_Devonshire Superstitions._--Seeing that you sometimes insert extracts from
newspapers, I forward you a copy of a paragraph which appeared in _The
Times_ of March 7, 1854, and which is worth a corner in your folk-lore
columns:
"The following gross case of superstition, which occurred as late as
Sunday se'nnight, in one of the largest {345} market towns in the north
of Devon, is related by an eye-witness:--A young woman, living in the
neighbourhood of Holsworthy, having for some time past been subject to
periodical fits of illness, endeavoured to effect a cure by attendance
at the afternoon service at the parish church, accompanied by thirty
young men, her near neighbours. Service over, she sat in the porch of
the church, and each of the young men, as they passed out in
succession, dropped a penny into her lap; but the last, instead of a
penny, gave her half-a-crown, taking from her the twenty-nine pennies
which she had already received. With this half-crown in her hand, she
walked three times round the communion-table, and afterwards had it
made into a ring, by the wearing of which she believes she will recover
her health."