52. If four persons cross hands while in the act of shaking hands, it indicates that two of the party will soon be married.
53. If three unmarried persons having the same Christian name meet at table, it is a sign that one of the three will be married within a year.
54. To be startled by a snake is a sign of sickness.
55. When thirteen persons sit down together at table, it is a sign that one of the party will die within a year. Fosbroke, in his Encyclopædia of Antiquities, states that “thirteen in company was considered an unlucky number by the ancient Romans;” but he does not give any classical authority for this statement.
There is at Dantzic a clock, which at 12 admits, through a door, Christ and the eleven, shutting out Judas, who is admitted at 1. But is not the belief older than the clock? The iniquity of Judas may have led him to be considered the thirteenth at the Lord’s Supper; and his self-destruction may have given to the number thirteen its fatal association.
It has, however, been explained away by M. Quetelet, in his work on Probabilities as follows: “If the probability be required, that out of thirteen persons, of different ages, one of them, at least, shall die within a year, it will be found that the chances are about one to one that one death, at least, will occur. This calculation, by means of a false interpretation, has given rise to the prejudice, no less ridiculous, that the danger will be avoided by inviting a greater number of guests, which can only have the effect of augmenting the probability of the event so much apprehended.”
This belief obtains in Italy and Russia, as well as in England. Moore, in his Diary, vol. ii., p. 206, mentions there being thirteen at dinner, one day, at Madame Catalani’s, when a French countess, who lived with her up-stairs, was sent for to remedy the grievance.
“Lord L(ansdowne) said he had dined once abroad with Count Orloff, and perceived he did not sit down at dinner, but kept walking from chair to chair; he found afterward it was because the Narishken were at table, who, he knew, would rise instantly if they perceived the number thirteen, which Orloff would have made by sitting down himself.” (See [63].)
56. If a dog bays under your window at night, it portends sickness or death.
Shakspeare ranks this among omens. In the play of Henry VI., he says: