37
Chap. 6.]
ship stones, trees, and water, and make offerings to them. a In a manu-script written in the early part of the fifteenth Century, there is a humor-ous song, in which there is an allusion to this Superstition. Itbegins thus :
* The last tyine I the wel wokeSir John caghtme with a crolie,
He made me swere be bei and bokeI shuld not tel.’
Even so late as the seventeenth Century, people in Scotland were in thehabit of visiting wells, at which they performed numerous acts of Super-stition . Shaw, in his History of the Province of Moray, says that ‘heathencustoms were much practised among the people,’ and among them, he in-stances their ‘ performing pilgrimages to wells,’ and ‘ building chapels tofountains.’ b At the present time in some parts of England, remains ofwell worship are preserved, in the custom of performing annual proces-sions to them, decorating them with wreaths and chaplets of flowers,singing of hymns, and even reading a portion of the gospel as part of theceremonies.
These same customs gave rise to the numerous Tioly wells, which for-merly abounded throughout the old World, and the memory of many ofwhich is still preserved in names of towns. In the ehurch of Nanterre ,near Paris, the birth place of Saint Genevieve , is a well, by the water ofwhich, this patroness of the Parisians miraculously restored her blindmother and many others to sight! Breval ’s Eu. 307. Saint Winifred’swell in Flintshire, Eng. from its sacred character gave name to the townof Holywell. Mr. Pennant says, the custom of visiting this well in pil-grimage, and offering up devotions there, was not in his time entirely laidaside: “in the summer, a few are to be seen in the water, in deep devo-tion up to their chin for bours, sending up tlieir prayers, or performing anumber of evolutions round the polygonal well.” Even so late as 1804,a Roman catholic bishop of Wolverhampton, took much pains to persuadethe world, that an ignorant proselyte of his, named Winifred White wasmiraculously cured at this well of various chronic diseases !
The custom of ‘ house-warmmg’ is very ancient; the same ceremonies,were formerly performed on the completion of new wells.
CHAPTER VI.
Wells continued: Depth of ancient wells—In Hindostan—Well of Tyre—Carthagenian wells—Wellsin Groece, Herculaneum and Pompeii—Wells without curbs—Ancient laws to prevent accidents frompersons and animals falling into them—Sagacity and revenge of an elepliaut—Hylas—Archelausof Macedon—Thracian soldier andalady at Thebes—Wooden covers—Wells in Judea—Reasous fornot placing curbs round wells—Scythians—Arabs—Aquilius—Abraham—Hezekiah—David—Mardo-nius—Moses and the people of Edom—Burckhardt in Petra—Woman of Bahurim—Persian tradition—Ali, the fourth Caliph —Covering wells with large stones—Mahommedan tradition—Themistocles—Edicteof Greek emperors—Well at Heliopolis—Juvenal—Roman and Grecian curbs of marble—Capitals ofancient columns converted into curbs for wells.
A knowledge of the depth and other circumstances, relating to someancient wells, is necessary to a due Investigation of the various methodsof raising water from them. We cannot indeed form a correct judgmentof the latter, without some acquaintance with the former.
Ward’s Hiudoos, 342, 352. >> Hone’s Every Day Book, ii, 636, 685. Fosbroke, 684.