Superst. I

845. Nor may she draw water from a spring, or it will dry up for seven years.
846. A corpse is set down thrice on the threshold by the bearers; when it is out of the homestead, the gate is fastened, three heaps of salt are made in the death chamber, it is then swept, and both broom and sweepings thrown in the fields; some also burn the bed-straw in the fields.
847. The evening before Andrew's day, the unbetrothed girls form a circle, and let a gander in; the one he turns to first, will get a husband.
848. Between 11 and 12 on John's day, the unbetrothed girls gather nine sorts of flowers, three of which must be willow, storksbill and wild rue; they are twined into a wreath, of which the twiner must have spun the thread in the same hour. Before that fateful hour is past, she throws the wreath backwards into a tree; as often as it is thrown without staying on, so many years will it be before she is married. All this must be done in silence.
849. He that has silently carried off an undertaker's measure, and leans it against a house door at night, can rob the people inside without their waking.
850. A root of cinquefoil dug up before sunrise on John's day, is good for many things, and wins favour for him that wears it.
851. Girls wear a wasp's nest, thinking thereby to win men's love.
852. If a man has strayed, and turns his pockets inside out, or if a woman has, and ties her apron on the wrong way, they find the right road again.
853. If a child has fräsel (cramp, spasms), turn one shingle in the roof, or lay the wedding apron under its head.
854. At Christmas or Newyear, between 11 and 12, they go to a crossway to listen, and learn all that most concerns them in the coming year. The listening may be from inside a window that has the 'träger' over it; or on Walpurgis night in the green corn.
855. If from the fires of the three holy eves (before Christmas, Newyear and High Newyear) glowing embers be left the next morning, you'll want for nothing all that year.
856. It is bad for a family if the head of it dies in a waning moon, but good in a waxing moon. It is lucky when a grave turfs itself over. A reappearance of the dead is commonest on the ninth day after death.
857. If a tree's first fruit be stolen, it will not bear for seven years.
858. The dragon carries the dung in the yard to his friends.
859. A woman with child must not creep through a hedge.
860. If a corpse is in the house, if a cow has calved, beggars get nothing.
861. Servants who are leaving take care not to be overlapt: they go, or at least send their things away, before the new one comes in.
862. A new manservant comes at midday, and consumes his dumplings on the chimney seat; the mistress is careful to set no sauerkraut before him that day, lest his work be disagreeable to him. One who is leaving gets a service loaf for every year he has been in the service.
863. If three thumps be heard at night, if the weh-klage howl, if the earth-cock burrow, there will be a death.
864. For debility in children: their water being taken in a new pot, put into it the egg of a coal black hen bought without bargaining, with nine holes pricked in it; tie the pot up with linen, and bury it after sunset in an anthill found without seeking. Any one finding such a pot, lets it alone, lest he catch the buried disease.
865. In the Diepholt country, headache (de farren) is cured thus: a woman of knowledge brings two bowls, one filled with cold water, and one with melted tallow. When the head has been held in the water some time, the tallow is poured into the water through an inherited hatchel (flax-comb), and the woman says: 'Ik geete (I pour).' Patient: 'Wat gütst?' Woman: 'De farren.' Then she speaks a spell, the whole process is repeated three times, the water is emptied on a maple bush (elder), the cold tallow thrown in the fire, and the ache is gone. (Annals ofBrunswk-Lünebg Churlande, 8th yr, st. 4, p. 596.) See 515.
866. In the country parts of Hildesheim, when any one dies, the grave digger silently walks to the elder bush (sambucus nigra), and cuts a rod to measure the corpse with; the man who is to convey it to the grave does the same, and wields this rod as a whip. (Spiel u. Spangenbg's Archiv '28, p. 4).
867. On Matthias night (Feb. 24) the young people meet, the girls plait one wreath of periwinkle, one of straw, and as a third thing carry a handful of ashes; at midnight they go silently to a running water, on which the three things are to float. Silent and blindfold, one girl after another dances about the water, then clutches at a prognostic, the periwinkles meaning a bridal wreath, the straw misfortune, the ashes death. The lucky ones carry the game further, and throw barleycorns on the water, by which they mean certain bachelors, and notice how they swim to one another. In other cases three leaves are thrown on the water, marked with the names of father, mother and child, and it is noticed which goes down first. (Ibidem.).
868. In some parts of Hanover, churching is called brummie, because in the villages on such an occasion, the mother and father and the invited sponsors, both of the last baptized and of earlier children, set up a growling (brummen) like that of a bear. (Brunsw. Anz. 1758, p. 1026; Hanov. Nützl. saml. 1758, p. 991, where it is brümmie.)
869. Of elder that grows among willows, they make charms to hang on children, nine little sticks tide with a red silk thread, so as to lie on the pit of the stomach. If the thread snaps, you must take the little bundle off with little pincers, and throw it in running water. (Ettner's Hebamme p. 859.)
870. Amulets of the wolf's right eye, pouch of stones, blind swallows cut out of his maw. (Ibid. 862)
871. Puer si veri genitoris indusium nigrum seu maculatum involvatur, si epilepsia ipsum angat, nunquam redibit. (Ibid. 854.)
872. When a child dwindles, they tie a thread of red silk about its neck, then catch a mouse, pass the thread with a needle through its skin over the backbone, and let it go. The mouse wastes, the child picks up. (Ibid. 920).
873. When an old wife blesses and beets (bötet) tension of the heart, she breathes on the painful part crosswise, strokes it, ties salt and rye-meal over it, and says: 'Hert-gespan, ik segge di an, flüg van den ribben, asse Jesus van den kribben!' If the patient be seized with spasms, let him stretch himself on a plum tree saying: 'Ranke-bom, (stand)! plumke-bom wasse (wax)!
874. Some men's mere look is so hurtful, that even without their knowing it, they put men and beasts in peril of their lives.
875. Some men, by bespeaking (muttering a spell), can pull up a horse in full gallop, silence a watch-dog, stanch blood, keep fire from spreading.
876. You may recover stolen goods by filling a pouch with some of the earth that the thief has trodden, and twice a day beating it with a stick till fire comes out of it. The thief feels the blows, and shall die without fail if he bring not back the things.
877. To save timber from the woodworm, knock it with a piece of oak on Peter's day, saying: 'Sunte worm, wut du herut, Sunte Peter is komen!'
878. If the nightmare visits you --- a big woman with long flying hair ---- bore a hole in the bottom of the door, and fill it up with sow-bristles. Then sleep in peace, and if the nightmare comes, promise her a present; she will leave you, and come the next day in human shape for the promised gift.
879. No bird will touch any one's corn or fruit, who has never worked on a Sunday.
880. He that was born at sermon time on a Christmas morning, can see spirits.
881. Where the mole burrows under the wash house, the mistress will die.
882. If a herd of swine meet you on your way, you are an unwelcome guest; if a flock of sheep, a welcome.
883. If the crust of the saved up wedding loaf goes mouldy, the marriage will not be a happy one.
884. In some parts the bride's father cuts a piece off the top crust of a well baked loaf, and hands it to her with a glass of brandy. She takes the crust between her lips, not touching it with her hand, wraps it in a cloth, and keeps it in a box; the glass of brandy she throws over her head on the ground.
885. The first time a woman goes to church after a confinement, they throw on the floor after her the pot out of which she has eaten caudle during the six weeks.
886. If a suspicious looking cat or hare cross your path, throw a steel over its head, and suddenly it stands before you in the shape of an old woman.
887. He that kills a black cow and black ox may look for a death in his house.
888. If on coming home from church the bride be the first to take hold of the house door, she will maintain the mastery, especially if she says: 'This door I seize upon, here all my will be done!' If the bridegroom have heard the spell, he may undo it by adding the words: 'I grasp this knocker ring, be fist and mouth (word and deed?) one thing!'
889. If magpies chatter or hover round a house, if the logs at the back of a fire jump over and crackle, guests are coming who are strangers.
890. In setting out for the wars, do not look behind you, or you may never see home again.
891. If you leave yarn on the spool over Sunday, it turns to sausages.
892. Ghosts are banished to betwixt door and doorpost; if a door be slammed to, they are too much tormented (995).
893. Look over the left shoulder of one who sees spirits and future events, and you can do the same.
894. If two friends walk together, and a stone fall between them, or a dog run across their path, their friendship will soon be severed.
895. If in going out you stumble on the threshold, turn back at once, or worse will happen.
896. The day before Shrove Sunday many people cook for the dear little angels the daintiest thing they have in the house, lay it on the table at night, set the windows open, and go to bed. (Obersensbach in the Odenwald.)
897. At harvest time he that gets his corn cut first, takes a willow bough, decks it with flowers, and sticks it on the last load that comes in. (Gernsheim.)
898. At the moment any one dies, the grain in the barn is shuffled, and the wine in the cellar shaken, lest the seed sown come not up, and the wine turn sour. (Ibid.) Conf. 576. 664. 698.
899. On St. Blaise's day the parson holds two lighted tapers crossed; old and young step up, each puts his head between the tapers, and is blessed; it preserves from pains in head or neck for a year (Ibid.)
900. In some parts of Westphalia a woman dying in childbed is not clothed in the usual shroud, but exactly as she would have been for her churching, and she is buried so.
901. The ticking of the wood-worm working its way through old tables, chairs and bedsteads we call deadman's watch: it is supposed that the dead man goes past, and you hear his watch tick.
902. (4) Set your hens to hatch on Peter-and-Paul's, they'll be good layers.
903. Pull the molehills to pieces on Silvester's, they'll throw up no more.
904. If the cuckoo calls later than John's, it means no good.
905. Thrash before sunrise on Shrove Tuesday, you'll drive the moles away.
906. If it freeze on the shortest day, the price of corn will fall; if it's mild, 'twill rise.
907. Sow no wheat on Maurice's, or it will be sooty.
908. Who at John's beheading would fell a tree, will have to let it be.
909. A March fog, and a hundred days after, a thunderstorm.
910. When the wind blows of a New Year's night, it means a death.
911. At Martinmas you may see by the goose's breastbone if the winter'll be cold or not.
912. Chickens hatched out of duck's eggs change colour every year.
913. Who drinks not on Good Friday, no drink can hurt him for a year (see 356).
914a. Stuff a bed with feathers in a waxing moon, and they slip out again.
914b. On Ash Wednesday the devil hunts the little wood-wife through the forest.
915. If on Christmas eve, or Newyear's day, or eve (?) you hang a washclout on a hedge, and then groom the horses with it, they'll grow fat.
916. If you thrash in the Rauch nights, the corn spoils as far as the sound is heard (see 418).
917. Set no hens to hatch on Valentine's, or all the eggs will rot.
918. Jump over John's fire, and you'll not have the fever that year.
919. If a horse be let blood on Stephen's, it keeps well all the year.
920. A wound dealt with a knife whetted on Golden Sunday will hardly ever heal.
921. If shooting at the butts that Sunday, you wrap your right hand in the rope by which a thief has hung on the gallows, you'll hit the bull's eye every time.
922. If a man has a new garment on, you give it a slap, with some such words as 'The old must be patched, the new must be thrashed;' and the garment will last the longer.
923. Sick sheep should be made to creep through a young split oak.
924. If a pregnant woman eat or taste out of the saucepan, her child will stammer.
925. If on a journey she mount the carriage over the pole or the traces, the child entangles its limbs in the navelstring (see 688. 933).
926. If a baby cries much in the first six weeks, pull it through a piece of unboiled yarn three times in silence. If that does no good, let the mother, after being churched, go home in silence, undress in silence, and throw all her clothes on the cradle backwards.
927. The first time the horned cattle are driven to pasture, draw a woman's red stocking over a woodman's axe, (5) and lay it on the threshold of the stable door, so that every beast shall step over it (see 752).
928. To keep caterpillars off the cabbages, a female shall walk backwards naked in the full moon three times in all directions through the cabbage garden.
929. If a single woman be suspected of pregnancy, let the manservant pull a harvest waggon in two, and set the front part facing the south and the hind wheels the north, so that the girl in doing her work must pass between the two halves. It prevents her from procuring abortion.
930. When a cricket is heard, some one in the house will die: it sings him to the grave.

Notes:
4. 902-919 from Schmeller's Dialects of Bavaria, p. 529. [Back]
5. Any steel tool laid on the threshold will do; conf. Reichs-Anz. 1794, p. 656. [Back]