92 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



POPULAR SUPERSTITIONS. 



By WALTER JAMES HOFFMAN, M. D. 



PRIMITIVE man fills his world with innumerable spirits, both 

 good and bad, and much of his time is spent in devising 

 means whereby he may invoke the aid of one class to assist him 

 in averting the malignant influence of the other. The dread and 

 wonder excited by the phenomena of the elements, or the dis- 

 covery of anything abnormal, either animate or inanimate, sug- 

 gest to his mind the existence and manifestation of deities. As 

 the burrowing of the mole is observed to cause ridges upon the 

 turf, so a mythic gigantic mole traverses beneath the earth to 

 form the mountain range. The storm is caused by a monster bird, 

 the movements of whose wings produce the winds and whose 

 voice is heard in the muttering thunder and lightning flash. So, 

 in everything, he recognizes the presence of some one or more 

 beings, the pretended explanations of whose functions and exploits 

 form the basis of his mythology. The emotions with which these 

 deities are regarded, the dread or reverence in which they are 

 held, and the impressions resulting therefrom, give rise among 

 different peoples to various religious beliefs or cults. 



Among civilized nations we perceive evidence of an inherent 

 tendency to regard with partiality anything strange or unusual, 

 the soil of the mind being prolific in the cultivation of morbid 

 fancies which, if given serious thought, become diflicult to eradi- 

 cate. 



The survival in America of Old- World customs, beliefs, and 

 superstitions is naturally to be expected because of the continuity 

 of the peoples with whom they originated. This is illustrated by 

 the occurrence of African demonology among the negroes of the 

 South, of Gallic folklore among the Creoles of Louisiana, of some 

 vestiges of quaint old English customs and superstitions in New 

 England, and particularly in the survival of Teutonic folklore 

 among the descendants of the early German colonists. 



It is not surprising, then, at this late day, that the folklore 

 and superstition of one part of the country may have been trans- 

 ported into another, and there taken root and become incorporated 

 as original. No matter how little or how much change may have 

 occurred in its transmission, or to what extent a new environment 

 may have influenced it. the nationality of such belief or supersti- 

 tion may still be ascertained with tolerable certainty, as the col- 

 lection and classification of such data have been reduced to a 

 science. 



As pertains to the status of the early cults of northern and 

 western Europe, Germany holds a middle place. Our knowledge 



