Page:County Churches of Cornwall.djvu/30

 8 THE CHURCHES OF CORNWALL sufficiently simple and dignified. The Londoner can at once realise this if he keeps his eyes open in crossing Blackfriars Bridge, and looks at the grandly carved capitals of the piers that flank the entrance. This beautiful grey granite, to the amount of 150,000 cubic feet, came from the Delank quarries, near St. Breward, which were first worked about 1840. They are situated in a romantic, wild, and beautiful gorge, the sight of which well repays the toil of reaching it. There is always interesting work in progress there ; on the writer's first visit in 1900 great sections of the new Beachy Head lighthouse were being pieced together and numbered before transhipment. On the occasion of a second visit in 191 1, the works in hand were the Cardiff waterworks and a great bridge for Rochester. When gazing at the con- summate skill, backed by clever steam or water- worked appliances, necessary for the hewing, polishing, and shaping of the granite, it is wonder- ful to think of the ability and pains that the Cornish workmen of the 15th cent, put forth in the cutting and shaping of the great monolith piers that sup- port the arcades of so large a number of their churches. Now and again, too, they did more than produce simple mouldings, and with good , effect, as is shown, for instance, by the capitals of the piers at Advent, or the S. dooways at St. Endellion and St. Nighton. Some may admire the rich treatment of the granite of the late church