Page:Lancashire Legends, Traditions, Pageants, Sports, Etc., with an Appendix Containing a Rare Tract.djvu/278

 When we see a fire on the top of a hill, we are sometimes assured that the flame is a witch-fire, and that the witches may be seen, from a distance, dancing round it at midnight. It is firmly believed that no witch, nor even any very ill-disposed person, can step over anything in the shape of a cross. Hence persons are advised to lay a broom across the doorway when any suspected person is coming in. If their suspicions are well-grounded, the witch will make some excuse and pass along the road. The power of a witch is supposed to be destroyed by sprinkling salt into the fire nine mornings in succession. The person who sprinkles the salt must be the one affected by the supposed witchcraft, and as the salt drops down must repeat, "Salt! salt! I put thee into the fire, and may the person who has bewitched me neither eat, drink, nor sleep, until the spell is broken." During 1871 a young man, resident near Manchester, suspected his own mother of having bewitched him, and the above spell was repeated in the presence of the magistrates before whom he was summoned, in consequence of his inhuman conduct to his mother. There is also a female resident near Burnley, who refuses to live with her husband, because she suspects him of having bewitched her on many occasions.

MISCELLANEOUS SUPERSTITIONS And observances are abundant throughout the county. They relate to a variety of subjects connected with the daily life of the peasantry; some are used as safeguards from evil; and others for the purpose of securing