picture, while to your right, as you drive along the high road, is the long, low building of the inn, flanked by a couple of scraggy fir-trees. and to your left the black lough. Here the van from Stranorlar to Donegal stops, that the horses may drink; and even so long ago as the end of the last century the inn was a place of refreshment for travellers. return to Derry until the troublous times were over. She lived to tell her greatgrandchildren how the cock had saved her life. But sometimes the bird of omen has been known to utter his faithful warnings in vain. A man named Teague Gallagher, who lived on the banks of the Bush, a salmon stream in County AnIn the summer of 1798, when society trim, fell into bad company, and fished in Ulster was completely disorganized, a for salmon on clear nights. He and his poor woman, too weary to go farther, comrades had met with many alarms was set down with her baby, and a large since they began their dishonest courses, trunk, at the inn door. A night's lodg- and had more than once been forced to ing was requested, and the tired traveller run for their lives, and Teague's wife implaced herself by the fireside while sup- plored him to give up poaching: "For per was being prepared. Evil-looking I canna rest for the fretting, Teague dear, men moved about the room, and she saw and my heart's quare and heavy," said them cast many glances at her trunk, she on one particular night. She cleared which was unusually large for a poor away the supper things as she spoke, and woman to possess. A good deal of whisat that moment her cock and hens flutpering in Irish took place, which she, tered down from their roosts upon the being a Derry woman, could not under- table, crowing and flapping their wings. stand; but the host, as he sharpened She hastened to feel their feet: they were knives upon the board, seemed to nod as cold as snow. "The saints defend toward her in a threatening manner. A us!'' cried the frightened woman; "liscock just then strutted up to her, plucked ten to the birds, an' it's only nine o'clock her dress with his beak, and crowed at night. It's maybe your death they're loudly. warning us of. Dinna gang after the fish this nicht, but gang till yer bed like a Christian man.' Wring his neck, the villain !" said the host to the servant girl. The bird flew up to the rafters out of harm's way, but as soon as the commotion was over he came down again, and once more crowed and plucked the traveller's gown. Much alarmed, the poor woman rose up, and said, as calmly as she could, "I'll go a wee piece along the road, to look about me. Please take care o' my trunk, an' I'll be back before the supper's ready." No one attempting to detain her, she left the inn with her child. Walking quietly until out of sight of the black lake and gaunt firs, she began to run wildly along the road toward the gap. A party of yeomanry met her when she was almost exhausted, and to them she told her story. It was a time when all houses were liable to be entered and examined. The inn was thoroughly searched; papers were found implicating the host in the rebellion; and human remains, as well as clothing, silver, and other valuables, discovered on the premises, showed that travellers had been made away with there. The woman was conducted to her destination by the yeomanry, and did not and wi' that she faded away." "Did she never return?" “Na, na, miss, dear; she got to her rest, for I lamented nae mair; an' forbye that I lived three year poor and hungry, till I gathered the price of masses for her soul.' In Cork and Kerry the crowing of a cock at night is thought to give notice that a ghost is in the house, and then whoever is still afoot hurries to bed in trepidation and draws the blanket over his head. The Little inmate, full of mirth, Chirping on my kitchen hearth, is regarded by our peasantry of all races -Celts, semi-Scotch, and descendants of the English settlers-with superstitious interest. It is described in Ulster as a gentle wee thing," the word "gentle" always meaning of fairy origin. It is thought to be very lucky when crickets come to a house, and very unlucky when they leave it, and it is considered a dangerous thing to kill them. The writer of this article saw her cook stoop to examine something on the kitchen floor the other day, and on asking what it might be, received the following answer : "It's a cricket, miss; I thought it was a clock" (i.e., black beetle), "an' I was very near putting my foot on it. I'm sure I'm glad I did not, for if I had killed it, the other crickets wouldna ha' left one stitch o' my clothes that they wouldna ha' cut holes in." This idea about the revengeful feelings of the crickets is universal, and is not confined to any race or religion, but how it originated we are unable to discover. Not long ago we fell in with a "flitting" on the high road. The father NEW SERIES.-VOL. XXXI., No. 1. went first, with the cart piled with bedding, chairs, tables, and other furniture; next walked the mother, with the cock under her arm; then the little son carrying the cat; and lastly the younger children, each with a small bundle. We wished the family good fortune in their new home. "Look, miss," said the man, taking his tobacco-box out of his pocket and showing two crickets within-" look what we're taking wi' us for luck.” The weasel is accredited with the same revengeful feelings as the cricket, and the people are most unwilling to kill one, lest all the weasels in the country should track out the murderer, and avenge the throat. A ploughman came from his death of their comrade by cutting his work in much agitation one evening, and on his master inquiring what was the matter, he replied: "I killed a weasel in the fairy field, your honor, and two other weasels has been chasing me up an' down the furrows all day, trying to get at me. Dear, dear, but I had the ill luck!" "What folly is this, Martin?" "I beg your honor's pardon, but it's allowed that weasels 'll pursue you to cut your throat if you kill one o' them; an' there was a grand-uncle o' my own killed a weasel, an' the next day he lay down by the roadside-" "Well, sir, he fell asleep, an' he was found dead an' bleeding, wi' dozens o' weasels swarming over him!" It is thought unlucky if a weasel should cross the path of any one setting out upon a journey-some misfortune will surely follow. The murderous and bloodthirsty nature of this little animal is thus explained: When the Danes came to Ireland they brought their cats with them, which, when their masters were driven out of the country, escaped to the woods and fields and turned into weasels! The memory of the Danes is held in detestation, and red-haired people are considered unlucky, because supposed to be descended from them. A curious superstition connected with the hare has come lately to the writer's knowledge. If a woman about to become a mother sees the little white tuft upon a hare's tail, it is thought that her child will be born with a hare-lip; and 6 any man who kills a hare, pulls off the tuft of white fur at once, lest this misfortune should happen in his own family or in that of a neighbor. But the woman may avert all danger of this kind by keeping a small portion of her petticoat unsewn if she have but the breadth of an inch of this garment unravelled, she may encounter any number of hares without fear of injury to her expected infant. The idea that a newt is on the watch to creep down the throat of any person who happens to fall asleep out of doors, so prevalent in Ireland, has given rise to many strange stories. A turf-cutter in the County Antrim is said to have been afflicted with the company of a newt for several months. He had been so foolish as to sleep in the bog one warm summer day. The reptile proving a most uncomfortable inmate, he applied to a country doctress for a cure. The old woman advised him to eat largely of salt herring, which would have the effect of making his disagreeable guest so intolerably thirsty that it would have to come up to drink. an' "Lie down," she concluded, "fornenst the river, wi' yer mouth open, yer troubles 'll soon be over." He obeyed strictly, while a crowd of anxious neighbors kept watch at a little distance, when, mirabile dictu, they saw a full-grown newt, followed by seven little ones, issued from his mouth, and hasten down to the stream to drink! Of course the patient beat a rapid retreat. This little reptile, regarded with so much fear and dislike, has, however, its own use in the world. Any one who catches it, holds it by its feet, and licks its back three times from the head to the tail, will be able henceforth to cure all burns and scalds, if he apply his tongue to them immediately after they have been received, before the blisters have begun to rise. As few people have courage enough to touch a newt even with their hands, those who have acquired this gift of healing are not very many; yet we have the pleasure of being acquainted with three old men who are thus gifted. While writing on the subject of cures performed by animals, it is only kind to inform our suffering fellow-creatures that they may obtain relief from toothache by rubbing their gums with a young frog. A young Irish frog, at any rate, is warranted to ease their pain. In Cavan, Louth, and Meath a field mouse made into broth is administered to consumptive patients, as in parts of Germany spiders and their webs are swallowed for ague. The We shall conclude this paper by relating the tragic fate of "the wren with little quill the poor wren, the most diminutive of birds"-who is pursued by far more than half of the inhabitants of Ireland with unflagging animosity. Every Roman Catholic of the lower classes kills a wren when he has the chance, and the reason for his rancor is well known to the Protestants. The legend is that during one of the rebellions a party of Protestant soldiers, weary from the hardships they had undergone, lay down to sleep in a glen, the sentinels also being overcome with sleep. rebels advanced softly, hoping to surprise them asleep, when a wren tapped with his beak three times upon the Protestant drum, awakening the drummer-boy, and the assailants were ignominiously routed. This incident, not told by Mr. Froude in his History, must, we fear, be accepted with caution, as the Protestants differ very much about the date of the occurrence, some saying it took place during the massacre of 1641, others in the rebellion of 1798, and others, again, in the time of their hero King William of glorious, pious, and immortal memory.' The writer confesses that she has heard the story from Protestants only, her researches among Roman Catholics in this direction having always been nipped in the bud. "The wren has a drop of the deil's blood in it," is all that they will ever say on the subject. On St. Stephen's Day, in the south of Ireland, boys carry about a wren in a furze-bush, which is decorated with ribbons. They shout and dance and sing. Later in the day, when they have killed the bird, they knock at all the doors in town and country, saying that the wren is in its coffin, and they want money to bury it.—Belgravia Magazine. FORMS OF SALUTATION. IT has often occurred to me that national salutations, both by word and by action, might, in most cases at any rate, have a natural history within the limits of investigation; and that their form might be shown or surmised to have been due in some degree, perhaps entirely, to the history, character, geographical position, occupations, or other peculiar circumstances of each particular nation or group of nations, or might at least furnish an interesting parallel to these specialities; while occasionally also the salutation might throw a ray of light upon the conditions of the past. However the matter may stand, the inquiry is, at all events, so far inviting in that it supplies us with all the elements of a speculation which may lead us along some of the pleasant by-ways skirting the main road of the world's progress. * The materials collected in investigating a subject so fertile exceed the bounds of any reasonable paper, and, in consequence, I am obliged to confine myself to as judicious a selection as I can make of those salutations which appear to me most striking. On the threshold I have to confess that the laudable ambition which at first fired me to strive after a scientific classification, has been ignominiously frustrated. I have given up in despair the attempt to draw any rational parallels between divisions of salutations and divisions of language, or divisions of race. Semitic, Indo-European, Turanian, Monosyllabic, Agglutinative, Inflectional, furnish but faint lines of correspondence; nor have I drawn more comfort from Caucasian, Mongolian, Ethiopian, American, and * Mr. Herbert Spencer, in one of his articles in the Fortnightly Review, on "Ceremonial Government" (July number, 1878), makes a passing remark that some [forms of salutation] take their character from surrounding conditions." The subjoined paper (which was read before the Birmingham Graduates' Club two years before Mr. Spencer's article appeared) is, in part, an attempt to follow out an idea akin to that which Mr. Spencer glances at, but does not pursue. The writer has naturally been led by Mr. Spencer's investigations to modify a few of his conclusions, but in the main, with the exception of necessary alterations, the paper now appears as it was originally read. Malay. I still think that a partial classification might be made on some basis of the kind I have mentioned, but I am reduced to hope that this will be the reward of efforts other than my own. The order of treatment has been selected more by instinct than by reason. I can only hope it will not be found injurious to the discussion of the subject. Naturally we turn to the East for the origin of most of our customs, and I cannot do better, I think, than begin with the salutations of those Eastern nations of whose customs we have the earliest knowledge. A large, if not the largest, class of salutations can be traced to intercession. The deeply religious character of the Orientals showed itself specially in their salutations. The Hebrew word barak, "to bless," had all the meanings of saluting, welcoming, and bidding adieu, the person spoken to being in each case commended to God. "Blessed be thou of the Lord;" "The Lord be with thee;" "And Jacob blessed Pharaoh, and went out from before him❞—are instances which illustrate the usage of the word. They are paralleled by the Arabian, God grant thee His favors," May God strengthen your morning,' 66 66 66 May your morning be good;" by the Persian, "I make prayers for thy greatness;" and by the Ottoman," Be under the guard of God," " My prayers are for thee," "Forget me not in thy prayers." And we cannot be surprised that this kind of salutation is found to exist, in some shape or other, among all national greetings. Our religion has come from the East, and some of their religious salutations still survive; as, for example, in the Esthonian " God guide you," the 66 Adieu" of the French, the "Go with God, Señor," of Spain, and our “God be with ye," corrupted into "Good by." And here it may be remarked, in passing, that the obviously religious phrases have been preserved by nations in a sense less distinctly religious than the English, while they have been lost or changed among ourselves. Has the closer intimacy of the Continent with Roman Catholicism produced an effect upon outward expression, or is the "" 66 change due to our greater reverence for sacred names-a reverence often, of course, merely Pharisaic, but which has led us, as it led the later Hebrews, to shrink from uttering the actual name of the Deity, and either to corrupt it as in "Good-by," or eliminate it as in Mercy me, Save you, sir," while the French are much more lavish with their "Mon Dieu," and the Germans with their Mein Gott"? If these suggestions will not hold, perhaps we may find a more rational solution in the universal tendency of the West, and especially of the English, toward brevity; which tendency would find illustration in our" Good-day," in the German "Guten Tag," in the Swedish," God dag," and in the French "Bonjour." Under the distinctly religious category come all wishes for good health; and here, again, we find the Easterns retaining the name of God, and the Westerns usually dropping it. The xaipɛ of the Greeks, the Salve, Ave, Vale, of the Romans, the Swedish Farwol, the German Leben sie wohl, the Esthonian and Russian Be well, and our Farewell, are all instances of the repression of the Oriental mention of the Deity. 66 The religious character of the Easterns is obvious, or obtrusive, likewise, in their answers. To the question, "How is your health?" an Arab would reply, "Praise be to God," the tone alone showing whether he was well or ill. "Is it well with thee?" would draw forth the response, God bless thee and preserve thee. These were the stock answers which it was and is still considered rude to vary an instance, by the way, of punctilio and conservatism truly characteristic of Oriental ceremoniousness and stagnation. This style of answer reminds us of the Deo gratias, a salutation of the early Christians, who, carrying out the apostolic injunction, "In all things give thanks," laid themselves open to the ridicule of the heretics, who said it was only an answer. "Thank God, how are you?" is one of the salutations in Arabia at the present time. In Andreas Hofer's district of the Tyrol the people still salute with Praised be Jesus Christ." Among the poorer classes in Poland the visitor often says, The Lord be praised," to which the reply is, I World without end. Amen." 66 The salutation, "Be prosperous, Mayest thou have ease and plenty," has been from the earliest times the commonest of all in the East. We are reminded of the Old Testament age, when prosperity in this world was regarded as the reward of goodness, and as the mark of the favor of God, who blessed "the basket and the store.' However much the Western nations value the same prosperity, they have ceased to regard rich men as presumptively favorites of Heaven. Christianity and experience have taught them otherwise, though there is a tendency still among certain more or less religious men of commerce to make Providence invariably responsible for their gains. Connected with prosperity was peace. This salutation has always been common to Hebrew, Arab, and Persian; but I am not aware that it is extant in Europe, save among the un-original Slavs. "Peace be on you" takes us back to those ages when wars, important and insignificant, were chronic among the nations and tribes of whom we are speaking, and when neither person nor property was safe from the enemy and the marauder. Amid such conditions, "peace" was equivalent to the whole heart's desire; with it came prosperity and all other excellent gifts, leisure for cultivating land and body and mind, for fattening the flocks, and multiplying the herds. Hence the complete formula, Peace be upon you, and the mercy of God, and all his blessings," was often concentrated into the single prhase, "Peace be upon you." When Christianity was blending the East and West, their salutations were, to some extent, blended likewise, or transferred bodily from the one to the other. Thus the Pauline greeting, Xapts kaì elpývn, "Grace and peace,' seems to have been a combination of the Eastern Peace and the Greek Xaipɛ. But the apostle's "Rejoicing" or "Faring well" was all spiritual, the free gift of God; and the peace was spiritual too, ensuing upon the same free gift—the peace which passed all understanding, and which dwelt in the heart and mind. The external had become the internal. The ecclesiastical salutation, Pax vobiscum, had of course the same Oriental and Christian basis. Another blessing upon which the East |