CORNISH TOWNS 125 between them. Even now there is talk of re- moving them from Bodmin owing to the difficulty of getting there. Bodmin is not on the main Great Western line but only connected with it from Bodmin Road by a branch line. Launceston can outshine the others by reason of her fine ruin of the ancient castle and an historical record second to none, but at present official recognition she cannot claim. Beyond these three we need not go. The coast- towns have been already visited, and as for smaller ones inland, such as Liskeard, Camelford, Redruth, Cambourne, Callington and Helston, they cannot hope to compete. Truro is just the picture of what one imagines a market- town to be. On market-days its open spaces are filled with country carts and the quaint little covered-in omnibuses, like those used by the peasantry of France on their immensely long straight roads. There is a buzz and clamour of talk outside the doors of the old Red Lion Inn, or, as it now seems to be the fashion to say hotel. This is the house in which Samuel Foote, actor and dramatist, was born in 1720 ; his father was at one time Mayor of Truro. The house is worth seeing on its own account, for it has a massive
