W—— Rectory, Feb. 12.
Primrosen.—The early appearance of primroses this year induces me to trouble you with some East-Anglian folk lore concerning them, premising that here the word still forms its plural in en.
At Cockfield, Suffolk, there are none, nor, it is said, do they thrive when planted; though they are numerous in all the surrounding villages, which do not apparently differ from Cockfield in soil.
The village legend says that here, too, they once were plentiful, but when Cockfield was depopulated by the plague, they also caught the infection and died, nor have they flourished since that time.
In East Norfolk some old women are still found who believe that if a less number of primrosen than thirteen be brought into a house on the first occasion of bringing any in, so many eggs only will each hen or goose hatch that season. When recently admitted into deacon's orders, my gravity was sorely tried by being called on to settle a quarrel between two old women, arising from one of them having given one primrose to her neighbour's child, for the purpose of making her hens hatch but one chicken out of each set of eggs. And it was seriously maintained that the charm had been successful.
Since then I have heard that it only has an influence over geese. Perhaps this may account in some measure for the belief. In early seasons, persons are induced to carry in specimens of the first spring flowers that they find. In such seasons, too, fowls lay early, and perhaps do not sufficiently protect their eggs. The ungenial weather which too frequently succeeds spoils the eggs, and the effect is attributed to the "primrosen" of course; the cases where a few flowers are brought in, and the fowls have numerous broods, remain unnoticed.
E. G. R.
Harvest Home Song, sung in some Parts of Surrey.—
"We have plough'd,