GOOD LUCK OMENS

Dominion, Volume 28, Issue 119, 13 February 1935, Page 8

GOOD LUCK OMENS

Man’s Unusual Faith in a Superstition COLLECTING PINS He made a dive in front of an approaching tram which just missed grazing him, to the astonishment of those watching. He bent down in the path of an oncoming motor, and retrieved the article which had attracted his attention just in time. He jumped back to the pavement and safety after causing a cyclist to change his mind suddenly about the most suitable direction in which to travel. The morning excitement being over, the Lambton Quay pedestrians gave him a curious glance, congratulated him silently on having seen a half crown lying in the middle of the road, and went on their way. But it was not a half crown which had attracted his attention and occasioned his heedless disregard of traffic. It was just a common, ordinary, and somewhat rusty pin. With a happy smile he turned back his coat lapel to insert his treasure there. The inside of the lapel literally glittered with pins, of all shapes and sizes, some steel and some brass, witli here and there a safety pin for tlie sake of variety. He turned back the other lapel for inspection, and it was the same. It was superstition that did it, he said. There wds afi old doggerel couplet which said that if you saw a pin and picked it up you would have good luck for the rest of the day, at least. So whenever he saw a pin lying round in >an ownerless state he picked it up as a matter of course. He bad been doing it for years, and although he was not superstitious about other things, he certainly believed in the pin theory.. You might say that he pinned his faith on it, he said apologetically. Brought Up To Pick Up Pins.

He had been brought up to pick up pins, and bad commenced his activities at quite an early age. Lately he had grown systematic, and was now able to claim a collection of over one thousand pins, all of them retrieved in odd places. Those in his coat were only the results of his collecting in the past few months. Later they would be added to the main collection, in which all the pins were graded and laid out neatly in rows of 50 for convenience in counting. You see he also believed in the converse of the superstition, that if you threw away one of the pins you picked up, a day of bad luck might result. His wife was in fact required to buy her pins for sewing purposes quite independently. Had the pins he collected actually brought him good luck? Well, he could not actually point to a thousand days of good luck, one for every pin collected, but lie was quite certain that there were instances of good luck which could be definitely attributed to the pins. Of course, the good luck 'might work in some little way that might not readily be apparent. He might get a well-cooked dinner or some unpleasant circumstance that fate had in store for him might be avoided. He had bought many art union tickets, but on each of the occasions when he had won prizes, one of £5 and one of £lO, he seemed to be aide to recall picking up a pin on the day when he bought his ticket. He was quite definite about having picked up pins on two particular mornings, and receiving notice of a rise in salary on the same day. One day, after finding one of his talismans, he was asked out for a car ride, but was compelled to refuse. The car met with an accident, and some of tlie passengers went into hospital. Then again, one morning, with a new addition to his coat lapel, he had gone home and found that his wife had presented him with a baby boy. 1 n face of these things, who could deny that pins did not have some sig-, nificance? On Income Tax Day. As far as bad luck went, he was not a particularly unlucky man, and Ins life had been a happy enough one. Of course, there were some things in every life that could be called bad luck. Thus he had never picked up a pin on the davs when he had filled in his income tax returns. Sometimes when he had not picked up pins he would be caught in a storm without an overcoat, but he had never met with an example of bad luck. He had not found a pin on the day of his marriage, but he was not quite sure What this signified. 1 . . ■ , Pins arc to be found in all sorts ot places lie said, and it only needed a little observation and experience to know where to get hold of these good omens. The most fruitful source of them in Wellington was in the cracks between the pavement stones, where he had often picked up as many (is six or seven in one day. In 'fact, it was seldom that a week passed without some pin lying in his path somewhere. They -were quite easy to see, too, their glittering bodies being conspicuous amid their more drab surroundings. They were very plentiful on most office floors, and he had even found them in boats and oh vehicles.

An outstanding example of good luck was when he found a pin in his dinner. If he had swallowed it without finding it, ill fortune would certainly have been the consequence. Then again he had once found one iu a tire on his car, It had not penetrated to the tube, but if he had not seen it and pulled it out he might have been stranded out in the country with a juncture. He was quite ingenious in his reasoning. Tailor’s Shop Beat Him. He had been very disturbed once when he went into the, back of a tailor’s premises to be measured for a suit. He was kept very busy for a time collecting pins off the floor, until he was forced ,to realise that he could not possibly pick up all the pins within reach. The problem was solved when he realised that after all the pins had a legitimate owner in the tailor, iind he went away with his conscience being pricked no longer. Pin collecting is not a hobby of his at all. It is just a part of his daily life, and' lie would never dream of going out of his way to find a pin, although he makes it his business to acquire all lie sees ill odd places. He does not spend his Saturday afternoons in pin hunting expeditions. He expects tlie pins to make their presence known to him first.

There is just one thing that worries him about the whole business. Why are there so many pins left lying about? Surely it is strange that there should be more of them, than, say, such articles as threepenny bits, which arc not so easily attached to the person. But possibly there are a larger number of observers of stray coinage.