“Place nine straws, which must be counted backward from nine to one, in a jug of water drawn from the river with the current, not against it; throw into the water some wood-parings from off the cradle, the door-step, and the four corners of the room in which the child was born, and add nine pinches of ashes, likewise counted backward. Boil up together, and pour into a large basin, leaving the pot upside down in it. If the boiling water draws itself up into the jug” (as of course it will), “that is proof positive that the child is bewitched. Now moisten the child’s forehead with some of the water before it has time to cool, and give it (still counting backward) nine drops to drink.”
The child that has been bewitched may likewise be held above a red-hot ploughshare, on which a glass of wine has been poured; or else a glass of water, in which a red-hot horseshoe has been placed, given to drink in spoonfuls.
In every village there used to be (and may still occasionally be found) old women who made a regular and profitable trade out of preparing the water which is to undo such evil spells.
The Saxon mother is careful not to leave her child alone till it has been baptized, for fear of malignant spirits, who may steal it away, leaving an uncouth elf in its place. Whenever a child grows up clumsy and heavy, with large head, wide mouth, stump nose, and crooked legs, the gossips are ready to swear that it has been changed in the cradle—more especially if it prove awkward and slow in learning to speak. To guard against such an accident, it is recommended to mothers obliged to leave their infants alone to place beneath the pillow either a prayer-book, a broom, a loaf of bread, or a knife stuck point upward.
Very cruel remedies have sometimes been resorted to in order to force the evil spirits to restore the child they have stolen and take back their own changeling. For instance, the unfortunate little creature suspected of being an elf was beaten with a thorny branch until quite bloody, and then left sitting astride on a hedge for an hour. It was then supposed that the spirits would secretly bring back the stolen child.
The infant must not be suffered to look at itself in the glass till after the baptism, nor should it be held near an open window. A very efficacious preservative against all sorts of evil spells is to hang round the child’s neck a little triangular bag stuffed with grains of incense, wormwood, and various aromatic herbs, and with an adder’s head embroidered outside. A gold coin sewed into the cap is also much recommended.
Two godfathers and two godmothers are generally appointed at Saxon peasant christenings, and it is customary that the one couple should be old and the other young; but in no case should a husband and wife figure as godparents at the same baptism, but each one of the quartette must belong to a different family. This is the general custom, but in some districts the rule demands two godfathers and one godmother for a boy, two godmothers and one godfather for a girl.
If the parents have previously lost other children, then the infant should not be carried out by the door in going to church, but handed out by the window and brought back in the same way. It should be carried through the broadest street, never by narrow lanes or by-ways, else it will learn thieving.
The godparents must on no account look round on their way to church, and the first person met by the christening procession will decide the sex of the next child to be born—a boy if it be a man.
If two children are baptized out of the same water, one of them is sure to die; and if several boys are christened in succession in the same church without the line being broken by a girl, there will be war in the land as soon as they are grown up. Many girls christened in succession denotes fruitful vintages for the country when they shall have attained a marriageable age.