Burns describes another custom:
“In order on the clean hearth-stane,
The luggies[61] three are ranged,
And every time great care is ta’en
To see them duly changed:
And uncle John wha wedlock’s joys
Sin’ Mar’s-year did desire,
Because he gat the toom-dish[62] thrice,
He heav’d them on the fire
In wrath that night.”
For this amusement three dishes are taken: one filled with clean and one with dirty water, and the other empty. They are set upon the hearth, and the parties, blindfolded, advance in succession to dip their fingers. If they chance upon the clean water, it is understood that they will marry a maiden; if upon the foul, they will marry a widow; if upon the empty dish, they will not marry at all.
Again: if a damsel eat an apple in front of a looking-glass, she will shortly see her future husband peeping over her shoulder. So Burns:
“Wee Jenny to her Grannie says,
‘Will ye go wi’ me, Grannie?
I’ll eat the apple at the glass
I gat frae uncle Johnie.’
She fuff’t[63] her pipe wi’ sic a lunt,
In wrath she was sae vap’rin’,
She notic’t na an aizle[64] brunt,
Her braw new worset apron,
Out thro’ that night.
“‘Ye little skelpie limmer’s[65] face!
How daur you try sic sportin’,
As seek the foul thief ony place,
For him to spae your fortune:
Nae doubt but ye may get a sight!
Great cause ye hae to fear it;
For mony a ane has gotten a fright,
An’ liv’d an’ di’d deleeret,
On sic a night.’”
A shirt-sleeve may be wetted, and hung before the fire to dry: then if he or she lie in bed and watch it until midnight, he or she will behold his or her future partner’s phantasm come in and turn it!
Children born on Halloween were formerly supposed to be gifted with certain mysterious endowments, such as the power of perceiving and conversing with the “dwellers on the threshold,” the inhabitants of the World Invisible.
Once upon a time, all over Scotland a bonfire was lighted on every farm; and often the bonfire was surrounded by a circular trench, symbolical of the sun. Every year these bonfires decrease in number; but within the recollection of living men no fewer than thirty could be seen on the high hilltops between Dunkeld and Abergeldy. And a strange weird sight it was, worthy of the pencil of a Rembrandt,—the dusky figures of the lads and lasses dancing wildly around them, to the hoarse music of their own voices! Miss Cumming writes that in the neighbourhood of Crieff, the bale-fires, as the people call them, still blaze as brightly as ever; and from personal observation we can assert that they are still lighted in many parts of Argyllshire.
A remarkable Halloween story is recorded in Dr. Robert Chambers’s valuable miscellany, “The Book of Days.” Mr. and Mrs. M., we are told, were a happy young couple, who, in the middle of the last century, resided on their own estate, in a pleasant part of the province of Leinster. Possessed of a handsome fortune, they spent their time in various rural avocations, until the birth of a child, a little girl, seemed to crown their felicity. On the Halloween following this notable event, the parents retired to rest at their usual hour, Mrs. M. cradling her infant on her bosom that she might be roused if it showed the least sign of uneasiness. From teething or some other ailment, the child, about midnight, became very restless, and not receiving the usual attention from its mother, woke up Mr. M. by its cries. He at once called his wife, and told her the baby was unwell; she made no answer. She seemed in an uneasy slumber, and in spite of all her husband’s efforts continued to sleep on, until he was compelled to take the child himself and endeavour to soothe it to rest. From sheer exhaustion it at last sank into silence, while the mother slumbered until a much later hour than usual. When she at last awoke, her husband told her of what had happened, and of the extent to which his night’s rest had been disturbed. “I, too,” she replied, “have passed the most miserable night I ever experienced: I now see that sleep and rest are two different things, for I never felt so unrefreshed in my life. How I wish you had been able to awake me—it would have spared me some of my fatigue and anxiety! I thought I was dragged against my will into a strange part of the country, where I had never been before, and, after what appeared to me a long and weary journey on foot, I arrived at a comfortable looking house. I went in longing to rest, but had no power to sit down, although there was a nice supper laid out before a good fire, and every appearance of preparations for an expected visitor. Exhausted as I felt, I was only allowed to stand for a minute or two, and then hurried away by the same road back again; but now it is over, and after all it was only a dream.”
Her husband listened with deep interest to this strange narrative, and then, sighing deeply, said, “My dear Sarah, you will not long have me beside you; whoever is to be your second husband played last night some evil trick, of which you have been the victim.”