Cornwall (England : County) -- Description and travel
Yet everywhere one feels a want; there is a lack of something. Perhaps
it is they are too matter-of-fact; a passing jest leaves them puzzled.
There is none of the dry humour of the Scot, which makes every man you
meet on the road in Scotland instinctively approach a remark from what
may be called the humorous angle. As an example of the Cornish lack of
this quality, when I remarked to a man who was showing me a real fine
golf-links stretching over the sandy towans of bent-grass, "these
sandhills are simply made for golf," he answered: "Oh no, they were not
made for the links; they were here long before!"
The people simply don't understand analogy or imagery; their minds are
very literal. In this part of the world they may well be literal, for
the hard necessity of making a livelihood from very poor material must
crush out fun. Yet in spite of many hardships endured, it is a rare
thing to see a pale or miserable-looking child. The children are round
and rosy, with sturdy legs, as indeed they may well have for they need
them. This general well-being cannot be altogether attributed to the
pure air, because in the Shetlands and on the West Coast of Scotland
where the air is just as pure the children are usually brown and thin.
It may be that this is due to the lack of milk, the heaths of Scotland
affording scant pasturage, while the constant moisture of the air in
Cornwall makes the grass grow richly.
At midday you will see the bairns running along the street munching
great pasties--a Cornish specialty--made with bits of meat and onion and
potato in a cover of paste, and the pasty seems to be the school-child's
usual dinner. Another specialty of Cornwall are the yellow saffron
cakes, so unappetizing in appearance to those unused to them. Of the
cream there is hardly need to speak. As one ardent admirer of the Duchy
remarked: "Of course, Devonshire cream _is_ Cornish cream, only they've
managed to get all the credit for it." In spite of this testimony it
seems to me there is a difference, the Cornish variety is at once more
fluid and more lumpy, but this may be an erroneous opinion based on
insufficient experience.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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