82 COUNTRY ESSAYS. 



masoning were completed up to the middle of July, 1866.* 

 Great damage was done to the foundations last winter, and sad 

 to say, the conviction is strong in the minds of all engaged on 

 the rock that the Atlantic on that occasion made a battering- 

 ram of some strong ship, scarcely a chip of which was left to 

 suggest her fate. 



The proprietor of the famous " First and Last Inn in England " 

 (which is a mile off at Sennen), has built a new hotel at Land's 

 End. The visitor may generally find fair accommodation at 

 it during the summer months. We were there in July, a few 

 days after the Great Eastern with the cable (now prosperously 

 laid) had passed by. The visitors' book is full of original 

 entries, people becoming unrestrained in their fun in proportion 

 as this inn is removed from civilisation. One party stated 

 themselves in it to be "poor lunatics travelling with their 

 keepers for change of air." We add a portion of their testi- 

 monial to show the slang of the period : 



" We can testify to the elasticity of the bedrooms, for, in one 

 small room, five poor unfortunates hung out, and one of them 

 had room to snore. ' Toke ' and * skilly ' as good as unan- 

 nounced pauper casuals have any right to expect. Landlord 

 a brick; did not come down in time to give us our bill. P.S. 

 Bill came at the last moment." 



Everyone will turn away with regret from the Land's End, 

 Britain's angusto limite mundi. The mind is over-awed at 

 the enormous scale of nature here, the boundless sea, far-reach- 

 ing sky, and stupendous cliffs. Danger lurks everywhere, but 

 sleeps in the sunshine for the nonce. Imagination may revel 

 in the buried marvels of Lyounesse fathoms under the waves. 

 And now as the long amber tracts of light glitter in the sunset, 

 the characteristic swells of the Atlantic roll in from the west, 

 like lengthening ribands of gloom, with enormous intervals 

 between. Onwards they come, and break "a breath of thunder" 

 * This lighthouse has since been finished. 



