St. Agnes' Eve.

"Two hazel nuts I threw into the flame,And to each nut I gave a sweetheart's name;This withthe loudest bounceme sore amaz'd,That in aflame of brightest colourblaz'd;Asblaz'd the nut, somay thy passion grow,For 'twas thy nut that did so brightly glow."

Another charm consisted in eating an apple. "Take a candle and go alone to a looking-glass; eat an apple before it, and some traditions say you should comb your hair all the time; the face of your conjugal companionto bewill be seen in the glass, as if peeping over your shoulder."

A third is, "to dip your left shirt-sleeve in a burn where three lairds' lands meet." "You go out, one or more—for this is a social spell—to a south-running spring or rivulet, where three lairds' lands meet, and dip your left shirt-sleeve. Go to bed in sight of a fire, and hang your wet sleeve before it to dry. Lie awake; and some time near midnight an apparition, having the exact figure of the party in question, will come and turn the sleeve, as if to dry the other side of it."

A fourth is performed as follows: "Take three dishes; put clean water in one, foul water in another, and leave the third empty; blindfold a person and lead him to the hearth where the dishes are ranged; he (or she) dips the left hand; if by chance in the clean water, the future husband or wife will come to the bar of matrimony a maid; if in the foul, a widow; if in the empty dish, it foretells with equal certainty no marriage at all. It is repeated three times, and every time the arrangement of the dishes is altered."

Pennant says that the young women in Scotland determine the figure and size of their prospective husbands bydrawing cabbages blindfolded. "They must go out, hand in hand, with eyes shut, and pull the first they meet with. Its being little, straight or crooked, is prophetic of the size and shapeof the grand object of all their spells—the husband or wife. Earth sticking to the roots indicates a fortune."

Formerly this was a night of great import to maidens who desired to know whom they were to marry. Of such it was required that they should not eat on this day, and those who conformed to the rule called it fasting St. Agnes' fast. Ben Jonson says—

And on sweet St. Agnes' night,Please you with the promis'd sight,Some of husbands, some of lovers,Which an empty dream discovers.

Old Aubrey gives a form whereby a lad or lass was to attain a sight of the fortunate lover. "Upon St. Agnes' night you take a row of pins, and pull out every one, one after another, saying a Pater Noster, sticking a pin in your sleeve, and you will dream of him or her you shall marry."

—Her vespers doneOf all its wreathed pearls her hair she frees;Unclasps her warmed jewels one by one;Loosens her fragrant boddice; by degreesHer rich attire creeps rustling to her knees.Half hidden, like a mermaid in sea-weed,Pensive awhile she dreams awake, and sees,In fancy, fair St. Agnes in her bed,But dares not look behind, or all the charm is fled.—Keates.

Saint Patrick, according to ancient lore, having been born at Kilpatrick, Scotland, landed near Wicklow, in the year of grace 433. Originally there was a dispute, according toLover, as to the true anniversary of this renowned saint, some supposing the eighth and others the ninth to be the correct day. The humorist represents a priest as settling the difficulty as follows:—

Says he, "Boys, don't be fighting for eight or for nine;Don't be always dividing—but sometimes combine;Combine eight with nine, and seventeen is the mark,So let that be his birthday." "Amen," says the clerk.So they all got blind drunk—which completed their bliss,And we keep up the practice from that day to this!

In Devonshire, according to Brand, on the eve of the Epiphany, the farmer and his men, with a large pitcher of cider, visit the orchard, and, encircling one of the best bearing trees, they drink the following toast three several times:—

"Here's to thee, old apple tree,Whence thou may'st bud, and whence thou may'st blow,And whence thou may'st bear apples enow!Hats full! caps full!Bushel—bushel—sacks full!And my pockets full too! Huzza!"

This done, they return to the house, to find the doors bolted by the ladies, who will not open until some one guesses what is on the spit, and which is the reward of him who names it. Some are so superstitious as to believe that if they neglect this ceremony, the trees will bear no apples that year. In allusion to a similar ceremony practiced in Sussex and Essex on New Year's eve, Herrick, in his "Hesperides," says—

"Wassail the trees, that they may bearYou many a plum, and many a pear;For more or less fruits they will bring,As you do give them wassailing."

A very singular merriment in the Isle of Man is mentioned by Waldron, in his history of that place. He says that "during the whole twelve days of Christmas there is not a barn unoccupied, and that every parish hires fiddlers at the public charge. On twelfth-day the fiddler lays his head in some one of the girls' laps, and a third person asks who such a maid, or such a maid shall marry, naming the girls then present one after another; to which the fiddler answers, according to his own whim, or agreeably to the intimacies he has taken notice of during this time of merriment. But whatever he says is as absolutely depended upon as an oracle; and if he happens to couple two people who have an aversion to each other, tears and vexation succeed the mirth. This they call cutting off the fiddler's head; for after this he is dead for the whole year."

A painful and mischievous custom prevailed on May eve in the south of Ireland so late as the year 1825. "It was a common practice for school boys, on that day, to consider themselves privileged to run wildly about with a bunch of nettles, striking at the face and hands of their companions, or any other person whom they felt they could assault with impunity."

In the department of the Hautes Alpes, of France, in and around the village of Andrieux, the dead are wrapped in a winding sheet, but are not inclosed in a coffin. In the valleys of Queyras and Grave, the dead are suspended in a barn during five months in the winter, until the earth is softened bythe sun's rays, when the corpse is consigned to its native element. On the return to the home of the deceased, it becomes a scene of bacchanalian revelry, in which the groans and sighs of the mourners mingle with the songs and jests of the inebriated guests. At Argentiere, after the burial, the tables are set out round the church-yard; that of the curate and the mourning family over the grave itself.

According to the tenor of various old civil codes and local enactments, when a person became affected with leprosy he was looked upon as legally and politically dead, and lost the privileges of citizenship. He was classed with idiots, madmen and outlaws, and was not allowed to inherit. The church performed the solemn ceremonies of the burial of the dead over him on the day on which he was separated from his fellow-men, and confined to a lazar-house. A priest, with surplice, stole and crucifix, conducted the leper from his residence to the church, and thence to the lazar-house. As the priest left the latter place he threw upon the body of the poor outcast a shovelful of earth, in imitation of the closing of a grave.

There exists an old social custom of claiming a pair of gloves, from man or woman, by a kiss given when asleep. Allusion to this occurs in Scott's "Fair Maid of Perth." Catherine Glover, on St. Valentine's day, found Henry of the Wynd asleep in a chair in her father's house. She stole a kiss from him, thereby choosing him as her valentine, and winning a pair of gloves. Her father, who was a glove-maker, says: "Thou knowest the maiden who ventures to kiss asleeping man wins of him a pair of gloves. Come to my booth. Thou shalt have a pair of delicate kid-skin that will exactly suit her hand and arm."

The fourth of February, says the NevadaTranscript, is the day on which the Chinese select one of their number to preside over their Joss house. The manner of proceeding is as follows: The two companies here are permitted to have each a certain number of representatives, and the fleetest and strongest men are generally chosen. These delegates repair to a vacant lot at the rear of the Joss house. A stipulated number of bombs, each one containing a metallic ring, are placed in charge of a committee, whose duty it is to fire off the bombs, one at a time. When the explosion takes place, the ring contained in the bomb is sent flying into the air. It is the desire of the two factions to have their respective delegates to secure as many of the rings as possible. Of course, a general scramble ensues. At the close, the side which has secured the most rings is entitled to select a Joss (equivalent to a minister of the gospel with us) from among their number.

A custom was instituted in the city of Toulouse by Charlemagne, that at Easter any Christian might give a box on the ear to a Jew wherever he chanced to meet him, as a mark of contempt for the nation which had, at that season, crucified the Saviour of mankind. This usage, scandalous in itself, was sometimes, through zeal, practiced with great violence. It is stated that the eye of a poor Jew was forced out on the side of the head whereon the blow was given. In the course ofcenturies this cruel custom was commuted for a tax, and the money appropriated to the use of the church of St. Saturnin.

Amatus Lusitanus relates the case of a monk who fainted whenever he saw a rose, and never quitted his cell when that flower was blooming. Scaliger mentions one of his relatives who experienced a similar horror when seeing a lily. Montaigne stated that there were men who dreaded an apple more than they did a musket ball. Zimmerman tells us of a lady who could not endure the touch of silk and satin, and shuddered when placing her hand upon the velvet skin of a peach. Boyle records the case of a man who felt a natural abhorrence to honey. Without his knowledge, some honey was mixed with a plaster applied to his foot, and his agony compelled his attendants to withdraw it. A young man was known to faint whenever he heard the servant sweeping. Hippocrates mentions one Nicanor who swooned whenever he heard a flute. Erasmus experienced febrile symptoms when smelling fish. The Duke d'Epernon swooned on beholding a leveret, although a hare did not produce the same effect. Henry III. of France fainted at the sight of a cat, and Marshal d'Albert at the sight of a pig.

The lower order of people in some parts of England have curious superstitions respecting the bee. A poor old widow once complained to me that all her stocks of bees had died, and on inquiring the cause, she informed me that on the death of her husband, a short time before, she had neglected totapat each of the hives, to inform the bees of the circumstance;that, in consequence of this omission, they had been gradually getting weaker and weaker, and that now she had not one left. Mr. Loudon mentions, that when he was in Bedfordshire, he was informed of an old man who sang a psalm in front of some hives which were not doing well, but which he said would thrive in consequence of that ceremony. In Norfolk, at places where bees are kept, it is an indispensable ceremony, in case of the death of any of the family, to put the bees in mourning, or the consequence would be that all of them would die. The method of putting them in mourning is to attach a piece of black cloth to each of the hives. In the neighborhood of Coventry, in the event of the death of any of the family, it is considered necessary to inform the bees of the circumstance, otherwise they will dwindle and die. The manner of communicating the intelligence to the little community, is, with due form and ceremony, to take the key of the house, and knock with it three times against the hive, informing the inmates, at the same time, of the bereavement. A similar custom prevails in Kent.—Mr. Jesse.

In Scotland, especially among the Highlanders, the women make a courtesy to the new moon. In some parts of England the women exclaim, upon seeing the new moon: "A fine moon, God bless her!"

Among the warnings or notices of death to be found in the dark chronicle of superstitions, the omens peculiar to certain families are not the least striking. Pennant tells us that many of the great families in Scotland had their demon, orgenius, who gave them monitions of future events. Thus the family of Rothmurchan had the Bodac an Dun, or Ghost of the Hill; and the Kincardines, the Spectre of the Bloody Hand. The Bodach Glas is introduced in the novel of "Waverley," as the family superstition of the MacIvors, the truth of which had been proved by an experience of three hundred years. Bodach is from the Saxon, Bode, a messenger, a tidings-bringer; Glas, the Gælic for gray, the "Gray Messenger." The appearance of a tall figure in a gray plaid was always regarded as an omen of an early death in the family.

The Duke de Saint Simon mentions in his "Memoirs" a singular instance of constitutional sympathy between two brothers. These were twins—the President de Banquemore and the Governor de Bergues, who were surprisingly alike, not only in their persons, but in their feelings. One morning, he tells us, when the president was at his royal audience, he was suddenly attacked by an intense pain in the thigh; at the same instant, as it was discovered afterwards, his brother, who was with the army, received a severe wound from a sword on the same leg, and precisely the same part of the leg.

In a letter of Philip, the second Earl of Chesterfield, it is related, that "on a morning in 1652, the earl saw an object in white, like a standing sheet, within a yard of his bedside. He attempted to catch it, but it slid to the foot of the bed, and he saw it no more. His thoughts turned to his lady, who was then at Networth, with her father, the Earl of Northumberland. On his arrival at Networth, a footman met him on thestairs, with a packet directed to him from his wife, whom he found with Lady Essex, her sister, and Mr. Ramsey. He was asked why he had returned so suddenly. He told his motive; and on perusing the letters in the packet, he found that his lady had written to him, requesting his return, for she had seen an object in white, with a black face, by her bedside. These apparitions were seen by the earl and countessat the same moment, when they were forty miles asunder."

At the time Viscount Dundee fell in the battle of Killiecrankie, in 1689, his friend, the Lord Balcarras, was a prisoner in the Castle of Edinburgh, upon a strong suspicion of attachment to the unfortunate house of Stuart. The captive earl was in bed, when a hand drew aside the curtain, and the figure of his friend was revealed to him, armed as for battle. The spectre gazed mournfully on Lord Balcarras, passed to the other end of the chamber, leaned some time on the mantlepiece, and then slowly passed out of the door. The earl, not for a moment supposing that he was looking at an apparition, called out "Stop!" but the figure heeded him not. Immediately afterwards, the news was conveyed to his lordship of the battle, and that the gallant Dundee was slain; or, as the song says, that

"Low lay the bonnet of bonny Dundee."

Lord Byron used to mention a strange story which the commander of a packet related to him. This officer stated, that being asleep one night in his berth, he was awakened by the pressure of something heavy on his limbs; and, there being a faint light in his room, could see, as he thought distinctly,the figure of his brother, who was at that time in the same service in the East Indies, dressed in his uniform, and stretched across the bed. Concluding it to be an illusion of the senses, he shut his eyes and made an effort to sleep. But still the same pressure continued, and still, as often as he ventured to look, he saw the figure lying across in the same position. To add to his wonder, on putting forth his hand to touch the figure, he found the uniform in which it appeared to be dresseddripping wet. On the entrance of one of his brother officers, to whom he called out in alarm, the apparition vanished. A few months later Captain Kidd received intelligence that on that very night his brother had been drowned in the Indian seas.—Moore's Life of Byron.

Honest Isaac Walton makes Sir Henry Wotton a dreamer in the family line; for, just before his death, he dreamed that the University treasury was robbed by townsmen and poor scholars, and that the number was five. He then wrote to his son Henry at Oxford, inquiring about it, and the letter reached him the morning after the night of the robbery. "Henry," says the account, "shows his father's letter about, which causes great wonderment, especially as the number of thieves was exactly correct."

Aubrey tells us, in his "Miscellanies," that "the beautiful Lady Diana Rich, daughter of the Earl of Holland, as she was walking in her father's garden, at Kensington, to take the fresh air before dinner, about eleven o'clock, being then very well, met with her own apparition—habit and everything—as in a looking-glass. About a month after she died of smallpox. It is said that her sister, the Lady Elizabeth Thynne, saw the like of herself also, before she died. This account I had from a person of honor."

Grimaldi, the father of "Joe," the celebrated clown, had a vague yet profound dread of the 14th day of the month. At its approach he was always nervous, disquieted, anxious; directly it had passed, he was another man again, and invariably exclaimed, in his broken English, "Ah! now I am safe for anoder month." If this circumstance were unaccompanied by any singular coincidence, it would be scarcely worth mentioning; but it is remarkable that Grimaldi actually died on the 14th of March, and that he was born, christened and married on the 14th of the month.—Dickens' Life of Grimaldi.

In Normandy, if any of the family are absent when the cake is cut on Twelfth-night, his share is carefully put by. If he remains well, it is believed that the cake continues fresh; if ill, it begins to be moist; if he dies, the cake spoils.

Mrs. Mathews relates, in the memoirs of her husband, the celebrated comedian, that he was one night in bed and unable to sleep from the excitement that continues some time after acting; when, hearing a rustling by the side of his bed, he looked out and saw his first wife, who was then dead, standingby the bedside, dressed as when alive. She smiled and bent forward, as if to take his hand; but in his alarm he threw himself out on the floor to avoid the contact, and was found by the landlord in a fit. On the same night, and at the same hour, the second Mrs. Mathews, who was far away from her husband, received a similar visit from her predecessor, whom she had known when alive. She was quite awake, and in her terror seized the bell-rope to summon assistance; the rope gave way, and she fell with it in her hand to the floor.

Isaac Walton gives an account of this apparition in the life of Dr. Donne. The doctor left his wife unwell in London, and went with Sir Robert Drury to Paris. Two days after arriving there he stated to Drury that he had had a vision of his wife walking through his room, with her hair hanging over her shoulders, and a dead child in her arms. So impressed were they by the incident that they immediately sent a messenger to London to inquire regarding Mrs. Donne's health. The intelligence procured by the man was, that she had been brought to bed of a dead child at the very hour in which her husband thought he had seen her in Paris.

Archbishop Laud, not long before the disastrous circumstance happened which hastened his tragical end, on entering his study one day, found his picture at full length on the floor, the string which held it to the wall having snapped. The sight of this struck the prelate with such a sense of the probability of his fate, that from that time he did not enjoy a moment's peace. The Duke of Buckingham was struck by anoccurrence of a similar kind; he found his picture in the Council Chamber fallen out of its frame. This accident, in that age of omens, was looked upon with a considerable degree of awe.

In the "Magna Britannia," the author, in his "Account of the Hundred of Croydon," says: "Our historians take notice of two things in this parish which may not be convenient to us to omit, viz: A great wood called Norwood, belonging to the archbishops, wherein was anciently a tree called the Vicar's Oak, where four parishes met, as it were, in a point. It is said to have consisted wholly of oaks, and among them was one that bore a mistletoe, which some persons were so hardy as to cut for the gain of selling it to the apothecaries of London, leaving a branch of it to sprout out; but they proved unfortunate after it, for one of them fell lame and others lost an eye. At length, in the year 1678, a certain man, notwithstanding that he was warned against it, upon the account of what the others had suffered, ventured to cut the tree down, and he soon after broke his leg.

"To fell oaks has long been counted fatal, and such as believe it produce the instance of the Earl of Winchilsea, who, having felled a curious grove of oaks, soon after found his countess dead in her bed suddenly, and his eldest son, the Lord Maidstone, was killed at sea by a cannon ball."

When Lord Bacon, as he himself records, dreamt in Paris that he saw "his father's house in the country plastered all over with black mortar," his feelings were highly wrought upon; the emotions under which he labored were of a veryapprehensive kind, and he had no doubt that the next intelligence from England would apprise him of the death of his father. The sequel proved that his apprehensions were well grounded, for his father actually died the same night in which he had his remarkable dream.

P. Claudius, in the First Punic War, caused the sacred chickens, who would not leave their cage, to be pitched into the sea, saying: "If they will not eat, they must drink."

Zoraster imagined there was an evil spirit that could excite violent storms of wind. The sailors are tinctured with a superstition of the kind, which is the reason why they so seldom whistle on ship-board; when becalmed, their whistling is an invocation.

A curious instance of popular superstition, in defiance of plain facts to the contrary, is related in a letter written in the year 1808, published in Dr. Aikin's "Athenæum." The writer says that in the year 1801, he visited Glasgow, and, passing one of the principal streets in the neighborhood of the Iron Church, observed about thirty people, chiefly women and girls, gathered round a large public pump, waiting their turn to draw water. The pump had two spouts, behind and before; but he noticed that the hinder one was carefully plugged up, no one attempting to fill her vessel from that source, although she had to wait so long till her turn came at the other spout.

On inquiry, the visitor was informed that, though the same handle brought the same water from the same well through either and both of the spouts, yet the populace, and even some better informed people, had for a number of years conceived an idea, which had become hereditary and fixed, that the water passing through the hindermost spout would beunlucky and poisonous. This prejudice received from time to time a certain sanction; for in the spout, through long disuse, a kind of dusty fur collected, and this, if at any time the water was allowed to pass through, made it at first run foul—thus confirming the superstitious prejudice of the people, who told the traveler that it was certain death to drink of the water drawn from the hindermost spout. The magistrates had sought to dispel the ignorant terror of the populace, by cleaning out the well repeatedly in their presence, and explaining to them the internal mechanism of the pump, but all was in vain.

That the soul quits the dead body in the form of a bird, is a wide-spread belief, and has been the subject of superstitious fancies from the earliest times. In the Egyptian hieroglyphics, a bird signifies the soul of man.

In the legend of St. Polycarp, who was burned alive, his blood extinguished the flames, and from his ashes arose a white dove which flew towards heaven. It was said that a dove was seen to issue from the funeral pyre of Joan of Arc.

In the Breton ballad of "Lord Nann and the Korrigan" there is an allusion to spirit-bearing doves—

"It was a marvel to see, men say,The night that followed the day,The lady in earth by her lord lay,To see two oak-trees themselves rearFrom the new-made grave into the air;"And on their branches two doves white,Who were there hopping gay and light;Which sang when rose the morning ray,And then toward heaven sped away."

"It was a marvel to see, men say,The night that followed the day,The lady in earth by her lord lay,To see two oak-trees themselves rearFrom the new-made grave into the air;

"And on their branches two doves white,Who were there hopping gay and light;Which sang when rose the morning ray,And then toward heaven sped away."

A wild song, sung by the boatmen of the Mole, in Venice, declares that the spirit of Daniel Manin, the patriot, is flying about the lagoons to this day in the shape of a beautiful dove.

In the ParisFigaro(October, 1872), is an account of the death of a gipsy belonging to a tribe encamped in the Rue Duhesme. Among other ceremonies, a live bird was held close to the lips of the dying girl, with the view of introducing her soul into the bird.

In certain districts of Russia bread-crumbs are placed in a piece of white linen, outside of the window, for six weeks, under the belief that the soul of the recent inmate will come, in the shape of a bird, to feed upon the crumbs. When Deacon Theodore and his three schismatic brethren were burnt in 1681, the souls of the martyrs, as the "Old Believers" affirm, appeared in the air as pigeons.

Among the curiosities of ancient credulity was the belief that certain birds possessed stones of remarkable talismanic virtue. One of these was supposed to be found in the brain of the vulture, which gave health to the finder and successful results when soliciting favors. Dioscorides gives an account of the use of an eagle-stone in detecting larceny. TheAlectorius, a stone worn by the wrestler Milo, was so called from being taken out of the gizzard of a fowl. A stone like a crystal, as large as a bean, extracted from a cock, was considered by the Romans to make the wearer invisible.Corviawas the name of a stone obtained from the nest of a crow. The swallow-stone was a Norman superstition, according towhich the bird knows how to find on the seashore a stone that restores sight to the blind. Longfellow, in "Evangeline," says—

"Seeking with eager eyes that wondrous stone which the swallowBrings from the shore of the sea, to restore the sight of her fledglings."

In old times it was believed that certain birds prognosticated death. In Lloyd's "Stratagems of Jerusalem" (1602), he says: "By swallows lighting upon Pirrhus' tents, and lighting upon the mast of Mar. Antonius' ship, sayling after Cleopatra to Egypt, the soothsayers did prognosticate that Pirrhus should be slaine at Argos, in Greece, and Mar. Antonius in Egypt." He alludes to swallows following Cyrus from Persia to Scythia, from which the magi foretold his death. Ravens followed Alexander the Great in returning from India, and going to Babylon, which was a sure presage of his end.

Among the Danish peasantry the appearance of a raven in the village is considered an indication that the parish priest is to die. "There is a common feeling in Cornwall," observes Mr. Hunt, "that the croaking of a raven over the house bodes evil to some of the family." Marlowe, in his "Rich Jew of Malta," described the "sad-presaging raven"—

"That tollsThe sick man's passport in her hollow beak,And in the shadow of the silent nightDoth shake contagion from her sable wings."

Gay, in "The Dirge," notices the presage—

"The boding raven on her cottage satAnd with hoarse croakings warn'd us of our fate."

A number of crows are said to have fluttered about Cicero's head on the very day he was murdered.

An evil prognostic attends the bittern in its flight. Bishop Hall, alluding to a superstitious man, says: "If a bittern flies over his head by night, he makes his will."

Homer has immortalized the crane as foreboding disaster—

"That when inclement winters vex the plainWith piercing frosts, or thick descending rain,To warmer seas the cranes embodied fly,With noise and order, through the midway sky;To pigmy nations wounds and death they bring,And all the war descends upon the wing."

Here is a saying that includes the magpie as a presager of death—

"One's joy, two's a greet [crying],Three's a wedding, four's a sheet [winding sheet]."

Theburree churree, an Indian night bird, preys upon dead bodies. The Mohammedans say that should a drop of the blood of a corpse, or any part of it, fall from this bird's beak on a human being, he will die at the end of forty days.

There is an odd superstition connected with the crossbill, in Thuringia, which makes the wood-cutters very careful of the nests. This bird in captivity is subject to many diseases, such as weak eyes, swelled and ulcerated feet, etc., arising probably from the heat and accumulated vapors of the stove-heated rooms where they are kept. The Thuringian mountaineer believes that these wretched birds can take upon themselves any diseases to which he is subject, and always keeps some near him. He is satisfied that a bird whose upper mandible bends to the right, has the power of transferring colds and rheumatisms from man to itself; and if the mandibleturns to the left, he is equally certain that the bird can render the same service to the women. The crossbill is often attacked with epilepsy, and the Thuringians drink every day the water left by the bird, as a specific against that disease.

The ancient myth about the ostrich was that she did not hatch her eggs by setting upon them, but by the rays of light and warmth from her eyes. Southey alludes to this in "Thalaba"—

With such a look as fables sayThe mother ostrich fixes on her eggs,Till that intense affectionKindle its light of life.

In Russia, on the 9th of March, the day on which the larks are supposed to arrive, the rustics make clay images of those birds, smear them with honey, tip their heads with tinsel, and then carry them about, singing songs to spring, or to Lada, their vernal goddess.

Milton's exquisite sonnet to the nightingale makes pointed reference to the fancy that her song portended success in love. Faber, in the "Cherwell Water Lily," gives an angelic character to the strains of the nightingale. The classical fable of the unhappy Philomela may have given origin to the conception that the nightingale sings with its breast impaled upon a thorn. The earliest notice of this myth by an English poetis, probably, that in the "Passionate Pilgrim" of Shakespeare—

"Everything doth banish moan,Save the nightingale alone.She, poor bird, as all forlorn,Lean'd her breast up till a thorn,And there sung the dolefull'st ditty,That to hear it was great pity."

There is a curious story of the blackbird that its original color was white, but it became black because one year three of the days were so cold that it had to take refuge in a chimney. Mr. Swainson says that "these three days (January 30th, 31st and February 1st) are called in the neighborhood of Brescia, 'I giorni della merla,' the blackbird's days."

The dove amongst birds, from its gentle and loving nature in the first place, and in the second from the purity of its plumage, has been preferably selected as the image of the Holy Ghost.

According to an apocryphal gospel, the Holy Ghost, under the form of a dove, designated Joseph as the spouse of the Virgin Mary by alighting on his head; and in the same manner, says Eusebius, was Fabian indicated as the divinely-appointed Bishop of Rome. According to a singular legend, the Holy Spirit, in the form of a dove, was present at the Council of Nice, andsigned the creedthat was there framed! There are many legends of a similar character.

At the consecration of Clovis the divine dove is said actually to have presided over the Christian destinies of France.Clovis and the Bishop of Rheims, St. Remi, proceeded in procession to the baptistry, where the chief of the Franks was to be consecrated king and made a Christian. When they arrived there, the priest, bearing the holy chrism, was stopped by the crowd, and could not reach the font. But a dove, whiter than snow, brought thither in her beak the "ampoule" (a phial of white glass) filled with chrism sent from heaven. St. Remi took the vessel and perfumed with chrism the baptismal water.

In a painted window at Lincoln College, Oxford, Elisha the prophet is represented with a double-headed dove seated on his shoulder. This becomes intelligent on referring to his petition to Elijah, when he entreated that "a double portion" of his spirit might rest upon him.

The dove, as a harbinger of good news, is alluded to in one of Martial's epigrams—

"A dove soft glided through the airOn Aretulla's bosom bare.This might seem chance, did she not stay,Nor would, permissive, wing her way.But, if a pious sister's vowsThe Master of mankind allows,This envoy of Sardoan skiesFrom the returning exile flies."

In old times ill-luck attended the killing of a robin. If one died in the hand, it was believed that the hand would always tremble. In "Six Pastorals," by George Smith, 1770, the following occurs:—

"I found a robin's nest within our shedAnd in the barn a wren has young one's bred;I never take away their nest, nor tryTo catch the old ones, lest a friend should die.Dick took a robin's nest from the cottage side,And ere a twelvemonth pass'd his mother died."

In Derbyshire, among many other places, it is believed that the catching and killing of a robin, or taking the eggs from the nest, is sure to be followed by misfortune, such as the death of cattle, blight of corn, etc. The folks say—

"Robins and wrensAre God's best cocks and hens.Martins and swallowsAre God's best scholars."

In Yorkshire, if a robin is killed, it is believed that the family cow will give bloody milk.

A superstition prevails in Ireland, and in some parts of England, that any young person, on first hearing the cuckoo, will find a hair of the color of their sweetheart's adhering to their stocking, if they will at once take off their left shoe and examine it carefully. Gay, in his "Shepherd's Week," says—

"Upon a rising bank I sat adown,Then doff'd my shoe, and, by my troth, I swearTherein I spied this yellow frizzled hair,As like to Lubberkin's in curl and hueAs if upon his comely pate it grew."

In Norfolk there is a belief that an unmarried person will remain single as many years as the cuckoo utters its call, when first heard in the spring. Subjoined is an old English invocation—

"Cuckoo, cherry-tree,Good bird, tell me,How many years I have to live?"

At the first call of the cuckoo the German peasant does the same thing as when he hears thunder for the first time in the year. He rolls himself two or three times on the grass, thinking himself thereby insured against pains in the back throughout the rest of the year, and all the more so if the bird continues its cry whilst he is on the ground.

If the first note of the cuckoo comes upon you when you have no money in your pocket, it is held, both in Germany and England, to portend want of money throughout the year.

A valuable virtue is attributed to cuckoos in keeping off fleas. In Hill's "Naturall and Artificiall Conclusions," (1650), we find: "A very easie and merry conceit to keep off fleas from your beds or chambers. Pliny reporteth that if, when you first hear the cuckow, you mark well where your first foot standeth, and take up that earth, the fleas will by no means breed where any of the same earth is thrown or scattered." This belief still exists in some parts of France.

"If you wish to know," says Horace Marryat, in his "Jutland and the Danish Isles," "why the cuckoo builds no nest of its own, I can easily explain it, according to the belief in Denmark. When in early spring-time the voice of the cuckoo is first heard in the woods, every village girl kisses her hand, and asks the question: 'Cuckoo! cuckoo! when shall I be married?' And the old folks, borne down with age and rheumatism, inquire: 'Cuckoo! when shall I be relieved from this world's cares?' The bird, in answer, continues singing 'Cuckoo!' as many times as years will elapse before the object of their desires will come to pass. But as many old people live to an advanced age, and many girls die old maids, the poor bird has so much to do in answering the questions put to her, that the building season goes by; she has notime to make her nest, but lays her eggs in the nest of the hedge-sparrow."

The magpie has always had many superstitions connected with it.Onemagpie foretells misfortune, which can be obviated, however, by pulling off the hat and making a polite bow to the bird. In Lancashire the saying is—

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