CHAPTER VII. 



FISHES IN MODERN FOLK-LORE. 



Survival of Zoolatry in Modern Folk-lore Mermaid Superstitions 

 Water-horses and Water-bulls How Fishes got their Shapes 

 Feminine influences Sinister Parsons of ill-omen to Fishermen 

 Fish annoyed by Bells Fish-prognostications As Weather- 

 prophets Fishes in Medicine Superstitions as to Origin of 

 certain Fishes. 



FACE to face with the living myths. and superstitions of 

 the present, one feels, as I think it is Max Miiller says, 

 like a geologist who in a country ramble should sud- 

 denly find himself confronted with a herd of megatheria. 

 For the world has not all grown old together, and there 

 are still in existence to-day people who have not aged 

 a bit in their intelligence since the " once-upon-a-time " 

 period which we the precocious youngsters and the wise- 

 acres of the human family only now retain as the com- 

 mencement of children's fairy-tales. We ourselves, for 

 instance, have long ago learned to look down as from 

 a superior pedestal upon the beast-world, and loftily 

 bespeak sympathy for the "poor dumb brute." But it is 

 not so all the world over ; for there are nations breathing 

 the same air with us, sharing the same sun and moon, 

 launching boats on the same seas, who still to-day, in 

 the nineteenth century, in the age of electricity, speak 

 respectfully of beasts, birds, and fishes as of equals. 

 There are actually some also who still look up to and 



