familiar but foreign — that's the feeling that nudges so many of us when we are in deepest Cornwall, or even when in the 'borderlands'.

'Cornwall and the Cornish' is among the latest in the Pocket Cornwall series of books from Penzance publisher Alison Hodge.

Its 128 pages mine a wealth of information from the once mainly industrial land now largely given over to a new money-spinner: tourism.

The stark remains of engine houses pepper the coast, particularly on the Penwith peninsula, a reminder of that region's industrial past.

The last working tin mine, South Crofty, closed in 1998, but the book states that there are plans to re-open it for tin production 'even as the area around it begins to be transformed into a park surrounded by suburban housing estates'.

Another monument to industrialisation is Treffry Viaduct, which towers above Luxulyan Valley.

Built between 1839 and 1842, it carried a tramway across the deep valley for the transportation of mineral produce to the coast.

But there are monuments that hark back to bloodier days.

At the lower end of Penryn is a stone, marking the 1549 rising, triggered by the imposition of the new English Prayer Book, seen by many as an attack by the new Protestant Church leaders as threatening religious customs in the countryside.

At St Neot Church, canny locals ensured the survival of ornate stained-glass windows from Protestant zeal — they were whitewashed and revealed in their glory once the 'storm had passed'.

Large houses also feature in the small book — Lanherne Manor, Antony House, Caerhays Castle, Godolphin and Boconnoc among them.

'Cornwall and the Cornish' by Bernard Deacon, is published by Alison Hodge, price £5.95.

l Another in the Pocket Cornwall series homes in on the insects of Cornwall and the Isles of Scilly.

It will help the reader identify the most commonly encountered butterflies and moths, dragonflies and damselflies, grasshoppers and crickets, beetles, bees, wasps, flies and bugs — it also provides a guide of the best places to see them.

'Insects of Cornwall and the Isles of Scilly' by Steve Jones, is published by Alison Hodge, price £5.95.

COLIN BRENT