Page:The Folk-Lore Journal Volume 6 1888.djvu/141

 Rh calved various superstitious means are practised, by plucking the hair from the tail, moving a light round the horns, or on the hoofs; and when the animal is milked for the first time a small wooden cross, a knife, a white mussel-shell, and a nut or bean called quitnnuyra, must be previously placed in the milking-pail.—(P. 401.)

As a cure for disorder of the heart, the people of Feroe drink the water in which the upright fir-moss (lycopodium selago) has been boiled.

Cure for "the stone."— A stone which has been voided by a woman, pulverised and mixed with water, is considered as a cure for a man, and vice versa.

The jaundice may be cured by drinking water in which an eagle's claw has been steeped, and to eat the broth in which a yellow-legged hen has been boiled. The sanitive quality is here ascribed to the yellow legs,

Gyo, a swelling and stiffness of the wrist,—To cure this the natives employ certain superstitious practices, holding the diseased part over hot ashes and repeating certain words.

Quroynt, violent pain or smarting.—This is cured by holding the place of the body in which the pain is felt over a vessel or tub filled with water, in which any piece of gold, handed down from father to son in the family, such as money or rings, has been boiled: and the diseased limb is covered with a cloth.

A disease consisting of small bladders which suddenly make their appearance on the body may be cured by bathing them in a decoction of ground liverwort (lichen caninus), pulled with gloves on either at sunset or when the sun is below the horizon.

Olvar-eld is cured by fumigating the part with conferva, first dried a little, and then placed on burning coals.—(Pp. 409-411.)