i2 4 THE LAND'S END 



of the place and in harmony with its environment, like 

 the Land's End fox and badger. 



At noon the market was over, but the town con- 

 tinued full of people until long after dark, the main 

 thoroughfare, Market Jew Street, and one or two 

 streets adjoining, being thronged with farmer folk 

 and people from the villages who had come in to sell 

 their produce and do their shopping. Carriers' carts 

 stood in rows by the side of the pavements, and as 

 in other market towns each had brought in its little 

 cargo of humanity, mostly women with sun-browned 

 faces, all in that rusty respectable dowdy black dress 

 which is universal in rural England and would make 

 an ugly object of any woman in the world. Again, 

 as is the custom in market towns, the thoroughfare 

 was the place where the people congregated to meet 

 and converse with their friends and relations. This 

 meeting with friends appeared to be a principal object 

 of a visit to Penzance on market day. It was a sort of 

 social function, and the longer I remained in the street, 

 sauntering about, watching the people and listening 

 to endless dialogues, the more I was interested. Not 

 only was this the healthiest-looking crowd I had ever 

 seen in a town, without a sickly or degraded face in 

 it, but it was undoubtedly the most cheerful, and at 

 the same time the most sober. The liveliness of the 

 crowd, its perpetual flow of hilarious talk, its meetings 

 and greetings and handshakings, and its numerous 

 little groups in eager good-humoured discussion, 

 made me very watchful, but down to the end I was 

 unable to detect the slightest sign of inebriety. It 



