Killigarth belonged to the Bevilles, and in the sixteenth century, one Sir William going forth from his own house on a winter's day, found under a hedge a certain John Size nearly dead with cold. He took him into his service and found that he had gotten a remarkable sort of servant, for Size "would eat nettles and thistles, coals and candles, birds with their feathers, and fish with their scales. He could handle, unhurt, blazing wood and hot iron, and used to lie asleep with his head curled under his body" (Carew).
The Trelawnys of Trelawne originally came from another place of the same name, further inland. Among the pictures at this house--parts of which are old--is an early one of Elizabeth, interesting on account of the queen's youth.
John Trelawny, father of the celebrated Jonathan, Bishop of Bristol, was committed to the Tower in 1627 by the House of Commons. As he was popular in the county the Cornish were greatly exercised, and it is said that the old ballad sung riotously by his compatriots:
"_And shall Trelawny die? Here's twenty thousand Cornishmen Will know the reason why--_"
was instrumental in procuring his release. Be that as it may, he was set free by order of the King and shortly after made a baronet. The ballad composed for the misfortunes of the father survived to be made of use when his son, one of the seven bishops who presented the petition to James II., was imprisoned and tried for seditious libel by that most worthless of the Stuarts. The verses were subsequently lost, the Rev. Robert Hawker, always ready to make good any little deficiency of the kind having composed the present version.
A model of Bishop Trelawny's pastoral staff, made of gilt wood with ornaments of copper, is preserved in Pelynt Church, where he was buried; but the most interesting thing in this neighbourhood, as well as the most puzzling, is that great earthwork the Giant's Hedge, which, stretching from Lerrin to Looe, a matter of seven miles, passes through this parish.
"_One day the devil having nothing to do Built a great hedge from Lerrin to Looe._"
There is no evidence to say by whom this earthwork, which in parts is 7 ft. high and 20 ft. wide, was built. Once more let us pray for a Passmore Edwards to supply us with this evidence--by judicious excavation.