Page:The Cornwall coast.djvu/363

BUDE 357 Haven (Bede, a grave).' When the masts went over the captain, married a fortnight before, rushed down into his cabin, drank a bottle of brandy, and was seen no more. The country rings with cries of shame on the dastards of Bude." A calmer eye- witness quite absolves the Bude men from all blame — to render more help had been impossible. The vessel was being steered skilfully to take the haven, but she was too large for its mouth. But, unjust or not, we must love Parson Hawker. He tells of his procedure when a corpse was reported : " I go out into the moonlight bareheaded, and when I come near I greet the nameless dead with the sentences 'I am the Resurrection and the Life,' &c. They lay down their burthen at my feet — I look upon the dead — tall — stout — well-grown — boots on, elastic, and socks — girded with a rope round the waist. I give him in charge to the sexton and his wife to cleanse, to arrange, to clothe the dead. I order a strong coffin, and the corpse is locked in for the night. I write a letter to the coroner and deliver it for transit to the police. And here the misery begins." To every corpse discovered Hawker gave burial in consecrated ground ; it was not many years since the law had forbidden this. The few graphic words quoted give us an idea of his days spent on this lonely, pitiless coast — days which he varied by acts of beneficence to his parishioners, and by the writing of much beautiful poetry. Close to the mouth of this perilous haven is the low breakwater, built to connect an outlying mass of rock that was formerly insular with every tide. Carew (1602) speaks of this rock ; he says : " We meete with Bude, an open sandie bay, in whose mouth riseth a little hill, by euerie sea-floud made