Aug. 14. 1852.] 



NOTES AND QUERIES. 



145 



amongst us, a remarkable instance of ■which ap- 

 peared last Wednesday at the gallows. A young 

 ■woman, who had a wen on her neck, was held up 

 in a nian's arms, and the hand of one of the hang- 

 ing malefactors was several times rubbed over it 

 ■vvith much ceremony, so that if it should please 

 God to remove the complaint, a miracle will be 

 juiputed to the wonder-working hand of a dead 

 thief." E. li. A. 



Super-stition in the Nineteenth Century. — The 

 following story is only curious as showing the 

 lingering belief in witchcraft, in a county tra- 

 versed by railroads. 



I was visiting in a cottage last February, in the 



parish of 13 , in the diocese of Peterborough ; 



and in casual conversation heard the inmates speak 

 of " the Wise Man." Upon inquiry T discovered 

 they meant "a sort of witch" living at Stamford, 

 who is supposed to have supernatural powers, both 

 in the way of foretelling future events, and also of 

 inflicting evil upon persons and things. 



Two cases were related to me of the exercise of 

 these powers, both of which my informants (one 

 an old, the other a young, woman) positively be- 

 lieved, 



1. Some years ago a flitch of bacon was stolen. 

 The owner of the lost property went to " the Wise 

 Man," and was told his bacon should be restored 

 on a certain day in a certain place, which hap- 

 pened. " The Wise Man " also drew an exact 

 likeness of the thief, by which he was recognised. 

 Of course I only relate as I was told. 



2. A servant girl stole some money from a fel- 

 low-servant's coffer. The latter went off (nearly 

 twenty miles) to " the Wise Man," and the thief 

 was afllicted until her death with a most painful 

 <lisease, My informants firmly believed this to 

 have been caused by " the AVise IMan." They 

 could not say whether he is still living. " Proba- 

 bly not," they added ; as they had " not recently 

 heard of any one consulting him," G. R. M. 



Care for TFens. — Calling, a few days ago, at a 

 cottage in the adjoining village (Cuddesden, in 

 Oxfordshire), I inquired of its occupant, a woman 

 who is afllicted with a large goitre, or external 

 swelling of the throat, whether she suffered much 

 inconvenience from its increasing size, and whe- 

 ther the doctors gave her much hope of relief? 

 ■She answered, that as yet it did not cause her 

 much inconvenience ; that the doctors gave her 

 110 hope of its diminution ; but that there was one 

 certain remedy which she should have tried, but 

 for lack of the opportunity, viz. stroking the swol- 

 len neck with the dead hand of a man who had 

 been hanged ! On my expressing disbelief in the 

 cfticacy of this singular application, she assured me 

 that her own flxther had been afllicted with a simi- 

 lar disease ; that he had tried this remedy, and had 



been completely cured by it, the swelling decreas- 

 ing gradually, as the hand of the man mouldered 

 away ; and that from that time until his death he 

 had had no return of the disease. W. Sneyd. 



Denton. 



NOTES ON MADEIBA. 

 (Vol. v., p. 501.) 



A Number of "N. & Q." sometimes reaches me in 

 Madeira, and I always see it with pleasure. The 

 Number for May 22nd last has just fallen in my 

 way ; and as there is an opportunity for sending a 

 letter to England to-morrow, I hasten to correct 

 two or three mistakes into which Mr. Yarreli. 

 has fallen. In a communication printed on p. 501. 



1. The Portuguese word faya^ though derived 

 from the Latin y«g-M5, does not at the Azores, and 

 in Madeira at least, signify a beech, a tree which, 

 except as a garden curiosity, is not found at either 

 of those places. It is the name of an evergreen 

 tree {Myrica faya) belonging to a family of which 

 our Gale or Dutch myrtle is (as far as I know) the 

 only British representative. 



2. I know of no Portuguese word like ceii-a sig- 

 nifying a bank ; but, whether any such exist or 

 not, it takes no part in the composition of Terceira^ 

 the name of one of the Azorts, which is nothing 

 more than the Portuguese form of tertia, third. 



3. Pico derives its name from an elevated peak 

 which rises from it. All the mountain summits, 

 both in the Azores and the Madeiras, are termed 

 Pico. 



4. The raven is not an inhabitant of Madeira, 

 nor did I ever hear of its being found here. 



Whilst I am on the subject of corrections, let 

 me turn to another matter, which, though it has 

 nothing to do with your publication, may do some 

 good to those whom it may concern if noticed in 

 your pages. The series of penny maps possesses 

 at any rate the merit of cheapness, and, I trust, 

 the more desirable merit of accuracy to a greater 

 degree, on the whole, than the chart of ^Madeira 

 attached to the map of Africa, No. 71. On that 

 chart are nineteen names, and of these five are 

 misspelled and one misplaced. Of the remainder 

 I observe that insignificant places have been se- 

 lected in preference to important ones. 



James Yate Jounsox. 



May I add In a postscript a correction of a mis- 

 take which ^Ir. Ford has fallen into in his Gather- 

 ings from Spain ? That gentleman tells us that 

 agua7-diente, the name of a Spanish drink, signifies 

 in plain English tooth-water, referring the last 

 member of the word to the Spanish form of the 

 Latin dens^ Its true origin, however, is in the 

 Latin ardere, to burn; and the Spanish aguar- 

 diente has correlatives in our a7-dent spirits, and 

 the Indian^re-water. Here, in Funchal, one can- 



