Part 24
[25] The “red-haired Danes” have continued a source of terror and a name of reproach to the present day. On the first of this month a Longrock quarrel was the subject of a magisterial inquiry at the Penzance town-hall, when it was proved that the defendant, Jeffery, had called one of the complainants, Lawrence, who has rubrick hair, a “red-haired Dane.” In Sennen Cove, St. Just, and the western parishes generally, there has existed, time out of mind, a great antipathy to certain red-haired families, who were said to be descendants of the Danes, and whose ancestors were supposed, centuries before, to have landed in Whitsand Bay, and set fire to, and pillaged the villages. Indeed, this dislike to the Rufus-headed people was carried so far that few families would allow any member to marry them, so that the unfortunate race had the less chance of seeing their children lose the objectionable tinge of hair.
[26] As the name Vellandruchar means wheel-mill, the mill which was formerly in this place was probably one of the oldest in the West. At no great distance from Vellandruchar is the site of another ancient mill called Vellansager. This name is equally suggestive, as denoting that the serging or bolting apparatus was not then common in the mills. These old mills were situated in the lower part of Burrien, on the stream which divides that parish from Paul. According to tradition, a sanguinary battle was fought on the moors a little above Vellandruchar, between Arthur and the Danes, when they say the mill was worked with blood, and that arrow, spear and axe-heads, with the remains of other weapons, have frequently been found in the bog-turf (peat soil) which is cut for fuel from Vellandruchar Moors. These moors were also said to be so much infested with adders, in old time, that cattle could not be turned into them in Summer, until one day an adder got into a pot of milk, which a man who was cutting turf on the moor brought with him to drink. The man placed a turf on the mouth of the pot, and stopped the adder in it. In a short time the imprisoned adder made a peculiar noise, which attracted other adders round the pot. These, in turn, seemed to call others, until from all parts of the moors the adders were seen directing their course straight to the interesting captive. The men cutting turf on the moors were all obliged to flee the low grounds. Towards night, when they ventured into the moor, they found that a mass of adders, as large as an ordinary hay-cock, had interlaced themselves into a solid heap over and round the pot. The people then formed a ring of dry furze, and other fuel they found ready cut, around the mass of adders, now apparently torpid. When many scores of trusses of furze were collected, fire was placed at the same instant to several parts of the ring of furze. They say that the noise made by the burning adders was frightful, and that a great number of milpreaves were found in the ashes.
This story of the adders is also told about Trevethow Moors, the ground now called the Hay Meadow, and many other places.
[27] At pater omnipotens adigat me fulmine ad umbras, Pallentes umbras Erebi, noctemque profundam, &c., &c.
[28] This was nearly the language of our learned countryman, Mr. Moyle, in “A charge to the Grand Jury at Liskeard, April, 1706.” “If France (says he) prevails in this war, we shall be dragooned into idolatry, slavery, and wooden shoes.”—See Moyle’s works, vol. 1, p. 163.
[29] “Golls” or “gollies” is the Phœnician name for Hercules, according to the Rev. Mr. Hogg, in his Fabulous History of Cornwall, so that the use of the term, vulgar as it may appear to some, connects the butcher of our narrative with a favourite deity of the Phœnicians.