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X- 



UsTSTITTJTim. 



BY ALBAN ANDREN. 



VOL. 15. SALEM: JAN., FEB., MARCH, 1883. Nos. 1,2,3. 



SWEDISH SUPERSTITIONS AND CHARACTERISTICS. 



READ MONDAY, JANUARY 1, 1883. 



You find among the Swedes many peculiar superstitions, 

 which seem to cling with great tenacity from by-gone 

 times. So, for instance, it is the custom for chamber- 

 maids or others, making the beds in the morning, not to 

 leave an unfinished bed under any pretext to go to any 

 other work, for fear that the person that is to occupy it 

 may not rest easily. In most Swedish stables you will 

 find a dead crow or blackbird hung over each horse, which 

 is considered a sure prevention for the evil one riding the 

 horse in the stable at night, and it is asserted by the farm- 

 ers that when such prevention is not taken the horses are 

 found in the morning foaming at the mouth, sweaty and 

 blowing hard, as if just arrived from a furious, drive. In 

 my boyhood, whenever a person sneezed it was considered 

 polite for bystanders to say "God save you " or " Prosit ; " 

 and the mc^re popular a person was in society the mpre 

 people were ready to say " God save you " in case of sneez- 

 ing. At an evening party, a society belle, after being 

 duly coaxed, would sit down and commence fingering the 



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