English Folk-Lore Superstitions.
It would be as tedious as it would be useless to relate at any length the multitude of silly superstitions which make up the medicinal folk-lore of this and other countries. Methods of curing warts, toothache, ague, worms, and other common complaints are familiar to everyone. The idea that toothache is caused by tiny worms which can be expelled by henbane, is very ancient and still exists. A process from one of the Anglo-Saxon Leechdoms converted into modern English by the Rev. Oswald Cockayne may be quoted as a sample:—
"For tooth worms take acorn meal and henbane seed and wax, of all equally much, mingle them together, work into a wax candle and burn it, let it reek into the mouth, put a black cloth under, and the worms will fall on it."
Marcellus, a late Latin medical author whose work was translated into Saxon, gave a simpler remedy. It was to say "Argidam, Margidum, Sturdigum," thrice, then spit into a frog's mouth and set him free, requesting him at the same time to carry off the toothache.
Another popular cure for toothache in early England was to wear a piece of parchment on which the following charm was written:—"As St. Peter sat at the gate of Jerusalem our Blessed Lord and Saviour, Jesus Christ, passed by and said, What aileth thee? He said Lord, my teeth ache. He said, Arise and follow me and thy teeth shall never ache any more."
Sir Kenelm Digby's method was less tempting. He directed that the patient should scratch his gum with an iron nail until he made it bleed, and should then drive the nail with the blood upon it into a wooden
