of the Orne, owes the discovery of the virtue of
its waters to a horse. An old animal suffering
from disease of the skin and covered with
sores, was turned into a valley, surrounded
by rocks, and abandoned to its fate. Two
months afterwards, on its master passing
the end of the valley, a fat and healthy
horse came trotting towards him familiarly
and turned out to be his once sick old
servant. He thereupon watched its proceedings,
and presently saw it roll in mud
surrounded by green marshy vegetation. On
draining the marsh, springs of hot water
limpid and abundant, were revealed. Brutes
are perverse, as usual. When did a flight of
pigeons, or a cow, or an old horse introduce
even a single patient to me, Julep, who am
both a surgeon and apothecary. If a sheep
were to come into my surgery day after day
to fatten on my pills, what might I not hope
from the observation of the neighbours, if
that sheep were but visibly to fatten! Could
not I train a sheep to come, and physic him
clandestinely with turnips ? By a young
surgeon in search of practice this question is
worth considering.

So, the thermal sulphurous springs of
Barèges, are said to have been discovered
through a sheep having been seen to traverse
the snows every morning to the springs.
The anecdote of the discovery of Karlsbad
has been often told:— A stag, flying before
the Emperor Charles the Fourth and his
huntsmen, plunged through a thin crust into
thermal waters, which were made baths for
the emperor, and restored him to health.

As to the characteristics of the mineral
waters of this country, there is, as Doctor
Glover has pointed out, a decided difference
in the character of the northern and southern
mineral springs of England. In the north,
sulphur-waters prevail; in the south, the
sulphated saline-waters are more common.
But chalybeate and saline springs are to be
found, more's the pity, in all parts of England.
The opposition shop delivers its goods,
carriage free, all over England, and yet has
not so much as a boy to pay for carrying a
basket. Patients, however, may find the
devil to pay if they drink those waters without
due advice.

The most northerly of the English spas is
Gilsland, which is situated on the river
Irthing, near the opening of high, barren
moorlands upon the cultivated vale of Eden.
Adjacent to the line of the Roman wall, it is
near to scenes famed in Border story, and
to a country of historical, as well as
picturesque, attractions; and, at Naworth, near
this spot, Lord William Howard, the Belted
Will of Marmion, had his stronghold; and
ruling there, he crushed the moss-troopers in
their last retreat. Who can hold out against
such an opposition? I've no Belted Wills,
and no mosstrooping stories to fetch people
with. I hang out a red light, and I do think
the public takes it for a danger signal!

Burdoswald, too, a fine specimen of a
Roman camp, is near Gilsland; and the place
has received in recent times more gentle
associations; for here, as the reader will
remember, Scott first met the lady who became
his bride; and near Gilsland, scenes in The
Bridal of Triermain, and a portion of Guy
Mannering are accordingly laid. Sulphur
in the form of sulphuret of sodium exists in
this spa— an ingredient to the existence of
which in mineral waters of the Pyrenees
great importance has been attached.

Scarborough, fondly called The Northern
Brighton and the Queen of English spas, has
predominant advantages in its situation,
sheltered as it is by high cliffs overlooking a
fine bay, and surrounded by noble marine-
scenery. It is, moreover, adjacent to a
beautiful country full of interest to the naturalist
and the historian. The medicinal properties
of the Scarborough waters, which are
valuable saline chalybeates, seem to have been
discovered in sixteen hundred and twenty-
one.

At Filey, too, the rising and attractive
neighbour of Scarborough, there is a water
highly charged with alterative salts.

Of inland spas, Harrogate is not surpassed
in the whole island for the power and variety
of its mineral waters, which have the
additional advantage of rising in a healthy and
interesting country. Advantage forsooth!
Everything brings capital to that shop. Fine
joke it would be to twit me with the advantage
or the chance I have of rising in a
healthy country. The strength of Low
Harrogate is in the sulphur wells, the
discovery of which dates from the year
fifteen hundred and sixty-one (at which time
this now fashionable place was a remote
hamlet in the forest of Knaresborough); and
it also affords an almost pure muriated water,
which has sulphuretted hydrogen for its most
active ingredient.

As Professor Phillips has remarked, the
many wells of Low Harrogate may have their
local origin determined mainly by the
anticlinal axis of strata which may be traced in
the higher ground west of Harrogate,
between the millstone-grit ranges of Rigton
and Birkscrag, which dip in opposite directions.
The existence of chalybeate waters
is, of course, common enough; but the
sulphuretted water of Harrogate, loaded with
common salt, indicates a deep-seated spring
rising under peculiar circumstances. The
Old Well is, in fact, a salt spring with traces
of iodine and bromine, as in sea-water. The
difference between it and adjacent springs
in the proportion of sulphates especially,
seems to be attributable to the different channels
through which they reach the surface.
The only deficiency of the Harrogate waters
is, that they are not thermal, nor are they
aërated by much carbonic acid.

The powerful saline springs of Cheltenham,
which likewise are aperient and alterative,