218 THE SEA. 



handkerchief a little stock-in-trade of his own, consisting of barnacles, bits of rock and ore, and 

 specimens of dried sea-weed. Pointing to these, he told me to take anything I liked as a 

 present in return for what I had given him. He would not hear of my buying anything ; he 

 was not, he said, a regular guide, and I had paid him more already than such an old man was 

 worth. What I took out of his handkerchief I must take as a present only. I saw by his 

 manner that he would be really mortified if I contested the matter with him, so as a present I 

 received one of his pieces of rock. I had no right to deprive him of the pleasure of doing a 

 kind action because there happened to be a few more shillings in my pocket than 

 in his." 



CHAPTER XX. 



SKETCHES OF OUR COASTS. CORNWALL (continued}. 



Wilkie Collins's Experiences as a Pedestrian Taken for " Mapper," "Trodger," and Hawker An Exciting Wreck at 

 Penzance The Life-line sent out An Obstinate Captain A Brave Coastguardsman Five Courageous Young Ladies 

 Falmouth and Sir Walter Raleigh Its Rapid Growth One of its Institutions A Dollar Mine Religious Fishermen 

 The Lizard and its Associations for Voyagers Origin of the Name Mount St. Michael, the Picturesque Her 

 Majesty's Visit An Heroic Rescue at Plymouth Another Gallant Rescue. 



MR. COLLINS'S experiences as a pedestrian are amusing. Says he : " We enter a small 

 public-house by the road-side to get a draught of beer. In the kitchen we behold the landlord 

 and a tall man, who is a customer. Both stare as a matter of course ; the tall man especially, 

 after taking one look at our knapsacks, fixes his eyes firmly on us, and sits bolt upright on the 

 bench without saying a word he is evidently prepared for the worst we can do. We get into 

 conversation with the landlord, a jovial, talkative fellow, who desires greatly to know what we 

 are, if we have no objection. We ask him what he thinks we are ? ' Well/ says the landlord, 

 pointing to my friend's knapsack, which has a square ruler strapped to it for architectural 

 drawing, " Well, I think you are both of you Mappers ; mappers, who come here to make new 

 roads ; you may be coming to make a railroad, I dare say. We've had mappers in the county 

 before this. I know a mapper myself. Here's both your good healths/ We drink the land- 

 lord's good health in return, and disclaim the honour of being ' mappers ; ' we walk through the 

 country, we tell him, for pleasure alone, and take any roads we can get, without wanting to 

 make new ones. The landlord would like to know, if that is the case, why we carry these 

 loads at our backs ? Because we want to carry our luggage about with us. Couldn't we pay 

 to ride ? Yes, we could. And yet we like walking better ? Yes, we do. This last 

 answer utterly confounds the tall customer, who has been hitherto listening intently to the 

 dialogue. It is evidently too much for his credulity ; he pays his reckoning, and walks out in 

 a hurry without uttering a word. The landlord appears to be convinced, but it is only in 

 appearance ; he looks at us suspiciously in spite of himself. We leave him standing at his 

 door, keeping his eye on us as long as we are in sight, still evidently persuaded that we are 

 ' mappers,' but ( mappers ' of a bad order, whose perseverance is fraught with some unknown 

 peril to the security of the Queen's highway. 



