

542 



ST. MICHAEL'S MOUNT, CORNWALL. 



[Ch. XX. 



one side slightly convex (see fig. 54), as if to enable it to fit 

 the bottom of a boat, the whole being so shaped that it might 

 be easily slung by cords on the side of a horse, and two of 

 these balancing each other would constitute such a load as a 

 horse might conveniently carry .* In addition to the above 

 considerations, Dr. Barham has shown that the Ictis of 

 Diodorus not only answers geographically to St. Michael's 

 Mount, but is just such a promontory as would have been 

 selected by foreign traders as well adapted for defence. It 

 still aifords a good port, daily frequented by vessels, where 

 cargoes of tin are sometimes taken on board, after having 

 been transported, as in the olden time, at low tide across the 

 isthmus. Colliers of 500 tons 5 burden can now enter the 

 harbour, which is on the landward or sheltered side of the 

 Mount (as seen in figs. 51, 53), and the depth of water would 



fficed 



6 



and other ancient navigators employed when they traded 

 with the Cassiterides, five, if not ten centuries before the 

 Christian era. . 



According to Carew, the old name of St. Michael's Mount, 

 ' Caraclowse in Cowse/ signifies, in the Cornish language, 

 ' The Hoare Rock in the wood/ and from this some have in- 

 ferred that the rock was once surrounded with, forest-covered 

 land. At present there are no trees upon the Mount, only a 

 few shrubs, and it is not easy to imagine how such a name 

 could ever have been appropriate since the days of Diodorus, 

 when the Mount was evidently already isolated, and the 

 isthmus such as it is now. Mr. Pengelly has lately entered 

 into a full discussion of this subject,f stating truly, that to 

 make such a name appropriate, we are required to assume 

 that the Mount was surrounded by land covered with trees ; 

 a geographical state of things which at once carries us back 

 much more than nineteen centuries, and yet the Cornish 

 language is assumed to have been spoken when the designa- 

 tion of the ' Rock in the Wood ' was assigned to the Mount. 

 Whether we endeavour to explain the altered geographical 



* Col. Sir H. James on Block of Tin 



1863. 



f Pengelly, Papers read at Bath As- 



dredged up in Falmouth Harbour, 45th 



Ann. Report lloyal Inst. Cornwall, soc. Birmingham, I860. 



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