So, too, among the New Zealanders, if a child sneeze on the occasion of receiving its name, the officiating priest at once holds to its ear the wooden image of an idol and sings some mystic words.
In a note appended to his “Mountain Bard,” the Ettrick Shepherd says, regarding the superstitions of Selkirkshire: “When they sneeze in first stepping out of bed in the morning, they are thence certified that strangers will be there in the course of the day, in numbers corresponding to the times they sneeze.”[363]
It was a Flemish belief that a sneeze during a conversation proved that what one said was the truth,[364] a doctrine which must have commended itself to snuff-takers.
In Shetlandic and Welsh folk-lore the sneeze of a cat indicates cold north winds in summer and snow in winter;[365] and the Bohemians have an alleged infallible test for recognizing the Devil, for they believe that he must perforce sneeze violently at sight of a cross.[366]
According to a Chinese superstition a sneeze on New Year’s Eve is ominous for the coming year; and, to offset this, the sneezer must visit three families of different surnames, and beg from each a small tortoise-shaped cake, which must be eaten before midnight.[367]
In Turkistan, when a person to whom a remark is addressed sneezes, it is an asseveration that the opinion or statement is correct, just as if the person accosted were to exclaim, “That is true!” In the same country three sneezes are unlucky. When, also, any one hiccoughs, it is etiquette to say, “You stole something from me,” and this phrase at such times is supposed to produce good luck.[368]
The Japanese attach significance to the number of times a man sneezes. Thus, one sneeze indicates that some one is praising him, while two betoken censure or disparagement; a triple sneeze is commonplace, and means simply that a person has taken cold.[369] In Mexico, also, it was formerly believed either that somebody was speaking evil of one who sneezed, or that he was being talked about by one or more persons.[370]
Sussex people are prejudiced against cats which develop sneezing proclivities, for they believe that, when a pet feline sneezes thrice, it augurs ill for the health of the household, and is premonitory of influenza and bronchial affections.[371]
In an interesting article in “Macmillan’s Magazine,” entitled “From the Note-book of a Country Doctor,”[372] a physician practicing in a remote part of Cornwall tells of a peculiar cure for deafness which recently came to his notice.
One of his patients, an elderly woman whose name was Grace Rickard, complained that she could no longer hear the grunting of her pigs, a sound which, from childhood, had roused her from sleep in the early morning. The doctor was obliged to tell her that the difficulty was due to advancing years.