s of life."

Mrs. Macaulay,[42] speaking of a consecrated well in St. Kilda, called
Tobirnimbuadh, or the spring of diverse virtues, says that "near the
fountain stood an altar, on which the distressed votaries laid down
their oblations. Before they could touch sacred water with any
prospect of success, it was their constant practice to address the
genius of the place with supplication and prayer. No one approached
him with empty hands.... Shells and pebbles, rags of linen or stuffs
worn out, pins, needles, or rusty nails were generally all the tribute
that was paid."

Collinson[43] mentions a well in the parish Wembton, called St. John's
Well, to which in 1464 "an immense concourse of people resorted: and
... many who had for years labored under various bodily diseases, and
had found no benefit from physick and physicians, were, by the use of
these waters (after paying their due offerings), restored to their
primitive health."

Brome, in his _Travels_, 1700, observes: "In Lothien, two miles from
Edinburg southward, is a spring called St. Katherine's Well, flowing
continually with a kind of black fatness, or oil, above the water,
proceeding (as it is thought) from the parret coal, which is frequent
in these parts; 'tis of a marvellous nature, for as the coal, whereof
it proceeds, is very apt quickly to kindle into a flame, so is the
oil of a sudden operation to heal all scabs and tumors that trouble
the outward skin, and the head and hands are speedily healed by virtue
of this oil, which retains a very sweet smell; and at Aberdeen is
another well very efficacious to dissolve the stone, to expel sand
from the reins and bladder, being good for the collick and drunk in
July and August, not inferiour, they report, to the Spaw in
Germany."[44]

Grose tells us of a well dedicated to St. Oswald, between the towns of
Alton and Newton. The neighbors have the opinion that a sick person's
shirt thrown into the well will prognosticate the outcome of the
disease; if it floats the sick one will recover, if it sinks he will
die. To reward the saint for the information, they tear a rag off the
shirt and hang it on the briers near by; "where," says the writer, "I
have seen such numbers as might have made a fayre rheme in a
paper-myll." Similar practices are related by other authors. Ireland
formerly had a sanctified well in nearly every parish. They were
marked by rude crosses and surrounded by fragments of cloth left as
memorials