Of course, it is very easy to say these visions might have been mere coincidences; but if they were only coincidences, they were surpassingly uncommon ones.
Talismans and Amulets
Amulets, though now practically confined to the East, were once very much in vogue throughout Europe.
Count Daniel O'Donnell, brigadier-general in the Irish Brigade of Louis XIV., never went into
battle without carrying with him an amulet in the shape of the jewelled casket "Cathach of Columbcille," containing a Latin psalter said to have been written by St Columba. It has quite recently been lent to the Royal Irish Academy (where it is now) by my kinsman, the late Sir Richard O'Donnell, Bart. Count O'Donnell used to say that so long as he had this talisman with him, he would never be wounded, and it is a fact that though he led his regiment in the thick of the fight at Borgoforte, Nago, Arco, Vercelli, Ivrea, Verrua, Chivasso, Cassano, and other battles in the Italian Campaign of 1701-7, and at Oudenarde, Malplaquet, Arleux, Denain, Douai, Bouchain, and Fuesnoy, in the Netherlands, he always came through scathless. Hence, like him, I am inclined to attribute his escapes to the psychic properties of the talisman.
The great family of Lyons were in possession of a talisman in the form of a "lion-cup," the original of Scott's "Blessed Bear of Bradwardine," which always brought them good luck till they went to Glamis, and after that they experienced centuries of misfortune.
Another famous talisman is the "Luck of Edenhall," in the possession of Sir Richard Musgrave of Edenhall, in Cumberland; and many other ancient families still retain their amulets.
"The Evil Eye"
I was recently speaking to an Italian lady who informed me that belief in "the evil eye" is still very prevalent in many parts of Italy. "I
myself believe in it," she said, "and whenever I pass a person whom I think possesses it, I make a sign with my fingers"—and she held up two of her fingers as she spoke. I certainly have observed that people with a peculiar and undefinable "something" in their eyes are particularly unlucky and invariably bring misfortune on those with whom they are in any degree intimate. These people, I have no doubt, possess "the evil eye," though it would not be discernible except to the extremely psychic, and there is no doubt that the Irish and Italians are both far more psychic than the English.