In Sweden it is unlucky to kill a stork, a robin or a swallow. If one kills a wren he will break a bone before the year is out. It is also unlucky to kill a marten. Many animals possess the power of curing diseases. Three hairs taken from the °cross° of an ass, that is the mark running up the back and out at right angles over the shoulders, will cure whoop ing-cough, but the ass will die. Another sure cure for whooping-cough can be obtained by asking and following the advice of a man riding a piebald horse. Swedish sailors will not men tion the name of the port for which they are bound.
If a huntsman, on going out in the morning, sees a fox cross his path, or meets an old woman or friar, he immediately returns home again; as he is persuaded that, in the first instance, he will meet with no game, and in the other that he will shoot a man hidden in the leaves, or do some other irreparable mis chief. In the Alps the mountaineers believe that if the cuccoo sings in the direction of the north, it will rain the next day; but if toward the south, the weather will be fine. In the Tyrol if a youngster look pale and sickly his parents suspect that the moon-rays must have found their way into his bedchamber.
Turkey.—In Turkey if a cat enters a chamber where a person is dying and manages to pass over his or her body before being driven from the room, both the dying person and the cat become vampires and live ever after by sucking the blood from living people. If one finds a piece of bread lying upon the ground he must pick it up, kiss it and carry it until he finds a hole into which it can be inserted. To step upon a piece of bread or to leave it lying upon the ground is one of the unpardonable sins and dooms the offender to the third hell, where he is perpetually gored by an ox that has but a single horn, and that in the centre of his forehead. The Turk is convinced that mis
fortune hovers nigh when he sees a rose leaf fall to the ground, and many people pay par ticular attention to the flowers and leaves which are decaying, gathering them carefully to pre vent them from dropping.
United States.— In Michigan a double cedar knot is carried in the pocket by some to cure rheumatism, and in New Hampshire a man may carry a gall from the stems of golden rod for the same disease. Hickory nuts, the buckeye and its cousin, the horse chestnut, which brings good luck in New Jersey, are other foes to rheumatism in different localities. Some people wear a strange ring made of a potato with a hole bored through it for rheu matism and others carry a plain potato in the pocket. The charm is more potent if the potato has been stolen. According to a Maine belief, a nutmeg pierced and hung on a string around the neck prevents boils, croup and neuralgia. In some parts of Massachusetts the cows are believed to forecast the future, and if they °moo° after midnight it is a warning of an ap proaching death in the family. Among the West Virginia mountaineers the crowing of the cock before the door tells of coming company. It is believed on Cape Cod and in many other dis tricts along the New England coast that a sick man cannot die until the ebb tide begins to run. In New England the sailors carry as a talisman a bone taken from a living turtle, a pebble from a fishhawk's nest or a small bone from the head of a cod. In Connecticut the belief holds that beans and potatoes must be planted in the old of the moon to prevent them running to vines. In Texas some superstitious people carry a small bone from a fish's head,.but the luck only comes after the charm has been lost. See also