THE " MYSTERY" OF THE " PASSION.'' 
381 
"Playing (or, vulgarly, Plain) Place," where football, hurling, 
wrestling, and other games are, or were, practised. Borlase, in 
speaking of these "rounds," does not limit the use of them to 
dramatic exhibitions ; he speaks also of other sports and games 
with which the Britons on particular occasions did here delight 
themselves. For jousts and tournaments, and for the exhibition of 
small pieces, such as there are a few fragments of in " S. George 
and the Turkish Knight," and similar pieces still acted at Christmas 
time by rustic amateur performers, in which there is more action 
than dialogue, these "rounds" are admirably adapted, there being 
ample room for players in the level plain, and for spectators on the 
benches. 
It is more probable that the two very large "rounds" were 
formed in more ancient times for other purposes — possibly, as has 
been suggested, for storing and protecting the tin collected 
from the neighbourhood, and that the use for representing "Mys- 
teries " was only secondary ; and that those said by Carew to have 
been formed for the purpose were made in imitation of these. At 
Ammergau there is nothing of the kind, only a temporary stage with 
scenery, and tiers of rude wooden seats, mostly uncovered, in front. 
In modern times there is a tendency in West Cornwall to imitate 
these ancient "rounds." " Gwennap Pit," the well-known scene 
of John Wesley's preaching, is an example. In his Journal Wesley 
speaks of it as a natural excavation. It was, however, originally 
formed by the subsidence or falling in of shallow mine works ; and 
in the engraving of Wesley's preaching it presents a very rugged 
appearance. Here he says he preached to, first 20,000, then he 
gets up to 30-, 32-, 33,000! Since Wesley first preached there this 
rude depression has been fashioned into a regular amphitheatre, 
nearly, if not perfectly, round, shelving downwards, with twelve 
rounds of grass-covered shallow seats or steps about three feet in 
breadth, of course narrowing in circumference as they are further 
down, the lowest step being about sixty feet, and the highest 383 
feet in circumference; the area of the whole is about 11,000 
square feet, and it will accommodate from 8-, to 10,000 people. 6 
Here, and at Queen's Pit, near Indian Queen's, and in other such 
"pits," 7 the Methodists of various denominations have large open- 
6 " The Cornish Banner," June, 1847, page 362. 
7 " Pits," locally, are hollows or depressions in the earth, which these 
modern amphitheatres are, and so differ from the "rounds," circular enclo- 
sures on the natural surface. 
