SUPERSTITION. 205 



shouldn't everybody sow in February or early March as we do, and 

 have their ingathering in August, generally our best and driest 

 month? In a climate so treacherous and inconstant as ours is, it 

 is the greatest folly in the world to run the smallest risk that you 

 can possibly avoid. We have been preaching this particular 

 doctrine for a dozen years past, and it has had some effect in our 

 immediate neighbourhood ; but it is sad to see the country at large 

 at this moment corn and hay rotting in the fields, that might, with 

 ordinary prudence and a little effort, be long ere now snug and safe 

 under " thack and rape." 



The more one inquires the truer does he find the dictum of a 

 philosopher of the last century to be, that " the superstitions, as 

 well as the languages, of all lands and ages are linked together by 

 mysterious bonds, which neither time nor distance seem able to 

 destroy." In our immediate neighbourhood an instance of a very 

 old superstition was brought under our notice a few days ago, such 

 as, with all our knowledge of such matters, we had hitherto never 

 dreamt of as existing in the Western Highlands. A man went to 

 market at a considerable distance to sell a good strong two-year-old 

 colt. He did not return on the day his wife expected him, and she 

 became uneasy, not so much for the well-being of her laggard liege 

 lord and master lie had often gone the same errand before, and 

 had always returned safe and sound, even if a little later than his 

 better half had a right to expect but as to whether he had sold 

 the colt, and if for anything like the price settled between the twain 

 as being his fair price before he left home. She put on a large fire 

 on her hearth, placing, when it had reached a certain stage of 

 ignition, a bundle of green alder boughs atop. When the whole 

 was fully ablaze, she went outside and watched the direction of the 

 smoke issuing from her chimney. The smoke was carried in an 

 easterly direction, a lucky quarter, and she returned to the house 

 and told her daughter that, whatever had come over the father 



