SCIENCE-GOSSIP. 



51 



been lost sight of, and no certain information would 

 ever have reached the world of its awful fate. 



The population never can have been large, 

 nor can fishing have brought immigrants from 

 Cornwall and Devon. The want of a harbour 

 is a fatal drawback, for though the anchorage is 

 excellent and shelter can generally be found in the 

 roughest weather, for many years there has not 

 been, and perhaps there never was, any place 

 where a small craft could count on absolute 

 safety in all states of sea and wind ; in other 

 words, vessels could never have belonged to 

 the island and stayed near it. The " shell- 

 fish" is good, and a band of rugged Cornish 

 fisher folk, from the remote coves of Land's End 

 and Sennen, usually come over for some months 

 every spring and summer, and manage to get large 

 hauls of lobsters, which they take over to Ilfra- 

 combe or Instovv for the London market. No life 

 of greater peril and exposure and more continu- 

 ous labour can be conceived than the fisherman's, 

 and its rewards are small and precarious. The 

 poor fellows lose their sleep, and work like slaves, 

 and often end by perishing in storms, and all in 

 return for very meagre wages. Deep-sea fishing 

 must have a certain inexplicable fascination ; at 

 any rate no dearth of fishermen is feared, though 

 the men who follow the calling do not seem 

 particularly happy. They find a strange pleasure 

 in relating their rather unromantic and monotonous 

 experiences of wet and cold. 



On the western side of the island there are 

 many singular clefts or rifts, looking as though 

 there had been some terrible convulsion of nature ; 

 this part of the island is called " The Earthquake," 

 and tradition afiirms that these clefts date from 

 the catastrophe of Lisbon. Any connection be- 

 tween these rifts, this splitting of the granite — 

 faults, as they would be technically called — and 

 the Lisbon earthquake is as improbable as between 

 them and the Battle of Waterloo. None the less, 

 they are of singular grandeur and among the 

 most wonderful of the many marvels of Mr. 

 Heaven's little kingdom. In other places, too, 

 the rocks are fantastically contorted, and look 

 as though they had been uncouthly carved 

 by laborious South Sea Islanders or Egyptian 

 colonists. These natural sculptures are locally 

 known by such appropriate names, for example, 

 as " The Templar." 



The antiquities of Lundy are not remarkable. 

 Legends have been handed down of a dense popu- 

 lation in ancient days, and of towns, villages and 

 churches ; but these have nothing to rest upon. 

 Some brass guns, hurled down from an old battery 

 on the sidelands, were said to be visible in the 

 water at certain states of the tide on the east side, 

 but I never saw them, though I often looked for 

 them. Some kistvaens were found many years 



ago, but no description was published of them, and 

 they are totally gone. Over a quarter of a century 

 ago, too, some men, cutting a trench for a wall, 

 came upon a curious grave of great antiquity, 

 enclosing a skeleton, and the remains of eight or 

 nine other human bodies were lying near. The 

 skeleton in the grave is said to have measured 

 8 feet 3 inches, and a second was also of the 

 abnormal size of 7 feet 10 inches. The im- 

 probability that these are correct measurements is 

 so obvious that few scientific men would accept 

 them as reliable. A lady generally living on the 

 island, though temporarily absent, assured me that 

 no mistake had been made, and that I could accept 

 the measurements as trustworthy. Unfortunately, 

 the attention of antiquaries was not drawn to the 

 matter, and the skeletons were buried in the 

 churchyard by order of the late squire. Some 

 rude beads, apparently of glass, were found in or 

 near the graves, and were preserved, and these were 

 submitted to my learned friend, Dr. Ainsworth, 

 who pronounced them Danish, but of no special 

 value. The largest of the skeletons was enclosed 

 in a rough stone grave, not a carefully constructed 

 stone coffin, although a stone had been hollowed 

 out for the head and another for the feet. If the 

 beads were Danish one may assume that the bodies 

 were those of Danes, and a curious inquiry might 

 arise as to whether the ancient Danes buried their 

 dead in the fashion described. The length of the 

 skeletons is startling. 



The present population is small, and though it 

 rises and falls a good deal, has of recent years 

 rarely exceeded fifty. Most of these people are 

 connected with the extensive farm, comprising 

 nearly all the cultivated land of the island ; others 

 belong to the Trinity House service, and a few to the 

 squire's family. Some years before I took up my 

 residence on the island, extensive quarrying opera- 

 tions were going on, and a large population was 

 living there ; the stone is said to be excellent. 

 Accommodation for visitors is not abundant, and 

 the squire does not like his little kingdom to be 

 invaded. In summer, a fast steamer visits Lundy 

 from Ilfracombe most weeks, and stops a few 

 hours, and in this way an opportunity is afforded 

 of exploring the place ; a skiff also crosses weekly 

 from Instow. Hard would it be to find another 

 spot so cut off from the busy world, so interesting 

 in its way, and yet so difficult of access. When I 

 used to cross to Instow I felt once more in the 

 bustle of modern life, though the first time I went to 

 Lundy from Birmingham, directly after a journey . 

 to New York, Instow, where I was kept twelve 

 days by the high seas, looked like the ultima 

 thule of civilisation. Since I ceased to reside on 

 the island, eighteen years ago, I have not set foot 

 upon it, and the trouble and uncertainty of getting 

 to and leaving Lundy explain my long absence. 



