Ethw. The Druid's cave, say'st thou? What cave is that?
Where is it? Who hath seen it? What scar'd fool
Has fill'd thine ears with all these horrid things?
Boy. It is a cavern vast and terrible,
Under the ground full deep; perhaps, my Lord,
Beneath our very feet, here as we stand;
For few do know the spot and centre of it,
Tho' many mouths it has and entries dark.
Some are like hollow pits bor'd thro' the earth,
O'er which the list'ning herdsman bends his ear,
And hears afar their lakes of molten fire
Swelt'ring and boiling like a mighty pot.
Some like straight passes thro' the rifted rocks,
From which oft' issue shrieks, and whistling gusts,
And wailings dismal. Nay, some, as they say,
Deep hollow'd underneath the river's bed,
Which shew their narrow op'nings thro' the fern
And tangling briars, like dank and noisome holes
Wherein foul adders breed. But not far hence
The chiefest mouth of ail, 'midst beetling rocks
And groves of blasted oaks, gapes terrible.
Ethw. So near? But who are they who dwell within?
Boy. The female high arch Druid therein holds,*[1]
With many Druids tending on her will,
- ↑ * It is natural to suppose that the Diviners or Fortune-tellers of this period should, in their superstitions and pretensions, very much resemble the ancient Druidesses who were so much revered amongst the Britons as oracles and prophetesses, and that they should, amongst the vulgar, still retain the name of
