The Mythology & Folklore Database
K___ Park, August 4th, 1828.
Yesterday I took a very agreeable ride of some twenty miles on an untireable horse of iny host's; for distances disappear before the excellence of the horses and of the roads. I must tell you all I saw.I rode first to the small town of St. Asaph to look at the cathedral, which is adorned with a beautiful window of modern painted glass. Many coats of arms were extremely well executed, and the artist had the good sense to avoid the cominon error of endeavouring to represent objects not suited to his art, which requires masses of colour and no delicate and floating shades.
To obtain a more perfect knowledge of the country, I ascended the tower. At a distance of about twelve miles I espied a church-like building on the summit of a high mountain, and asked the clerk what it was.
He replied, in broken English, that it was "the king's tabernacle," and that whoever would pass seven years without washing himself, cutting his nails, or shaving his beard, would be allowed to live there; and at the expiration of the seventh year he would have a right to go to London, where the king must give him a pension and make him a "gentleman."
The man believed this wild story implicitly, aud swore to its truth: "Voila ce que c'est que la foi [That is what faith is]."
I inquired afterwards the true state of the affair, and heard the origin of this history; namely, that the building was erected by the province, or "county," to commemorate the jubilee of the last king's reign, and had stood empty ever since; but that a wag had advertised a considerable reward in the newspapers, to any man who would fulfil the above-named conditions.
The common people had mixed up this strange ordeal with the "tabernacle" of King George III.