Lib. 3. nat. quast.] Empedocles thought
that Baths were made hote by fire, which the earth secretly conteineth in
many places, especially if the said fire bee vnder that ground where the
water passeth. And Pontanus writeth very learnedly concerning the Baian
Baths.
No maruell though from banke of Baian shore
hote Baths, or veines of skalding licour flow:
For Vulcans forge incensed euermore
doeth teach vs plaine, that heart of earth below
And bowels burne, and fire enraged glow.
From hence the flitting flood sends smokie streames,
And Baths doe boil with secret burning gleames.
I thought good in this placel to touch that which Saxo Grammaticus the most
famous historiographer of the Danes reporteth. That certaine fountains of
Island do somtime encrease & flow vp to the brinke: sometimes againe they
fall so lowe that you can skarse discerne them to be fountaines. Which kind
of fountaines, albeit they bee very seldome found with vs, yet I will make
mention of some like vnto them, produced by nature in other countries, lest
any man should think it somwhat strange. Plinie maketh a great recitall of
these. There is one (saieth he) in the Isle of Tenedos, which at the
Solstitium of sommer doth alwaies flow from the third houre of the night,
till the sixt. In the field of Pitinas beyond the Apennine mountaine, there
is a riuer which in the midst of sommer alwaies encreaseth, and in winter
is dried vp. He maketh mention also of a very large fountaine, which euery
houre doeth encrease and fall.