SOME SUPERSTITIONS

Wanganui Chronicle, Volume LXXVI, Issue 18458, 17 April 1922, Page 3

SOME SUPERSTITIONS

There are many superstitions in the north country of England, but mostly nowadays of a harmlews character, serving to remind us of the dim and misty past. Tn Devon there is much superstition (writes Cecil Cressy in the uNewcastle Weekly Chronicle”). It is a common thing to see a little glass globe hanging up in a house, a survival of a time when such an object had a magical value. A little bundle of ash twigs in the same part of the country is used to ward off infection. The custom of carrying a shrivelled potato in the pocket to ward off rheumatism has not wholly died out. In the out-of-the-way rural districts the people have a firm belief in herbs and charms as a cure for their various ills- Tn Cheshire, perhaps, such superstitions are most numerous. and a native will tell you that hedgehogs are useful in the cure of epilepsy, that ointment should never be applied with the first finger, as that one is venomous, and that a child’s nails should never be cut during the first year of its life, or it will grow up light-fin-gered. Tn Yorkshire the use of a holed stone as a protection for the cattle against pixies still persists, and on Tyneside holey stones are hung up for luck. Tn the Orkney Islands we find that the power of the “evil eye” still exists and holds sway. Hence strange practices, such as burning a piece of the witch’s garments to break the spell, and on making a purchase of a cow, cutting the leading rope in two to prevent any influence being communicated, reveal the presence of strong superstitious beliefs. Jeremy Taylor’s view of superstition is interesting. A supertious man he says, is jealous and blind, forward, and mistaken; he runs towards heaven as he thinks, but he chooses foolish paths, and out of fear takes anything that he is told, or fancies, and guesses concerning God, by measures taken from his own diseases and imperfections.