Monday’s child is fair of face,
Tuesday’s child is solemn and sad,
Wednesday’s child is merry and glad;
Thursday’s child is inclined to thieving,
Friday’s child is free in giving:
Saturday’s child works hard for his living.”
This saying is familiar to every one:--
“Whistling girls and crowing hens
Always come to no good ends.”
Or, as they say it in the Old Country:--
“A whistling woman and crowing hen,
Are neither fit for God nor men.”
An old woman, skilled in such matters, declares that when vagrant cats
begin to collect around the back-yards, “it’s a sure sign the winter’s
broken.”
Whistling to keep one’s courage up, or for a wind, are rather in the
nature of an invocation to some occult power than a sign. Sailors, it
is well known, have a superstitious fear of whistling at sea, believing
it will bring on a storm.
Yawning is said to be catching. Well, if it is not catching, it comes
so near to being so, that most persons accept it as a fact; and laugh
as we may, daily experience goes to confirm it as such, and must
continue to do so until some more satisfactory explanation is found
than we yet know of.
[Illustration]
V
CHARMS TO GOOD LUCK
“The nights are wholesome; then no planets strike,
No fairy takes, nor witch hath power to charm.”
Of the things closely associated in the popular mind with good or bad
luck, what in short one may or may not do to obtain the favors or turn
aside the frowns of fortune, the list is a long one. We say “God bless
me!” when we sneeze, as an invocation to good luck. Then, for instance,
it is considered lucky to find a cast-off horseshoe, or a four-leaved
clover, or to see the new moon over the right shoulder, or to have a
black cat in the house, especially one that comes to you of its own
accord. Then there also is the lucky pocket-piece, which the owner
will seldom part with, although I once heard a man loudly lamenting
that he had “sold his luck” by doing so. There also is the lucky-bone
of a haddock,[8] the wishing-bone of a chicken, the lucky base-ball
bat, and, what is still more strange, the lucky spider, if one happens
to be found on one’s clothes,--though this will hardly prevent, we
imagine, all womankind from screaming out to the nearest person to come
and brush off the hateful little creature. Many will not kill a spider
on account of this belief, which is supposed to be derived from the
romantic story of King Robert Bruce and the spider.
The familiar saying, “There’s luck in odd numbers,” lingers in song
and story. Does not Rory O’More say so? Odd numbers or combinations of
odd numbers are almost invariably chosen in buying lottery tickets.
Moreover, they have received the highest official sanction for a
very long time. In the “Art of Navigation,” printed in the year 1705,
the following rule is laid down for firing salutes by ships of the
royal navy: “to salute with an odd number of guns, the which are to
be answered with fit correspondency. And the number of odd guns is so
punctually observed, that whenever they are given _even_ ’tis received
for an infallible sign that either the captain or some noted officer is
dead in the voyage.”
The above rule or custom has held good to this day. In the United
States the prescribed salute to the President is twenty-one guns;
seventeen to the Vice-President, and so on in descending scale,
according to rank, in the several branches of the civil, military, and
naval service. Medicines are often taken an odd number of times, though
not invariably, as they once were. A hen is always set on an odd number
of eggs, although I could never find any one who could give any other
reason than custom for it. What Biddy does when she “steals her own
nest” is not ascertained.
It appears from such data as we have been able to gather that
the number Three and its multiple Nine were formerly held to be
indispensable to the successful working of the magician’s arts. In
“Macbeth,” the weird sisters mutter the dark incantation:--
“Thrice to thine, and thrice to mine,
And thrice again to make up nine!--
Peace!--the charm’s wound up.”
And yet again, when concocting their charmed hell-broth, while awaiting
the coming of the ambitious thane to learn his fate of them, the mystic
rite begins by declaring the omens propitious:--
“1 _Witch_. Thrice the brinded cat hath mewed.
2 _Witch_. Thrice and once the hedge-pig whined.”
With the Romans, three handfuls of salt cast over a dead body had all
the virtues of a funeral. Pirates were formerly hung at low-water
mark and left hanging there until three tides had overflowed them.
Shakespeare makes Falstaff say: “This is the third time; I hope good
luck lies in odd numbers.” Even now, the cabalistic phrase “third time
never fails,” prompts the twice unsuccessful candidate for fortune’s
favors to renewed and more vigorous effort. In short, there seems to be
no end to the virtues inherent in odd numbers.
But as all rules have their exceptions, so with this prophetic rule
of three, the fates would seem to have ordained that it might be made
to work both ways. Simply by keeping one’s eyes and ears open one
sees and hears many things. An enterprising news-gatherer jots down a
bit of superstition touching the fateful side of the rule in question
that came to him in this easy sort of way: “I heard,” he says, “a most
sensible person, the other day, exclaim because Queen Victoria had been
obliged twice to postpone her trip to the south of France, once on
account of the unsettled state of affairs over there, and again because
of the unsettled state of the weather. ‘The third time will be fatal
to her,’ added this cheerful individual; ‘you just mark my words.’”
It is nevertheless true, however, that the cabalistic number Thirteen
stands quite alone, so far as we are informed, as the sombre herald of
misfortune. But here, as elsewhere, the exception only goes to prove
the rule.
A gentleman holding a lucrative office under the government once told
me that two of his clerks wore iron finger rings, because they were
supposed to be lucky. It is a matter of general knowledge that certain
gems or precious stones are worn on scarf-pins, watch-chains, finger
rings, or other articles of personal adornment solely on account of the
prevailing belief in their efficacy to ward off sickness or disease,
prevent accidents, keep one’s friends,--in short, to bring the wearer
good luck. This branch of the subject will be more fully treated of
presently.
More unaccountable still is the practice of wearing or carrying about
on one’s person a rabbit’s foot as a talisman, that timid little
animal always having been intimately associated with the arts of the
magician and sorcerer. But it must always be bunny’s hind foot. The
insatiate passion for novelty, we understand, has now installed a
turkey’s claw in the room of the rabbit’s foot, to some extent, showing
that even credulity itself is the obedient slave of fashion. Of course
neither the rabbit’s foot nor turkey’s claw is worn in its natural
rough state, but under the jeweller’s skilful hands, tipped with gold
or silver and set with the wearer’s favorite gem (topaz, amethyst, or
whatever it may be), the charm, or mascot, becomes an ornament to be
worn, either suspended from the neck, the wrist, or belt, or as a clasp
for the cape. The practice of wearing a caul,[9] or an amulet blessed
by the priest, clearly denotes that here rich and poor meet on common
ground. It is not proposed, however, to treat of those beliefs which
may be directly traced to the teachings of a particular church, or
that have become so embedded in the faith it inculcates as to be an
inseparable part of it The Protestant world, or that part of it we live
in, is intrenched in no such stronghold.
To continue the catalogue:--
A black cat, without a single white hair, is a witch of the sort that
brings luck to the house. Keeping one also insures to unmarried females
of the family plenty of sweethearts.
A branch of the mountain ash kept in the house, or hung out over the
door, will keep the witches out.
Good luck is frequently crystallized in certain uncouth but expressive
sayings, such, for example, as “nigger luck,” “lucky strike,” or
“Cunard luck,” referring to the remarkable exemption of a certain
transatlantic steamship company from loss of life by disasters to
its ships. This particular saying has been quite frequently heard
of late in consequence of the really providential escape of the
steamship _Pavonia_, of that line, from shipwreck, while on her voyage
from Liverpool to Boston. What was uppermost in the minds of some of
the passengers and crew may easily be inferred from the following
extract, with which a relation of the good ship’s fortunate escape from
foundering concludes:--
“The change of the moon passed at 9.30 A.M., and the light breeze
changed at almost the same moment. The gulls were sitting on the water,
which was a sign of luck, according to the sailors. Then we discovered
a lot of ‘Mother Carey’s chickens’ near the ship, which was also a
lucky omen, so we felt that Friday was to be our lucky day.”
Unquestionably, the horseshoe is the favorite symbol of good luck
the world over. You will seldom see a man so much in a hurry that he
will not stop to pick one up. Although the iron of which the shoe is
fashioned is no longer endowed with magic power, as it once was, no
sooner has it been beaten by the smith into the form of a shoe than,
_presto_, it becomes a power to conjure with. Popular _dictum_ even
prescribes that the shoe must be placed with the prongs upward or its
virtue will be lost. It must, moreover, be a cast-off shoe or the charm
will not work.
The luck of the horseshoe has become proverbial. We are now dealing
with facts of common knowledge. Indeed, we do not see how any form
of superstition could be more fully or more freely recognized in the
everyday affairs of life. Even those who scout the superstition itself,
as a thing unworthy of serious attention, do not hesitate to avail
themselves of its popularity for their own ends, thus giving it a still
wider currency. In short, this hoary superstition is thriftily turned
to account by every imaginable device to tickle the fancy or to turn a
penny, although in being thus employed it has quite cut loose from its
ancient traditions.
Thus it is that we now see the horseshoe stamped on monograms, on
Christmas cards, on book covers, or even used in the title of a book,
most effectively, as in the case of “Horseshoe Robinson.” It also is
seen worked into floral designs to be hung above the bride’s head, at
a wedding, or reverently laid upon the last resting-place of the dead.
Surely superstition could go no farther.
The horseshoe has also come to be a favorite trade-mark with
manufacturers and dealers in all sorts of wares. It is elaborately
worked up in gold and silver charms for those who would rather be lucky
than not, regardless of the original _dictum_ that, to be serviceable,
the shoe must be made of iron and nothing else. There lies before me,
as I write this, the advertisement of a certain farrier, who rests
his plea for custom upon the fact that as horseshoes bring luck to
the purchaser, therefore every horse should be shod with his shoes. A
certain horseshoers’ union attributes its victory over the employers,
in the matter of shorter hours, to the efficacy of its trade symbol.
And not long ago the fortunate escape of Boston from a disastrous
conflagration was heralded in a daily paper with a cut of a horseshoe
prefixed to the account.
Of late years, too, the horseshoe has grown to be a favorite symbol in
the house,--a sort of household fetich, as it were,--if not because of
any faith in its traditional ability to bring good luck, one is at loss
to know why a piece of old iron should be so conspicuously hung up in
the houses of rich and poor alike.
The horseshoe was always, also, the favorite emblem of the tavern and
inn, in all countries. Such signs as the “Three Horseshoes,” once swung
in Boston streets. In Samuel Sewall’s Diary we find the following
entry: “Sanctifie to me ye deth of old Mrs. Glover who kept the 3
horseshoes, and who dyed ye last night.” Sewall, who lived in the
immediate neighborhood, leaves us in the dark as to whether he mourned
most for Mrs. Glover or her exhilarating mixtures.
Returning to its proper place in folk-lore, I myself have seen the
horseshoe nailed to the bowsprit of a vessel, over house and barn
doors, and even to bedsteads. In the country, its supposed virtues
continue to hold much of their old sway, while among sailors a belief
in them has suffered little, if any, loss since the day of Nelson
and of the _Victory_. On some very old country house, as old as the
witchcraft times, one can still see the shape of a horseshoe wrought in
the brickwork of the chimneys, as well as one nailed above the door,
thus cleverly closing every avenue against the entrance of witches.
But of all the odd caprices connected with the use of the horseshoe,
that related of Samuel Dexter, of Boston, must carry off the palm for
oddity. He, being dissatisfied with his minister, Dr. Codman, nailed a
horseshoe to his pew door, and then nailed up the pew itself.
The origin of this remarkable superstition is involved in the obscurity
of past ages. It is usually attributed to the virtue of cold iron to
keep witches out, through their inability to step over it, and is
probably allied to that other superstition about the driving of iron
nails into the walls of Roman houses, with a like object. Beyond that
point its meaning grows more and more obscure. The conjunction, so
essential to perfect the charm, between iron in any form and the horse,
is said to have come from the magical properties attributed to the
animal by the ancients, in whose mythology the horse always plays an
important part. King Richard, on Bosworth field, offers his kingdom for
a horse, and Poor Richard, in his Almanac, tells us how a man lost his
life for want of a nail in his horse’s shoe. Butler, from whose pen
figures of speech gush forth like water from a never-failing spring,
declares that evil spirits are chased away by dint
“of sickle, horseshoe, hollow flint.”
In Gay’s fable of “The Old Woman and her Cats,” the alleged witch
laments that
“Straws laid across my path retard;
The horseshoes nail’d each threshold’s guard.”
Turning now from the merely passive to the active agency on the part of
the seeker after fortune’s favors, we enter upon a no less marvellous,
but vastly more attractive, field. Here is something that is tried
every day:--
Of two persons breaking apart the wishing-bone of a chicken before
forming a wish, the one getting the longer piece is assured of the
fulfilment of his or her wish; the shorter piece bodes disappointment.
Another way to test fickle fortune is to form a wish while a meteor
is falling; if one can do so the desire will be gratified. This
saying would be no bad symbol of the importance of seizing a golden
opportunity ere it has escaped us. As the immortal Shakespeare says:--
“There is a tide in the affairs of men
Which taken at the flood, leads on to fortune.”
If a load of hay goes by, make a wish on it and your wish will be
gratified, provided you instantly look another way. But the charm will
surely be broken if, like Lot’s wife, you should look back.
To see the new moon with the old in her arms, a much more common thing
by the way in this country than in England, is considered lucky; as
runs an old couplet:--
“Late, late yestreen, I saw the new moone
Wi’ the auld moone in hir armes.”
Here is another instance wherein the auguries differ. An old sea-rhyme
founded on the same thing adds this prediction:--
“And if we gang to sea, master,
I fear we’ll come to harm.”
It is also accounted good luck to see the new moon over the right
shoulder, especially if you instantly feel in your pocket and find
money there, as your luck thereby will be prodigiously increased, but
you must take care instantly to turn the money over in your pocket.
Burglars are said to carry a piece of coal, or some other object, about
with them for luck.
Upon getting out of bed in the morning, always put the right foot
foremost. Slightly altered, this injunction has been turned into the
familiar saying: “Put your best foot foremost.” Dr. Johnson was so
particular about this rule, that if he happened to plant his left foot
on the threshold of a house, he would turn back, and reënter right foot
foremost. Similarly, one must always begin dressing the right foot
first. An exception occurs to us: in military tactics it is always the
left foot that goes foremost.
Professional gamblers are firm believers in the element of luck, the
world over. According to their _dictum_, a youth who has never gambled
before, is sure to be lucky at his first essay at play. Finding a piece
of money or carrying a dice in the pocket also insures good fortune,
they say.
To secure luck at cards or to change your luck, when it is going
against you, you must walk three times around your chair or else blow
upon the cards with your breath. Beyond reasonable doubt you will be a
winner. Not so very long ago, it was the custom for women to offer to
sit cross-legged in order to procure luck at cards for their friends.
I have seen players spit on their hands for the same purpose. Sitting
cross-legged, with the fingers interlaced, was formerly considered the
correct magical posture.
The hair will grow better if cut on the waxing of the moon. This notion
is probably based on the symbolism of the moon’s waxing and waning, as
associated with growing and declining nature.
A Newfoundland fisherman to-day spits on the first piece of silver
given him for luck. In the Old Country this was also a common practice
among the lower class of hucksters, upon receiving the price of the
first goods sold on that day, which they call “hansell.”[10] Boxers
often spit into their hands before engaging in a set-to, as also did
the schoolboys of my own age, who thought it a charm to prevent the
master’s ferule from hurting them as much as it otherwise would, but
later found out their mistake.
In some country districts the belief still holds that if a live frog
can be passed through a sick cow the animal will get well, but the frog
must be alive and kicking, or the charm will not work.
Salt was formerly the first thing taken into a new house, in the belief
that the occupants would never want for bread in that house.
“Happy is the corpse that the rain rains on.” This is a sort of
corollary to the belief, that it is a fortunate sign if the sun shines
on a newly wedded couple.
The long established custom of laying the head of the dead to the east
is probably a survival of the ancient sun-worship. It is traced back to
the Phœnicians. In Shakespeare’s “Cymbeline” we find this reference to
it:--
“We must lay his head to the east:
My father hath reason for’t.”
We are reminded that ropes are coiled, cranks turned, and eggs beaten
with the sun. One writer upon Folk-lore[11] remarks that passing the
bottle at table from right to left, instead of being merely proper
form, really comes from this ancient superstition.
Telling the bees of a death in the family was formerly a quite general
practice, if indeed it has entirely died out. I know that it has been
practised in New England within my own recollection. It was the belief
that a failure to so inform the bees would lead to their dwindling away
and dying, according to some interpreters, or to their flying away,
according to others. The manner of proceeding was to knock with the
house-key three times against the hives, at the same time telling the
noisy inmates that their master or mistress, as the case might be, was
dead. One case is reported where an old man actually sung a psalm in
front of some hives. In New England the hives were sometimes draped in
black. The semi-sacred character with which antiquity invested this
wonderful little insect sufficiently accounts for the practice. Mr.
Whittier has some verses about it in “Home Ballads.” Beating upon a pot
or kettle when bees are swarming comes from Virgil’s injunction, in the
like case, to raise tinkling sounds.
Laying a plate for a dead person was in pursuance of the belief that,
if it were omitted, one death in the family would speedily be followed
by another.
The Passing Bell was originally instituted to drive away evil spirits,
as well as to bespeak the prayers of all good Christians for a soul
just leaving the body. Sitting up with a dead body originated in a like
purpose. The former custom is dimly reflected in the tolling of the
bell, the number of strokes indicating the age of the deceased.
It is considered lucky to put on a garment wrong side out. I knew of
a sea-captain who, on rising late in the morning of the day he was to
sail, in his hurry, put on his drawers wrong side out. He said to his
wife, with a laugh, that he would wear them so for luck. The ship in
which he sailed was lost, with all on board, on the very same night;
and, as it turned out, the captain’s mistake in putting on his clothes
proved the means of identifying his mutilated remains when they were
found on the beach the next morning.
The trial to discover a witch, made use of by the circle of hysterical
young girls in the time of the lamentable witchcraft terror, was to
take a sieve and a pair of scissors or shears, stick the points of the
shears in the wood of the sieve, and let two of them hold it balanced
upright on the tips of their two fingers; then to ask St. Peter and St.
Paul if a certain person, naming the one suspected, was a witch. If the
right one was hit upon, the sieve would suddenly turn round.
As usual, Butler has something to say of this charm:--
“Th’ oracle of the sieve and shears
That turns as certain as the spheres.”
Another similar charm is that of the Bible and key. I do not learn of
its being practised of late, though it has been put to the trial since
I can remember, to discover a thief. It is done in this way. The key is
placed upon a certain chapter in the Bible, after which the sacred book
is shut and tightly fastened. Both are then hung to a nail. The name of
the suspected person is then repeated three times by some one present,
while another recites:--
“If it turns to thee, thou art the thief.”
Should the key have turned, the guilt is, of course, fixed upon the
real criminal.
Perhaps the manner of proceeding in such cases will be made clearer by
the following relation of an actual test and its results, which took
place in England some thirty years ago, and was given to the world as
a curious instance of the degree of superstition then still existing
in many parts of Great Britain. The account goes on to say that: “At
the Cricklade Petty Sessions, in Wiltshire, a matron named Eliza Glass
made a statement which was briefly as follows: Her father had lost
or missed the sum of four pounds sterling, and suspicion, apparently
unfounded, fell upon herself and her husband. The theory was formed
that she had stolen a key, and thus her husband had obtained access to
the money. It was determined to test the matter by the ‘Bible and key.’
The key was placed in the Bible on a particular place in Solomon’s
Song, the book closed and tied, and suspended by a string passed
through the handle of the key, which protruded. One of the persons then
thought of the suspected individual, the edge of the book turned toward
the tester, and Mrs. Glass was adjudged guilty, or as she expressed
it, ‘upset.’ All this was in her absence. But she knew that she was
innocent, and when informed of her condemnation adopted tactics which
others, more astute than she, had used before her; she determined to
impeach the credibility of the witness. Taking a New Testament she put
the key on the words ‘Blessed are the pure in heart,’ and suspending
the book as before, she was acquitted. Troubled by the apparent
inconsistency of the Old and the New Testaments, she inquired of the
magistrates what was to be done. They dismissed her with the remark
that the bench could not interfere, and that, if innocent, she ought to
be satisfied with the approval of a good conscience.”
Thrusting a knife between the leaves of a Bible to obtain a name for a
child has not gone out of use even yet.