Transactions. 85 



Another of a similar nature current in some parts of England is 

 that the letters are the sacred ones I.H.S. In Kent again these 

 are said to represent J.C, while in other parts the mai'ks are said 

 to represent the oak in winch King Charles obtained refuge 

 during his flight. In Northumberland among tlie many curious 

 ideas which at one time abounded was that of the curative powers 

 of an Irish stick. It had the power of curing cattle which had 

 been bitten by adders or similar reptiles, and it was also held in 

 high esteem for its virtues when applied to human beings. One 

 instance of its remedial powers is here quoted from a Newcastle 

 newspaper in which I discovered it some four years ago : — " Seventy 

 years ago Weardale possessed an Irish Stick, owned by a person 

 named Morley. A scholar at the village school had a ring-worm 

 on her arm, and the mistress of the school rubbed the part affected 

 with her gold wedding ring, a supposed remedy ; but the wedding 

 ring charm failed, and the girl was sent to Morley's, and a cure 

 eflected." 



Another superstitious cure, in which a bush or tree was the 

 medium, was that for whooping cough, which was believed to be 

 cured by the following means : — The crown of the child's head 

 was shaved, and the hair hung upon a bush or tree, when 

 the birds would come and carry it away to their nests, and carry 

 aw^ay the cougli with it. My authority says nothing whatever as 

 to the possibility of the young birds re '.red in the nest becoming 

 afflicted with the distressing malady. 



3. The Roman Hoad in Annandale. 



By Mr John Thorburn Johns tone, Moflat. 



The line of the Roman road is very clearly laid down on sheet 

 IG of the one-inch Ordnance Survey, and can be quite easily 

 followed northwards, on the ground, from a point on the Moifat 

 Branch Railway, a little north-east from the Loclihouse Tower, 

 along the hillside all the way to Little Clyde, in Lanarkshire, a 

 distance of fully ten miles. Southwards from Lochhouse, the 

 line is not so easily followed. Cultivation has in a great measure 

 destroyed the traces of it in the fields. The direction of the road 

 is such that the gradient is regular and gradual, following the 



