Page:The Folk-Lore Journal Volume 1 1883.djvu/390

382 weather will follow. If a child's stocking slips down bid it fasten it up quickly for fear that it should bring bad weather.

If a bat flies into a house and settles on a person's head that person will become bald.

When you kill a pig send your neighbours some of the meat. This custom is also English. In Lincolnshire "pig-cheer," i. e. the inward parts of the pig which cannot be salted, are distributed among the neighbours after a sufficient portion has been put aside for family use.

A Würtemberg Pfarrer told me that he had great trouble with his people on account of their obstinate belief in witchcraft. Formerly he lived in a village which was the dwelling-place of a well-known wizard. This wizard had received many sackfuls of apples from a certain rich and pious peasant, but on one occasion the peasant refused to give him more, when he came to ask for a further supply. "You will be sorry for this," said the wizard, as he went away. And sure enough the man was sorry, for in a few days one of his children sickened, and after a short illness died. On the burial-day another child fell ill, and it also died. A third was also attacked by the fatal disease. While it lay dying the father said to his fourth child, "Your turn will come next"; and, when he was reproved for speaking thus, he obstinately asserted that the whole family was bewitched. A Jew, who lived in the village, came to the Pfarrer soon after and told him that he believed that the children were all put to sleep in the bed where the first child had died, and that therefore they were infected by the fever-germs that it had left behind. He also said that he would lend the children beds if the Pfarrer could persuade the parents to take them. This was needless, however, as the peasant himself changed the sleeping-place of the children, and the malady spread no further. The whole family believes to this day the wizard caused this calamity to fall on their house because he had been sent away empty-handed.

On another occasion a rich peasant-woman sent for a wise man to tell her why a fine young horse had fallen ill. The man told her it was bewitched, and after drawing a magic circle he declared that whoever first stepped within the line would be the guilty person. A poor old woman to whom the peasant-woman had been very kind appeared