In England, among the cataracts which merit a brief mention, may be cited the one in Devonshire, near the spot where the Tamer receives the small river Lid. The water there falls above a hundred feet: it proceeds from a mill at some distance, and after a course on a descent of nearly one hundred feet from the level of the mill, reaches the brink of the precipice, whence it falls in a most beautiful and picturesque manner, and, striking on a part of the cliff, rushes from it in a wider cataract to the bottom; where falling again with great violence, it makes a deep and foaming basin in the ground. This fine sheet of water causes the surrounding air at the bottom to be so impregnated with aqueous particles, that those who approach it find themselves in a mist. In Cumberland there are several cataracts; but these are exceeded in beauty by a remarkable fall of the Tees, on the western side of the county of Durham, over which is a bridge suspended by chains, seldom passed unless by the adventurous miners. Asgarth force, in Yorkshire, is likewise a very interesting fall.
In Scotland, the fall of Eyers, near Loch Ness, is a vast cataract, in a darksome glen of a stupendous depth. The water rushes beneath, through a narrow gap between two rocks, and thence precipitating itself more than forty feet lower into the bottom of the chasm, the foam, like a great cloud of smoke, rises and fills the air. The sides of this glen are stupendous precipices, blended with trees overhanging the water, through which, after a short space, the waters discharge themselves into the lake. About half a mile to the south of this fall, is another which passes through a narrow chasm, whose sides it has undermined for a considerable distance. Over the gap is a true alpine bridge, formed of the trunks of trees covered with sods, from the middle of which is an awful view of the water roaring beneath. In Perthshire, the river Keith presents a very considerable cataract, the noise produced by which is so violent as to stun those who approach it. The western coast of Ross-shire is, however, peculiarly distinguished by these natural wonders, among which may be cited the grand cataract of the river Kirkag, and the cascade of Glamma, which latter being situated amid the constant obscurity of woody hills, is truly sublime.
In Ireland, the noble river Shannon has a prodigious cataract, which, at about fifty miles from its mouth, prevents it from being longer navigable for vessels of a large burden.
SPRINGS AND WELLS.
ST. WINIFRED’S WELL.
Holywell, in Flintshire, is famous for St. Winifred’s well, one of the finest springs in the world. On account of the sanctity in which it was holden, it gave name to the town. This well pours out, each minute, twenty-one tuns of water, which, running to the middle of the town, down the side of a hill, is made use of by every house as it passes, after which it turns several mills, and is employed in various manufactures, which greatly increase the population of the place and its neighborhood. Over the spring, where a handsome bath has been erected, is a neat chapel, supported by pillars, and on the windows are painted the chief events of St. Winifred’s (or, as it was anciently written, Wenefrede’s) life. About the well grows moss, which the ignorant and superstitious devotees most stupidly imagine to be St. Winifred’s hair. This saint is reported to have been a virgin martyr, who lived in the seventh century, and, as the legend says, was ravished and beheaded in this place by a pagan tyrant; the spring having miraculously risen from her blood. Hence this bath was much frequented by popish pilgrims, out of devotion, as well as by those who came to bathe in it for medicinal purposes. Mr. Pennant says, “The custom of visiting this well in pilgrimage, and offering up devotions there, is not yet entirely laid aside: in the summer a few are to be seen in the water, in deep devotion, up to their chins for hours, sending up their prayers, or performing a number of evolutions round the polygonal well.”
It might have been supposed that the present enlightened age would have been secure against a repetition of impostures of this kind; but Doctor Milner, a Catholic bishop, of Wolverhampton, took much pains to persuade the world that an ignorant proselyte, of the name of Winefrid White, was there cured of various chronic diseases, so late as the year 1804, by a miracle. Sir Richard Phillips, having, in the Monthly Magazine, referred this pretended miracle to the known effect of strong faith on ignorant minds, in any proposed means of cure, was attacked by the Catholic clergy for his incredulity; but in number three hundred and two, of the Monthly Magazine, he replies in the following words.
“We have no doubt whatever that Winefrid White was cured by her journey to Holywell, and by bathing in the wonderful natural spring at that place; but we are not credulous enough to believe that her cure was effected by any antagonist properties of the water to the cause of her disease; nor impious enough so to sport with eternal omnipotence, as to assert that a capricious suspension of the laws of nature took place for this purpose. On the contrary, we believe that the poor woman was cured by causes well known to every medical practitioner, and proved in hundreds of recorded instances; that is to say, by her faith in the means proposed for her cure, wrought to the highest pitch by her religion, and by the assurances of those to whom she was accustomed to defer. We think, nevertheless, that the publication of this ‘case of Winefrid White,’ savors strongly of religious empiricism, and is exactly analogous to the ‘cases of cure’ which we every day see advertised in all the newspapers. We refrain from treating the subject theologically, yet it appears to us that Matthew xxiv. 24, proves that ‘signs and wonders’ are not only no evidence of divine interposition, but may be used even by ‘false prophets, so as to deceive the very elect.’ The continuance of miraculous powers will be found, we suspect, to depend on other circumstances than the date of the year. They disappear wherever the printing-press begins to be freely used, and, by its agency, fixes all the circumstances that attend them; and they still continue to flourish wherever the history of the circumstances depends for any period on traditional evidence. Miracles are, therefore, performed in abundance, even in our days, among the negroes, the Hottentots, the Caffres, the Tartars, the South Sea islanders, and the Indians of the two Americas. The last we believe on record are to be found in the Hon. M. Elphinstone’s published embassy to Cabul in 1808: he states that the sick were carried after him many days’ journey; and, at page twenty-eight, he says: ‘Some thought we could raise the dead; and there was a story current, that we had made and animated a wooden ram at Mooltaun; that we had sold him as a ram; and that it was not till the purchaser began to eat him, that the material of which he was made was discovered.’ We forbear to press the subject further.”
WIGAN WELL.
About a mile from Wigan, in Lancashire, is a spring, the water of which burns like oil. On applying a lighted candle to the surface, a large flame is suddenly produced, and burns vigorously. A dishful of water having been taken up at the part whence the flame issues, and a lighted candle held to it, the flame goes out; notwithstanding which the water in this part boils and rises up like water in a pot on the fire, but does not feel warm on introducing the hand. What is still more extraordinary, on making a dam, and preventing the flowing of fresh water to the ignited part, that which was already there having been drained away, a burning candle being applied to the surface of the dry earth at the same point where the water before burned, the fumes take fire, and burn with a resplendent light, the cone of the flame ascending a foot and a half from the surface of the earth. It is not discolored, like that of sulphureous bodies, neither has it any manifest smell, nor do the fumes, in their ascent, betray any sensible heat. The latter unquestionably consist of inflammable air, or hydrogen gas; and it ought to be observed that the whole of the country about Wigan, for the compass of several miles, is underlaid with coal. This phenomenon may therefore be referred to the same cause which occasioned the dreadful explosion of Felling colliery; but in the present case, this destructive gas, instead of being pent up in the bowels of the earth, accompanies the water in its passage to the surface.