The little town of St. Agnes is steadily growing in popularity, while St. Agnes Beacon is of great geological interest, and from the summit a fine view is obtained of the Cornish coast from Trevose Head to St. Ives.
Opie, the painter, was a native of St. Agnes, where he was born in 1761. The house is passed on the way to Perranporth, and is known as "Harmony Cottage". Opie's artistic talent is said to have been first recognized by "Peter Pindar", when that worthy resided at Truro. A large number of his early paintings may still be seen in many of the houses in the vicinity of his birthplace, although a considerable number have been carried off by discerning collectors.
A few years ago Perranporth was nothing but a small cluster of fishermen's cottages, but the fine stretches of golden sand and some imposing masses of arched rocks have brought many visitors, for whom increased accommodation has had to be found. One and a half miles from Perran Round, an ancient amphitheatre, are portions of an old church, long hidden in the sand, over which St. Piran, or St. Piranus officiated in the sixth century. The church of Perranporth is a chapel of ease to Perranzabuloe, i.e., _Piran-in-sabulo_.
Although Max Müller satisfied himself that St. Piran was a purely mythical figure, and that the word "Piran" meant merely a "digger", others assure us that there is enough evidence to satisfy a court of law that Piran was connected with the school founded by Patrick, and that in the fifth century he was a missionary in Cornwall. Excavations are being made constantly around this little church half-buried in the fine sand, and many important discoveries have resulted. There appears to be little doubt that the church shares with Gwithian oratory the distinction of being the earliest Christian edifice of which any considerable portions remain in England. At the same time it is as well to bear in mind that the part of the material structure revealed by the spade is some two centuries later in date than St. Piran, the patron saint of the Tinners.
"There is a charm in the Cornish coast which belongs to no other coast in the world." So wrote Dean Alford many years ago, and no portion of Cornwall possesses greater charm than the section as seen from Newquay Beacon. Like so many of its neighbouring holiday resorts, Newquay was a very small and not very well known little place until the Great Western Railway gave it four trains a day from London, advertised its charms in the press, and depicted them in glowing colours on innumerable posters. The result is that Newquay has boomed to such an extent that it is now the great centre of attraction on the north coast. Twenty years ago Newquay was little more than a cluster of cottages, but so rapid has been its development that we seem to be centuries away from the days when there was no fashionable hotel on the Headland, and when the place was reached along a jolting little mineral line from Par Junction.