Page:Folk-lore - A Quarterly Review. Volume 22, 1911.djvu/233

 COLLECTANEA.

A Folklore Survey of County Clare {continued from p. 60). XII. Lucky and Unlucky Deeds.

It is unlucky to see the new moon through glass ; to throw dust or slops out of a house on New Year's Day, as you throw away with them all the good luck of the year; to throw dust or slops towards a neighbouring "fort";^ to see one magpie, or a " weazel " (stoat), without saluting it by bowing or taking off your hat ; to go out of a house where they are churning without "putting your hand to the churn," i.e. giving a few strokes with the churn "dash," so that you will not "take" the butter; and to take fire out of a house, — so that, if you light a pipe indoors, it should be smoked out before leaving. Iron and pins, — except crooked pins with the points towards you, — should be picked up, and the first thrown over the left shoulder. Rub your hand on wood if it itches or after a boastful speech or speaking too confidently of the future ; in east Clare you touch wood twice, with the phrase, " Good word {or time) be it spoken," after an imprudent expression. ^ You should bow to the new moon. Turn your money for luck after seeing the new moon. On visit- ing a friend in a new house, you should give some present, however small. In east Clare some persons are careful to throw a hen or other fowl that has died of disease over the fence on to their neighbour's land, to remove the ill-luck from their own poultry.3 Others will not wash eggs offered for sale, as it stops

^ So Dr. Macnamara and others.

"^ " Scratch it in wood, and it will come good," says a rhyme.

^ Practised near Tulla, and resulting in some cases in great ill-will.