Thrush.—There is a popular notion that a person must have this complaint once in his life, either at his birth or death. Norfolk nurses prefer to see it in babies, on the plea that it is healthy, and makes them feed more freely; but if it appears in a sick adult person he is generally given over as past recovery. Some of the remedies for this disease are curious, as, for instance, a Cornish one, which recommends the child to be taken fasting on three consecutive mornings, "to have its mouth blown into" by a posthumous child. In Devonshire the parent is advised to take three rushes from any running stream, and to pass them separately through the mouth of the infant. Afterwards the rushes should be thrown into the stream again, and as the current bears them away, so will the thrush, it is said, depart from the child. Should this prove ineffectual, the parent is recommended to capture the nearest duck that can be found, and to place its beak, wide open, within the mouth of the sufferer. As the child inhales the cold breath of the duck, the disease, we are told, will gradually disappear. A further charm consists in reading the eighth Psalm over the child's head three times every day on three days in the week for three successive weeks.
Toothache.—This common ailment, which produces so much discomfort, unfortunately rarely meets with a degree of sympathy proportionate to the agony it occasions, but has nevertheless been honoured with an extensive folk-lore; and the quaint remedies that superstitious fancy has suggested for its cure would occupy a small volume if treated with anything like fulness. Selecting some of the best known, we may mention one which, in point of efficacy, is considered by many as unsurpassed, namely, a tooth taken from the mouth of a corpse, and worn round the neck as an amulet. Occasionally a double-nut is carried in the pocket for the same purpose. There is a belief, too, that the possession of a Bible or a Prayer Book, with the following legend written in it, is an effectual charm:—"All glory, all glory, all glory be to the Father, and to the Son, and to the Holy Ghost. As our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ was walking in the Garden of Gethsemane, He saw Peter weeping. He called him unto Him, and said, 'Peter, why weepest thou?' Peter answered and said, 'Lord, I am grievously tormented with pain—the pain of my tooth.' Our Lord answered and said, 'If thou wilt believe in Me, and My words abide with thee, thou shalt never feel any more pain in thy tooth.' Peter said, 'Lord, I believe; help Thou mine unbelief.' In the name, &c., God grant M. N. ease from the pain in his tooth." These charm formulas, which constitute an important element in folk-lore literature, are still extensively used in this country to arrest or cure some bodily disease; and they are interesting as being in most cases modified forms of those used by our Anglo-Saxon ancestors.
Typhus Fever.—Even for so dangerous a disease as typhus fever, our peasantry do not hesitate to practise their own remedies. One consists in applying the skirt of a sheep to the soles of the feet, and keeping it there for several hours, under a notion that this will draw away the fever from the head. Some years ago a clergyman in Norfolk, whilst visiting a poor man suffering from this complaint, found that his wife had placed the spleen of a cow on the soles of his feet, having been assured that it was an efficacious remedy. There is another story that the rector of a Norfolk parish was solicited for the loan of the church plate to lay on the stomach of a child, which was much swelled from some mesenteric disease, this being held to be an excellent remedy in such cases.
Warts.—These have been regarded as prognostications of good or bad luck according to their position on the body, those on the right hand foreboding riches, whereas one on the face is believed to indicate troubles of various kinds. It would be difficult to enumerate the many methods that have been adopted to charm or drive them away, most persons disliking these ugly little excrescences, and willingly resorting to any means, however eccentric, to lose them. As in the case of so many other charms, most of those used also for this complaint are of the nature of a sacrifice, the warts being transferred to a substitute. Thus, the person is recommended to count his warts, to wrap in a piece of paper a pebble for each, and then to throw the parcel away, in the hope that its unfortunate finder will get them. Another remedy is to open the warts to the quick, and to rub them with the juice of a sour apple, which should afterwards be buried, and as it decomposes the warts will die away. Some rub the wart with eels' blood, and others believe in the efficacy of the ashen tree. After picking each wart with a pin, they stick it into the bark, and repeat this rhyme:—
"Ashen tree, ashen tree,
Pray buy these warts of me."
An Irish servant's formula is to pass his hand over the warts, making the sign of the cross, at the same time bidding them, in God's name, depart and trouble him no more. He then gives some one a slip of paper, on which is written "Jesus Christ, that died upon the cross, put my warts away," to drop by the roadside. It is thought that as it perishes, so, too, will the warts vanish. Another plan is to steal a piece of raw meat, rub the warts with it, and throw it away, a charm mentioned by Southey in "The Doctor." Other remedies are the juice of ants, spiders' webs, pigs' blood, while tying a horse-hair round each wart is considered efficacious. Another method is to blow on the warts nine times when the moon is full; and in some places boys take a new pin, cross the warts with it nine times, and cast it over the left shoulder. These, then, are some of the principal cures for warts, most of them, as we have already said, belonging to the category of vicarious charms, which have at all times been one of the favourite resources of poor mortals in their difficulties—such charms being sacrifices made on the principle so widely adopted—Qui facit per alium facit per se.
Wen.—The same notion of vicariousness enters into the cures recommended for wens, one of the most efficacious being the touch of a dead man's hand. And Grose informs us how, in days gone by, children were brought by their nurses to be stroked with the hands of dead criminals, even whilst they were hanging on the gallows. In Northamptonshire numbers of sufferers were in the habit of congregating round the gallows, in order to receive "the dead-stroke," the notion being that as the hand of the man mouldered away, so the wen would by degrees decrease. In Gloucestershire an ornamental necklace made of plaited hair from a horse's tail is thought to be a good remedy.
Whooping-Cough.—This common enemy of childhood has, from time immemorial, afforded ample opportunity to the superstitiously-inclined to devise sundry charms for its cure, of which the following are a few:—Passing the patient three times under the belly and three times over the back of a donkey; or let the parent of the afflicted child catch a spider, and hold it over the head of the child, repeating three times:—