Indeed, the old herbalists of England claimed by the sole use of herbs, not only to cure all fleshly ills, but to drive away or keep at a distance wolves, leopards, and all venomous wild beasts.[486]
In Tibet, according to L. Austine Waddell, M. B., ferocious mastiffs are permitted to roam at large in the night, a source of terror to wayfarers, who therefore carry about charms consisting of “the picture of a dog muzzled and fettered by a chain, terminated by the mystic and all-powerful thunderbolt sceptre,” while along the dog’s body are written certain Sanskrit magical sentences.[487]
VI. WORDS USED AS CHARMS
The English word “charm” is derived from the Latin carmen, a verse; and the magical potency of a sentence used as a charm was believed to rest in the words themselves, and not in the person who uttered them. In the opinion of the cabalistic magicians of the Middle Ages, the power of a charm of words depended upon its being unintelligible.
The Latin poet, Varius, wrote in the first century B. C. that old women, by the sole use of words as charms, were able not only to restrain and subjugate wild animals and serpents, but also to drive away noxious creatures and vermin. Few early writers allude to this practice, which appears, however, to have been much in vogue in different countries towards the close of the mediæval period. The Swiss theologian, Felix Hammerlein (1389-1457), wrote of a peasant living near Zurich who was able, by repeating a magic formula, to rid infested premises of adders, vipers, lizards, and other reptiles;[488] and in some parts of Normandy it was a custom formerly to place small rolls of hay under the fruit trees. The hay was then set on fire by means of torches carried by young children, who repeated meanwhile: “Mice, caterpillars, and moles, get out of my field; I will burn your beard and your bones; trees and shrubs, give me three bushels of apples.” Hampson remarks that this incantation somewhat resembles one employed by the ancient Grecians against beetles, whom they held responsible for the destruction of their corn. These magical lines are thus translated: “Fly, beetles, the ravenous wolf pursues you.”[489]
It was currently reported among the ancients that the famous philosopher, Pythagoras, not only possessed the faculty of predicting storms and earthquakes, but that he had by a magical word been enabled to tame a Daunian bear, and had also prevented an ox from eating beans by whispering in his ear.[490]
Antoine Mizauld, the French physician and astrologer, affirmed that, according to Ptolemy, in order to drive away serpents, one should prepare a talisman by engraving the figure of two serpents upon a square piece of copper and pronouncing a charm of words as follows: “With this image I forbid serpents to harm any one, and command them to leave the place where it shall be buried.” In like manner, says the same authority, to expel rats and mice, one has only to represent an image of one of these creatures upon a piece of tin or copper, and at the proper time, as determined by astrology, command them to depart.
In order to expel snakes, insects, and vermin from their dwellings, the Bulgarian women of Turkey, on the last day of February, endeavor to frighten the creatures by beating copper vessels all over the house, while shouting, “Out with you, snakes, scorpions, flies, bugs, and fleas!” One of the vessels is then taken into the court-yard, the pests being expected to follow it. And in Serfo, an island of the Grecian archipelago, at the commencement of the vintage a bunch of grapes is thrown into each house to expel the vermin, while this formula is repeated: “The black grape will sicken you; the black grape will poison you! Out with you, rats and fleas!”[491]
In Albania, when locusts or cockchafers devastate the fields, a number of women, having caught some of the insects, form a mock funeral procession, and proceed to drown them in some convenient stream. And while on their way thither they chant in turn the following dirge, which all repeat in chorus:—