that but for this precaution the bees would all desert the place. A
correspondent at Pershore says: "While conversing with a farmer's wife
in this neighbourhood, I was gravely informed that it was certainly
the truth, unless the bees were 'told' when anybody died in the
house, something would happen either to bees or honey before long.
She considered it a great want of foresight not to go from the house
in which the 'departed one' had breathed his or her last to the hive
without delay, and 'tell the bees' what had happened." In some places
the custom is to take the key of the front door to the hive and tap it
gently, saying, "Bees, bees, your master (or mistress) is dead." The
hives also are usually covered with crape. If a swarm of bees return to
their old hive, it is believed that a death will happen in the family
within the year. This superstition probably prevails nearly all over
the kingdom, and is believed to be of great antiquity. In Oxfordshire,
it is said that if a man and his wife quarrel, the bees will leave
them. In Devonshire, the custom is (or was in the year 1790) to turn
round the bee-hives that belonged to the deceased at the moment
the corpse was being carried out of the house; and on one occasion,
at the funeral of a rich old farmer at Collumpton, as a numerous
procession was on the point of starting, a person called out, "Turn
the bees;" upon which a servant, who had no knowledge of the custom,
instead of turning the hives about, lifted them up, and then laid them
down on their sides. The bees, thus invaded, quickly fastened on the
attendants, and in a few moments the corpse was left quite alone, hats
and wigs were lost in the confusion, and a long time elapsed before the
sufferers returned to their duty.
CHARMS
are still believed in to a great extent among the poor. In the
neighbourhood of Hartlebury they break the legs of a toad, sew it up
in a bag alive, and tie it round the neck of the patient. There were
lately some female charmers at Fladbury. The peasantry around Tenbury
and Shrawley have also great faith in charms, and the toad remedy is
applied at the former place, the life or death of the patient being
supposed to be shadowed forth by the survival or death of the poor
animal. At Mathon, old women are intrusted with the cure of burns by
charming, which they do by repeating a certain number of times the old
doggrel rhyme, beginning--
"There were two angels came from the north," &c.
In the neighbourhood of Stoke Prior a charm was some time ago used by
a labouring man for the removal of the thrush (or "throcks" as it is
locally termed) in children: he would put his finger into his mouth,
and then into that of the child, rubbing the gums, while he mumbled out
something terminating with "Father, Son, and Holy Ghost," then put down
the child without speaking another word, and leave the house without
eating or drinking. Charming for the toothache is still customary at
Cutnall Green. The charm is written on paper, and sealed up, which the
afflicted person carries about with him, and it is believed to be a
sure cure. A "poke" or wart on the eye is "charmed away" by rubbing it
with a wedding ring. Drinking out of a sacramental cup is considered a
cure for the hooping cough. A pillow, filled with hops and laid under
the patient's bed, is an undoubted cure for rheumatism. This charm was
prescribed to George III by a physician at Reading, recommended by Lord
Sidmouth, and administered to the royal patient accordingly.
The following lines are very generally taught to children in the rural
districts, to say at night with their prayers:
"Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John,
Bless the bed that I lie on;
There are four corners to my bed,
There are four angels round my head,
One to watch, and one to pray,
And two to carry my soul away."
TOUCHING FOR THE KING'S EVIL
was in old times an established institution. In 1666 the Chamberlain
of the Worcester Corporation spent £10. 14s. in an entertainment to
Mr. Gratrix, "an Irishman famous for helping and curing many lame and
diseased people only by stroking of their maladies with his hand,
and therefore sent for to this and many other places." Valentine
Gratrix--surnamed the Stroker--was a great proficient and master of
the art; and by a letter of his (still in existence) to the Archbishop
of Dublin, it appears that he believed himself to be inspired by God
for the purpose of curing this disease. He was entertained with great
hospitality at many of our citizens' houses, and was thus fortunate in
having a long start of the mesmerizers of the present day. The parish
register of Chaddesley Corbett contains a "Mem. That Nov. 24, 1685,
a certificate was granted to Gervase Burford, to be touched for the
King's evil;" and two years later King James II was at Worcester, and
attended at the Cathedral for the purpose of touching persons affected
with the evil. From the Worcestershire county records it appears that
in 1688 one Susannah Rose petitioned the Court of Quarter Sessions on
behalf of her brother, George Gilbert, a blacksmith, of Stourbridge,
upon whose toes a hammer having fallen, had disabled him from work,
and "after much suffering he was persuaded it was gone to the King's
evil, went to London, and was touched by his Majesty, but afterwards
was forced to go to a surgeon, at Rushock, under cure for above
half-a-year, when he left him off, and would not let him be entertained
in the parish any longer," and the poor petitioner being unable to
provide for him, prays for his settlement at Bellbroughton, where
he was born and apprenticed. In the parish records of St. Nicholas,
it is stated that in 1711, one Walker, a pauper, was sent to London
to be touched; and I believe that Dr. Johnson was touched by Queen
Ann, as late as 1712. In the reign of Charles II a royal proclamation
was issued stating the time when that monarch would touch persons
afflicted with this disease. A broadside containing a printed copy of
this proclamation still exists at Painswick, in Gloucestershire, in
the possession of Mr. Gyde, the surgeon there. William of Malmesbury,
who flourished in the twelfth century, alleges the origin of the Royal
touch to have been on this wise: a young married woman, having some
enormous glandular swellings on her neck, was admonished in a dream to
have it washed by the King (Edward the Confessor). His Majesty readily
fulfilled this labour of love by rubbing her neck with his fingers
dipped in water, and before a week had expired, the tumour subsided and
a fair new skin covered the affected part, so that a perfect cure was
the result--and not only that, but the woman, who had been previously
childless, in less than another year became the mother of twins, which
(the sage chronicler gravely remarks) "greatly increased the admiration
of Edward's holiness. Those who knew him more intimately affirm that
he often cured this complaint in Normandy; whence appears how false is
their notion who in our times assert that the cure of this disease does
not proceed from personal sanctity but from hereditary virtue in the
Royal line."
WITCHCRAFT.
"A thousand fantasies
Begin to throng on my memory,
Of calling shapes and beck'ning shadows dire,
And aery tongues, that syllable men's names
On sands and shores and desert wildernesses."
A lingering belief in witchcraft still remains among the most ignorant
of our population, both rural and urban. Some particulars relative to
the existence of this superstition in this county in the seventeenth
century will be found among the county records in the early part of
this volume. The law against witchcraft, passed in the time of James
I, being very stringent, the driving out evil spirits, allaying
of ghosts, and abjuring witches, became, for nearly a century, a
profitable employment. Witch-finders existed as public officers; and
beside the public executions which disgraced every assizes, multitudes
of accused were destroyed by popular resentment, while others were
drowned by the test applied, for if, on being thrown into the water,
they did not sink, they were presumed witches, and either killed on the
spot or reserved for burning at the assizes. In the year 1649, four
persons were tried at Worcester for this supposed offence, and all
were executed, _two of them confessing their crime_, viz.: Margaret
Landis and Susan Cook; Rebecca West and Rose Holybred died obstinate.
The custom at Worcester was to duck the accused in the Severn (Cooken
Street, or "Cucken Street," as it is spelt in some old maps, being no
doubt the line of route on these occasions).
Baxter, in his "World of Spirits," speaks of those men who told of
things stolen and lost, and who showed the face of a thief in a glass,
and caused the goods to be brought back, who were commonly called
"white witches." "When I lived (he says) at Dudley, Hodges, at Sedgley,
two miles off, was long and commonly accounted such a one; and when I
lived at Kederminster, one of my neighbours affirmed that, having his
yarn stolen, he went to Hodges, ten miles off, and he told him that at
such an hour he should have it brought home again and put in at the
window, and so it was; and as I remember he showed him the person's
face in a glass. Yet I do not think that Hodges made any known contract
with the devil, but thought it an effect of art."
About the year 1672 a prebend of Worcester (Joseph Glanville) seriously
wrote a book, entitled, "Some considerations touching the being of
Witches and Witchcraft," which engaged him in a controversy that
lasted as long as his life. The statute 9th George II, chap. 5 (1736),
at length repealed the disgraceful Witch Act, and stopped all legal
prosecutions against persons charged with conjuration, sorcery, &c.;
yet what has once taken so firm a hold of the popular mind is not to
be so easily eradicated; and Dr. Nash, who wrote his "Worcestershire"
towards the close of the last century, asserts that not many years
previously a poor woman, who happened to be very ugly, was almost
drowned in the neighbourhood of Worcester, upon a supposition of
witchcraft; and had not Mr. Lygon, a gentleman of singular humanity and
influence, interfered in her behalf, she would certainly have been
drowned, upon a presumption that a witch could not sink. Later still,
Mr. Allies informs us, that when the late Mr. Spooner kept a pack of
hounds, whenever they passed through a certain field in Leigh Sinton,
the hounds would invariably run after something which nobody could see,
until they came to the cottage of an old woman named Cofield, when
they would turn back again, the old witch having then got safely into
her own "sanctum." The exploits of Mrs. Swan, of Kidderminster, who
pretended to discover stolen property for everybody else except what
she herself had lost, and who died in an awfully tempestuous night in
November, 1850, when her cats so mysteriously disappeared, cannot yet
be forgotten; nor the recent existence of "the wise man of Dudley,"
and many others of the same class, though not quite so celebrated,
who are now living. Some of the Mathon people still believe that
witchcraft makes their pigs waste away; and, when convinced of the
fact, they kill the animal, and burn a part of the flesh, to prevent
any ill effects to those who eat the remainder. Mr. Lees informs us
of a pear tree in Wyre Forest, the fruit of which is even now hung up
in the houses of the peasantry as a protection against witchcraft.
The witch elm (_Ulmus montana_) was the one commonly employed for the
purpose, as most easily attainable. That was _good_; the mountain
ash or witten tree was _better_; and the sorb tree or true service
(_Pyrus domestica_) was the _strongest_ of all. Nine withes of witch
hazel, banded together, is used as a rustic appliance to guard against
witching influence. There is a place called "Witchery Hole," in Little
Shelsley, concerning which, whenever a violent wind blows from the
north, the people say, "The wind comes from Witchery Hole," insinuating
that certain "broomstick hags" had something to do with raising the
wind. For a baker to cross the flour before he commences baking is
regarded as a security against the witch entering the bread. The
horse-shoe is still seen over doors, in many places, and fastened to
bedsteads to keep witches away. At the Police Office, at Stourbridge,
only a few months ago, a woman named Wassall charged a Mrs. Cartwright,
a poor woman afflicted with paralysis, with threatening to do her some
bodily injury. The defendant alleged that the affliction under which
she was suffering was caused by the complainant, who had bewitched
her; and that when she begged her to remove the spell, complainant
told her it had been upon her for twelve weeks, and it should continue
six weeks longer. Finding entreaties vain, the defendant made use of
some idle threat, which led to the summons. A "charm" was shown to the
Court, which the deluded creature had worn by the advice of a "wise"
man to remove the spell; it was a small black silk bag, containing
pieces cut out from the Prayer Book and Bible, and some hair, evidently
from a cat's back. The Bench endeavoured to assuage the fears of the
poor woman, and told her not to impute her affliction to the evil
machinations of any one, at the same time severely lecturing the
complainant for practising such deceit upon an ignorant and afflicted
fellow-creature.
There were reputed witches at Malvern in the last generation; and
at Colwall the common people are said even now to dislike peewits
(lapwings) which visit that place, believing that their cry is
"bewitch'd, bewitch'd;" and should any person capture one of these
birds he is strongly recommended not to keep it for fear of misfortune
or accident. Peewits are believed to be departed spirits who still
haunt the earth in consequence of something that troubles them.
GHOSTS.
At Beoley, about half a century ago, the ghost of a reputed murderer
managed to keep undisputed possession of a certain house, until a
conclave of the clergy chained him to the bed of the Red Sea for
fifty years. When that term was expired the ghost reappeared (two or
three years ago), and more than ever frightened the natives of the
said house--slamming the doors, and racing through the ceilings. The
inmates, however, took heart, and chased him, by stamping on the floor
from one room to another, under the impression that, could they once
drive him to a trap-door opening into the cheese-room (for which, if
the ghost happened to be a rat, he had a very natural _penchant_),
he would disappear for a season. The beadle of the parish, who
also combined with that office the scarcely less important one of
pig-sticker, declared to the writer that he dared not go by the house
now in the morning till the sun was up. (It was an ancient superstition
that evil spirits flew away at cock-crowing.)
The Droitwich Canal, in passing through Salwarpe, is said to have
cut off a slice of a large old half-timbered structure supposed to
have been formerly a mansion-house; and in revenge for this act of
mutilation, the ghost of a former occupier revisits his old haunts,
affrights the domestics, and may be seen on dark nights, with
deprecatory aspect, glide down the embankment, and suicidally commit
himself to the waters below.
The Little Shelsley people will have it that the Court-house in
that parish is haunted, and that a Lady Lightfoot, who was said to
have been imprisoned and murdered in the house, comes at night and
drives a carriage and four fiery horses round some old rooms that are
unoccupied, and that her ladyship's screams are sometimes heard over
the whole Court. She has likewise been seen to drive her team into the
moat, when the whole disappeared, the water smoking like a furnace.
Many of the ancient manor-houses of Worcestershire have similar
superstitions. At Huddington, there is an avenue of trees, called "Lady
Winter's Walk," where the lady of Thomas Winter, who was obliged to
conceal himself on account of the share he had in the Gunpowder Plot,
was in the habit of awaiting her husband's furtive visits; and here
the headless spectre of her ladyship is still seen occasionally pacing
up and down beneath the sombre shade of those aged trees. A headless
female also appears at Crowle brook, by which it would seem that the
poor heart-broken lady sometimes extended her visits.
At Leigh, a spectre, known as "Old Coles," formerly appeared, and at
dead of night, with _vis insana_, would drive a coach and four down a
part of the road, dash over the great barn at Leigh Court, and then
cool the fiery nostrils of his steeds in the waters of the Teme. Mr.
Jabez Allies also records that this perturbed spirit was at length laid
in a neighbouring pool by twelve parsons, at twelve at night, by the
light of an inch of candle; and as he was not to rise again until the
candle was quite burnt out, it was therefore thrown into the pool, and,
to make all sure, the pool was filled up--
"And peaceful ever after slept Old Coles's shade."
This Coles (as is recorded by Mr. Lees) was on intimate terms with a
neighbour at Cradley, and being distressed for want of money, heard
that his friend was going to Worcester to receive a large sum, and
thereupon waylaid him on his return by night. Coles seized the bridle
and threatened his friend's life; but the Cradley yeoman drew his
sword and made a furious cut, which freed him at once from the robber,
and he rapidly rode home; on his arrival there he found a bloody hand
firmly grasping his horse's bridle, and one of the fingers bore the
signet ring of his friend Coles. Next day he went to Leigh, and found
Coles in bed; he acknowledged his crime, and begged for mercy, which
was granted in consideration of his awful punishment.
At Astwood Court, once the seat of the Culpepers, was an old oak
table, removed from the side of the wainscot in 1816, respecting which
tradition declares that it bore the impress of the fingers of a lady
ghost, who, probably tired of appearing to no purpose, at last struck
the table in a rage, and vanished for ever; but the ghost was also in
the habit of walking from the house to "the cloven pear-tree."
At Holt Castle, it was not long ago believed by the servants that
a mysterious lady in black occasionally walked at dead of night in
a certain passage near to the attics; and likewise that the cellar
had been occupied by an ill-favoured bird like a raven, which would
sometimes pounce upon any person who ventured to approach a cask for
drink, and having extinguished the candle with a horrid flapping of
wings, would leave its victim prostrated with fright. A similar legend
prevails at Leigh Court. A solution has been given to this legend,
however, which would imply a little cunning selfishness on the part of
the domestics who had the care of the ale and cider depôt.
LOVE SPELLS.
A correspondent at Cutnall Green says that it is believed there that
for a single female to sleep in a new pair of shoes and stockings is a
sure means of her dreaming of her future husband; and for a female to
sleep with a breast bone, knife and fork, and a plate, carefully put
under her bolster, also is sure to make her dream of her lover.
Another informant--a lady, who forgot to state the place of her
residence--sends me the following: If a maiden wishes to know her
future husband, let her on Midsummer Eve, at midnight, descend
backwards from her bed-room to the garden, and, still walking backwards
around it, and scattering hemp seed with her right hand as she goes,
repeat these lines:
"Hemp seed I sow
Hemp seed is to mow,
And the man that my husband is to be,
Let him follow after and mow,"
when he will suddenly appear with a scythe in his hand, which, unless
the poor damsel be particular in keeping her right hand stretched out,
may prove a dangerous weapon. Also on Midsummer Eve, take two flowers
called among the country people "Midsummer Men," and planting them in
the thatch, repeat your own and sweetheart's name. Should they grow,
a wedding is certain, but if not, the lovers will be parted. On All
Saints, commonly called "All Hallows," let a young woman take a ball of
new worsted, and holding the end in her fingers, throw the ball through
the window (at midnight) saying, "Who holds?" the man who is to be her
husband will pick up the worsted, mention his name, and disappear. On
Christmas Eve, let three, five, or seven young girls take each a sprig
of rosemary and place it in a bowl of water, putting the vessel in the
centre of the room. Stretch a string across directly before it, hanging
thereon a white garment of each person. They must then sit speechless
until the witching hour of midnight, when each of their lovers will
appear and take a piece of rosemary out of the basin, and mention his
own name and his sweetheart's. When the first new moon in the year
appears, she may go to the garden, and looking steadily at it, say--
"New moon, new moon,
Tell unto me
Which of these three is my husband to be,"
mentioning the names of three young men, and curtseying to each one.
When next she sees them, let her notice if they have their backs or
faces towards her. The one who has his face towards her will be her
husband. Hang a peapod containing nine peas over the doorway; the
young man who passes under it first (not one of the family) will be
the husband of the young woman who hangs it there. When a young girl
receives a letter from her lover, let her pin it in nine folds and
place it next her heart, on retiring to rest. If she dream of gold or
jewellery, he is sincere in his professions; if not, let her beware.
Take a ring and hang it upon one of your own hairs, hold it steadily
over a wine glass half full of water, and wish to know how many years
it will be before you are married. As many times as it hits against the
side of the glass, so many years it will be before you are joined in
holy wedlock.
If a girl pluck a rose on Midsummer Eve, and wear it on the succeeding
Christmas Day, whatever single man takes it from her must marry her.
To ascertain whether a pretended lover is sincere, take an apple-pip,
and naming one of your followers, put the pip on the fire: if it make a
noise in bursting it is a proof of love; if there is no crack, it is a
sign that he has no regard for you:
"If you love me, bounce and fly;
If you hate me, lie and die."
Another charm consists in sticking pips upon the cheek, and naming
several lovers, the truest being shown by that which remains longest.
Fingered leaves are supposed to have a magical character. If the
terminating leaflets of the common ash are _even_ (they being usually
_odd_) they bring "luck or a lover."
The herb Paris, a common plant in thick woods, has very frequently its
four leaves multiplied into five or six, and thus generally gets the
name of _true love_. So the common Cinquefoil, called "Five-leaved
grass," from having its leaves in five digitated divisions, are made
six or seven by accessory leaflets, and the following rhyme is repeated
in rural places:
"Five-leaved grass, with six leaves on,
Put it under your pillow, and you'll dream of your mon."
A powerful love-spell is produced by what is called the "Speechless
hawthorn." In May or June a flowering branch of the hawthorn must be
silently gathered in the evening, and the maiden gathering it must
refrain from speech that night, as a single word spoken would break
the spell. Hastening to bed as soon as possible, speechless she must
place the hawthorn branch under her pillow, and then, in the visions of
the night, the man whom fate has destined for her future husband will
certainly present himself.
The common brake fern (_Pteris aquilina_), cut in two obliquely, shows
the initial letters of a sweetheart's name.
Get a maiden egg, carefully break it, and fill half the shell with
salt; then eat the salt as you go to bed, walking up stairs backwards,
and backing into bed also; be sure and keep silence and you will dream
of your lover: if he should offer a glass of water he will be a poor
man; if a glass of wine, a gentleman.
On some Friday night go to bed, and put your shoes under your pillow,
crossing the left shoe over the right, and say--
"On this blessed Friday night
I put my left shoe o'er my right,
In hopes this night that I may see
The man that shall my husband be,
In his apparel and in his array,
And in the clothes he wears every day;
What he does and what he wears,
And what he'll do all days and years;
Whether I sleep or whether I wake,
I hope to hear my true love speak."