Saturday

I am still haunted by the ghost of Cornwall, when I wake up it fills my mind.  To be quite honest I do not think of the landscape as beautiful there, Bodmin Moor is bleak, but the colours are so beautiful, soft greys, beiges of the rushes and grasses, the background broken by the darker colours of the gorse, and then there is the movement of the ponies as they appear far off, and of course the sky lark's song rising to fill the sky as she defends her nest.

LS got cross with these two girls for using the two Piper Post standing stones to jump their ponies through, and glared at them in silence as they called out a a cheerful 'good morning' to which I replied, though deep in action trying to video the circle in a very wobbly manner...It does say on the English Heritage board to respect the site and not damage it but I suppose it was just too much of an experience for them.....

So what did I think of 'Jamaica Inn' on BBC1, well apart from the same problem that everyone seemed to experience, not understanding what was said half the time, a bit disappointed. The third episode retrieved the spirit of the book, which coincidentally I was reading at the time, but Emma Frost who adapted it took too much liberty with framing the story for the screen, so that it became bitty and did not flow as Du.Maurier's words flowed, the wicked vicar of Altarnun did not have a sister for one and his 'albino' appearance was somewhat muted...

I bought some plants for the 'summer' show of this garden, bright geraniums to add a splash of colour and a diascia  for its 'pinkness'.  Two tomato plants, a handful of sweet peas, to add to the cosmos I am growing at the moment, and all have been planted in their pots.  The garden is alive with sparrows, blackbirds and starlings filling the mouths of their young and the compost I dug out is filled with worms, so the hedgehog is also feeding very well. Loads of slugs lurking at the bottom of the pots, which have been despatched(alive) into the brown garden waste bin.  Snails are taken on a long walk to the front garden but I'm sure they come back, in the old garden I would put them on the bank at the farthest end, and then later on in summer hear the thrush banging their shells against a stone...

Cornwall - A Separate Place by Philip Marsden in the Saturday Guardian