In striking contrast to this was the water afterwards brought through
the district from a watershed on the distant Welsh hills, which depended
for its supply almost entirely on the downfall from the clouds. The
difference between that and the water from the Roman well was very
marked, for while the rainwater was very soft, the other that contained
the lime was very hard, and therefore considered more conducive to the
growth of the bones in children. Our personal experiences also with the
water at Inverness, and in the neighbourhood of Buxton in the previous
year, which affected us in a similar way, convinced us that water
affected human beings very markedly; and then we had passed by Harrogate
and Leamington, where people were supposed to go purposely to drink the
waters. Even the water of the tin-mining district through which we were
now passing might contain properties that were absent elsewhere, and the
special virtues attributed to some of the Saints' Wells in Cornwall in
olden times might not have been altogether mythical.
Besides the four Stannary towns in Devon there were originally four in
Cornwall, including Liskeard, where all tin mined in their respective
districts had to be weighed and stamped.
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