number of rascals--but fewer in number than almost any other county, if we exclude wreckers and smugglers from the catalogue of rascality. Strange superstitions have lingered on, and one very curious story of a girl fed for years by fairies has been put on record. It is somewhat remarkable that Cornwall has produced no musical genius of any note; and yet the Cornishman is akin to the Welshman and the Irishman. Cornwall has certainly sent up to London and Westminster very able politicians, as Godolphin, Sir William Molesworth, and Sir John Eliot. It furnished Tyburn with a victim--Hugh Peters, the chaplain of Oliver Cromwell, a strange mixture of money-grasping, enthusiasm, and humour. It has been the object of the author, not to retell the lives of the greatest of the sons of Cornwall, for these lives may be read in the _Dictionary of National Biography_, but to chronicle the stories of lesser luminaries concerning whom less is known and little is easily accessible. In this way it serves as a companion volume to _Devonshire Characters_; and Cornwall in no particular falls short of Devonshire in the variety of characters it has sent forth, nor are their stories of less interest. The author and publisher have to thank many for kind help: Mr. Percy Bate, Mr. T. R. Bolitho, Rev. A. T. Boscawen, Mr. J. A. Bridger, Mr. T. Walter Brimacombe, Mr. A. M. Broadley, Mr. R. P. Chope, Mr. Digby Collins, Mr. J. B. Cornish, Mrs. Coryton of Pentillie Castle, Miss Loveday E. Drake, Mr. E. H. W. Dunkin, F.S.A., Mr. J. D. Enys of Enys, the Rev. Wm. Iago, Mrs. H. Forbes Julian, Mrs. de Lacy Lacy, the Rev. A. H. Malan, Mr. Lewis Melville, Mr. A. H. Norway, Captain Rogers of Penrose, Mr. Thomas Seccombe, Mr. Henry Trengrouse, Mr. W. H. K. Wright, and Mr. Henry Young of Liverpool--and last, but not least, Miss Windeatt Roberts for her admirable Index to the volume. The publisher wishes me to say that he would much like to discover the whereabouts of a full-length portrait of Sir John Call, with a view of Bodmin Gaol in the background. S. BARING-GOULD. CONTENTS PAGE WILLIAM PENGELLY, GEOLOGIST 1 SIR CHARLES WILLS, K.B. 12 LIEUTENANT GOLDSMITH AND THE LOGAN ROCK 18 HUGH PETERS, THE REGICIDE 26 JAMES POLKINGHORNE, THE WRESTLER 54 HENRY TRENGROUSE, INVENTOR 59 THE BOTATHAN GHOST 72 JOHN COUCH ADAMS, ASTRONOMER 83 DANIEL GUMB 91 LAURENCE BRADDON 96