SUPERSTITIONS OF THE WELLS.

WELL-WORSHIP.

A spring of water has always something about it which gives rise to holy feelings. From the dark earth there wells up a pellucid fluid, which in its apparent tranquil joyousness gives gladness to all around. The velvet mosses, the sword-like grasses, and the feathery ferns, grow with more of that light and vigorous nature which indicates a fulness of life, within the charmed influence of a spring of water, than they do elsewhere.

The purity of the fluid impresses itself, through the eye, upon the mind, and its power of removing all impurity is felt to the soul. “Wash and be clean,” is the murmuring call of the waters, as they overflow their rocky basins, or grassy vases, and deeply sunk in depravity must that man be who could put to unholy uses one of nature’s fountains. The inner life of a well of waters, bursting from its grave in the earth, may be religiously said to form a type of the soul purified by death, rising into a glorified existence and the fulness of light. The tranquil beauty of the rising waters, whispering the softest music, like the healthful breathing of a sleeping infant, sends a feeling of happiness through the soul of the thoughtful observer, and the inner man is purified by its influence, as the outer man is cleansed by ablution.

Water cannot be regarded as having an inanimate existence. Its all-pervading character and its active nature, flowing on for ever, resting never, removes it from the torpid elements, and places it, like the air, amongst those higher creations which belong to the vital powers of the earth. The spring of water rises from the cold dark earth, it runs, a silver cord glistening in the sunshine, down the mountainside. The rill (prettily called by Drayton “a rillet”) gathers rejoicingly other waters unto itself, and it grows into a brooklet in its course. At length, flowing onward and increasing in size, the brook state of being is fairly won; and then, by the gathering together of some more dewdrops, the full dignity of a stream is acquired. Onwards the waters flow, still gleaning from every side, and wooing new runlets to its bosom, eager as it were to assume the state which, in America, would be called a “run” of water. Stream gathers on stream, and run on run; the union of waters becomes a river; rolling in its maturity, swelling in its pride, it seeks the ocean, and there is absorbed in the eternity of waters. Has ever poet yet penned a line which in any way conveys to the mind a sense of the grandeur, the immensity of the sea? I do not remember a verse which does not prove the incapacity of the human mind to embrace in its vastness the gathering together of the waters in the mighty sea. Man’s mind is tempered, and his pride subdued, as he stands on the sea-side and looks on the undulating expanse to which, to him, there is no end. A material eternity of rain-drops gathered into a mass which is from Omnipotence and is omnipotent. The influences of heaven falling on the sheeted waters, they rise at their bidding and float in air, making the skies more beautiful or more sublime, according to the spirit of the hour. Whether the clouds float over the earth, illumined by sun-rays, like the cars of loving angels; or rush wildly onward, as if bearing demons of vengeance, they are subdued by the mountains, and fall reluctantly as mists around the rocks, condense solemnly as dews upon the sleeping flowers, sink to earth resignedly as tranquil rains, or splash in tempestuous anger on its surface. The draught, in whatever form it comes, is drunk with avidity, and, circulating through the subterranean recesses of the globe, it does its work of re-creation, and eventually reappears a bubbling spring, again to run its round of wonder-working tasks.

Those minds which saw a God in light, and worshipped a Creator in the sun, felt the power of the universal solvent, and saw in the diffusive nature of that fluid which is everywhere, something more than a type of the regenerating Spirit, which all, in their holier hours, feel necessary to clear off the earthiness of life. Man has ever sought to discover the spiritual in the material, and, from the imperfections of human reason, he has too frequently reposed on the material, and given to it the attributes which are purely spiritual. Through all ages the fountains of the hills and valleys have claimed the reverence of men; and waters presenting themselves, under aspects of beauty, or of terror, have been regarded with religious feelings of hope or of awe.

As it was of old, so is it to-day. It was but yesterday that I stood near the font of Royston Church, and heard the minister read with emphasis, “None can enter into the kingdom of God except he be regenerate and born anew of water.” Surely the simple faith of the peasant mother who, on a spring morning, takes her weakly infant to some holy well, and three times dipping it in its clear waters, uttering an earnest prayer at each immersion, is but another form of the prescribed faith of the educated churchman.

Surely the practice of consulting the waters of a sacred spring, by young men and maidens, is but a traditional faith derived from the early creeds of Greece—a continuance of the Hydromancy which sought in the Castalian fountain the divination of the future.

THE WELL OF ST CONSTANTINE.

In the parish of St Merran, or Meryn, near Padstow, are the remains of the Church of St Constantine, and the holy well of that saint. It had been an unusually hot and dry summer, and all the crops were perishing through want of water. The people inhabiting the parish had grown irreligious, and many of them sadly profane. The drought was a curse upon them for their wickedness. Their church was falling into ruin, their well was foul, and the arches over it were decayed and broken. In their distress, the wicked people who had reviled the Word of God, went to their priest for aid.

“There is no help for thee, unless thou cleansest the holy well.”

They laughed him to scorn.

The drought continued, and they suffered want.

To the priest they went again.

“Cleanse the well,” was his command, “and see the power of the blessing of the first Christian emperor.” That cleansing a dirty well should bring them rain they did not believe. The drought continued, the rivers were dry, the people suffered thirst.

“Cleanse the well—wash, and drink,” said the priest, when they again went to him.

Hunger and thirst made the people obedient. They went to the task. Mosses and weeds were removed, and the filth cleansed. To the surprise of all, beautifully clear water welled forth. They drank the water and prayed, and then washed themselves, and were refreshed. As they bathed their bodies, parched with heat, in the cool stream which flowed from the well, the heavens clouded over, and presently rain fell, turning all hearts to the true faith.

THE WELL OF ST LUDGVAN.

St Ludgvan, an Irish missionary, had finished his work. On the hill-top, looking over the most beautiful of bays, the church stood with all its blessings. Yet the saint, knowing human nature, determined on associating with it some object of a miraculous character, which should draw people from all parts of the world to Ludgvan. The saint prayed over the dry earth, which was beneath him, as he knelt on the church stile. His prayer was for water, and presently a most beautiful crystal stream welled up from below. The holy man prayed on, and then, to try the virtues of the water, he washed his eyes. They were rendered at once more powerful, so penetrating, indeed, as to enable him to see microscopic objects. The saint prayed again, and then he drank of the water. He discovered that his powers of utterance were greatly improved, his tongue formed words with scarcely any effort of his will. The saint now prayed, that all children baptized in the waters of this well might be protected against the hangman and his hempen cord; and an angel from heaven came down into the water, and promised the saint that his prayers should be granted. Not long after this, a good farmer and his wife brought their babe to the saint, that it might derive all the blessings belonging to this holy well. The priest stood at the baptismal font, the parents, with their friends around. The saint proceeded with the baptismal ceremonial, and at length the time arrived when he took the tender babe into his holy arms. He signed the sign of the cross over the child, and when he sprinkled water on the face of the infant its face glowed with a divine intelligence. The priest then proceeded with the prayer; but, to the astonishment of all, whenever he used the name of Jesus, the child, who had received the miraculous power of speech, from the water, pronounced distinctly the name of the devil, much to the consternation of all present. The saint knew that an evil spirit had taken possession of the child, and he endeavoured to cast him out; but the devil proved stronger than the saint for some time. St Ludgvan was not to be beaten; he knew that the spirit was a restless soul, which had been exorcised from Treassow, and he exerted all his energies in prayer. At length the spirit became obedient, and left the child. He was now commanded by the saint to take his flight to the Red Sea. He rose, before the terrified spectators, into a gigantic size, he then spat into the well; he laid hold of the pinnacles of the tower, and shook the church until they thought it would fall. The saint was alone unmoved. He prayed on, until, like a flash of lightning, the demon vanished, shaking down a pinnacle in his flight. The demon, by spitting in the water destroyed the spells of the water upon the eyes[15] and the tongue too; but it fortunately retains its virtue of preventing any child baptized in it from being hanged with a cord of hemp. Upon a cord of silk it is stated to have no power.

This well had nearly lost its reputation once—a Ludgvan woman was hanged, under the circumstances told in the following narrative:—

A small farmer, living in one of the most western districts of the county, died some years back of what was supposed at that time to be “English cholera.” A few weeks after his decease his wife married again. This circumstance excited some attention in the neighbourhood. It was remembered that the woman had lived on very bad terms with her late husband, that she had on many occasions exhibited strong symptoms of possessing a very vindictive temper, and that during the farmer’s lifetime she had openly manifested rather more than a Platonic preference for the man whom she subsequently married. Suspicion was generally excited; people began to doubt whether the first husband had died fairly. At length the proper order was applied for, and his body was disinterred. On examination, enough arsenic to have poisoned three men was found in the stomach. The wife was accused of murdering her husband, was tried, convicted on the clearest evidence, and hanged. Very shortly after she had suffered capital punishment horrible stories of a ghost were widely circulated. Certain people declared that they had seen a ghastly resemblance of the murderess, robed in her winding-sheet, with the black mark of the rope round her swollen neck, standing on stormy nights upon her husband’s grave, and digging there with a spade, in hideous imitation of the actions of the men who had disinterred the corpse for medical examination. This was fearful enough; nobody dared go near the place after nightfall. But soon another circumstance was talked of in connexion with the poisoner, which affected the tranquillity of people’s minds in the village where she had lived, and where it was believed she had been born, more seriously than even the ghost story itself. The well of St Ludgvan, celebrated among the peasantry of the district for its one remarkable property, that every child baptized in its water (with which the church was duly supplied on christening occasions) was secure from ever being hanged.

No one doubted that all the babies fortunate enough to be born and baptized in the parish, though they might live to the age of Methuselah, and might during that period commit all the capital crimes recorded in the “Newgate Calendar,” were still destined to keep quite clear of the summary jurisdiction of Jack Ketch. No one doubted this until the story of the apparition of the murderess began to be spread abroad, then awful misgivings arose in the popular mind.

A woman who had been born close by the magical well, and who had therefore in all probability been baptized in its water, like her neighbours of the parish, had nevertheless been publicly and unquestionably hanged. However, probability is not always the truth. Every parishioner determined that the baptismal register of the poisoner should be sought for, and that it should be thus officially ascertained whether she had been christened with the well water or not. After much trouble, the important document was discovered—not where it was at first looked after, but in a neighbouring parish. A mistake had been made about the woman’s birthplace; she had not been baptized in St Ludgvan church, and had therefore not been protected by the marvellous virtue of the local water. Unutterable was the joy and triumph of this discovery. The wonderful character of the parish well was wonderfully vindicated; its celebrity immediately spread wider than ever. The peasantry of the neighbouring districts began to send for the renowned water before christenings; and many of them actually continue, to this day, to bring it corked up in bottles to their churches, and to beg particularly that it may be used whenever they present their children to be baptized.[16]

GULVAL WELL.

A young woman, with a child in her arms, stands by the side of Gulval Well, in Fosses Moor. There is an expression of extreme anxiety in her interesting face, which exhibits a considerable amount of intelligence. She appears to doubt, and yet be disposed to believe in, the virtues of this remarkable well. She pauses, looks at her babe, and sighs. She is longing to know something of the absent, but she fears the well may indicate the extreme of human sorrow. While she is hesitating, an old woman advances towards her, upon whom the weight of eighty years was pressing, but not over heavily; and she at once asked the young mother if she wished to ask the well after the health of her husband.

“Yes, Aunt Alcie,” she replied; “I am so anxious. I have not heard of John for six long months. I could not sleep last night, so I rose with the light, and came here, determined to ask the well; but I am afraid. O Aunt Alcie, suppose the well should not speak, I should die on the spot!”

“Nonsense, cheeld,” said the old woman; “thy man is well enough; and the well will boil, if thee’lt ask it in a proper spirit.”

“But, Aunt Alcie, if it sends up puddled water, or if it remains quiet, what would become of me?”

“Never be foreboding, cheeld; troubles come quick without running to meet ’em. Take my word for it, the fayther of thy little un will soon be home again. Ask the well! ask the well!”

“Has it told any death or sickness lately?” asked the young mother.

“On St Peter’s eve Mary Curnew questioned the water about poor Willy.”

“And the water never moved?”

“The well was quiet; and verily I guess it was about that time he died.”

“Any sickness, Aunt Alcie?”

“Jenny Kelinach was told, by a burst of mud, how ill her old mother was; but do not be feard, all is well with Johnny Thomas.”

Still the woman hesitated; desire, fear, hope, doubt, superstition, and intelligence struggled within her heart and brain.

The old creature, who was a sort of guardian to the well, used all her rude eloquence to persuade Jane Thomas to put her question, and at length she consented. Obeying the old woman’s directions, she knelt on the mat of bright green grass which grew around, and leaning over the well so as to see her face in the water, she repeated after her instructor,

Some minutes passed in perfect silence, and anxiety was rapidly turning cheeks and lips pale, when the colour rapidly returned. There was a gush of clear water from below, bubble rapidly followed bubble, sparkling brightly in the morning sunshine. Full of joy, the young mother rose from her knees, kissed her child, and exclaimed, “I am happy now!”[17]

THE WELL OF ST KEYNE.

St Keyne came to this well about five hundred years before the Norman Conquest, and imparted a strange virtue to its waters—namely, that whichever of a newly-married couple should first drink thereof, was to enjoy the sweetness of domestic sovereignty ever after.

Situated in a thickly-wooded district, the well of St Keyne presents a singularly picturesque appearance. “Four trees of divers kinds,” grow over the well, imparting a delightful shade, and its clear waters spread an emerald luxuriance around. Once, and once only, have I paid a visit to this sacred spot. Then and there I found a lady drinking of the waters from her thimble, and eagerly contending with her husband, that the right to rule was hers. The man, however, mildly insisted upon it that he had had the first drink, as he had rushed before his wife, and dipping his fingers into the waters, had sucked them. This the lady contended was not drinking, and she, I have no doubt, through life had the best of the argument.

Tonkin says, in his “History of Cornwall,” “Did it retain this wondrous quality, as it does to this day the shape, I believe there would be to it a greater resort of both sexes than either to Bath or Tunbridge; for who would not be fond of attaining this longed-for sovereignty?” He then adds, “Since the writing of this, the trees were blown down by a violent storm, and in their place Mr Rashleigh, in whose land it is, has planted two oaks, an ash, and an elm, which thrive well; but the wonderful arch is destroyed.” The author can add to this that (as he supposes, owing to the alteration made in the trees) the sovereign virtues of the waters have perished.

Southey’s ballad will be remembered by most readers:—

It has been already stated that, sitting in St Michael’s Chair, on the tower of the church of St Michael’s Mount, has the same virtue as the waters of this well; and that this remarkable power was the gift of the same St Keyne who imparted such wonderful properties to this well.

MADDERN OR MADRON WELL.

Of the holy well at St Maddern, Carne[18] writes thus:—

“It has been contended that a virgin was the patroness of this church—that she was buried at Minster—and that many miracles were performed at her grave. A learned commentator, however, is satisfied that it was St Motran, who was one of the large company that did come from Ireland with St Buriana, and he was slain at the mouth of the Hayle; the body was begged, and afterwards buried here. Near by was the miraculous Well of St Maddern, over which a chapel was built, so sacred was it held. (This chapel was destroyed by the fanaticism of Major Ceely in the days of Cromwell.) It stood at no great distance on the moor, and the soil around it was black and boggy, mingled with a gray moorstone....

“The votaries bent awfully and tremblingly over its sedgy bank, and gazed on its clear bosom for a few minutes ere they proved the fatal ordeal; then an imploring look was cast towards the figure of St Motran, many a crossing was repeated, and at last the pin or pebble held aloof was dropped into the depth beneath. Often did the rustic beauty fix her eye intently on the bubbles that rose, and broke, and disappeared; for in that moment the lover was lost, or the faithful husband gained. It was only on particular days, however, according to the increase or decrease of the moon, that the hidden virtues of the well were consulted.”[19]

MADRON WELL.

Of this well we have the following notice by William Scawen, Esq., Vice-Warden of the Stannaries. The paper from which we extract it, was first printed by Davies Gilbert, Esq., F.R.S., as an appendix to his “Parochial History of Cornwall.” Its complete title is, “Observations on an Ancient Manuscript, entitled ‘Passio Christo,’ written in the Cornish Language, and now preserved in the Bodleian Library; with an Account of the Language, Manners, and Customs of the People of Cornwall, (from a Manuscript in the Library of Thomas Artle, Esq., 1777)”:—

“Of St Mardren’s Well, (which is a parish west to the Mount,) a fresh true story of two persons, both of them lame and decrepit, thus recovered from their infirmity. These two persons, after they had applied themselves to divers physicians and chirurgeons, for cure, and finding no success by them, they resorted to St Mardren’s Well, and according to the ancient custom which they had heard of, the same which was once in a year—to wit, on Corpus Christi evening, to lay some small offering on the altar there, and to lie on the ground all night, drink of the water there, and in the morning after to take a good draught more, and to take and carry away some of the water, each of them in a bottle, at their departure. This course these two men followed, and within three weeks they found the effect of it, and, by degrees their strength increasing, were able to move themselves on crutches. The year following they took the same course again, after which they were able to go with the help of a stick; and at length one of them, John Thomas, being a fisherman, was, and is at this day, able to follow his fishing craft. The other, whose name was William Cork, was a soldier under the command of my kinsman, Colonel William Godolphin, (as he has often told me,) was able to perform his duty, and died in the service of his majesty King Charles. But herewith take also this:—

“One Mr Hutchens, a person well known in those parts, and now lately dead, being parson of Ludgvan, a near neighbouring parish to St Mardren’s Well, he observed that many of his parishioners often frequented this well superstitiously, for which he reproved them privately, and sometimes publicly, in his sermons; but afterwards he, the said Mr Hutchens, meeting with a woman coming from the well with a bottle in her hand, desired her earnestly that he might drink thereof, being then troubled with cholical pains, which accordingly he did, and was eased of his infirmity.” The latter story is a full confutation of the former; for, if the taking the water accidentally thus prevailed upon the party to his cure, as it is likely it did, then the miracle which was intended to be by the ceremony of lying on the ground and offering is wholly fled, and it leaves the virtue of the water to be the true cause of the cure. And we have here, as in many places of the land, great variety of salutary springs, which have diversity of operations, which by natural reason have been found to be productive of good effects, and not by miracle, as the vain fancies of monks and friars have been exercised in heretofore.

Bishop Hale, of Exeter, in his “Great Mystery of Godliness,” says:—“Of which kind was that noe less than miraculous cure, which, at St Maddern’s Well, in Cornwall, was wrought upon a poore cripple; whereof, besides the attestation of many hundreds of the neighbours, I tooke a strict and impartial examination in my last triennial visitation there. This man, for sixteen years, was forced to walke upon his hands, by reason of the sinews of his leggs were soe contracted that he cold not goe or walke on his feet, who upon monition in a dream to wash in that well, which accordingly he did, was suddainly restored to the use of his limbs; and I sawe him both able to walk and gett his owne maintenance. I found here was neither art or collusion,—the cure done, the author our invisible God,” &c.

In Madron Well—and, I have no doubt, in many others—may be found frequently the pins which have been dropped by maidens desirous of knowing “when they were to be married.” I once witnessed the whole ceremony performed by a group of beautiful girls, who had walked on a May morning from Penzance. Two pieces of straw, about an inch long each, were crossed and the pin run through them. This cross was then dropped into the water, and the rising bubbles carefully counted, as they marked the number of years which would pass ere the arrival of the happy day. This practice also prevailed amongst the visitors to the well at the foot of Monacuddle Grove, near St Austell.

On approaching the waters, each visitor is expected to throw in a crooked pin; and, if you are lucky, you may possibly see the other pins rising from the bottom to meet the most recent offering. Rags and votive offerings to the genius of the waters are hung around many of the wells. Mr Couch says:—“At Madron Well, near Penzance, I observed the custom of hanging rags on the thorns which grew in the enclosure.”

Crofton Croker tells us the same custom prevails in Ireland; and Dr O’Connor, in his “Travels in Persia,” describes the prevalence of this custom.

Mr Campbell,[20] on this subject, writes:—“Holy healing wells are common all over the Highlands, and people still leave offerings of pins and nails, and bits of rag, though few would confess it. There is a well in Islay where I myself have, after drinking, deposited copper caps amongst a hoard of pins and buttons, and similar gear, placed in chinks in the rocks and trees at the edge of the ‘Witches’ Well.’ There is another well with similar offerings freshly placed beside it, in an island in Loch Maree, in Ross-shire, and many similar wells are to be found in other places in Scotland. For example, I learn from Sutherland that ‘a well in the Black Isle of Cromarty, near Rosehaugh, has miraculous healing powers. A country woman tells me, that about forty years ago, she remembers it being surrounded by a crowd of people every first Tuesday in June, who bathed and drank of it before sunrise. Each patient tied a string or rag to one of the trees that overhung it before leaving. It was sovereign for headaches. Mr —— remembers to have seen a well, here called Mary’s Well, hung round with votive rags.’”

Well-worship is mentioned by Martin. The custom, in his day, in the Hebrides, was to walk south round about the well.

Sir William Betham, in his “Gael and Cymbri,” (Dublin: W. Curry, Jun., & Co., 1834,) says, at page 235:—“The Celtæ were much addicted to the worship of fountains and rivers as divinities. They had a deity called Divona, or the river-god.”

THE WELL AT ALTAR-NUN. CURE OF INSANITY.

Amongst the numerous holy wells which exist in Cornwall, that of Alternon, or Altar-Nun, is the only one, as far as I can learn, which possessed the virtue of curing the insane.

We are told that Saint Nunne or Nuanita was the daughter of an Earl of Cornwall, and the mother of St David; that the holy well, which is situated about a mile from the cathedral of St David, was dedicated to her; and that she bestowed on the waters of the Cornish well those remarkable powers, which were not given to the Welsh one, from her fondness for the county of her birth.

Carew, in his “Survey of Cornwall,” thus describes the practice:—

“The water running from St Nun’s well fell into a square and enclosed walled plot, which might be filled at what depth they listed. Upon this wall was the frantic person put to stand, his back towards the pool, and from thence, with a sudden blow in the breast, tumbled headlong into the pond; where a strong fellow, provided for the nonce, took him, and tossed him up and down, alongst and athwart the water, till the patient, by foregoing his strength, had somewhat forgot his fury. Then was he conveyed to the church, and certain masses said over him: upon which handling, if his right wits returned, St Nun had the thanks; but if there appeared small amendment, he was bowssened again and again, while there remained in him any hope of life or recovery.”

The 2d of March is dedicated to St Nun, and the influence of the water is greatly exalted on that day.

Although St Nun’s well has been long famous, and the celebrity of its waters extended far, yet there was a belief prevailing amidst the uneducated, that the sudden shock produced by suddenly plunging an insane person into water was most effective in producing a return to reason.

On one occasion, a woman of weak mind, who was suffering under the influence of a religious monomania, consulted me on the benefit she might hope to receive from electricity. The burden of her ever-melancholy tale was, that “she had lost her God;” and she told me, with a strange mixture of incoherence and reason, that her conviction was that a sudden shock would cure her. She had herself proposed to her husband and friends that they should take her to a certain rock on St Michael’s Mount, stand her on it, with her back to the sea, when “the waters were the strongest, at the flowing of the tide;” and after having prayed with her, give her the necessary blow on the chest, and thus plunge her into the waters below. I know not that the experiment was ever made in the case of this poor woman, but I have heard of several instances where this sudden plunge had been tried as a cure for insanity.

Mr T. Q. Couch thus describes the present condition of this well in a paper on “Well-Worship:”—[21]

“On the western side of the beautiful valley through which flows the Trelawney River, and near Hobb’s Park, in the parish of Pelynt, Cornwall, is St Nun’s, or St Ninnie’s Well. Its position was, until lately, to be discovered by the oak-tree matted with ivy, and the thicket of willow and bramble which grew upon its roof. The front of the well is of a pointed form, and has a rude entrance about four feet high, and spanned above by a single flat stone, which leads into a grotto with arched roof. The walls on the interior are draped with luxuriant fronds of spleenwort, hart’s tongue, and a rich undercovering of liverwort. At the further end of the floor is a round granite basin, with a deeply moulded brim, and ornamented on its circumference with a series of rings, each enclosing a cross or a ball. The water weeps into it from an opening at the back, and escapes again by a hole in the bottom. This interesting piece of antiquity has been protected by a tradition which we could wish to attach to some of our cromlechs and circles in danger of spoliation.”

According to the narrative given by Mr Bond in his “History of Looe,” the sacred protection given must have been limited in time, as the following story will prove:—

“KIPPISCOMBE LANE,

Probably so called from a consecrated well on the right hand side of the road. The titular saint of this well is supposed to have been St Cuby, now corrupted into Keby’s Well. The spring flows into a circular basin or reservoir of granite, or of some stone like it, two feet four inches at its extreme diameter at top, and about two feet high. It appears to have been neatly carved and ornamented in its lower part with the figure of a griffin, and round the edge with dolphins, now much defaced. The water was formerly carried off by a drain or hole at the bottom, like those usually seen in fonts and piscinas. This basin (which I take to be an old font) was formerly much respected by the neighbours, who conceived some great misfortune would befall the person who should attempt to remove it from where it stood, and that it required immense power to remove it. A daring fellow, however, (says a story,) once went with a team of oxen for the express purpose of removing it. On his arrival at the spot, one of the oxen fell down dead, which so alarmed the fellow that he desisted from the attempt he was about to make. There are several loose stones scattered round this basin or reservoir, perhaps the remains of some building which formerly enclosed it—a small chapel likely. The last time I saw this reservoir it had been taken many feet from where it used to stand, and a piece of the brim of it had been recently struck off.”

ST GUNDRED’S WELL AT ROACH ROCK.

Carew, in his “Survey of Cornwall,” p. 139, (p. 324, Lord Dunstanville’s edit.,) tells us, “near this rock there is another which, having a pit in it, containeth water which ebbs and flows as the sea does. I was thereupon very curious to inspect this matter, and found it was only a hole artificially cut in a stone, about twelve inches deep and six broad; wherein after rayne, a pool of water stands, which afterwards with fair weather vanisheth away, and is dried up; and then again, on the falling of rain, water is replenished accordingly, which with dry weather abates as aforesaid, (for upon those occasions I have seen it to have water in its pit, and again to be without it,) which doubtless gave occasion to the feigned report that it ebbs and flows as the sea:” of all which premisses thus speaks Mr Carew further, out of the Cornish “Wonder Gatherer”:—

The last tradition of this hermitage chapel is, that when it was kept in repair, a person diseased with a grievous leprosy, was either placed or fixed himself therein, where he lived until the time of his death, to avoid infecting others. He was daily attended with meat, drink, and washing by his daughter, named Gunnett or Gundred, and the well hereby from whence she fetched water for his use is to this day shewn, and called by the name of St Gunnett’s Well, or St Gundred’s Well.

It is not possible to give even the names of the wells which are still thought to have “some healing virtue” in them. The typical wells have alone been mentioned, and to these brief notices of a few others may be added.

ST CUTHBERT’S OR CUBERT’S WELL.

Hal thus describes this famous place:—“In this parish is that famous and well-known spring of water, called Holy-well, (so named, the inhabitants say, for that the virtues of this water was first discovered on All-Hallows day.) The same stands in a dark cavern of the seacliff rocks, beneath full seamark on spring-tides, from the top of which cavern falls down or distills continually drops of water from the white, blue, red, and green veins of those rocks. And accordingly, in the place where those drops of water fall, it swells to a lump of considerable bigness, and there petrifies to the hardness of ice, glass, or freestone, of the several colours aforesaid, according to the nature of those veins in the rock from whence it proceeds, and is of a hard, brittle nature, apt to break like glass.

“The virtues of this water are very great. It is incredible what numbers in summer-season frequent this place and waters from counties far distant.”[22]

RICKETY CHILDREN.

The practice of bathing rickety children on the first three Wednesdays in May is still far from uncommon in the outlying districts of Cornwall. The parents will walk many miles for the purpose of dipping the little sufferers in some well, from which the “healing virtue” has not entirely departed. Among these holy wells, Cubert, just named, is far-famed. To this well the peasantry still resort, firm in the faith that there, at this especial season, some mysterious virtue is communicated to its waters. On these occasions, only a few years since, the crowd assembled was so large, that it assumed the character of a fair.

CHAPELL UNY.

On the first three Wednesdays in May, children suffering from mesenteric diseases are dipped three times in this well, against the sun, and dragged three times around the well on the grass, in the same direction.

PERRAN WELL.

Children were cured of several diseases by being bathed in this well. They were also carried to the sea-shore, and passed through a cleft in a rock on the shore at Perranzabalo. In the autumn of 1863 I sought for these holy waters. I was informed that some miners, in driving an adit, had tapped the spring and drained it. There is not, therefore, a trace of this once most celebrated well remaining. It was with difficulty that its site could be discovered. I have since learned that the cut stone-work which ornamented this holy place, was removed to Chiverton, for the purpose of preserving it.

REDRUTH WELL.

No child christened in this well has ever been hanged. Saint Ruth, said to have been called Red Ruth, because she always wore a scarlet cloak, especially blessed, to this extent, those waters. I believe the population in this large parish cares but little now, whether their children be baptized with this well water or any other; but, half a century since, it was very different. Then, many a parent would insist on seeing the water taken from the well and carried to the font in the church.

HOLY WELL AT LITTLE CONAN.

On Palm Sunday the people resorted to the well sacred to “Our Lady of Nant’s,” with a cross of palm, and after making the priest a present, they were allowed to throw the cross into the well; if it swam the thrower was to outlive the year, if it sank he was not.[23]

THE PRESERVATION OF HOLY WELLS.

It is a very common notion amongst the peasantry, that a just retribution overtakes those who wilfully destroy monuments, such as stone circles, crosses, wells, and the like. Mr Blight writes me—“Whilst at Boscaswell, in St Just, a few weeks since, an old man told me, that a person who altered an old Holy Well there, was drowned the next day in sight of his home, and that a person who carried away the stones of an ancient chapel, had his house burned down that very night.” We hope the certainty of punishment will prevent any further spoliation. Cannot we do something towards the preservation of our antiquities? I quote from a local paper the following:—

“If the attention of the members of the Penzance Antiquarian Society were directed to the state of the ‘Holy Well’ at Laneast, and the remains of the Old Chapel Park, St Clether, they might perhaps induce the proprietors of these ‘remnants of antiquity’ to bestow a little care on the same, and arrest their further ruin and destruction. Many other ‘objects of interest’ are in a sad state of neglect, and fast ‘fading away.’ Slaughtor Bridge, near Camelford, has completely vanished. This is much to be regretted, and is a double loss—first, to those who delight in these ‘memorials of the past,’ and also to the town and neighbourhood, depriving them of an attraction that has induced many strangers of taste to pay them a visit.”