She seemed a sad, beautiful Lady, this Saracen woman. Sometimes at night, or at summer dawn, she sat by her lattice window overlooking the sea, and played and sang to herself the plaintive melodies of her own land. Then, as the fisherfolk would aver, they sat motionless at the sound of her sweet voice. Even the fishes would come to the surface to listen; birds hovered over the castle, and mermaids from the Lizard caverns would float across the bay, enchanted by the appealing tones. For many years these strange happenings went on at Pengersick castle; the fair lady’s harp sent its sweet music through the air, the forbidding Lord continued his incantations, until one wild and stormy night--the darkest ever known in those parts--the countryside was startled by an eerie gleam in the sky. Presently angry flames burst forth, and the frightened people, hurrying from all sides to discover what this huge conflagration might be, found that Pengersick Castle was ablaze. Nothing they could do would still the flames, the massive pile burnt itself out, and the next morning only the fire-scarred walls remained. The whole of the inside--furniture, books, pictures--everything was destroyed; and what was more curious, from that day onward neither the Lord of Pengersick nor his Lady was ever seen again. They had vanished just as mysteriously as they had arrived. Years later a rich merchant--some said he had been a pirate--built upon the site of the ruins a new castle. That is the one you see to-day, a mellow old building looking peacefully out to sea. You may visit it either from Helston or Penzance, it lies about midway between the two. Near at hand is famous Prussia Cove where, in the 18th century, a smuggler armed his house and opened fire upon the Revenue men with small cannon. To the west is Mounts Bay with the more famous St. Michael’s Mount, and to the east low undulating cliffs stretch in a graceful curve, until they rise to the rugged headlands dividing the sheltered coves of the Lizard Peninsula. This coast is the very end of England, enjoying a climate mild even in the depth of winter. Spring comes here fully six weeks before it reaches London, the Midlands and the North; summer lingers almost until Christmas time, and, like the Strange Lady of Pengersick, the sea and the hills of this part of the Duchy exercise a charm that none can resist. [Illustration: _Pengersick Castle._] [Illustration: A man with halo flying away with two angels on a chariot drawn by two spirit horses (with wings).] HOW ST. GERMAN LEFT CORNWALL. Some fifteen hundred years ago the Church in Cornwall had fallen into grievous heresies, and the Roman Emperor Valentinian decided that a stern, strong man was needed to pull these erring people back into the right way. So he instructed St. Germanus of Auxere to go to barbarous Britain and tell the Cornish all about it. And accordingly St. Germanus, or St. German, as we call him, came.