The Myths and Fables of To-Day

by Samuel Adams Drake

A gold wedding-ring is believed to be a cure for sties.

Wearing red yarn around the neck is esteemed a prevention against nose-bleeding.

Sticking your jack-knife into the head of the bed will prevent cramps. Another way is to put both your slippers by your bedside, bottoms up, before retiring for the night. Should you neglect this, the cramps will surely return. The gentleman who gave me this receipt, said he got it from his mother. The old way, as laid down in the books, was to lay out your shoes in the form of a cross, before retiring.

In some country districts, a heavy growth of foliage is considered a certain forerunner of coming sickness. The blossoming of trees, in autumn, also forebodes an epidemic of sickness.

It is a matter of common knowledge, that tooth charmers continue to carry on a more or less lucrative trade in the country towns. “What did she do to you?” was asked of a countryman who had just paid a visit to one of these cunning women, at the urgent solicitation of a friend. “Do?” was the bewildered answer, “why, she didn’t do nothing at all, but just said over something to herself, and the pain was all gone in a minute.” This person, like a great many others, had a rooted aversion to having a tooth “hauled,” as he expressed it, and would have suffered untold tortures from an aching tooth, rather than have gone to a regular practitioner. One woman, in particular, whom I have in mind, enjoys a wide reputation in the neighborhood where she practises her healing art. She simply mutters some incantation, or spell, and presto! the most excruciating pain is conjured away; so ’tis said.

There is a very old belief touching the virtue of a halter, that has done service in hanging a criminal, to charm away the headache. Probably other powers are attributed to this barbarous instrument of death, for it is said to be a fact, that the negroes of the southern States will pay a great price for a piece of the hangman’s noose, to be kept in the house, as a charm.

The madstone is claimed to be a certain remedy for the bite of rabid dogs, snake bites and the like. The wonderful cures effected by one of these magic stones, owned by a lady living in Mississippi (references being given to quite a number of well-known people, who had either tested the remarkable properties of this particular stone, or who had personal knowledge of the facts), went the rounds of the newspapers some years ago. Upon being applied to the wound or bite, the stone adhered to it until the virus was absorbed. It then fell off, and after being well cleaned, was again applied until it failed to hold. When this took place, the patient was considered out of danger. With this stone it was claimed that the bite of a mad dog could be cured at any time before hydrophobia had set in.

A similar case is reported from Virginia, with details that leave no doubt of the honesty of the principals concerned.

This was the famous Upperville madstone, which has been in the hands of the Fred family for over one hundred and fifty years. As its name indicates, the peculiar property of this stone is its apparent appetite for the virus to be found in the wound made by the bite of any venomous animal. This is the owner’s story:

“The stone was brought to Virginia in 1740 by Joshua Fred, who was a well-to-do farmer in Warwickshire, England, and became an important landowner in Fauquier County. By his wish his descendants had clung to this stone as a priceless heirloom, and I am proud to say that their use of it has always reflected credit upon the good, old-fashioned hospitality and kindliness characteristic of Virginians. It was well known all over the country that anybody might go to the Fred farm with any unfortunate who had been bitten by a dog, and enjoy a certain cure without any cost. For a hundred years none of the Freds would permit any one who was cured in this way by the madstone to pay a farthing, even for board or lodging or horse feed. In later years the vicissitudes of peace and war having somewhat affected the fortunes of various members of the family, it became the practice to allow visitors who came to use the madstone to pay what they pleased for their entertainment and for the care of their teams. Beyond this, however, no charge whatever was made for scores of most remarkable cures.