Feather beds should be made of domestic birds' feathers, such as geese, ducks, and fowls. Wild fowl feathers should not be mixed with these feathers; for, otherwise, the sick will...
The writer was told the name of the farm where the following events were said to have taken place, but he is not quite sure that his memory has not deceived him, so he will only re...
Place the Bible for three successive nights under the bolster of the sufferer, and it will cure him.
In the Spectator, No. 117, are these words:-- If the dairy-maid does not make her butter come so soon as she would have it, Moll White (a supposed witch) is at the bottom of the ch...
It was formerly a general custom in Wales for young lads and lasses to meet and spend a pleasant evening together in various farmhouses. Many kinds of amusements, such as dancing,...
This bird, too, is supposed to indicate the death of an inmate of the house which is its home; or, if not the death, some sore disaster to one or other of the members of that famil...
It was firmly believed, at one time, in Wales, that the Fairies exchanged their own weakly or deformed offspring for the strong children of mortals. The child supposed to have been...
The little busy bee has been from times of old an object of admiration and superstition. It is thought that they are sufficiently sensitive to feel a slight, and sufficiently vindi...
1. Drop a pin into a holy well and your warts will disappear, but should anyone take the pin out of the well, the warts you have lost will grow on his fingers. 2. Rub the warts wit...
The corpse candle, or canwyll corph, was a light like that of a candle, which was said to issue from the house where a death was about to occur, and take the course of the funeral...
Jones writes as follows:--W. J. was once a Sabbath-breaker at Risca village, where he frequently used to play and visit the alehouses on the Sabbath day, and there stay till late a...
A white horse figures in the superstition of school children. When the writer was a lad in school at Llanidloes, it was believed that if a white horse were met in the morning it wa...
The following tale I obtained from the Rev. Owen Jones, Vicar of Pentrevoelas. The scene lies amongst the wildest mountains of Merionethshire. David, the weaver, lived in a house c...
Children suffering from whooping cough were taken to a seventh son, or lacking a seventh son of sons only, to a fifth son of sons only, who made a cake, and gave it to the sufferer...
Mention is made in Camden of snake rings. Omitting certain remarks not connected with the matter directly, he writes:--In some parts of Wales we find it a common opinion of the vul...
It would appear that poor Bob was doomed to a sad end. His last exploit is thus given:-- Wrth fyned adre o chware cardia, ar Bont Maesgwyn gwelai Robert Llwyd Hari gylch crwn o dan...
The raven has ever enjoyed a notoriously bad name as a bird of ill-omen. He was one of those birds which the Jews were to have in abomination (Lev., xi., 5-13). But other nations b...
The following tale was related to me by the Rev. W. E. Jones, rector of Bylchau, near Denbigh:-- Richard Roberts, Coederaill, Bylchau, when a young man, worked in Flintshire, and i...
Although Max Muller, in Chips from a German Workshop, vol. ii., p. 238, states that The Aryan nations had no Devil, this certainly cannot at present be affirmed of that branch of t...
The cure of diseases by charms is generally supposed to be a kind of superstition antagonistic to common sense, and yet there are undoubted cases of complete cures through the inst...
In the preceding tales the Evil One is depicted as an agent in the destruction of his own kingdom. He thus shows his obtuseness, or his subordination to a higher power. In the stor...
The charm consisted of a verse taken from the Bible, written on a slip of paper, wrapped round the bird's leg, as the steel spurs were being placed on him. The verse so employed wa...
It is considered very lucky indeed to find that a strange swarm of bees has arrived in the garden, or tree, belonging to a cottager. The advent of the bees is joyfully welcomed, an...
I am indebted to the Rev. Owen Jones, Vicar of Pentrevoelas, a mountain parish in West Denbighshire, for the following tale, which was written in Welsh by a native of those parts,...
When ducks sportively chase each other through the water, and flap their wings and dive about, in evident enjoyment of their pastime, it is a sign that rain is not far off.
Several months after the occurrence recorded above of Huw Llwyd, when he had just started from his home one Sunday morning to go to his Church to officiate there, for he was the pa...
Mr. Roberts states that his grandmother, born in 1744, had only traditions of this spirit. He was said to have worn a three-cocked hat, and appeared as a gentleman, and whilst divi...
According to Richards, and Dr. Owen Pughe, is a Fairy, a goblin, etc. The plural of Gwyll would be Gwylliaid, or Gwyllion, but this latter word Dr. Pughe defines as ghosts, hobgobl...
A curious notion prevailed respecting this bird, arrived at, presumably, in consequence of its peculiar name--the goat sucker--viz., that it lives on the milk of the goat, which it...
1. Spit on the ground the first thing in the morning, mix the spittle with the mould, and then anoint the ringworm with this mixture. 2. Hold an axe over the fire until it perspire...