Mousehole. A snippet from A Filigree of Gold.
By P.B. Phillips

​

The band played a simple tune and Isaac began one of his little comic songs;

​

'In Launceston we have a little pamphlet,'

'That we give to travelers heading further west.'

'A warning of What's to come,'

'We think it kind, and we think it best.'

​

'It is written.'

'There is a little town,'

'Small and tucked away.'

'Best avoid it dear travelers,'

'It's called Mousehole Bay.'

​

'A population of munters,'

'Every child's a lump.’

'Mothers and fathers, all related,'

'The family tree's a stump.'

​

'The little rhyme took.'

'Everyone that read it laughed.'

'Travelers indeed avoided poor Mousehole,'

'Its economy almost halved.'

​

'By-and-by, the Mousehole folk were sick and tired,'

'Of their unwanted reputation.'

'Their mayor thought long and hard,'

'And wrote to the King; a little disputation.'

​

'Bring us your outcasts.’

'Your ugly, your retarded,'

'Your inbred, your deformed.'

'Here they'll have no shame,'

'No reason to feel forlorned.'

​

'All of us are hideous,'

'Repulsive to outsider's nose and eye.'

'All are proud to call Mousehole,'

'Our home,'

'Our land,'

'Our little,’

'Cornish Pigsty!'

​

'The King read the mayor's note,'

'And took it as a boast.'

'Now everyone calls Mousehole,'

'The centre of the inbred Cornish coast!'

​

​