May 4. 1850.] 
NOTES AND QUERIES. 429 
pear even stronger if we go back to the date of the 
first use of the word in England. Possibly about 
the same time, or not much earlier, we find in this 
same collection of Clara Hatzlerin, the word spelt 
“new” and rhyming to “ triu.” 
« Empfach mich uff das New 
In deines hertzen triu.” 
The genitive of this would be “newes,” thus 
spelt and probably pronounced the same as in 
England. That the word is not derived from the 
English adjective “new” —that it is not of En- 
glish manufacture at all—TI feel well assured: in 
that case the “s” would be the sign of the plural ; 
and we should have, as the Germans have, either 
extant or obsolete, also ‘the new.” The English 
language, however, has never dealt in these ab- 
stractions, except in its higher yoetry; though 
some recent translators from the German have 
disregarded the difference in this respect between 
the powers of the two languages. ‘ News” is a 
noun singular, and as such must have been adopted 
bodily into the language; the form of the genitive 
case, commonly used in conversation, not being 
understood, but being taken for an integral part of 
the word, as formerly the Koran was called “ The 
Alcoran.” 
“ Noise,” again, is evidently of the same deri- 
vation, though from a dialect from which the 
modern German pronunciation of the diphthong 
is derived. Richardson, in his English Dictionary, 
assumes it to be of the same derivation as 
“noxious” and “noisome;” but there is no pro- 
cess known to the English language by which it 
could be manufactured without making a plural 
noun of it. In short, the two words are identical ; 
“news” retaining its primitive, and “noise” 
adopting a consequential meaning. ; 
Samugn Hrcexson. 
FOLK LORE. 
Charm for the Toothache. — A reverend friend, 
very conversant in the popular customs and super- 
stitions of Ireland, and who has seen the charm 
mentioned in pp. 293, 349, and 397, given by a 
Roman Catholic priest in the north-west of Ireland, 
has kindly furnished me with the genuine version, 
and the form in which it was written, which are as 
follows : — 
“ As Peter sat on a marble stone, 
The Lord came to him all alone: 
* Peter, what makes thee sit there ?’ 
*My Lord, I am troubled with the toothache.’ 
* Peter arise, and go home; 
And you, and whosoever for my sake 
Shall keep these words in memory, 
Shall never be troubled with the toothache,’ ” 
fl bee 8 
Charms. —The Evil Eye.— Going one day into 
a cottage in the village of Catterick, in Yorkshire, 
E observed hung up behind the door a ponderous 
necklace of “lucky stones,” 7. e. stones with a 
hole through them. On hinting an inquiry as to 
their use, I found the good lady of the house dis- 
posed to shuffle off any explanation; but by a 
little importunity I discovered that they had the 
credit of being able to preserve the house and its 
inhabitants from the baneful influence of the “evil 
eye.” “ Why, Nanny,” said I, “ you surely don’t 
believe in witches now-a-days?” ‘No! I don't 
say ’at Ido; but certainly i’ former times there 
was wizzards an’ buzzards, and them sort 0’ 
things.” “ Well,” said I, laughing, “but you 
surely don’t think there are any now?” “No! I 
don’t say ’at ther’ are; but I do believe in a yevil 
eye.” After a little time I extracted from poor 
Nanny more particulars on the subject, as viz. : — 
how that there was a woman in the village whom 
she strongly suspected of being able to look with 
an evil eye ; how, further, a neighbour's daughter, 
against whom the old lady in question had a 
grudge owing to some love affair, had suddenly 
fallen into a sort of pining sickness, of which the 
doctors could make nothing at all; and how the 
poor thing fell away without any accountable 
cause, and finally died, nobody knew why; but 
how it was her (Nanny’s) strong belief that she 
had pined away in consequence of a glance from 
the evil eye. Finally, I got from her an account 
of how any one who chose could themselves obtain 
the power of the evil eye, and the receipt was, as 
nearly as I can recollect, as follows : — 
“Ye gang out ov’a n'ght—ivery night, while ye 
find nine toads—an’ when ye’ve gitten t’ nine toads, ye 
hang ’em up ov’ a string, an’ ye make a hole and buries 
t’ toads i’t hole—and as ’t toads pines away, so “t person 
pines away ’at you've looked upon wiv a yevil eye, an’ 
they pine and pine away while they die, without ony 
disease at all!” 
I do not know if this is the orthodox creed 
respecting the mode of gaining the power of the 
evil eye, but it is at all events a genuine piece of 
Folk Lore. 
The above will corroborate an old story rife in 
Yorkshire, of an ignorant person, who, being 
asked if he ever said his prayers, repeated as 
follows : — 
«“ From witches and wizards and long-tail’d buzzards, 
And creeping things that run in hedge-bottoms, 
Good Lord, deliver us.” 
Manrearert Garry. 
Ecclesfield, April 24. 1850. 
Charms. —I beg to represent to the corre- 
spondents of the “ Norges Anp Queries,” especially 
to the clergy and medical men resident in the 
country, that notices of the superstitious practices 
still prevalent, or recently prevalent, in different 
parts of the kingdom, for the cure of diseases, are 
highly instructive and even valuable, on many 
| accounts. Independently of their archeological 
