An unusually large number of places in Worcestershire in ancient times seemed to have been dedicated to the _Dii Inferi_, as also to the more sprightly beings which have hardly yet ceased to exist in our woods and groves, in shady glens, and by babbling streams. The Devil's Leap is a deep dingle, partly in Dodenham and partly in Hartley. There are the Devil's Den, Hell Hole, and Death's Dingle, in Stanford; this "den" is a black wood in a narrow dell, deeply enclosed in entangled woods; and Mrs. Sherwood says that the country people give it names which commemorate its former evil character--"The Devil's Den" being the mildest of the epithets bestowed on this sequestered scene. In the above-named Hell Hole grows the plant called Devil's-bit, which, tradition says, was given to heal man of any deadly wounds, but when Satan saw what numbers of the human race it deprived him of, he in spite bit the roots off, whereupon it miraculously grew without those usually necessary appendages, and this is the reason we find it growing apparently without roots. There is the Devil's Pig-trough, near Leigh; and the Devil's Bowling-green at Inkberrow, ironically so called, it is said by Mr. Allies, as, till lately, it was one of the roughest pieces of ground in that parish. The Devil's Spadeful is the name of a large mound of earth near Bewdley, traditionally said to have been so denominated in consequence of the great impersonation of evil having once intended to drown the Bewdleyites by damming up the Severn, but being misinformed by a drunken cobbler as to the distance he had to go, he dropped the spadeful of earth and decamped. This tradition, slightly modified, is common in various counties, and is one of a numerous class tending to mark the popular contempt for Satan's want of sagacity. Hell Holes abound in the county, and there is Hell Bank near Stourbridge, Hell Kitchen near Newbold-on-Stour, and Hell Patch in Upton Warren. Whether, however, these names had reference to the "shades below" or originated in the Celtic word _hel_ (to assemble) is a question. In Shelsley Walsh is a place called Witchery Hole; and the _souvenirs_ of fairy-land are exceedingly numerous in many parishes of the county, such as Hob's Hole, in Offenham; Hob Moor, in Chaddesley Corbett; Little Hob Hill, in Beoley; Little Dobbin's Hill, in the Berrow; Dobbin's Meadow, in Mathon; Puck Meadow, in Hallow; Puck Hill, in Himbleton; Puck Croft, in Powick; Puck Piece, in Abbot's Lench; Pixam, or Pixies' Ham, in Powick; Cob's Croft, in Dodderhill; in Northfield, several places called Hob, Cob, and Jack; Impey, in Alvechurch; The Whistlers, in Lulsley, and innumerable others.