The inhabitants of ancient Gascony are no less credulous, as is apparent from the following bits of Friday lore. Any one rash enough to start on a journey on horseback runs especial risk of falling off his horse, and of being drowned in attempting to ford a stream. It has even happened that newly baked loaves have been found tinged with blood in the oven. However, Friday is a good day for making vinegar, and the casks filled at three o’clock in the afternoon of that day are found to be superior to others. This is because our Lord, while on the cross, was given vinegar to drink, mingled with gall, at three o’clock on the afternoon of Good Friday.[448]
In Normandy, also, Friday is the favorite day for putting water in wine or cider, for the people believe that on any other day the mixture would become sour.[449]
According to a quaint Italian belief, whoever is born on a Friday will be of sanguine temperament, passionate, light-hearted, and handsome. He will delight in music, both vocal and instrumental, and will have a liking for fine clothes. Moreover, he will be voluble in speech, though of unstable character.[450]
The Tyrolese have a saying, “Whoever is born on a Friday must experience trouble,” and they regard it as folly to marry on that day.[451]
The French people share fully the general distrust of the sixth day of the week. This is shown by statistics of the Parisian theatres, where there are produced on an average nearly two hundred new pieces annually, and for many years not one of these has had its first performance on a Friday.[452]
In Alsace Wednesday and Friday are unlucky days, and the former is never chosen for a wedding or baptism. But of the two, Friday is the more undesirable, and no business of importance is done thereon, nor any journey undertaken. It is foremost among witch days, for evil spirits are then abroad, and their activity on a Friday is proverbial. These sentiments prevail in other German districts, and are entertained by people of cultivation and learning. Indeed, it may be affirmed truly that the possession of intellectual force is by no means incompatible with a superstitious belief in the luck or misfortune of particular days. The credulousness of the great Napoleon in this regard is well known. Bismarck is said to have once written to his wife from Letzlingen, a village of Prussian Saxony: “I have not had such good luck in hunting to-day as I had three years ago; but then—it is a Friday.”[453] The French statesman, Gambetta, is reported to have arranged his journeyings and business affairs with reference to auspicious hours, as determined by a professional reader of cards; and President Felix Faure, we are told, is similarly credulous. Indeed, so prevalent are notions of this kind in the French capital that tastefully ornamented cards with a list of “hours to be avoided” find a ready sale in the streets.[454]
Among the Slavonians St. Prascovia, the modern successor of Venus and Freyja, is believed to visit the peasants’ houses every Friday, and woe to the luckless woman whom she then finds engaged in certain occupations. Local tradition says that sewing, spinning, and weaving on that day are sinful, and are especially distasteful to St. Prascovia, familiarly known as “Mother Friday,” because the dust so produced gets into her eyes. She is very apt to take revenge by inflicting upon the offenders divers physical ailments, such as sore eyes, whitlows, or hang-nails. In some districts the peasants retire earlier than usual on Friday evenings, under the impression that Mother Friday will punish those whom she may find awake when she makes her evening visits. These popular beliefs are exemplified in the following tradition:—
There was once a certain woman who did not pay due reverence to Mother Friday, but set to work on a distaff full of flax, combing it and whirling it. She spun away until dinner-time, then sleep fell upon her. Suddenly the door opened, and in came Mother Friday, before the eyes of all who were there, clad in a white dress, and in such a rage! And she went straight up to the woman who had been spinning, and scooped up from the floor a handful of the dust that had fallen out of the flax, and began stuffing and stuffing that woman’s eyes full of it! After she had stuffed them full, she went off in a rage,—disappeared without saying a word.
When the woman awoke, she began squalling, at the top of her voice, about her eyes, but could not tell what was the matter with them. The other women, who had been much frightened, began to cry out: “Oh, you wretch, you! you’ve brought a terrible punishment on yourself from Mother Friday.” Then they told her all that had taken place. She listened to it all, and then began imploring: “Mother Friday, forgive me! Pardon me, the guilty one! I’ll offer thee a taper, and I’ll never let friend or foe dishonor thee, mother!”