In some parts of Cornwall, the following recipe is given for the prick of a thorn:

"Happy man, that Christ was born!
He was crowned with a thorn;
He was pierced through the skin,
For to let the poison in :

But His five wounds, so they say,
Closed before He passed away.

In with healing, out with thorn :
Happy man that Christ was born."

It is not unlike one known in Yorkshire :

"Unto the Virgin Mary our Saviour was born,
And on His head He wore a crown of thorn;
If you believe this true, and mind it well,
This hurt will never fester nor swell.”

Sufficient instances have been quoted to show how varied are the charms in use throughout the country; and it is surprising, in these days of medical science, that they should still be so prevalent. It proves the force of long-standing superstition, and how difficult it is to remove certain ideas, however whimsical and fallacious, when once they have taken deep root in the mind.

CHAPTER VII.

BIRTH-BAPTISM.

THERE still linger on, throughout England, many curious superstitions connected with human birth, all of which invest this momentous event with an atmosphere of the supernatural. Thus, in Lancashire there. is a strong dread* of "the witches or fairies coming secretly and exchanging their own ill-favoured imps for the newly born infant; and various charms are used to prevent the child from being thus stolen away." Shakspeare alludes to this notion when he makes King Henry IV., speaking of Hotspur in comparison with his own profligate son, say:-

"O that it could be prov'd,

That some night-tripping fairy had exchang'd,
In cradle-clothes, our children where they lay,
And call'd mine Percy, his Plantagenet !

Then would I have his Harry, and he mine."

This idea prevails, too, in Scotland, and Pennant informs us that in his day infants were carefully watched till the christening was over, lest they should

* Harland and Wilkinson, 'Lancashire Folk-Lore.'

be stolen or changed by the fairies. Spenser, also, mentions this superstition :—

"From thence a fairy thee unweeting reft,

There as thou slep'st in tender swadling band,

And her base elfin brood there for thee left;

Such men do changelings call, so chang'd by fairy theft."

Gay, in his fable of the Mother, Nurse, and Fairy, laughs at the superstitious idea of changelings. He represents a fairy speaking thus:

"Whence sprung the vain, conceited lye,
That we the world with fools supplye?
What! give our sprightly race away
For the dull, helpless sons of clay !
Besides, by partial fondness shown,
Like you, we doat upon our own.
Wherever yet was found a mother,
Who'd give her booby for another?

And should we change with human breed,
Well might we pass for fools indeed."

In some places it is believed that children born at midnight have the power of seeing ghosts, whereas in Devonshire it is said that those born by daylight never see such things. Great importance, too, is paid by many to the day of the week on which a child is born*; as each day is supposed to bestow upon it certain characteristics; and hence the superstitious believe that they can prognosticate the character of a child from the day of its birth. Certain seasons are thought to be more propitious for births than others. In Cornwall, children born in May are called "May

* See chapter on Days of the Week.

chets," and kittens cast in May are invariably destroyed, for

"May chets

Bad luck begets.".

Good Friday and Easter Day, are both considered, says Brand ('Popular Antiquities,' 1849, vol. ii. p. 87), lucky days for changing the caps of young children. If a child tooths first in the upper jaw, it is considered ominous of its dying in infancy. Children, too, prematurely wise, are said not to be long-lived, a notion which we find mentioned by Shakspeare, in his Richard III.

In Leicestershire, the first time a new-born child pays a visit, it is presented with an egg, a pound of salt, and a bundle of matches. In some parts of Lancashire,* as well as in Yorkshire, Northumberland, and other counties, when an infant for the first time goes out of the house, in the arms of the mother or the nurse, the family or families visited present it with an egg, some salt, a little loaf of bread, and now and then with a small piece of money. These gifts are supposed to ensure that the child shall never stand in need of the common necessaries of life. It was formerly customary, and the practice has not yet wholly died out, of providing a large cheese and a cake, and cutting them at the birth of a child. Pieces of these were distributed among all the houses in the vicinity. the child was a boy, the pieces of cheese were sent to

* Harland and Wilkinson's 'Lancashire Folk-Lore.'

If

the males; if a girl, to the females, each member of a family receiving a portion; visitors also came in for their share. These were called the "Groaning Cake and Cheese." Misson, in his 'Travels in England,' says, "The custom here is not to make great feasts at the birth of their children; they drink a glass of wine, and eat a bit of a certain cake; which is seldom made, but upon these occasions."

In Oxford it was the practice to cut the "Groaning Cheese" in the middle, and by degrees to form it into a large kind of ring, through which the child was passed on the day of its christening. In the North Riding of Yorkshire, at the birth of the first child, the first slice of the "Sickening Cake," is cut into small pieces by the medical man, and distributed amongst the unmarried of the female sex, under the name of dreaming bread." Each takes a piece, places it in the foot of the left stocking, and throws it over the right shoulder. The anxious expectant must then retire to bed backwards, without uttering a word, and if she fall asleep before twelve o'clock, her future partner will appear to her in her dream.

In some parts of North Lancashire,* it is customary to have a tea-drinking on the birth of a child. All the neighbours and friends are invited, and both tea and rum are plentifully distributed. After tea, each visitor pays a shilling towards the expense of the "birth feast," and the remainder of the evening is spent in

* Harland and Wilkinson, Lancashire Folk-Lore,' p. 26.

N