man Ocean near Trouphead.
Gradually it rises to a noble arched cavern, at the end of which is the
font cut into the stone, where it would catch the outpourings of a small
spring. When I saw it long years ago, it was filled with clear living
water, which, save when it had been the frugal drink of the poor
Jacobite refugee, had probably been scarcely disturbed since the early
day when heathen men and women went thither to throw off their idolatry
and enter the pale of Christendom. The unnoticeable smallness of many of
these consecrated wells makes their very reminiscence and still
semi-sacred character all the more remarkable. The stranger in Ireland
or the Highlands of Scotland hears rumours of a distinguished well
miles on miles off. He thinks he will find an ancient edifice over it,
or some other conspicuous adjunct. Nothing of the kind--he has been
lured all that distance over rock and bog to see a tiny spring bubbling
out of the rock, such as he may see hundreds of in a tolerable walk any
day. Yet, if he search in old topographical authorities, he will find
that the little well has ever been an important feature of the
district--that, century after century, it has been unforgotten; and,
with diligence, he may perhaps trace it to some incident in the life of
the saint, dead more than 1200 years ago, whose name it bears.
Highlanders still make pilgrimages to drink the waters of such
fountains, which they judiciously mix with the other aqua to which they
are attached. They sometimes mimic the spirit of the old pilgrimage, by
leaving behind them an offering at the fountain. I have seen such
offerings by the brink of remote Highland springs, as well as in
Ireland. The market value of them would not afford an alarming estimate
of the intensity of the superstition still lingering in this form in the
land. The logic of the depositors probably suggests, that the spiritual
guardians of the fountain, though amenable to flattery and propitiation
by gift, are not really well informed about the market value of worldly
chattels, and are easily put off with rubbish.

A historical inquiry into the worship or consecration of wells and
other waters would be interesting. In countries near the tropics, where
sandy deserts prevail, a well must ever have been a thing of momentous
importance; and we find among the tribes of Israel the digging down a
well spoken of as the climax of reckless, heartless, and awful
destructiveness. To find, how