Here are strange-coloured rocks, and richest keel, in which lie bedded 
     
     fossils of a former time; here grows our native shamrock, "rabbit clover" if you 
     
     will, one of the stray oxalis plants that flourishes in shady nooks; here lichens 
     
     fasten on dead trunks or spread themselves amongst the moss; while down below the 
     
     seething punch pours into a dark hole, beneath a grimy arch of mud stained—snow; 
     
     to rise again in tainted springs down in the murky gorge beyond. 
     
    

    
     The fascination of the scene leaves me; I am sated, and remember that I must 
     
     climb out again; for though I be sometimes a dreamer, - stern duties await me; 
     
    

    
     I had a leisure hour; I enjoyed it heartily, but now I must to work again, - I 
     
     must climb out, but how? 
     
    

    
     "Facilis est descensus Averni." 
     
     but it is a different matter when one would leave the bowl; down showered rain 
     
     and muddy snow to baffle every effort, dead branches broke at touch, my footing 
     
     slipped; I thought of dripping caverns down below, where punch in puncheons 
     
     surged beneath the snow; then, bending to my toil, I raised myself grimy and 
     
     soaked, like gorgon from the pit, until above I breathed free air again, and found 
     
     the silence sweeter than before, since new arriving songsters tuned their voice 
     
     to swell their cheerful morning song "Rejoice." 
     
    

    
     JEREMIAH S. CLARK 
     
    
   
   
    
       
     
    
   
   
    
     NOTE. - The Devil‘s Punch-bowl received its name from a tradition related to me 
     
     with fullest detail by the late William Hawkins. His father, John Hawkins, was 
     
     hauling a puncheon of rum from Charlottetown to Darnley, by the Old Malpeque 
     
     Road. It was before the days of "wheeled carriages," and Mr. Hawkins had the 
     
     precious liquid lashed to the two drag-poles which were attached by a sort of 
     
     collar to the horse's neck. 
     
    

    
     Imagine him, painfully dragging his load along over stumps and cradle—hills, 
     
     past the seven-mile—house, ten—mile hill, Hazel Grove, and on until when he came 
     
     to the turn in the road just above the Punch-bowl; here the lower drag—pole 
     
     slipped into the hole, and, breaking away from its lashings, the puncheon of 
     
     rum tumbled down the sheer precipice, crashing through the thick undergrowth, 
     
     until it lay far down in the depths below. There are various traditions, but 
     
     Mr. H. assured me that he often heard his father tell how he "swamped" a road 
     
     around to the defile, and, taking his horse into the depths, loaded the unbroken 
     
     hogshead single-handed, and went on his way to Darnley. 
     
    

    
     Evidently a council of demons had decreed that the stuff would accomplish 
     
     its mission more directly if trucked to its destination than if poured out 
     
     amongst the slime and creepy things of the horrible pit. Who shall say that 
     
     Hawkins toiled unaided when he raised that ten—men's-load, and bound it to its 
     
     place a century ago? 
     
    
   
   
    
     i * * * * * * * i * * * * * * * * * * 'k * 
     
    
   
   
    
     EDITOR'S NOTE. - The original Devil's Punch Bowl is a lake in Ireland near the 
     
     summit of Mangerton Mountain in County Kerry. It is five miles south of 
     
     Killarney, which uses it as a water supply. The lake is thought to be the 
     
     crater of an ancient volcano. 
     
    
   
   
    
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