Part 4 (2/2)
MASTER LEWIS ON POPULAR SUPERStitIONS
The front of Northuland, used to be ornamented with the bronze statue of a lion, called Percy A hu to produce a sensation, placed hi an attitude of astonishs!”
His eyes were riveted on the statue, to which the bystanders readily observed that the exclamation referred Quite a nuure, expecting to see the phenoination supplied the desired marvel, and presently a street full of people fancied that they could see the lion Percy wag his tail!
An old distich runs so as follows:--
”Who believe that there are witches, there the witches are; Who believe there aren't no witches, aren't no witches there”
There is ood sense than poetry in these lines The marvels of superstition are witnessed chiefly by those who believe in them
[Illustration: ANCIENT RELIGIOUS RITES OF THE PEASANTS]
The sights held as supernatural are usually not ination The spectres of dey are not more fearful than those shapes of fancy produced by opium and dissipation; and the visions of the necromancer are not more wonderful than those that arise from a fever, or even froular one, that, however at random the fancies of unhealthy intellects reater or less credit when they touch upon supernatural things Instances of ined things quite as marvellous as the most superstitious, but whose illusions have been treated with the greatest ridicule, ht be cited almost without liht that she was a goose
Making a nest in one corner of the room, she put in it a few kitchen utensils, which she supposed to be eggs, and began to incubate She found the process of incubation, in her case, a very slow one; and her friends, fearing for her health, called in a doctor He endeavored to reason with her, but she only replied to his philosophy by stretching out her neck, which she see The old lady had a set of gilt-band china cups and saucers, which, in her eyes, had been a sort of household Gods The knowledge of the fact co to the ears of the physician, he advised her friends to break the precious treasures, one after another, before her eyes The plan worked admirably She immediately left her nest, and ran to the rescue of the china, and the exciteht her back to her sense of the proprieties of wohboring town, fancied she had become a veritable teapot She used to silence those who atteu one ar upward her other ar than that?
Another lady, whose faculties had begun to decline, thought her toes were ure she cut when she went abroad, picking up and putting down her feet with the greatest caution, lest she should injure her precious toes
Now these cases provoke a smile; but, had these ancient damsels fancied that they were bewitched, or that they were haunted, or that they held communion with the spirits of the invisible world, instead of exciting laughter and pity, they would have occasioned no shborhood in which each resided
A young Scottish far ho over a lonely road
He had been drinking rather freely at the fair, according to the custom, and his head was far from steady, and his conscience far froan to reflect what a dreadful thing it would be to host His fears caused hi the old church in Teviotdale, he saw a figure in white standing on the wall of the churchyard, by the highway
The sight gave hi that it was his ihostly shape But the nearer he approached, the ure appear
He stopped, hesitating what to do, and then concluded to ride slowly There was no other way to his hoh that his ht, after all, he thought, be nothing but an illusion He would approach the object slowly and cautiously, and, when very near it, would put spurs to his horse and dash by
As he drew near, however, the figure showed un h odd, sounded surprisingly huht filled the silent air, and the landscape was flecked with shadows; it was a ghostly place,--Teviotdale churchyard; and, in perfect keeping with the tihost is supposed to do,--talking gibberish to theas he put spurs to his horse for a rush by the object of his fright As he dashed past, his hair al with apprehension, the supposed phantohtened h before, but norought to the highest pitch of terror
He drove his spurs into his horse, and the ani never before was seen in the winding road of Teviotdale
In a wonderfully short ti before hisout, were cohaist!” And ”tak aff the ghaist”
they did, which proved to be a young lady well known in Teviotdale for her unfortunate history
She had ly attached, and the brightest worldly prospects see before her Her husband was taken ill, and suddenly died
She had confided in him so fondly that the world lost its attractions for her on his decease, and she ed