Enys Tregarthen - The Piskey-Purse: Legends and Tales of North Cornwall: Popular Books by Enys Tregarthen : All times Bestseller Demanding Books

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Original Title Page.

The Piskey-Purse

Elves, Urchens, Goblins all, and Little Fairyes.

The ugly little creature sped away, followed by three wee hares.

The ugly little creature sped away, followed by three wee hares.

p..

The Piskey-Purse

Legends and Tales of North Cornwall

By
Enys Tregarthen
Illustrated by
J. Ley Pethybridge

London
Wells Gardner, Darton & Co., Ltd.
3, Paternoster Buildings, E.C.
And 44, Victoria Street, Westminster

Publishers logo.

1905

Introduction

The tales given in this small volume, with one exception, are from North Cornwall, where I have always lived.

The scene of The Piskey-Purse is from Polzeath Bay (in maps called Hayle Bay, which is not its local name), in St. Minver parish. This charming spot was once much frequented by the Piskeys and other fairy folk, and many a quaint story used to be told about them by the old people of that place, which some of us still remember. The spot most favoured by the Piskeys for dancing was Pentire Glaze cliffs, where, alas! half a dozen lodging-houses now stand. But the marks of fairy feet are not, they say, all obliterated, and the rings where Piskeys danced may yet be seen on the great headland of Pentire, and tiny paths called Piskey Walks are still there on the edge of some of the cliffs.

The Magic Pail is a West Cornwall story, the scene of which is laid on a moorland between Carn Kenidzhek (the Hooting Carn) and Carn Boswavas, and not a great distance from the once-celebrated Ding Dong tin-mine.

The ancient town of Padstow provides the Witch in the Well; lovely Harlyn Bay, in the parish of St. Merryn, is the scene of Borrowed Eyes and Ears; and the Little White Hare is from the Vale of Lanherne, at St. Mawgan in Pydar.

Readers will gather from these tales that we have several kinds of fairies in Cornwallthe Good Little People, the Merry Little People, and the Bad Little People. To the latter belong the Spriggans, who are spiteful and lovers of money, and who have all the hidden treasures in their keeping. The Merry Little People are the Piskeys and the Nightriders, and are the best known of all the Wee Folk. The Piskeys are always dancing, laughing, and carrying on. Their special delight is in leading the traveller astray, and who is at their mercy till he turns a garment inside out. The Nightriders take horses out of the stable and ride them over the moors and downs when their owners are in bed.

There are many quaint accounts as to the origin of the Cornish fairies. According to one tradition they are the Druids, who, because they opposed Christianity when it was first preached in Cornwall, were made to dwindle in size till they became the Little People they now are. The worst opposers of the Christian Faith dwindled to ants!

Another tradition says that the Wee Folk are the original inhabitants of Cornwall, who lived here long centuries before the Birth Star of the Babe of Bethlehem was seen in the East. In North Cornwall they are still sometimes called the little Ancient People.

Whoever the Cornish fairies are, and whatever their origin, they are not without their interest from the folklore point of view, and we hope that these stories about them will be pleasing, not only to Cornish people themselves, but to those who come to visit the land outside England.

I am indebted to my kind publishers for their deep interest in these folklore tales, and to Mr. J. Ley Pethybridge, a Cornishman, for so faithfully depicting many of the scenes referred to.

Enys Tregarthen

Contents

Chapter	Page
I.	1
II.	59
III.	111
IV.	168
V.	191

List of Illustrations

• Page
• Frontispiece

The Piskey-Purse

Polzeath Bay.

Polzeath Bay.

Under a hill, and facing Polzeath Bay, a wild, desolate but magnificent porth on the north coast of Cornwall, stood a small stone cottage, thatched with reed, and with tiny casement windows. It was enclosed by a low hedge, also built of stone, which many generations of orange-coloured lichens, pennycakes and moss, had made pleasant to look at and soft to sit on.

The cottage and hedge thus confronting the porth, with its beach of grey-gold sand, commanded the great headland that flanked it on its north side, and leagues and leagues of shining water stretching away to where the sun went down. Three people lived in this cottagea very old woman called Carnsew, and her two great-grandchildrenGerna and Gelert.

They were a lonely trio, for they were the only people living at the bay at that time.

The children had nobody but themselves to play with, and nothing much to do all day long save to pick limpets for their Great-Grannies ducks, and to help her a bit in the houseplace and in the garden, which grew very little except potatoes, cabbages, herbs, and gillyflowers. They never went to school, for there was no school for them to go to, even if their great-grandmother could have afforded to send them, which she could not; but in spite of that, they were not ignorant children, and although they did not know A from B, they knew a great deal about the Small People, or fairies, of which there were many kinds in the Cornish land.

The Great-Grannie having lived ninety odd years in the world, was well up in everything relating to the Small People, or she thought she was, and it was she who told her great-grandchildren about them.

Gerna and Gelert cared most to hear about what they called their own dear Wee Folkthe merry little Piskeyswho, Great-Grannie said, lived in one of the googs or caverns down in their bay.

Piskey Goog, as their particular cavern was called, was half-way down the beach in Great Pentire itself, and just beyond Pentire Glaze Hawn. On the top of the cliff were large Rings, where the merry Little People held their gammets, or games, and danced in the moonshine.

The children often sat on the hedge of their cottage to watch the Piskeys dancing, and, as the hedge was in view of Pentire Glaze cliffs, they could hear the Piskeys laughing, which they did so heartily that sometimes Gerna and Gelert could not help laughing too. They could also see their lightsPiskey-lights they called themflashing on the turf until they sometimes wondered if a hundred little dinky-fires were burning there.

One June evening, when the moon was getting near her full and making everything beautiful, even the dark headland standing grimly out from the soft sky, the Piskeys, as they thought, were again holding their revels on the top of the cliff, and as they danced the Rings seemed one blaze, and their laughter broke more frequently than ever on the quiet of the evening. There was no other sound to be heard save the far-off growl of the sea, for the tide was down.

Gerna and her brother were on the hedge as usual, and as they watched the dark moving figures and the flashing of the little fires they longed that they, too, could join the dancers.

When the fun seemed to be at its height, the Piskey-lights went suddenly out, and a weird cry, like the cry of a sea-bird proclaiming a storm, broke on the silence, which so startled the children that they gripped each others hands in trembling amazement. Then they saw in the moonshine hundreds and hundreds of tiny dark figures, all in a line, on the edge of the cliffs from Pentire Glaze Hawn to the cliff above Piskey Goog, some of whom seemed to be bending over the cavern; and then they disappeared.

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