460 Collectanea.
but since her death he has not been able to make a single pat. He got the priest to ' read over ' his cows the other day [this was was written in 1888], but even that, which is supposed to be an infallible remedy, had no effect.
"The poor people here have wonderful faith in the priest, who, they believe, ' can turn them into turkey-cocks, or fasten them to the ground.' One girl died a few years ago of a fit, simply because, so her mother told us, she had, notwithstanding the priest's strict injunctions, taken off a ' gospel ' which he had hung round her neck."
Here my friend's Tipperary notes conclude.
I add a few miscellaneous jottings from my own knowledge.
A great charm resides in the " saghd bush" (whitethorn), and few people will venture to cut one. " A protestant man," living in CO. Meath, was about to cut down one of these " lone thorn " (which is another name for it) trees, and was cautioned that if he did so evil would befall him. He ridiculed the idea, but as he was cutting down the tree he got a thorn in his hand, which gathered ; he got blood-poisoning, the inflammation went all up his arm, and he died in very great pain very soon afterwards. This happened about the year 1877.
A cure for whooping-cough is to pass the child three times round an ass (under and over its body) ; and for mumps, a horse's bridle is put on the child's head, and it is driven to a place where the horses are watered and made to drink like a horse.
The country people are terribly afraid of a species of newt which is found in boggy, marshy ground, and which they call " man-leppers," because they believe that any one who is so unwary as to talk while stooping over a drain runs the risk of the animal jumping down his throat and taking up his abode inside him. The only remedy is to make a strong solution of salt and water, and drink it as near as possible to the man-lepper's former home, when he will get rid of it without much delay. I believe this superstition is known also in parts of England.
I can remember an old woman buying warts from one of my brothers. She gave him a halfpenny for them. This halfpenny was then wrapped in a piece of paper, and my brother was directed to throw it away at the corner of a cross-road which we passed on our way home. I cannot recollect whether the charm was successful or not.
