Page:The Cornwall coast.djvu/93

FALMOUTH AND TRURO 87 shelter both to the fugitive Charles II. and to his mother, the Queen Henrietta Maria. The Sheriff of Cornwall, who saw her at this time, described her as " the woefuUest spectacle my eyes ever yet look'd on ; the most worne and weake pitifuU creature in the world, the poore Queene shifting for one hour's liffe longer." She escaped to France, adverse winds preventing her capture by the Parliamentary fleet. It was in the following year that the young King took refuge at Pendennis, before he sought an asylum at Scilly ; the approach of Fairfax warned him to fly in time. Then followed one of the most strenuous sieges of the war, John Arundel, "John for the King," defending the place for about six months, and only surrendering on honourable terms, when there was only one salted horse left as provision. This brave old defender was in his eighty-seventh year. Two hundred sick persons were left behind when the garrison marched out, under the stipulation that none of them should be compelled thereafter to fight against their king ; and it is said that many died from eating too heartily after their prolonged famine. Lord Clarendon tells us that " the castle refused all summons, admitting no treaty, till they had not victual for twenty-four hours, when they carried on the treaty with such firmness that their situation was never suspected, and they obtained as good terms as any garrison in England." Pendennis was the last stronghold, with the exception of Raglan, to hold out for the Royalist cause ; and it was fitting that this most gallant defence and dignified sur- render should be placed to the credit of loyal Cornwall. It tallies with the brave struggle of 6