SUPE5STM0I]S : Miners', Sailors,' Farmers.' LTHOUGH Cornish miners, or " tinners " as they are generally called, are a very intelligent, and since the days of Wesley a religious body of men, many of their old-world beliefs still linger. To this day it is considered unlucky to make the form of a cross on the sides of a mine, and when underground )'ou may on no account whistle for fear of vexing the knockers and bringing ill-luck, but you may sing or even swear* without producing any bad eifect. Down one mine- shaft a black goat is often seen to descend, but is never met below ; in another mine a white rabbit forebodes an accident. " The occurrence of a black cat in the lowest depths of a mine will warn the older miners off that level until the cat is exterminated." — Thomas Cornish, Western Antiquary, October, i88y. A hand clasping the ladder and coming down with, or after a miner, foretells misfortune or death. This superstition prevails, also, in the slate quarries of the eastern part of the county. The miners in the slate quarries of Delabole have a tradition that the right hand of a miner, who committed suicide, is some- times seen following them down the ladders, grasping the rings as they let them go, holding a miner's light between the thumb and finger. It forebodes ill to the seer. — Esm^ Stuart. See " Tamsin's Choice," Longman, June, 1883.
- Some say you must neither whistle nor swear, but you may sing and laugh.
