cold breath of the duck will cause the disease
slowly and surely to depart. Whooping-cough
never will be taken by a child that has ridden
upon a bear. When bear-baiting was in fashion,
this belief yielded a part of his income to the
bear owner. Roast mouse cures the measles.
A consumptive infant should be carried through
a flock of sheep as it is lett out of the fold early
in the morning. The weaning of a child should
begin on Good Friday.

Between birth and death we may indulge in
thousands of these fancies which are still
credited by some people in England. If I eat an
egg I must finish by making a hole in the shell,
or the witches will sail out in it to wreck the
ships. And, considering the price of eggs, I may
refrain from burning egg-shells, because if I
do so the hens cease to lay. If I have the
cramp of nights, I may cross my shoes and
stockings when I take them off, or put my
slippers under the bed with the soles upwards.
If I have a stye in the eye I may pull a hair out
of the tail of a black cat and rub the tip nine
times over the pustule. I may know that I am
going to receive money if I find a spider on my
clothes, and am not bound to accept Fuller's
moral to the saying. "The moral is this: such
who imitate the industry of that contemptible
creature may, by God's blessing, weave
themselves into wealth and procure a plentiful
estate." If I meet a white horse I may know
that I must spit at it. I may rejoice in having
teeth set far apart, because that makes me
lucky and a traveller. If my keys, or penknife, or
any steel thing that I have, will rust, in spite of
any care, I may be sure that somebody is laying
money by for me. I may know how lucky it is
to find old iron and hoard up old pot-lids and
horse-shoes discovered in the public road;
by the fortune this thrifty habit accumulates.
Seven years' trouble but no want, is the sentence
I may hear mystically pronounced upon me if I
break a looking-glass. If my left palm itches,
money goes out; if the right, money comes in.

        Rub it 'gainst wood,
        'Tis sure to come good.

If my knee itches, I shall kneel in a strange
church; if the sole of my foot, I shall walk over
strange ground; if the elbow, I shall sleep with
a strange bedfellow. If my ear tingles, I am to
hear sudden news. If I shiver, or feel cold in
the back, somebody treads over my future
grave. If my cheek burn, somebody talks
scandal of me. If I hear a singing in my right
ear, somebody praises me; if in the left ear,
somebody abuses me, and I may punish him by
biting sharply into my own little finger: in so
doing I bite his evil tongue. If I have my
clothes mended on my back, I am to be ill
spoken of. At church I may take good heed of
the preacher's text, knowing that all texts
heard in church will have to be repeated on the
Judgment-day. If the clock strikes while the
text is being given, death may be expected in
the parish. Of course I may know that it is
unlucky to kill a cricket, because crickets bring
luck to a house, but eat holes in the worsted
stockings of those who destroy them. I may
know, too, that if I kill a beetle it is sure to
rain; that I must not let a feather-bed be turned
on Sunday if I wish to keep my luck; that sneezing
on Monday hastens anger, but that if I sneeze
on Sunday morning fasting, I shall enjoy my
own true love to everlasting. To dream about
that lady, I must stick nine pins into the bladebone
of a rabbit and put them under my pillow.
So there arise now marvels concerning
courtship:

If an unmarried person happens to be placed
at dinner between man and wife, that promises
marriage within the year. When you first see
the moon in the new year, take off one stocking
and run to a stile, there you will find, tucked
under your great toe, a hair of the same colour
as your lover's. The first egg laid by a pullet is
the luckiest thing a man can present to his
sweetheart. Men must never go courting on
Friday. In some Lancashire villages they
pursue home with poker and tongs and tin
kettle music whoever breaks this rule. If the
fire burns brightly when it is poked, the absent
lover is in good spirits. Persons about to marry,
when they meet a male acquaintance, are desired
to rub their elbows. When a newly married
couple first come home, bring in a hen and
make it cackle. A maiden who desires to
know which of her lovers really care for her,
names each as she throws an apple pip into the
fire; if the pip cracks, the love is hearty. A
girl shelling peas, when she finds a peascod with
nine peas in it, must lay it on the threshold of
the kitchen door: the first bachelor who crosses
it will love her. Two people on the point of
being married, should first loosen all the knots
and ties about their clothes, and afterwards
proceed to fasten them again privately. Be sure
when you get married that you don't go in at one
door and out at the other. Whichever sleeps
first on the marriage night will be the first to
die. So there arise now marvels concerning
death:

A wild bee, that is a bumble-bee, entering a
room, gives warning of death. So does the crowing
of a hen, so does the squeaking of a mouse
behind the bed of a sick person. If the door of
a hearse be closed before the mourners are all in
the coaches, there will be another death in the
family. If a cow breaks into your garden there
will be death in your house within six months.
The gentleman who sends note of this superstition
adds the singular fact that it was made
known to him by the breaking of three cows
into his own garden, when an old house servant
grieved that there would be three deaths in the
family within six months --- and there were. The
third was that of a son-in-law, into whose garden,
also, a cow broke some weeks before he died.
Nobody can die on a bed in which there are any
pigeon or game feathers. This is a wide-spread
belief, easily continued to the ignorant by proofs
like the following, which were adduced by a
Sussex labourer against a sceptic: "Look at poor
Muster S———, how hard he were a dying; poor