Minor Queries with Answers.
Ruin near St. Asaph, North Wales.—About two miles from St. Asaph, in Flintshire, near to a beautiful trout stream, called, I think, the Elway, stands an old ruin of some ecclesiastical edifice. There is not very much of it now standing, but the form of the windows still exists. I have in vain looked in handbooks of the county for an account of it, but I have seen none that allude to it in any way. It is very secluded, being hidden by trees; and can only be approached by a footpath. In the centre of the edifice, there is a well of most beautiful water, supplied from some hidden spring; and from the bottom of which bubbles of gas are constantly ascending to the surface. The well is divided by a large stone into two parts, one evidently intended for a bath. The peasantry in the neighbourhood call it the Virgin Mary's Well, and ascribe the most astonishing cures to bathing in its waters. I could not, however, find out what it was. Some said it was a nunnery, and that the field adjoining had been a burial-ground; but all seemed remarkably ignorant about it, and seemed rather to avoid speaking about it; but, from what I could gather, there was some wild legend respecting it: but, being unacquainted with the language, I could not learn what it was. I should feed obliged if any of your correspondents could give me a description of it, and any information or legend connected with it. Near to it are the celebrated "Kaffen Rocks," which
show undoubted evidence, from the shells and shingle embedded in their strata, of having at some period been submerged; and the caverns which exist in them are very large, and bones of hyenas and other animals are to be found in them. They are, however, very difficult to find without a guide, and there are very few persons in the neighbourhood who seem to know anything about them. They are very well worthy of a visit, and the surrounding scenery is beautiful in the extreme. I shall be happy to put any person in the way of finding them, should a desire be expressed in your pages.
Investigator.
Manchester.
[This is Fynnon Vair, or "the Well of Our Lady," situated in a richly-wooded dell near the river Elwy, in the township of Wigvair. This well, which is inclosed in a polygonal basin of hewn stone, beautifully and elaborately sculptured, discharges about 100 gallons per minute: the water is strongly impregnated with lime, and was formerly much resorted to as a cold bath. Adjoining the well are the ruins of an ancient cruciform chapel, which, prior to the Reformation, was a chapel of ease to St. Asaph, in the later style of English architecture: the windows, which are of handsome design, are now nearly concealed by the ivy which has overspread the building; and the ruin, elegant in itself, derives additional interest from the beauty of its situation. See Lewis's Wales, and Beauties of England and Wales, vol. xvii. p. 550.]
Wafers.—When and where were wafers invented? They were no new discovery when Labat saw some at Genoa in 1706; but from a passage in his Voyages d'Espagne et Italie, published in 1731, it would appear that they were even then unknown in France. A writer in the Quarterly Review says:
"We have in our possession letters with the wafers still adhering, which went from Lisbon to Rome twenty years before that time; and Stolberg observes that there are wafers and wafer-seals in the museum at Portici."
Abhba.