VII. — Popular Antiquitie^. — Tinner Folk Lore. — Bij Thomas 

 Q. Couch. 



THE Tinner, dressed in "blanketing coat," and slouching in 

 huge pachydermatous boots, is a being as strange as he is 

 picturesque. At home and by his fire of piled-up turves, he is no 

 less interesting for the peculiar manner of his life, unchanged 

 from ancient times, and for the stores of wild tradition with which 

 he will unreservedly entertain you if long acquaintance have en- 

 titled you to his confidence. I have long known the tinners of 

 the ancient district of Blackmoor, and here put on record a few 

 of the special observances, with their meaning, which have been 

 perpetuated from remote ages to our own times by those engaged 

 in this old branch of Cornish industry. 



The first red-letter day in the tinner's calendar is Pattl's Pitcher^ 

 day, or the eve of Paul's Tide (January 24th). It is marked by a 

 very curious and inexplicable custom, not only among tin-streamers, 

 but also in the mixed mining and agricultural town and neigh- 

 bourhood of Bodmin, and among the sea-faring population of 

 Padstow. The tinner's mode of observing it is as follows : — On 

 the day before the Feast of St. Paul, a water-pitcher is set up at 

 a convenient distance, and pelted with stones until entirely de- 

 molished. The men then l^ave their work, and adjourn unto a 

 neighbouring ale-house, where a neAV pitcher, bought to replace 

 the old one, is successively filled and emptied, and the evening is 

 given up to merriment and misrule. 



On enquiry whether some dim notion of the origin and meaning 

 of this custom remained among those who still keep it up, I find 

 it generally held to be an ancient festival intended to celebrate the 

 day when tin was first turned into metal, — in fact, the discovery 

 of smelting. It is the occasion of a revel, in which, as an old 

 streamer observes, there is an open rebellion against the water- 

 drinking system which is enforced upon them whilst at work. 

 This custom is not quite peculiar to tinners, but is, as has been 

 said, observed elsewhere — with variations. 



At Bodmin, the boys of the town are accustomed, on Paul's 



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