252 FISHING GOSSIP. 
to which if you lay your ear, you shall hear, as it 
were, the noise of smiths at work, one-while blowing 
the bellows, another-while striking of sledge and 
hammer ; sometimes the sound of a grindstone and 
iron tools rubbing against it, also the hissing sparks 
of goads from the furnace.” Can this be Vulcan 
forging the bolts of Jove, with which tradition states 
that Neptune once armed Britannia’s hand for a 
highly patriotic purpose ? 
Endless are the springs we meet with that “ freeze 
in the hottest weather and are hot in winter,” and 
lakes which seem to ‘possess some irritable Genius who 
does not like the throwing of stones, for we read of 
two or three, “the which, if a pebble is cast into 
them, they raise storms of hail, lightning, and 
thunder.” Waters, “which have the most marvellous 
and rapid effect in petrifying all that they come in 
contact with,” are also to be found—at least in books. 
Collier mentions that “Chatri Columbe, a tailor’s wife 
in Burgundy, accidentally drank of some of these 
waters after she was married, the result of which 
was, that her first child, a daughter, when born, was 
discovered to be a perfectly-formed petrifaction. She 
lived in the time of Henry ITI. of England.” 
Of waters which, for some occult reason or other, 
prefer a subterranean channel, the examples also are 
very numerous if we are to believe these old his- 
torians :— 
