IN Parley's Magazine for Jan. 1840, but some of the giddy populace in the we told our readers that in many cases monkish times took advantage of these there were some traits in the supersti- carnivals for purposes of drinking and tions or character of our Saxon ancestors, sports, and the monks themselves increawhich deserve severe reprobation, rather sed the evil continually by new 'saintsthan imitation; and this remark ought days' without number. The protestant always to be remembered in referring to reformation greatly reduced these days; ancient customs. Our ancestors were a but many of the curious customs which religious people, and their holidays were distinguished each day, still linger in originally instituted for moral purposes; a small degree among the ignorant pop SUPERSTITIOUS CUSTOMS. 127 Some of these the wrong side outwards, you will have good luck all day. ulation of Great Britain. superstitions we will recite, although not one has a particle of truth in it. Many of these wild opinions were brought to this country, and sometimes believed by the illiterate. Fortune-telling has become rather unfashionable since the death of Mrs Pitcher; but still many a 'cunning man' and many a‘cunning woman' pretends to unfold future events to visitors of ev ery degree, from the servant-girl who desires to know if John will be faithful, to the rich heiress and the wealthy matron. There are still a few respectable people in England who will not transact business, nor be bled, nor take physic, on a Friday, because it is an unlucky day. There are other people, who, for the same reason, will not be married on a Friday; others again, who consider every child born on that day doomed to misfortune. It is a common saying and popular belief that Fridaynight's dreams, on the Saturday told, Many believe that the howlings of a dog foretel death, and that dogs can see death enter the houses of people who are about to die. Among common sayings are these that pigs can see the wind-hairy people are born to be rich—and people born at night never see spirits. Again, if a cat sneezes or coughs, every person in the house will have colds. In the morning, if, without knowing or intending it, you put on your stockings To give to, or receive from, a friend a knife or a pair of scissars, cuts friendship. A friend of ours, while talking thoughtlessly with a good woman, carelessly turned a chair round two or three times ; she was offended, and said it was a sign they should quarrel; and so it proved, for she never spoke friendly to him after. When your cheek burns, it is a sign some one is talking about you. When your ears tingle, lies are being told about you. When your nose itches, you will be vexed. When your right eye itches, it is a sign of good luck; or your left eye, of bad luck; but Left or right, Brings good at night. These are every-day sayings, and things of every-day belief. It is further believed that children will not thrive if they are not christened; and if they do not cry during the ceremony, that they will not live long. It is unlucky to pare your finger nails on a Sunday. If a married woman loses her wedding ring, it is a token that she will lose her husband's affections; her breaking of it forebodes death. A spark in the candle is the sign of a coming letter. Upon new-year's-day, if you have not something new on, you will not get much all the year. Bubbles upon tea denote kisses. To cure your corns, you must steal a very small bit of beef, bury it in the ground, and as that rots the corns will go away. There are women in some parts of England, who, to cure the hooping cough, pass the afflicted child three times before breakfast under a blackberry-bush, both ends of which grow into the ground. There are others who travel the road to meet a man on a piebald horse, and ask him what will cure the hooping-cough, and whatever he recommends is adopted as an infallible remedy. There was one remarkable cure of this kind. A young mother made an inquiry of a man mounted as directed; he told her to put her finger, to the knuckle-joint, down the child's throat, and hold it there twenty minutes by the church clock. She went home and did so, and it never coughed again. And, we should think, never breathed again. Some persons carry in their pockets a piece of coffin, to keep away the cramp. Stockings are hung crosswise at the foot of the bed, with a pin stuck in them, to keep off the nightmare. To always have money in your pocket put into it small spiders called moneyspinners; or keep in your purse a bent coin, or a coin with a hole in it; at every new moon take it out and spit upon it, return it to your pocket, and wish yourself good luck. And we warrant, that as long as you keep it there your purse will never lack a piece of money. In Berkshire, England, at the first appearance of a new moon, maidens go into the fields, and, while they look at it, say, New moon, new moon, I hail thee! He who my true love is to be. They then return home, firmly believing that before morning their future husbands will appear to them in their dreams. From a British magazine we select the following account, given by a gentleman who was witness to the silly and wicked superstition. "A few evenings ago a neighbor's daughter came to request the loan of a Bible. As I knew they had one of their own, I inquired why mine was wanted? She said that one of their lodgers, a disagreeable woman, had lost one of her husband's shirts, and suspecting the thief to be in the house, was going to find it out by the bible and key; and for this purpose, neither bible nor key belonging to any person living in the house would do. Find a thief by the bible and key! thought I. I'll go and be a spectator of this ceremony. So I gave the child a bible and went with her. I found the people of the house assembled, and a young boy and girl to hold the apparatus. for it seems it can only be done properly by a bachelor and a maid. The key was then bound into the bible against the first chapter of Ruth, part of 17th verse, ‘the Lord do so to me and more also'; and strict silence and gravity enjoined, and then the ceremony began. HISTORY OF ENGLAND FOR CHILDREN. "First, the boy and girl placed their left hands behind their backs, and the key balanced on the middle fingers of their right hands; then the woman who had lost the article named a person, and said, 'the Lord do so to me and more also, has he (or she) got my husband's shirt.' Nearly all the names of the people in the house had been repeated, when on the name of an old crony of the loser being mentioned, the urchin who held the bible suspended from the key gave his hand a slight motion-down went the bible-and the scene of pro-ing and coning which ensued cannot be described. During the disturbance I thought it better to look on and laugh, and retired to a corner of the room, expecting every in 129 stant to see them do battle. In the height of the disturbance the loser's husband came home, and on learning the cause said he had removed the shirt himself, and put it into his chest. Indignation was now turned against the person who advised the mode of divining its discovery by the borrowed bible and key; but she boldly defended it, and said it never failed before, nor would it have failed now, had not the man in the corner, meaning me, laughed; and she added, with malicious solemnity, that the bible would not be laughed at. I retreated from the gathering storm, and returned home to note down the proceedings, and forward them to you." A New History of England, EDWARD FIRST. FOR CHILDREN. EDWARD was in Sicily when he heard of his father's death; but he was in no great hurry to become a king; it was almost two years before he came to England. You will expect to hear something good of him, because he was an affectionate son and husband; but he did not love the ways of the Lord, nor desire to please him, and therefore we need not wonder that he was not afraid of sin. He began his reign in a very dreadful manner. He wished to be king of Wales, as well as of England, and the Welsh did not like to have Edward for their king; so he went to war with them, took David the Welsh king's brother prisoner, and burnt him to death. The Welsh said they would not have any king that was not born in Wales-so, as Edward's little boy was born in Wales, he said that he should be their prince; and ever since that time the eldest son of the king of England has always been called Prince of Wales. Edward went to war with Scotland too, and forced the Scotch in a very unjust manner to make him their king. Sometimes the Scotch lost their kingdom, and then again recovered it; great numbers of the Scotch nobility lost their lives in different battles. Baliol, one of their kings, was Edward's prisoner for a number of years, and their famous champion, the brave Wallace, haying been betrayed into his hands, was, by his command, executed on Tower-Hill as a rebel. Every patriotic defender of his country's rights and liberties is stigmatized as a rebel by the British government. Our own patriots, Hancock, Adams, Washington, and many others, were called rebels, and would have been executed on TowerHill, had they fallen into their hands. He Edward also meditated an invasion upon France, but met with great opposition from the clergy, which provoked him to pursue the most violent measures. reduced them to the utmost distress, and obliged them to comply with all his demands ; and, as the money did not come in fast enough for him, he extended his rigor to all orders of men. These proceedings caused such discontent, that the king was forced to make an apology for the steps he had taken, by which he prevented a civil war. The Scotch did not like him better than did the Welsh, and rebelled against him, which made Edward so angry, that he said he would make them obey or murder them. Wretched man! how could he dare to say that he would do so; he could only go as far as the Lord would let him, and he died on his way to Scotland; but, like the tiger thirsting for blood, when he was dying he made his son promise not to bury his body until he had conquered the Scotch; so that, to the last moment of his life, he taught his son and his people to hate, not love, their neighbor. This monarch is esteemed as a model of a polite and warlike king; but it is shocking to think that such wicked measures as he pursued should ever be considered necessary to aggrandize a nation. It is said that the figure of Edward was majestic and well-proportioned, excepting that his legs were uncommonly long, on which account he was surnamed Longshanks. Short Lessons to be committed to memory Character-Fond of war, cruel, ambitious, revengeful. Right to the throne-Son of Henry the third. Death-1307, on his way to Scotland. Possessions-England and Wales. Children-Edward, Thomas, Edmund, Joan, Margaret, Elizabeth, Mary.--Edward, who was the first prince of Wales, succeeded him. Mary became a nun. |