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THE PADSTOW DISTRICT 319 men have given up thinking about Tregeagle. The legends vary in telHng his doom ; some make the draining of Dosmare his last penance and some this task at the Land's End. But if an imaginative reason is desired to account for the formation of the Padstow Doom Bar, surely this tale will do as well as any other. It will be seen that this chronicle of Tregeagle carries him back to the time of Petrock, the patron saint of Padstow, whose name is a corrup- tion of Petrock's-stow. Little Petherick, some- times called St. Petrock Minor, is thought to be a corruption of the same name. Petrock was a Celtic saint, probably a Welshman, who went to Ireland for his religious education ; he crossed to Cornwall in a coracle, and landed in this estuary of the Camel. He founded an oratory here, and probably another at Little Petherick. It is also suggested that he established another cell at Place, the seat of the Prideaux, but it seems more likely that the chapel at Place was founded by St. Samson. After spending many years at Padstow the saint is said to have voyaged to the East, visiting India, and also going on a visionary journey to some Island of the Blest, after the manner of St. Brendan. After returning to Corn- wall he removed to Bodmin and established the most important of his religious foundations. Like Padstow, Bodmin was formerly named Petrock- stow, and this has caused endless confusion to the chroniclers as well as some quarrels between the two towns. Further, the saint evidently went into Devon ; we trace his footsteps at Dartmouth, Exeter, Hollacombe, Anstey, and elsewhere. Bod- min can boast precedence of Padstow in certain respects, for it attained episcopal consequence.