Page:The Folk-Lore Journal Volume 2 1884.djvu/386

 378 NOTES AND QUERIES.

to me by Mr. Alexander Walker, ex-dean of guild, Aberdeen, illus- trates this notion. The scone of the story is in Kincardineshire.

'• Geordie Tamson, who lived near Jollybrands on the south turn- pike, not far from the toll-bar, lay sick. After weeks of treatment by the doctor, Geordie lay ill, without the least token of improvement. A " skeely woman " from the Dounies, a village not far off, was called in. She at once prescribed a supper of " nettle kail," and added that the dish must be made of " unspoken nettles," gathered at midnight. That very night by eleven o'clock three young men, friends of Gcordie's, from Cairngrassie, were on their way to the Red Kirkyard of Portlethen, where there was a fine bed of nettles. It was bright moonlight. It happened that during the previous week Jamie Leipar, from the Skatera, had been laid beside his fathers in the Red Kirk- yard, and his body was being watched by his brothers, lest the body- snatchers, or *' resurrectionists," should carry it off" for dissecting purposes. When the three young men were nearing the kirkyard yitt, they heard whisperings inside the wall. Up to this time they had met no one, had been spoken to by no one. Now, if they we're challenged, before they reached the nettles in the corner of the yard next the sea, and filled their basket, their labour was lost, and the herb was useless as medicine. Calling to mind who the whisperers were, and trusting that they and their errand were known, they cried: " Dinna spyke, dinna spyke. Ye're watchin Jamie Leipar. We're nae resurrection fouk ; we're fae Cairngrassie, come tae gaither * unspoken nettles ' tae mak Geordie Tamson better. Dinna spyke then : for God's sake, dinna spyke, or ye'U spilt a'." In a moment the whispering ceased, not a word was spoken. To the sound of the waves breaking on the rocks behind the kirk the nettles were gathered, carefully taken to the sick man, cooked of course, and given him. A complete and speedy recovery followed."

Walter Gregor. Miscellaneous Superstitions in Poula.— Isle of Vaila, Shetland, October 30. — In my last letter I gave an account of the superstitious customs connected with farming and fisliing, and I shall now exhibit a miscellaneous assortment of current beliefs that have no rational basis. A plague of moths will infest the house into which a woman