They take up the poker and poke out the grates, – rugs, They examine the mugs: They turn up the They can't find the RING! And the Abbot declared that, "when nobody twigged it, Some rascal or other had popped in and prigged it!" The Cardinal rose with a dignified look, He called for his candle, his bell, and his book! In holy anger, and pious grief, He solemnly cursed that rascally thief! He cursed him at board, he cursed him in bed; But what gave rise To no little surprise, The day was gone, The night came on, Come limping a poor little lame Jackdaw; No longer gay, As on yesterday; His feathers all seemed to be turned the wrong way; His pinions drooped - he could hardly stand His head was as bald as the palm of your hand; His eye so dim, So wasted each limb, That, heedless of grammar, they all cried, "THAT'S HIM!That's the scamp that has done this scandalous thing! That's the thief that has got my Lord Cardinal's Ring !" The poor little Jackdaw, When the monks he saw, Feebly gave vent to the ghost of a caw; And turned his bald head, as much as to say, "Pray, be so good as to walk this way !" Slower and slower He limped on before, Till they came to the back of the belfry door, Where the first thing they saw, Midst the sticks and the straw Was the RING in the nest of that little Jackdaw! Then the great Lord Cardinal called for his book, The mute expression Served in lieu of confession, When those words were heard, That poor little bird Was so changed in a moment, 't was really absurd, He grew sleek, and fat; In addition to that, A fresh crop of feathers came thick as a mat! His tail waggled more Even than before; He hopped now about With a gait devout; Or slumbered in prayer time and happened to snore, That good Jackdaw Would give a great "Caw!" As much as to say, "Don't do so any more!" When, as words were too faint, His merits to paint, The conclave determined to make him a Saint; And on newly made Saints and Popes, as you know, SABINE BARING-GOULD. BARING-GOULD, SABINE, an English clergyman and author, the oldest son of Edward Baring-Gould of Lew-Trenchard, Devonshire, was born in Exeter, Devonshire, January 28, 1834. He graduated at Clare College, Cambridge, in 1856, and took orders in the Church of England in 1864. From 1864 to 1867 he was curate of Harbury, Yorkshire; from 1867 to 1871 curate of Dalton, Yorkshire; and from 1871 to 1881 rector of East Mersea, Essex. At his father's death, in 1872, he succeeded to the family estates, and in 1881 to the rectory of Lew-Trenchard. He visited Iceland in 1861, and in 1863 published "Iceland: its Scenes and Sagas," though he had previously published one or more books. Among his most important works are, in mediæval lore: "The Book of Werewolves," "Post-mediæval Preachers," "Myths of the Middle Ages" (two series), "The Silver Store," "Curiosities of Olden Times," and "Legends of Old Testament Characters." On theological subjects: "The Origin and Development of Religious Belief," "Mosaicism," "Lives of the Saints," "Some Modern Difficulties," "The Lost and Hostile Gospels," "Village Sermons for a Year," "The Vicar of Morwenstow," "The Seven Last Words," "The Church in Germany," and "The Trials of Jesus." His novels, which are among his most interesting books, are: "Mehalah," "Court Royal," "Red Spider," "The Gaverocks," "Richard Cable," "John Herring," Margery of Quether," "In the Roar of the Sea," "Mrs. Curgenven of Curgenven," "Cheap Jack Zita," "Kitty Alone." The "Tragedy of the Cæsars" was published in 1892, "Dartmoor Idylls" in 1896. From 1871 to 1873 Mr. Baring-Gould was editor of The Sacristy, a quarterly review of ecclesiastical art and literature. 66 THE CORNISH WRECKERS. (From "The Vicar of Morwenstow.") WHEN the Rev. R. S. Hawker came to Morwenstow in 1834, he found that he had much to contend with, not only in the external condition of church and vicarage, but also in that which is of greater importance. ... "The farmers of the parish were simple-hearted and respectable; but the denizens of the hamlet, after receiving the wages of the harvest time, eked out a precarious existence in the winter, and watched eagerly and expectantly for the shipwrecks that were certain to happen, and upon the plunder of which they surely calculated for the scant provision of their families. The wrecked goods supplied them with the necessaries of life, and the rended planks of the dismembered vessel contributed to the warmth of the hovel hearthstone. "When Mr. Hawker came to Morwenstow, the cruel and covetous natives of the strand, the wreckers of the seas and rocks for flotsam and jetsam,' held as an axiom and an injunction to be strictly obeyed: "Save a stranger from the sea, And he'll turn your enemy!' "The Morwenstow wreckers allowed a fainting brother to perish in the sea before their eyes without extending a hand of safety,-nay, more, for the egotistical canons of a shipwreck, superstitiously obeyed, permitted and absolved the crime of murder by shoving the drowning man into the sea,' to be swallowed by the waves. Cain! Cain! where is thy brother? And the wrecker of Morwenstow answered and pleaded in excuse, as in the case of undiluted brandy after meals, 'It is Cornish custom. The illicit spirit of Cornish custom was supplied by the smuggler, and the gold of the wreck paid him for the cursed abomination of drink." One of Mr. Hawker's parishioners, Peter Barrow, had been for full forty years a wrecker, but of a much more harmless description: he had been a watcher of the coast for such objects as the waves might turn up to reward his patience. Another was Tristam Pentire, a hero of contraband adventure, and agent for sale of smuggled cargoes in bygone times. With a merry twinkle of the eye, and in a sharp and ringing tone, he loved to tell such tales of wild adventure and of " derring do" as would make the foot of the exciseman falter and his cheek turn pale. During the latter years of last century there lived in Wellcombe, one of Mr. Hawker's parishes, a man whose name is still remembered with terror-"Cruel Coppinger." There are people still alive who remember his wife. Local recollections of the man have molded themselves into the rhyme "Will you hear of Cruel Coppinger? He came from a foreign land: He was brought to us by the salt water, He was carried away by the wind!" His arrival on the north coast of Cornwall was signalized by a terrific hurricane. The storm came up Channel from the southwest. A strange vessel of foreign rig went on the reefs of Harty Race, and was broken to pieces by the waves. The only man who came ashore was the skipper. A crowd was gathered on the sand, on horseback and on foot, women as well as men, drawn together by the tidings of a probable wreck. Into their midst rushed the dripping stranger, and bounded suddenly upon the crupper of a young damsel who had ridden to the beach to see the sight. He grasped her bridle, and shouting in some foreign tongue, urged the double-laden animal into full speed, and the horse naturally took his homeward way. The damsel was Miss Dinah Hamlyn. The stranger descended at her father's door, and lifted her off her saddle. He then announced himself as a Dane, named Coppinger. He took his place at the family board, and there remained until he had secured the affections and hand of Dinah. The father died, and Coppinger at once succeeded to the management and control of the house, which thenceforth became a den and refuge of every lawless character along the coast. All kinds of wild uproar and reckless revelry appalled the neighbor. hood day and night. It was discovered that an organized band of smugglers, wreckers, and poachers made this house their rendezvous, and that" Cruel Coppinger" was their captain. In those days, and in that far-away region, the peaceable inhabitants were unprotected. There was not a single resident gentleman of property and weight in the entire district. No revenue officer durst exercise vigilance west of the Tamar; and to put an end to all such surveillance at once, the head of a gauger was chopped off by one of Coppinger's gang on the gunwale of a boat. Strange vessels began to appear at regular intervals on the coast, and signals were flashed from the headlands to lead them into the safest creek or cove. Amongst these vessels, one, a fullrigged schooner, soon became ominously conspicuous. She was for long the chief terror of the Cornish Channel. Her name was The Black Prince. Once, with Coppinger on board, she led a revenue-cutter into an intricate channel near the Bull Rock, where, from knowledge of the bearings, The Black Prince escaped scathless, while the king's vessel perished with all on |