Page:Folk-lore - A Quarterly Review. Volume 20, 1909.djvu/400

 34^ Collectanea.

Two persons washing their hands in the same water should make the sign of the cross on the water, or they will quarrel.^

Quarrels will be caused by sitting in a room with three candles burning, or with the poker and tongs on the same side of the fire- place.

To say goodbye at a gate foretells that you will be parted from your friend (1895).

To go back over your doorstep for anything forgotten is unlucky ; you should sit down to break the spell.

Red worsted wound nine times around the wrist is in constant use for the cure of sprains.

If you have the hiccough, drink nine times round a cup and it will leave you.

Cut all your nails before twelve o'clock on Good Friday, but never cut them on any other Friday in the year, and you will not have toothache.

If you put your left stocking on before your right, every morning, you will not have toothache.

If you find a left-hand glove, leave it lying where it is, or it will bring sorrow.

If you have clothes mended on your back, you will have lies told about you.^

The clothes of the dead will not wear long.

There is a common saying in this part of Worcestershire, if any garment is hopelessly dirty, that "it is as black as the Devil's nutting bag." ^*^

If an infant is christened with the same name as that borne by an elder brother or sister, the child will die.

If several children are brought to the christening font together, care must be taken that the boys are baptized first, as otherwise, when they grow up, the boys will have smooth faces and the girls will have beards.^^

If an eyelash falls out, put it on the back of the hand, and wish, and the wish will come true.

^Cf. " Folk Lore in Hull," Notes and Queries, vol. vi. (1S52), p. 311.

9 Cf. The Folk- Lore Record, vol. i., p. 12 (West Sussex).

10 Cf. The Folk-Lore Record, vol. i., p. 14 (West Sussex).

'^ Cf. Notes and Queries, 1st S., vol. i. (1850), p. 197 (north of England).