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Page 28
Such theories left ample room for the creation of all sorts of cure
charms, and when such ideas prevailed among the educated in the medical
profession, we need not be surprised that they still survive among many
uneducated persons, although two centuries have gone since. In 1714 one
of the most eminent physicians in Europe, Boerhaave, wrote of chemistry
and medicine:--"Nor even in this affair don't medicine receive some
advantage; witness the cups made of regulus of antimony, tempered with
other metals which communicate a medicinal quality to wine put in them,
and it is ten thousand pities the famous _Van Helmont_ should have been
so unkind to his poor fellow creatures in distress as to conceal from us
the art of making a particular metal which he tells us, made into rings,
and worn only while one might say the Lord's Prayer, would remove the
most exquisite h�morrhoidal pains, both internal and external, quiet the
most violent hysteric disorders, and give ease in the severest spasms
of the muscles. 'Tis right, therefore, to prosecute enquiries of this
nature, for there is very frequently some hidden virtues in these
compositions, and we may make a vast number of experiments of this kind
without any danger or inconvenience."
As it illustrates the theories just mentioned, we notice here the
influence attributed to the wonderful Lee Penny. This famous charm is a
stone set in gold. It is said to have been brought home by Lochart of
Lee, who accompanied the Earl of Douglas in carrying Robert the Bruce's
heart to the Holy Land. It is called Lee Penny, and was credited with
the virtue of imparting to water into which it was dipped curative
properties, specially influential to the curing of cattle when diseased,
or preventing them taking disease. Many people from various parts of
Scotland whose cattle were affected have made application within these
few years for water in which this stone has been dipped. It is believed
that this stone cannot be lost. It is still in the possession of the
family of Lochart.
Ague, it was believed, could be cured by putting a spider into a goose
quill, sealing it up, and hanging it about the neck, so that it would be
near the stomach. This disease might also be cured by swallowing pills
made of a spider's web. One pill a morning for three successive mornings
before breakfast.
There were numerous cures for hooping-cough of a superstitious
character, practised extensively during the earlier years of this
century, and some are still recommended. The following are a few of
these. Pass the patient three times under the belly, and three times
over the back of a donkey. Split a sapling or a branch of the ash tree,
and hold the split open while the patient is passed three times through
the opening. Find a man riding on a piebald horse, and ask him what
should be given as a medicine, and whatever he prescribes will prove a
certain cure. "I recollect," says Jamieson, "a friend of mine that rode
a piebald horse, that he used to be pursued by people running after him
bawling,--
"Man wi' the piety horse,
What's gude for the kink host?"
He said he always told them to give the bairn plenty of sugar candy. Put
a piece of _red_ flannel round the neck of a child, and it will ward off
the hooping cough. The virtue lay not in the flannel, but in the red
colour. Red was a colour symbolical of triumph and victory over all
enemies. Find a hairy caterpillar, put it into a bag, and hang it round
the neck of the child. This will prove a cure. Take some of the child's
hair and put it between slices of bread and butter, and give it to a
dog; if in eating it, the dog cough, the child will be cured, and the
hooping cough transferred to the dog. A very common practice at the
present day is to take the patient into a place where there is a tainted
atmosphere, such as a byre or a stable, a gas work, or chemical work. I
have seen the gas blown on the child's face, so that it might breath
some of it, and be set a coughing. If during the process the child take
a _kink_, it is a good sign. This idea must, I think, be of modern
origin.
It was believed that if a present were given, especially if it were
given to a sweetheart, and then asked back again, the giver would have a
stye on the eye. Again, a stye on the eye was removable by rubbing it
with a wedding ring. I suspect these two superstitions are portions of
an ancient allegory, which, in time loosing their figurative meanings,
came to be treated as literal facts.
Warts, especially when they are upon exposed parts of the body, are
sometimes a source of annoyance to their possessors, and various and
curious methods were taken for their removal. From their position on the
body they also were regarded as prognostications of good or bad luck. To
have warts on the right hand foreboded riches; a wart on the face
indicated troubles of various kinds.
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