Page:Folk-lore - A Quarterly Review. Volume 25, 1914.djvu/401

 Collectanea. 369

If a man walking in the fields can plant his foot on seven daisies it is a sign that winter has gone and spring is at hand.

When primroses blossom you must not take into the house less than seven at one time, or there will be bad luck with the chickens.

When you first hear the cuckoo take note how you are occu|)ied, for what you are doing then will be your chief business during the year. If you hear the cuckoo after June 24th it is the sign of a death in the family.

Lady Day (25th March) or Old Lady Day (6th April) is the beginning of the farm year, and farm servants are engaged or re- engaged at that date. In Sussex the farm year begins on 29th September, when labour has to be engaged and the rent paid. This is the most anxious time for the farmer in the whole year.

A warm Easter Sunday is dangerous : better a dry, wild one.

A wet Easter Day, a wet summer and rain ;

A fine Easter Day, plenty of grass but little good hay.

A swarm of bees in May is worth a load of hay ; A swarm in June is worth a silver spoon ; A swarm in July is not worth a butterfly.

Girls think May to be an unlucky month. Courtship begun in May is soon broken off. Marriage in May is sure to be unlucky. Even to be born in May is undesirable. Many people will not buy new clothes in May, and make no change which they can possibly avoid.

June nth is a good day to begin hay-making. There is an old saying: "Eleventh of June, grass or nune (none)."

At Hallowe'en chestnuts are roasted. Two are placed before a hot fire and named after two young people in whom you are interested. If the chestnuts burn steadily side by side, they will marry and live happily ever afterwards : should either burst or jump away, the match will not come off.

Ducks must not be hatched between what we call the Two- Midsummers — 24th June and 6th July. If they are they become deformed, and cannot walk : their legs are cramped and useless^ and they soon die.

(Recorded by Mrs. Hardy, Wiston, Sussex.)