1S0 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



of this vestment : " Our good Catholics, despairing of relief from the 

 faculty, repair to St. Hubert, at whose shrine, by virtue of certain cere- 

 monies, they are cured ; but it is worthy of remark that, if these cere- 

 monies are not strictly observed, the latent rabies immediately breaks 

 out, and they become irrevocably hydrophobic. There is a vestment 

 of St. Hubert's which is preserved in a chest secured by six locks, the 

 keys of which are kept by the six different vergers. For these four- 

 score years past they have been continually cutting off pieces from 

 this holy vestment ; nevertheless, it remains to this day perfectly en- 

 tire ! Now, it is impossible that there should be any imposture in the 

 case ; for they have never been able to discover whether this miracu- 

 lous robe be of linen, woolen, or of silk ; consequently it cannot be 

 annually renewed. They cut off a piece of the robe and incarnate a 

 thread between the skin of the patient's forehead. Hence another 

 miracle for a person thus cured becomes possessed of a power to 

 postpone the hydrophobia during forty days in any of his acquaint- 

 ance who, after being bitten, may not have leisure immediately to 

 visit St. Hubert ; on the condition, however, that, if they exceed the 

 forty days ever so little, without applying for a prorogation of the 

 term, they go mad irrevocably." 



A rubric of the regulations to be observed by the patients, in order 

 that the miracle might succeed, was printed in 1671. It contained a 

 long catalogue of ridiculous observances and ceremonies, all of which, 

 however, were in the same year condemned by the Sorbonne as " su- 

 perstitious." That this practice continues, notwithstanding the oracu- 

 lar declaration of that famous theological establishment, may be in- 

 ferred from the following circumstance, related by M. Stanislaus 

 Prioux, in his " Vie de Saint Hubert:" "At the time when rabies 

 had spread the utmost terror over the greater portion of the northern 

 countries (about two years ago, in 1851), I knew an old man at Brus- 

 sels, who, in his youth, had undergone the ordeal presci'ibed by St. 

 Hubert, and who yet carried on his forehead the precious cicatrix. 

 He assured me he had saved the lives of several people by granting 

 them delays, while others bitten at the same time by the mad animals 

 died." 



According to Fleming, who quotes from Dudley Costello's " Tour 

 through the Valley of the Meuse," what are called " the keys of St. 

 Hubert " consist of an iron heated red-hot, and applied to animals 

 bitten by mad dogs. It appears never to have borne the form of a 

 key ; for, in the town of St. Hubert itself the amulet was an iron ring 

 inserted in the wall of one of the houses in the principal street. It no 

 longer exists, though the belief in the potency of St. Hubert is, among 

 the peasantry, as strong as ever. In other places, where this saint is 

 especially venerated, the form of the exorcising instrument in no way 

 resembles the key given by St. Peter. At Liege, it is also an iron 

 ring, and at Utrecht an iron cross. 



