Is truth more strange than fiction the writer is inclined to ask as his thoughts are carried on memories wings back over a period of sixty odd years, to a small village in the north east of Cornwall. In that small village in the year 1864 there stood an old farmhouse; or to be more correct, there leaned upon its crutches an old thatched house. The front wall had a decided lean to the south so as to be on a dangerous angle, and to necessitate those very substantial crutches. The walls ,as was common in those days , were made of clay and straw and were very thick , Thus making the house very warm in winter and cool in summer, and when nicely white washed had quite a respectable appearance . The house was a large one consisting of two stories ,but at the time of writing, only a part of the house was used as a dwelling, that being the center portion and a skillion on the east end was used as a byre and usually contained one or two cows during the winter . The top story of the western portion was used as a barn and underneath that a pig or two ate and slept in a very contented manner. The house sparrows had burrowed deep under the eaves of the thatch and provided for themselves homes where they could live and multiply. The entrance to the interior of the dwelling portion was by means of two half doors – those doors were fastened on the inside by latches and catches; 1 piece of leather was attached to the latch from the inside and passed through a hole an inch or two above the latch and hung down on the outside, so that by pulling the piece of leather on the outside the latch would raise within and give access. The one window to admit light to the ground floor was on the south side and consisted of panes of glass about four inches square in a lead frame about three feet square. There were three rooms on the ground floor and three bedrooms in the second story.
A stone pavement was laid along the front of the house. The main entrance was into the main and largest room from the south; directly opposite the entrance; on the wall, hung and American clock in a case about two feet six inches long about fifteen inches wide by about six feet. Above the ground floor, in the bottom left hand corner of the case, a piece of the vaneering about inch square had been knocked off by a stone throw one by a neighbour’s son and quite by accident struck the clock with the above result. Next to the clock, on the same wall stood the dresser, plentifully laden with Delft and hanging on the same wall next to it were two sides of cured bacon. In the east end of the room was the fire recess, in a semicircle on the north side of which stood a scuttle; suspended from an iron bar up in the chimney there was a row of chimney crooks and hanging from them were the necessary crocks for cooking, which could be raised or lowered as required, there being sliding ratchets on the chimney crooks. The fire material was placed on the earth in the recess and consisted of wood or coal. Built into the north side of the recessed was an earthenware oven, heated with a wood fire like a baker’s oven. Over the mantelpiece hung a picture of Lord Nelson, the corner of which was a game cock – I presume meant to describe Nelson’s fighting qualities – and over that picture hung a single barrel muzzle-loading gun. On the south side and in front of the windows stood the dining table. Suspended from the great wooden beams that served as joists for the second floor was a bacon rack containing cured hams and other portions of pork, and occasionally pork sausages. On the western end of the same room was a partition wall with two doorways, one on the south side opening into the dairy and the other on the north side opening into the potato and lumber house. Between the two doors stood a mahogany folding table and on the table the family Bible and other books were kept. In the dairy in borad-topped glazed earthenware jars was usually a good supply of sweet scolded cream and milk, and in the potato house a supply of potatoes.
It maybe I asked why I mention these details. It is to show how endelibly the impressions of youth are stamped on our memory and how the veracity of this auto biography depends on those impressions and their retention in our memory. There are many incidents to which I shall refer later so I will hasten to describe further the surroundings of the place.
In front of the house was a courtyard surrounded by huge elm trees; across the yard was an open shed where in winter the feed was placed, and cattle could go in and out at will for food and shelter. On the south side of the Yard and beyond was arable land of only medium quality. On the west side was a road and the village square. On the east was meadowland land of fair quality, And also the kitchen garden with giant sticks of rhubarb, gooseberries, Black and red currants, beehives, and an abundance of vegetables in season. On the north and at the back of the house were the hay and corn stacks. The rural scene with its sweet scented grass, its edge growths of bushes and huge elm trees seemed to offer special protection and make it a congenial place for bird life, And in the early spring when all nature was budding into newness of life, why should not the black-bird, The thrush, the robin, the goldfinch and the skylark mingle their voices in the chorus of praise to so great a creator, or why, since I was not responsible for that creation, or the architecture of the house, apologise for first opening my eyes to the light of day in such a place and amidst such surroundings? And yet that event nearly caused a tragedy and I was hastily removed from the scene and went the first six weeks of childhood in a neighbor’s house and under their care, While my mother’s life hung by a slender thread between life and death through scarlet fever and other complications.
How it was that I was considered to be ray mother’s pet I never knew. Was it on account of that early separation while she struggled with death through weeks of pain, or was there a fear that I would share the fate of my two older brothers who had both died in infancy, or was it because I most resembled her in appearance? I know that as a child I was regarded in that light, but the reason I shall never know. Suffice it to say that there was a mutual love that made life seem inseparable – as I child I thought it would be impossible to live without my mother. I was ruled by my mother’s love and fear of my father, and yet my father was kind and good but had a very hasty temper, and, like John the Baptist, he wore a leather girdle about his loins, which did not concern me as long as he wore it there, but it did concern me very considerably sometimes when he took it off, for then I had a very decided inclination to sidle close up to my mother. However, I loved my father and used to look forward to his return from work in the evening and enjoyed his company, because he loved us, and, although he was hasty sometimes with the girdle, he used to say afterwards that it caused him more pain than it cuased me. My sister was two years my senior and was to my father the apple of his eye. He simply adored her, and she was worthy of his adoration for she might be called in every respect her father’s girl. How strange, that after sixty-three years a person whould remember clearly certain events that occurred during the first six and a half years of his life. Of course, it is only certain events that stand out above others, bold and impressive, after such a lapse of time. It is my intention to recall here the very earliest events that occurred in my memory, and the first of those events was the birth of my brother, who is two years and five weeks my junior, also the nurse and certain work she was doing, seems as clear as on the day I saw her. It may be considered to be a stretch of imagination to claim to be able to remember events that occurred at two years of age, sixty-three years afterwards, but when recounted to my mother many years afterwards she said that the facts were as I recalled.
