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,
“Water, water, tell me truly,
Is the man I love duly
On the earth, or under the sod,
Sick or well,—in the name of God?”
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:—
“A well there is in the west country,
And a clearer one never was seen;
There is not a wife in the west country
But has heard of the Well of St Keyne.
“An oak and an elm-tree stand beside,
And behind doth an ash-tree grow,
And a willow from the bank above
Droops to the water below.”
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.
“Plunge thy right hand in St Madron’s spring,
If true to its troth be the palm you bring;
But if a false digit thy fingers bear,
Lay them at once on the burning share.”
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”:—
“You neighbour scorners, holy, proud,
Goe people Roache’s cell,
Far from the world and neer to the heavens;
There hermitts may you dwell.
“Is’t true the springe in rock hereby
Doth tidewise ebb and flowe?
Or have we fooles with lyars met?
Fame says its, be it soe.”
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.