STUMBLING.

WE gather, from Congreve's Love for Love, where, in the character of Old Foresight, he so forcibly and wittily satirises superstition, that to stumble in going down stairs is held to be a bad omen. From him, as well as from the Spectator, we gather, that sometimes a rusty nail, or a crooked pin, shoots up into prodigies!"

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Cicero, in his second book, De Divinatione, § 40, observes: "Quæ si suscipiamus, pedis offensio nobis, et abruptio corrigiæ et sternutamenta erunt observanda." In Pet. Molinæi Vates, p. 218, we read: "Si quis in limine impegit, ominosum est.' "That you may never stumble at your going out in the morning," is found among the omens deprecated in Barton Holiday's Marriage of the Arts, 4to.

Poor Robin, in his Almanack for 1695, thus ridicules the superstitious charms to avert ill luck in stumbling: “All those who, walking the streets, stumble at a stick or stone, and when they are past it turn back again to spurn or kick the stone they stumbled at, are liable to turn students in Goatam college; and, upon admittance, to have a coat put upon him, with a cap, a bauble, and other ornaments belonging to his degree."

"It is lucky," says Grose, "to tumble up stairs." Probably this is a jocular observation, meaning it was lucky the party did not tumble down stairs. Melton, in his Astrologaster, p. 45, says: "10. That if a man stumbles in a morning as soon as he comes out of dores, it is a signe of ill lucke.” He adds: "30. That if a horse stumble on the highway, it is a signe of ill lucke." Bishop Hall, in his Characters of Vertues and Vices, under the head of the Superstitious Man, observes, that "if he stumbled at the threshold, he feares a mischief." Stumbling at a grave was anciently reckoned ominous; thus Shakespeare:

"How oft to-night

Have my old feet stumbled at graves!"

In Whimzies, or a New Cast of Characters, 1631, speaking of a yealous (jealous) neighbour, the author says: "His earth-reverting body (according to his mind) is to be buried

in some cell, roach, or vault, and in no open space, lest passengers (belike) might stumble on his grave."

Gaule, in his Mag-astromancers Posed and Puzzel'd, p. 181, omits not, in his very full catalogue of vain observations and superstitious ominations thereupon, "the stumbling at first going about an enterprise."

KNIVES, SCISSORS, RAZORS, &c.

It is unlucky, says Grose, to lay one's knife and fork crosswise; crosses and misfortunes are likely to follow. Melton, in his Astrologaster, p. 45, in his catalogue of many superstitious ceremonies, observes: "25. That it is naught for any man to give a pair of knives to his sweetheart, for feare it cuts away all love that is betweene them." Thus Gay, in his second Pastoral of "The Shepherd's Week:"

"But woe is me! such presents luckless prove,

For knives, they tell me, always sever love!"

It is, says Grose, unlucky to present a knife, scissors, razor, or any sharp or cutting instrument, to one's mistress or friend, as they are apt to cut love and friendship. To avoid the ill effects of this, a pin, a farthing, or some trifling recompense, must be taken in return. To find a knife or razor denotes ill luck and disappointment to the party.

The following is found in Delrio, Disquisit. Magic., p. 494, from Beezius: "Item ne alf, vel mar equitet mulierem in puerperio jacentem, vel ne infans rapiatur (a strigibus) debet poni cultellus vel corrigia super lectum."

OF FINDING OR LOSING THINGS.

MELTON, in his Astrologaster, p. 46, says: "11. That if a man, walking in the fields, finde any foure-leaved grasse, he shall, in a small while after, finde some good thing." He tells us, ibid. : "15. That it is naught for a man or woman to loss

their hose garter." As also, ibid. : "14. That it is a sign of ill lucke to finde money."

Greene, in his Art of Conny-Catching, signat. B, tells us, ""Tis ill lucke to keepe found money." Therefore it must be

spent.

Dr. Nathaniel Home, in his Dæmonologie, or the Character of the Crying Evils of the Present Times, &c., 8vo. Lond. 1650, p. 60, tells us: "How frequent is it with people (especially of the more ignorant sort, which makes the things more suspected) to think and say (as Master Perkins relates), if they finde some pieces of iron, it is prediction of good lucke to the finders! If they find a piece of silver, it is a foretoken of ill lucke to them."

Mason, in his Anatomie of Sorcerie, 1612, p. 90, enumerating our superstitions, mentions, as an omen of good luck, "If drinke be spilled upon a man; or if he find old iron." Hence it is accounted a lucky omen to find a horseshoe.

Boyle, in his Occasional Reflections, 1665, p. 217, says: "The common people of this country have a tradition that 'tis a lucky thing to find a horse-shoe. And, though 'twas to make myself merry with this fond conceit of the superstitious vulgar, I stooped to take this up."

There is a popular custom of crying out "Halves!" on seeing another pick up anything which he has found, and this exclamation entitles the person who makes it to one half of the value. This is alluded to as follows in Dr. John Savage's Horace to Scæva imitated, 1730, p. 32:

"And he who sees you stoop to th' ground,

Cries, Halves! to ev'rything you've found."

The well-known trick of dropping the ring is founded on this custom. See further in Halliwell's Popular Rhymes, p.257.

NAMES.

AMONG the Greeks it was an ancient custom to refer misfortunes to the signification of proper names. The Scholiast upon Sophocles, as cited by Jodrell in his Euripides, ii. 349, &c. observes, that this ludicrous custom of analysing the

insuappes I mues" He wis I can affirm thus much,

is 'resent witnesse, I que he DARIENE."

eres mang persas i regnesticatives of weather - czOF SIA "Ors. 24′tes mit. "Iris.” SEX Lord Verulam, tongreve unfict: ether wars can er frost; the one makes me tumours o ant pure and the other makes zem Harzer. Thus uso Kuter. nus žudices, p. iii. c. ii.

On hosier's poles depending stockings tied
Flag with the slacken'd gale from side to side;
Church monuments foretel the changing air;
Then Niobe dissolves into a tear,

And sweats with secret grief; you'll hear the sounds
Of whistling winds, ere kennels break their bounds;
Ungrateful odours common shores diffuse,

And dropping vaults distil unwholesome dews,
Ere the tiles rattle with the smoking show'r," &c.

In the British Apollo, fol. Lond. 1708, i. No. 51, is said: "A learned case I now propound,

Pray give an answer as profound;
'Tis why a cow, about half an hour
Before there comes a hasty shower,
Does clap her tail against the hedge?"

In Tottenham Court, a comedy, 4to. Lond. 1638, p. 21, we read: "I am sure I have foretold weather from the turning up of my cowe's tayle.

[The following curious lines respecting the hedgehog occur in Poor Robin's Almanack for 1733:

"Observe which way the hedge-hog builds her nest,

To front the north or south, or east or west;

For if 'tis true that common people say,

The wind will blow the quite contrary way:
If by some secret art the hedge-hogs know,
So long before, which way the winds will blow,
She has an art which many a person lacks
That thinks himself fit to make almanacks

From the following simile given by Bm, în ba Belvedere, or the Garden of the Musest sum ver that our ancestors held somehow or are lesteding to le a prognosticator of the weather. Et S100