Page:Folk-lore - A Quarterly Review. Volume 18, 1907.djvu/384

 34^ Reviews.

the " Curse of the Anvil." In the former, which is Christian, the aggrieved person makes a round of the Stations of the Cross in a contrary direction, invoking the devil all the time to send bad luck upon his enemy ; while, to turn the anvil upon your enemy, a mode of invoking ill-luck which Dr. Hyde thinks comes down from pagan days, is carried out by putting the horn of the anvil facing backwards and requesting the devil to do his worst upon the person accursed, " so that a melting and every kind of misfortune may come on him." In most cases, however, there is no possible means of distinguishing ideas that have been handed on, with merely a change of names, from one system of belief to the other. One of the most striking examples of a pagan purpose being carried over into. Christian customs was the use made of hymns in the early Church of Ireland as charms against danger or disease. Hardly one of the numerous hymns ascribed to the saints of the Celtic Church was composed for Church purposes or as an anthem of praise to God ; they have a much more personal or business-like purpose. To ward off dangers or demons, to preserve a traveller on a journey, to cure sickness or to keep back the plague from passing to them across the ' ninth wave,' these were the practical purposes for which in ancient times hymns were composed and repeated. The best known instance is that of the 'Lorica' of St. Patrick, composed on his approach to Tara to ward off the " spells of women, smiths and Druids " during his contest with the King of Ireland. These hymns usually fall into the regular charm-form, invoking the "virtue of God, the might of God, the wisdom of God," the eye and ear and hand of God, against snares of demons, seductions of vice, and all other ills. In the same way one of St. Columba's best known hymns was a " Path Protection," which kept every one safe who repeated it on setting forth on a journey. Dr. Hyde gives many instances of hymns used in this way to the present day. There are religious charms for a sore eye, charms to staunch blood, for the toothache, for milking the cow, and many other purposes. Some of them come down direct in both wording and spirit from the days when St. Patrick's