[54]
A well adjoining to Bolton Hall still retains his name. He is said to
have ordered it to be dug and walled round for a bath; and it is much
venerated by the country people to this day, who fancy that many
remarkable cures have been wrought there.
It is not generally recorded that the science of alchemy was much
encouraged by the royal visionary. Though he had commissioned three
adepts to make the precious metals, and had not received any returns,
his credulity remained unshaken, and he issued a pompous grant in favour
of three other alchemists, who boasted that they could not only
transmute metals, but could impart perpetual youth, with unimpaired
powers both of mind and body, by means of a specific called the _Mother
and Queen of Medicines, the Celestial Glory, the Quintessence or Elixir
of Life._ In favour of these "three lovers of the truth, and haters of
deception," as they styled themselves, Henry dispensed with the law
passed by his grandfather, Henry IV., against the undue multiplication
of gold and silver, and empowered them to transmute the precious metals.
This extraordinary commission had the sanction of Parliament; and two
out of the three adepts were the heads of Lancashire families--viz.
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