86 OUR HOLIDAY IN CORNWALL 



exquisitely copied from life by a clever artist, show 

 vividly every colour, every spot, every vein and 

 line, as they shone on the living fish. Of course, 

 all depends on the skill displayed in painting the 

 casts. Badly-painted casts are worse than useless ; 

 but those I have now seen are true facsimiles ; and, 

 given this artistic accuracy, plaster-casts are 

 unquestionably more valuable than stuffed skins, 

 the colours of which cannot be retained. On the 

 other hand, it may be argued that skins can be 

 painted, and that the owner of a stuffed skin knows 

 that he possesses that which is unique, and cannot 

 be multiplied as casts can. There is, adjoining 

 the museum, a lecture-hall for students, with all 

 modern appliances for studying not only nature 

 but all the arts and sciences. 



All this, be it remembered, is to be found on a 

 rather inaccessible hill, surrounded only by the 

 ancient habitations of old-fashioned Cornish fisher- 

 folk. 



Thursday, August 3. I learn from the news- 

 papers that in London the weather is a scorcher, 

 that Cowes is a frying-pan, and the people are 

 grilled ; we may comfort ourselves that here, in 

 Penzance, the thermometer keeps steadily at 74 or 

 75 in the shade ; although it is hot, we can bear it. 



We rode across the peninsula on a four-horse 

 Jersey car, over the moors till we came to that 

 remarkable rock called Gurnard's Head, and we 

 were certainly not oppressed by the heat ; we were 

 fanned by a gentle breeze most of the way, and 



