EXTRAORDINARY CURES AT HOLYWELL.

New Zealand Tablet, Volume XXI, Issue 23, 5 October 1894, Page 8

EXTRAORDINARY CURES AT HOLYWELL.

{Catholic Times, August 17.)

Wondebs are multiplying fast here, writes a special correspondent from Holywell. Bach day sees a new care, or brings record of some recent one till now unknown. The town is literally packed with the pilgrims or visitors, large numbers of whom are from Lancishire. It is no exaggeration to say that hundreds collect daily at tha holy well to offer their prayers and petitions. On Sunday night was seen a sight fit to gladden any Catholic heart. The hundreds of pilgrims formed a procession round the well, bearing aloft the statues of Our Lady and St Winefride, uniting in a grand chorus of hymn and prayer, while their lighted tapers shed a bright if weird light on the time-worn shrine of St Winefride. Many a fervent prayer is offered up here for the conversion of England, and if miracles are required to effect that great end, assuredly God is already granting them. See the record for the last ten daya :— Sanday, August 5, Eliza Taylor completely and instantaneously cured of, it wou.d seem an internal complaint which had vexed her for fourteen years. On Tuesday two men recovered each the sight of an eye— the latter after 11 years deprivation, merely by the application of the water to

the eye. This occurred while the Nottingham pilgrims and their good Bishop were praying at the well. On Wednesday, a girl aged 20, who had been deaf for miny years, recovered her hearing at the completion of a novena. Two other deaf people partially regained their hearing about the same time. On Thursday was published the account of the wonderful cure of Mr Egan, of St Helens, aged 72 who afW a fortnight spent at H jlywell, w*9 cured of a bad rupture from which ho had suff jred'forover fifty years. On Friday was received a letter from a woman who had been staying at Holywell stating that she was cured of asthma after suffering from it for thirty years. On Saturday anoiher woman, a victim for twelve years to a painful internal diseage of the nature of a cancer, and who avers that scarce a day ever saw her free from pair., found herself cured aid free from all pain after three baths in ths Well. On Monlay a chad of six years, whose right arm and hand hid be^n cramped and incipable of flexible motion, received suppleness in the limb whist he bathed in the water. These are hire statements of facts. It is impossible to give proofs here and now, but it is eg lally impossible to doubt the veracity and convictions of the fortunate recipients of these favours. And there are many more that might bj added to the list.

Another correspondent describing the scene on Sunday night says : At the close of the service in the church the congregation proceeded to the well, the precincts of which ware speedily crowded. A strange feature of the proceedings was the presence of a number of cripples seeking cures, sjme being so bad tbat they had ro be carried down into the well, the dim recesses of which were illuminated by the lighted candles carried by hundreds of pilgrims. Over the basin into which the spring rises was suspended a huge coronal, full of lighted candles. The procession marched round the well singing hymns, and devotions were said. Father Beauclerk, BJ. afterwards recapitulated the "favours" conferred by St Winefride during tha past week, and said that ha had received a letter from a priest at Wigan stating that the woman from there who was cured at the well the preceding Sunday, after fourteen years' suff ring, was now as well as ever, and that a doctor had certified as to tha genuineness of the cure.

A St Helens correspondent writes : Mr Joseph EgaD, who has for many years carried on the business of a marine store dealer and scrap iroo merchant ia St Helens, and who resides with hie daughter at 76, Claughton street in tbat town, states that as the result of a visit to Holywell he bas been marvellously cured of a serious rupture He had been attended by a number of medical men at different times, and only a few years ago he was examined by Dr Bellew, of St Helens. He determined to go to Holywel), aod went there on 'the 18 th July. He took lodgings in Well street, and each day he went

to St Wmefride's Well, where he joined in the prayers and bathed in the waters. While there he felt stronger each day, and he returned to Bt Helens on the 28th July. He was thankful to God, and all he desired in making it public was to get others who were suffering like him to go to the well ; in plain words, he wanted to do a good turn to hia neighbours. The correspondent tben called upon Dr Bellew at his surgery in Oottam street, with a view to further testing the statement. Dr Bellew said he had never known a person of the years of Mr Bgan, who was so Beriously ruptured, to recover under surgical treatment. On being asked if there was efficacy at Holywell, Dr Bellew, who is also a Catholic, said he had no doubt there was effi. cacy there. He had been to Lourdes, and had seen wonderful cures, and he had also been to Holywell. Mr E?an, it need scarcely be Baid, is overjoyed at his restoration to health and strength, and is prepared to personally state the circumstances to any person.