend to it, with the minimum expenditure of his own strength. If he who makes an oak grow where none grew before is to be considered a benefactor to his race, surely anyone who contributes in greater or less degree to so benevolent and beneficial an object as this steam man-engine has proved to be, has a good claim to be ranked among the philanthropic benefactors of his race. There is, of course, some little risk in performing this feat in the dark, damp and slippery mine-shafts, lit, perhaps, by a solitary candle stuck into a lump of clay and attached to the front of the miner's hat; and it is scarcely necessary to add that the use of the man-engine is most strictly forbidden to all except those by whom it is really required. Is it necessary to say that the man-engine, therefore, became a great attraction to all schoolboys who chanced to be within easy distance of one?--at any rate the writer, then a schoolboy, used to spend parts of many a half-holiday in practically investigating the merits of the machine, by descending by its means into the depths of the earth, until the utter darkness made the descent too dangerous even for a schoolboy.

John Basset's eldest son, John Francis Basset, of Stratton, brother of the present owner of the estates (Gustavus Lambert Basset, who served in the Crimea as lieutenant in the 72nd Highlanders), was a barrister, and was Sheriff of Cornwall in 1861. He succeeded to the Tehidy property on the death of his aunt, Frances, Baroness Basset, in 1855, and died at the family mansion in 1869. His chief mining interests (which were immense) were in the Bassets, South Frances, and Dolcoath mines. His landed property lay chiefly in Illogan, Camborne, Redruth, and St. Agnes, besides other estates which he owned in Meneage, Gluvias, Falmouth, Tywardreath, etc.

But we must now speak of one whom Davies Gilbert, P.R.S., described as, in every sense, the first man in the county--I mean that Francis Basset, D.C.L., Baron de Dunstanville of Tehidy, and Baron Basset of Stratton,[57] whose monument forms so conspicuous an object on the summit of the historic hill of Carn Brea, and which was erected to his memory by the county of Cornwall in 1836.[58] He was the grandson of Mrs. Delany's Francis Basset, and son of the Francis Basset who represented Penryn in Parliament from 1766 to 1769. His mother was Margaret St. Aubyn.[59] Born at Walcot, in Oxfordshire, on 9th August, 1757, he was educated at Harrow, Eton, and lastly at King's College, Cambridge, where he took his degree of M.A. when twenty-nine years of age. When Lord de Dunstanville's father died, the boy wrote to Dr. Bathurst--afterwards Bishop of Norwich--this characteristic little note:

'DEAR SIR,

'Knowing the regard my papa had for you, I wish you would be my tutor.

'Yours, 'FRANK BASSET.'

A tour on the Continent in company with the Rev. William Sandys, the son of a former steward of the family, a gentleman who had been specially trained to perform the pleasant but arduous duties of cicerone, completed his education, and thus he started in life with every advantage that a youth of talents and position could desire; nor did he fail to employ them.

On his return home he at once threw himself into the arena of public life; and from time to time published sundry political and agricultural treatises. Amongst the former may be mentioned, 'Thoughts on Equal Representation' (1783), 'Observations on a Treaty of Commerce between England and France' (1787), 'The Theory and Practice of the French Constitution' (1794), 'The Crimes of Democracy' (1798), and a speech which he delivered at a county meeting at Bodmin in 1809.

That he considered the foregoing productions not unworthy of his genius may be judged from the fact that he had them handsomely bound together, and presented them to his 'dearest friend, Miss (Harriet) Lemon,' the daughter of Sir William Lemon, of Carclew, Bart., M.P., a lady who ultimately became his second wife: the volume is preserved in the Royal Institution of Cornwall. His agricultural tracts--'Experiments in Agriculture' (1794), 'A Fat Ox' (1799), 'Crops and Prices' (1800), 'Crops in Cornwall' (1801), 'Mildew' (1805)--mostly appeared in Young's 'Annals of Agriculture;' and, like his political treatises, evince much acumen and practical common sense.

He was chosen Recorder for Penryn, and represented that borough in Parliament in 1780. On his entrance into political life he joined Lord North's party, and was hurried into the fatal coalition; though the outbreak of the French Revolution considerably modified his political views, which ultimately became what we should now call Conservative.[60] As illustrative of his electioneering activity, the following will be interesting, at least to my Cornish readers:

_Extracts from Letters from the Hon. Mrs. Boscawen to Mrs. Delany._

'June, 1784.

'... Your turbulent nephew Sir Francis Basset has failed in his first petition, and our friend Mr. Christopher Hawkins of Trewithan is declar'd duly elected for Mitchell, in preference to Mr. Roger Wilbraham, one of Sir Francis's _moveable candidates_, for he set him up at Truro too, and has presented a petition _there too_, and _another_ at Tregony, where our friends had a majority of 21! I hope Sir Francis will continue to have the same success as he had in this first attempt, which was decided in Parliament last night....'

'18 Oct., 1784.

'... My son (George Evelyn, 3rd Viscount Falmouth) and his sposa are very cheerfull in Cornwall, giving balls to their neighbours; while _your nephew Basset_ is waging most _inveterate war_ and _hostilities_ at Truro. My son has _all the lore_ (they say), but then he (S^r F.) has _all the money_--la partie n'est pas égale!'

Possibly personal pique had something to do with Sir Francis's desertion of his original political allies; for I find amongst the Additional MSS. in the British Museum, a letter in his hand to the Duke of Portland, on the 20th November, 1783, relinquishing all connexion with that nobleman's Government, on account of their having superseded Sir Francis's nephew, Mr. Morice, as Warden of the Stannaries. 'Ill-usage to myself' (wrote he) 'I could better have brooked than to my friends.'

In the year 1779, it will be remembered, Plymouth was threatened by the combined French and Spanish fleet, and Francis Basset distinguished himself on the occasion by marching to that town a large body of the miners' militia, who, under his directions, rapidly threw up such additional earthworks as were deemed necessary for the security of that port. This prompt action on his part gained for him his first title--his baronetcy. Indeed, he seems to have had quite a talent for fortification, for to him also are due the works of defence of which traces are still to be seen at Basset's Cove, now better known as Portreath, and which formerly consisted of one battery of four 12-pounders, and another of two 6-pounders.

Sir Francis evidently took great interest in the affairs of Rodney, and on 7th June, 1783, moved an address to the King that a 'lasting provision' might be made for the gallant Admiral; but, on the Government's undertaking to see after it, he withdrew his motion.

He opposed the Peace, and argued 'with energy' against it; but, as the report from which I quote merely 'preserves the substance of the argument without the _declamation_,' we are unfortunately deprived of this specimen of the Baronet's eloquence. In November of the same year he seconded the Address in reply to the King's speech, declaring his confidence in the Administration, his desire to alleviate the burdens of the people, his abhorrence of smuggling, as to which he said he spoke with some authority, living as he did in a maritime county; and, having spoken with tenderness of the natives of India, whose grievances the Government had promised to redress, he concluded with a warm eulogy of the unparalleled successes of Lord Rodney.

Nor did he neglect the arts of peace; deriving as he did an almost princely income from the mines which lay within sight of his mansion, he was ever on the watch for opportunities for developing mining prosperity, and promoting the moral and social welfare of the miner. He was deeply interested, too, in improving the means of locomotion in the county, and in 1809 laid the first rail of the iron tramway designed to connect Portreath on the northern shore of Cornwall with the Gwennap mines.

Moreover, he was a liberal patron of the fine arts,[61] and his edition of Carew's 'Survey of Cornwall,' enriched with Tonkin's notes, and published in 1811, is one amongst many instances of his public spirit, and his interest in the affairs of his county.

He lived to the good old age of seventy-seven, but the end came at last; and on his way to London, to attend in his place in the House of Peers, he was seized with paralysis at Exeter. He managed to reach town, but died at his residence, Stratheden House, South Place, Knightsbridge, nearly opposite the Hyde Park Cavalry Barracks, on the 5th February, 1835.

These were the days before railways, and the tale is still told in the west country of the magnificent procession, with its 'outriders and ten pages on horseback,' which wended its way at a walking-pace from London to Tehidy, a distance of 300 odd miles, accomplished in twelve days.

His monument, adorned with a portrait by Westmacott, stands in Illogan Church; and an epitaph that does not flatter records that 'his open heart, his generosity, and universal benevolence, won him the esteem of all classes, and the affection of those who intimately knew him. A sincere Christian, an elegant scholar, the patron of merit, and a munificent contributor to charitable institutions throughout the Empire, he proved himself the friend of his country and of mankind. But, with a laudable partiality, he especially devoted the chief energies of his mind, and directed the influence of rank and talents to advance the moral welfare and to promote the prosperity of Cornwall, his native county.'

The entailed estates devolved, upon his death, on his nephew, the before-named John Francis Basset, from whom they have passed to their present owner, Gustavus Lambert Basset, Esq., of Tehidy.

The first Baron de Dunstanville left only one daughter, Frances, who, on her father's decease became Baroness Basset of Stratton. Noted for her diligence in charity and all good works, she died at Tehidy, on 22nd January, 1855, in her seventy-fourth year, last of her race in the direct line; and in her the revived, but short-lived, peerage became extinct.

FOOTNOTES:

[46] Major Glynn (who stammered), at one of the county meetings at which Lord de Dunstanville had spoken with laudable pride of his ancestors having come over with the Conqueror, is reported to have said, 'We-ell-ell-ell, and, and wha-at of that, my lord? M-m-mine were here c-c-c-centuries before the C-c-c-conqueror was born.'

[47] They quarter the arms of Plantagenet (or at least formerly did so); and Davies Gilbert calls De Dunstanville 'a nominal barony of Plantagenet blood.'

[48] Playfair says that the first of this family of De Dunstanville, one Thurston Basset, whom we find on the Roll of Battle Abbey, came over with the Conqueror. From him sprang _many_ families favoured by our kings, most of them now extinct. There is a grant of lands from King John to Wm. Bassett, and Cecilia his wife. In the 'History of the Manor of Castle Combe, in Wilts, with Memoirs of the Dunstanvilles,' etc., by Geo. P. Scrope, M.P. (_privately printed_ by J. B. Nichols and Sons, in 1852), it is stated that Reginald de Dunstanville, Earl of Cornwall, was first Baron of Castle Combe. There appear to have been more than one of that name living in the twelfth century; one of them, perhaps the earliest, was also sometimes named Reginald Fitz-Roy, who was the son of Henry I. by Adeliza de Insulâ. Reginald, according to Mr. Scrope's pedigree of the De Dunstanvilles, married Havisia (or Beatrix), daughter of Caudor, the second Earl of Cornwall, 'ex Regio sanguine Britannorum.' Adeliza, the sister of Cecilia de Dunstanville, married another Basset, viz. Thomas, Baron Basset of Hedendon, 10th Henry II. This work contains much minute information about the early De Dunstanvilles.

[49] One of their sons, Gilbert, founded Bicester Abbey, in Oxfordshire.

[50] The name was also written Tydy, Tihidi, Tyhudy, Tehedie, etc. It is perhaps right to add here (although this is a sketch of the Basset family, rather than of the De Dunstanvilles) the following notes, which I have gathered from Carew: 'Walter de Dunstanvil appears to have had to furnish one knight in respect of his Cornish possessions. See "Evidentiæ Extractæ de Rubro Libro de Scaccario," 143.--_Cornub._ And Alan de Dunstanvill's name occurs in the "Nomina Baron: et militum et rotulis de feodis militum, vel de scutagio solutis regi Richardo Primo: in libro rubro scaccarii."--_Cornubia_ (A.D. 1189 to 1199). There was, moreover, a Reginald de Dunstanville, a baron of the realm, temp. Hen. I., who is mentioned in the Testa de Nevill.

[51] William of Worcester writes in 1478: 'Turris Castelli Karnbree, Sir John Basset, chevalier stat.' Hals says (but I cannot conceive upon what authority) that this castle was built by the Brays, who came over with the Conqueror (and who certainly intermarried with the Bassets), and hence the name. But Carn Brea is the appropriate Cornish form of 'rock-crowned hill.' Parker attributes the Castle to Robert Fitz Hugh de Dunstanville--temp. Will. I.

[52] There is a monument to this Basset, amongst others, in the church at Illogan; on it is recorded that he died '19 Sept., 1739, æt. 25, descended from a Race of Virtuous, Loyal, and well-Allied ancestors, who for more than four hundred years have lived at their Manor of Tyhydy, in this Parish, in great honour and esteem.'

[53] In this latter post his brother, Sir Arthur, succeeded him. Sir Thomas, another brother, was General of the Ordnance to Prince Maurice; a major-general for the King; and commanded a division at the battle of Stratton; he was knighted in 1644.

[54] At greater length.

[55] If not on the field of battle itself, he was certainly on the way to it at Lostwithiel--hard by.

[56] The Pendarves property ultimately passed to F. Basset's relict, as old Alexander died without signing his will.

[57] He was created a baronet, 24th Nov. 1779; Baron de Dunstanville, by Pitt, 17th June, 1796; and Baron Basset, 30th Oct., 1797.

[58] A fine portrait of him, seated, is preserved in the Museum of the Royal Institution of Cornwall, at Truro. Sir John St. Aubyn has another portrait of him at the age of nineteen, in a 'Vandyck' dress, painted by Opie, after Sir Joshua Reynolds.

[59] His first wife was Frances Susannah Coxe, to whom Penwarne dedicated his volume of Cornish poems.

[60] It is perhaps worth while to notice here that a Private Act was passed (47 Geo. III. sess. 1, c. 3, 1807), to relieve him from certain pains and penalties for taking his seat in the House of Peers before making the oaths and declarations, etc., required by law.

[61] Forty-one of his surplus pictures were offered for sale at Christie's on 8th May, 1824, when six of them were bought in, and the remainder sold for £703 13s. He was an early friend of Opie, and attended the great Cornish artist's funeral in 1807; and it may be added that he placed in a chapel, which he built at his own expense, in Cornwall, an altar-piece by that eccentric artist, Lane, which was exhibited in the Royal Academy, 1808.

_ADMIRAL WILLIAM BLIGH, F.R.S._

_ADMIRAL WILLIAM BLIGH, F.R.S._

'His name is added to the glorious roll Of those who search the storm-surrounded Pole.'

BYRON.

The name of Admiral Bligh will always be associated with that painful episode in the history of the British Navy--the Mutiny of the _Bounty_--and the settlement of the mutineers on Pitcairn and other of the South Sea Islands; whence we still occasionally obtain news of their happy and flourishing descendants--happier far than their progenitors.[62] He is another example of a Cornish circumnavigator of the globe; the first being a Michell of Truro, who went round the world with Sir Francis Drake. Captain Samuel Wallis, R.N., of Lanteglos juxta Camelford, also sailed round the world in the _Dolphin_ in 1766-68.

The Admiral was born, in all probability (though there has been some uncertainty on the subject) on the Duchy Manor of Tinten,[63] in the parish of St. Tudy, about half a mile south of the 'Church Town,' about the year 1753,--the son of Charles and Margaret Bligh; although I am aware that, according to another account, he is said to have been the son of John Bligh, of Tretawne, in the adjoining parish of St. Kew. The earliest connexion which I have been able to trace between this family and the parish of St. Tudy is, that they acquired some property here of the Westlakes, in 1680-81; but there was a John Bligh, or Blygh, at Bodmin, who acted as an assistant to the Commissioners for the Suppression of Monasteries, temp. Henry VIII. To this ancient town a branch of the Bligh family contributed four mayors between the years 1505 and 1588--indeed, the Cornish Blighs may be traced back as early as the reign of Henry IV. I am not sure whether or not Admiral Sir Richard Rodney Bligh, G.C.B, (who died in 1821), was a member of this family; but he was a Cornishman, as were some other naval officers of the same name.

Young Bligh--often called 'Bread-fruit Bligh,' from his having accompanied Captain Cook,[64] as sailing-master in the _Resolution_, on his second voyage round the world, in 1772-74, (in the course of which the fruit associated with his name was first discovered at Otaheite)--became a lieutenant in the Royal Navy; and, having obtained a high reputation as a skilful navigator, was appointed by George III. to command the _Bounty_, of 250 tons, on a voyage to Otaheite, in December 1787. After one or two ineffectual attempts to round Cape Horn, she arrived at her destination ten months after leaving England, and remained there for five or six months, the crew revelling in the natural beauty of the place, and enjoying an intercourse (which appears unfortunately to have been totally unrestricted) with the soft savages, its interesting inhabitants. On the homeward voyage, however, laden with plants and specimens of the bread-fruit, which it had been the object of the voyage to secure, with a view to its acclimatization in the British West India Islands, Bligh--who had made himself, by his irascible and overbearing disposition, obnoxious to many of those who sailed with him--was secured and bound by the majority of his crew; and, together with eighteen luckless sailors, was cast adrift on the 28th April, 1789, in an open boat only twenty-three feet long, and deeply laden within 'eight inches of the water's edge,' in which small, frail craft they sailed 3,618 miles. They had on board 32 lbs. of pork, 150 lbs. of bread, some wine, some spirits, and some water--but NO CHART:--

'The tender nautilus, who steers his prow, The sea-born sailor of his shell canoe, The ocean Mab, the fairy of the sea, Seemed far less fragile, and, alas! more free.'

Not until nearly twelve months afterwards, did they reach England; after having touched at one or two islands, where they got a few shell-fish and some fruit, and at the Dutch settlement of Timor, to the east of Java, which they reached on 14th June, 1789, and where they obtained a schooner. Bligh arrived home on the 14th March, 1790, with twelve of his companions; the remainder having died on their weary, miserable passage.[65] To Bligh's skill, resource, and courage, were due the lives of all who were saved.