Traditions and Hearthside Stories of West Cornwall, Second SeriesBottrell, William
General
Traditions and Hearthside Stories of West Cornwall, Second Series
Bottrell, William
Cornwall (England : County) -- Social life and customs; Legends -- England -- Cornwall (County)
"Then she told me all about the price and number of yards,
that I kept repeatan to myself all the way in till I come to the
doctor's shop and there I forgot all about et. But she told me I
should find a nice motherly oman in this shop just her size, and
that's you my dear, who would tell me what to do ef I forgot.
Jenny wanted to have something to do while her foot was
healan. I told her I didn't much like to go to shop to buy her
smock and undercoat; she could ask the nearest neighbour's
wife to do et for her. 'No, the devil a bit,' says she, 'that I
waan't! Ask Honney's boy Tom's wife, to buy the things for
me! I'll go without a sheft fust, for she will go to meetan
somewhere or other every night for a week that she may tell the
rest of them what my things cost (and oh! the lies they will tell
about et among them); besides, we shall have the house full
all the time with them, makan out they are come to see how I
am. Take the cheeld along weth thee down to An' Nancy
Trembaa's; leave 'n there; and ask her to step up to milkey
and do the rest of the mornan work for me.' When I left the
cheeld down to An' Nancy's, and told her what had happened,
away she went, wethout stopan so much as to put her hat on, up
to keep things to rights while I'm wantan.
"Well, soas, I've done the best I could. I've got the plaster
and salve in the head of my hat, with a fuggan Jenny made me
take to eat on the road. A high bell-topper es as handy as a[210]
basket to stow away the lumber in; dash me ef a esn't. None
of your low billycocks for me.
"Now I wish 'e all well, my dears, and ef you will come up
to see us one Sunday afternoon you shall be as welcome 'One
and All,' as ef you had been my own sisters. God bless 'e all;
I shall be tother side of Ding Dong in less than an hour."
Neither the master nor the shop assistants saw anything to
laugh at when the tinner had told his simple story. On the
contrary they felt much interested, as his 'old oman' was a
well-known customer.
How a Zennor Man Choked Himself, but had his Will
in his Pocket.[4]
NOT long ago a high-country farmer, after having
finished his marketing, in Penzance, treated himself
to a supper at a cook-shop in Caunsehead. Being
in great hunger, or haste, he thought it waste of
time to cut his meat into smaller pieces than he
could possibly swallow; besides, solid junks would stand by his
ribs and do the more good.
He made but two morsels of a quarter of a pound of beef;
and in bolting the last it stuck in his throat. In an instant he
went blue in the face and fell on the floor. The landlord ran for
a surgeon, and by good luck found one at home, the other side
of the street. "Stand clear a bit, and open the man's trap,"
said the doctor. With much trouble the Zennor man's jaws were
forced open, and the doctor feeling a portion of the meat pulled
out a piece about six inches long.
The patient was soon restored and ready for another such
meal.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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