Of the cuckoo, she says, “When evil is coming, he sings low among the bushes, and can scarcely get his “cuckoo” out. In the last week before he leaves, he always tells all that will happen in the course of the year till he comes again—all the shipwrecks, storms, accidents, and everything. If any one is about to die suddenly, or to lose a relation, he will light upon touchwood, or a rotten bough, and “cuckoo.”
“He is always here three months to a day, and sings all the while. The first of April is the proper day for him to come, and when he does so, there is sure to be a good and early harvest. If he does not come till May, then the harvest is into October. If he sings long after midsummer, there will be a Michaelmas harvest. If any one hears the cuckoo first when in bed, there is sure to be illness or death to him or one of his family.”
Among her saws are—
“Them that ever mind the world to win,
Must have a black cat, a howling dog, and a crowing hen.
“If youth could know what age do crave,
Sights of pennies youth would save.
“They that wive
Between sickle and scythe,
Shall never thrive.”
With reference to howling dogs, she says, “Pull off your left shoe and turn it, and it will quiet him. I always used to do so when I was in service. I hated to hear the dogs howl. There was no tax then,
and the farmers kept a heap of them. They won’t howl three times after the turning the shoe; if you are in bed, turn the shoe upside down by the bedside.”
Among the historical prophecies of Mother Shipton and Mother Bunch, her sister, as remembered by her, are—
That Mrs. Shipton foretold that the time should come when ships should go without sails, and carriages without horses, and the sun should shine upon hills that never see the sun before; all which are fulfilled, Mrs. Lubbock thinks, by steamers, railways, and cuttings through hills, which let in upon them the light of the sun.