he purpose; and as if he had been taking his dram in a
modern gin-palace, we are told that the drinking-glass, or glass
drinking-vessel, "vitrea bibera," which he was conveying to his lips,
was smashed in pieces, and he himself seized with deadly sickness.
Columba sends the consecrated pebble, with a prescription that the water
in which it is dipped is to be drunk. If, before he drinks, Broichan
releases his slave, he is to recover; if not, he dies. The Magus
complies, and is saved. The consecrated stone, which had the quality of
floating in water like a nut, was afterwards, as we are told, preserved
in the treasury of the king of the Picts. It has been lost to the world,
along with the saint's white robe and his consecrated banner, both of
which performed miracles after his death. But the sanitary influence
attributed to the water in which consecrated stones have been dipped, is
a superstition scarcely yet uprooted in Scotland.

Sermons in Stones.

One of the clubs has lately deviated from the printing of letterpress,
which is the established function of clubs, into pictorial art. As it
threatens to repeat the act on a larger scale, it is proposed to take a
glance at the result already afforded, in order that it may be seen
whether it is a failure, or a success opening up a new vein for club
enterprise. In distributing a set of pictorial prints among its members,
the club in question may be supposed to have invaded the art-unions: but
its course is in another direction, since its pictures are entirely
subservient to archaeology. The innovator in question is the Spalding
Club, which has already distributed among its adherents a collection of
portraits of the sculptured stones in Scotland, and now proposes to do
the same by the early architectural remains of the north. In giving
effect to such a design, it will produce something like Dugdale's
Monasticon and the great English county histories.

If that which is to be done shall rival that which the club has
achieved, it will be worthy of all honour. No one can open the book of
The Sculptured Stones without being almost overwhelmed with astonishment
at the reflection that they are not monuments excavated in Egypt, or
Syria, or Mexico, but have stood before the light of day in village
churchyards, or in marketplaces, or by waysides throughout our own
country. As you pass on, the eye becomes almost tired with the endless
succession of grim and ghastly human figure