334< Mr. Brayley, Jun., on the alleged 



How far the Druids, or other sacerdotal orders among our 

 more remote ancestors, may have appropriated these results 

 of atmospheric action to their own purposes, — how far it may 

 be true of the officiating Druid, that, 



" to wondering crowds 



And ignorant, with guileful hand he rocked 

 The yielding Logan" — * 



is a distinct question ; and one into which it is unnecessary 

 here to enter. 



But the writer has found that other antiquarian friends 

 are unwilling to resign, altogether, that notion of the origin 

 of these excavations, which, in the hands of Dr. Borlase and 

 his compeers, has given rise to so imposing a pageant of the 

 ceremonies of Druidism : They are still desirous of attributing 

 to the " Druid" the skill by which 



" the rocks 



That crest the grove-crowned hill he scooped, to hold 

 The lustral waters."f 



It may not be out of place, therefore, to state briefly the re- 

 sults of an examination, made in the autumn of the year 

 1825, of the rock-basins upon the tors or earns which crown 

 the summit of Carnbrea Hill, near Redruth, in Cornwall ; 

 the granite of which is part of the same formation as that of 

 Dartmoor. 



This examination verified every part of Dr. Macculloch's 

 statement, with the exception that the sides of the basins did not 

 appear to be crumbly ; while several minor facts were ascer- 

 tained, which, though not adverted to in Dr. Macculloch's pa- 

 per, are nevertheless entirely confirmatory of his opinion. Thus 

 it was found that wherever the form of the cavity, and the di- 

 rection and inclination of the surfaces of the rock, were such 

 as to have admitted the water to remain for the longest space 

 of time, in those situations the basins are always deeper than 

 in others ; and that where the water has escaped from one 

 basin to another situated below it, a passage has been worn, 

 which in some cases has nearly converted the two basins into 

 one. In one instance, the thickness of an immense slab of 

 granite, much resembling that which Borlase calls the " Sa- 

 crificing Stone," having on its upper surface six or seven 

 rock-basins, has been cut through in several places; and the 

 continuation of the process which formed the basins will 

 eventually divide the slab into several blocks. In this man- 

 ner many of the basins have been destroyed, by the process 

 which originally produced them. The side of one basin has 



* Carrington's " Dartmoor." f Ibid. 



been 



