pieces, thirteenpenny-halfpenny pieces, and the like: but nevertheless the devil's proposals seemed so very advantageous that, notwithstanding the difficulty there would be in reckoning the money, the old woman could not avoid complying with it, as she imagined the removal of the stones by a single man would be a work of almost infinite time, and that she should be able to tell as much money while it should be about as would make her as rich as a princess. But the bargain was no sooner made, and she had no sooner laid her fingers on a fourpennyhalfpenny coin, than the devil, with an audible voice, cried out, Hold!' and 'The stones are gone!' The old woman, disregarding what he said however, peeped out into her back-yard, and to her great amazement it was even so as Satan had spoken; for the common deceiver of mankind in an instant took down the stones, bound them up in a wyth, and conveyed them to Salisbury Plain. But just before he got to Mount Ambre the wyth slackened, and as he was crossing the river Avon at Bulford one of the stones dropped down into the water, where it lies to this very hour; the rest were immediately reared up on the spot of ground destined by Merlin for them and the devil, pleased with the accomplishment of his work, declared upon fixing the last stone that nobody should be ever able to tell how the fabric or any of the parts of which it is

:

composed came there. A friar who had lain all night concealed near the building, hearing the devil's declaration, replied to it by saying, "That is more than thee canst tell;" which put Satan into such a passion that he snatched up a pillar and hurled it at the friar with an intention to bruise him to dirt; but he running for his life, the stone in its fall only reached his heel and struck him on it; the mark of which appears in that pillar even unto this day, and is called "The Friar's Heel."1

In WALES, during the last century, they showed, says the Reverend John Price, in his account of Holyhead in Anglesey," the print of Kybi's foot in a rock by the east end of the chancel, till it was lately destroyed by Mr Ellis, fellow of Jesus College, Oxford, then curate of this place."

"2

IRELAND is fertile in monuments of this kind. Mr Crofton Croker narrates the legend of Cloughna-Cuddy, a stone in Lord Kenmare's park at Killarney, impressed with the mark of Father Cuddy's knees."3 The same sprightly gentleman describes the Clough-a-Regaun near Limerick : "That stone is far taller than the tallest man, and

1 A Description of Stonehenge on Salisbury Plain, p. 3-5. Salisbury, 1809.

2 Bibliotheca Topographica Britannica, No. x. p. 7. Lond. 1783.

3 Killarney Legends, p. 62. Lond. 1831.

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the power of forty men would fail to move it from the spot where it fell. Deeply imprinted in it is still to be seen the marks of the fingers of the hag Grana."

In SCANDINAVIA is a rock on which may be traced the large footsteps of Olaf Tryggvason, as plainly as if he had trodden on the newly fallen snow.2

IN GERMANY there is such another rock at Hei

delberg, as a friend informs me; a second near Vienna; and a third somewhere on the Danube.

In ITALY, near the monastery of Vallombrosa is a stone, on which is the figure of Saint John Gualbert, the founder of the religious order of Vallis Umbrosa. The legend is, that while the saint was praying on the top of a neighbouring precipice he was seized by the devil and cast down on a rock with such violence that it was impressed with the mark of his body. This incident seems to have escaped the Reverend Mr Butler's notice: according to him, the monk having most devoutly received the last sacraments, died happily on the 12th of July in 1073, being seventy-four years old.3

Captain Slidel saw in the cathedral of Toledo in

1 Croker's Fairy Legends of the South of Ireland, p. 320, edit. Lond. 1834.

2 Scripta Historica Islandorum de Rebus Gestis Veterum Borealium, t. i. p. 304. Hafniae, 1828.

3 Butler's Lives of the Saints, vol. ii. p. 53, edit. Dublin,

SPAIN a stone on which it is said the Blessed Virgin alighted, and which retains the impression of her feet, although now much worn by the hands of the faithful who touch it with the ends of their fingers when grieved by disease or affliction.1

In FRANCE, at the church of Saint Radegonde in Poitou, is a stone which bears the print of our Saviour's foot. In the same district is another on which the mare of Saint Jouin indented her hoof one day when her holy rider was sorely vexed by the devil.2 That respectable personage himself has left the prints of the soles of his feet and of his hinder parts on a rock near Hambert in Maine ;3 and in the department of Charente is a rock bearing the mark of the slipper of Saint Mary Magdalen. "Cette empreinte," says an unbelieving modern, "ressemble en effet médiocrement à celle d'un pied droit de grandeur moyenne; mais l'observateur raisonnable n'y voit qu'un jeu de la nature, dont l'illusion a été probablement favorisée par les meuniers des environs, qui se seront amusés à perfectionner à coups de marteau ce qui se trouvait naturellement ébauché."4

1 A Year in Spain by a Young American, vol. ii. p. 36. Lond. 1831.

2 Mém. de S. R. des Antiq. de France, t. viii. p. 454, 3 Id. p. 256.

4 Id. t. vii. p. 43.

Of all the countries on the earth PALESTINE has the richest store of such relics. In the mosque of Saint Omar at Jerusalem is a stone bearing the print of the angel Gabriel's fingers and the prophet Mahomet's foot;1 and in the church which crowns the Mount of Olives is preserved a fragment of rock imprinted with the mark of our Saviour's foot while in the act of ascension.2 Sir John Mandeville describes many others, such as a rock on Mount Sinai impressed with the figure of Moses; a rock in the valley of Jehoshaphat retaining the footsteps of the ass on which Christ rode into Jerusalem; a rock at Gethsemane marked with the print of His hand; and a rock near Nazareth imprinted with His footsteps.3 Travellers in the seventeenth century were shown in Jerusalem "the house of Annas, where our Saviour being hurried with violence down a steep place, to prevent falling He laid hold of the corner of a wall, where there is a place in one of the stones fit for a man's hand, which the monks think a great miracle; and Simon the Pharisee's house, where there is a stone with the print of a foot which they say our Saviour made when He stood to pardon Mary Magdalen her sins; and St

1 Bishop Russell's Palestine, p. 174. Edin. 1832. 2 Id. p. 216. Minuter relations say the left foot. 3 Mandeville, in Hakluyt, pp. 33, 38, 39, 41. Lond. 1589.