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CHAPTER II.

THE HOLY WELLS

S. Patrick in Ireland—A pagan holy well—S. Samson—Celtic saints very particular about the water they drank—S. Piran and S. Germoe—S. Erth and the goose-eggs—S. Sithney and the polluted well—Dropping of pins into wells—Hanging rags about—Well-chapel of S. Clether—Venton Ia—Jordan wells—Gwennap ceremony—Fice's well—Modern stupidity about contaminated water.

THE system adopted by S. Patrick in Ireland was that of making as little alteration as he could in the customs of the people, except only when such customs were flatly opposed to the precepts of the gospel. He did not overthrow their lechs or pillar-stones; he simply cut crosses on them. When he found that the pagans had a holy well, he contented himself with converting the well into a baptistery. It is a question of judgment whether to wean people gently and by slow degrees from their old customs, or whether wholly to forbid these usages. S. Patrick must have known perfectly what the episcopal system was in Gaul, yet when he came into a land where the Roman territorial organisation had never prevailed, he accommodated Christian Church government to the conditions of Celtic tribal organisation.

He found that the Irish, like all other Celtic