DORSET WEATHER LORE. 



145 



(vi.) 



to forebode a wet month. (Mr. H. Norris.) This 

 position of the moon is sometimes spoken of as 

 " lying on her back." 



" As many days as the moon is old at Middlemas 

 {i.e., Michaelmas), so many floods before Christ- 

 mas." 



Miscellaneous Weather Forecasts. 



I now come to what I may term miscellaneous weather 

 forecasts, or circumstances and incidents portending wet or 

 fine weather. And first I will deal with predictions of 

 rain. 



Predictions of Rain. 



(i.) " Predictions of rain," says M.G.A.S. (Miss 

 Summers, of Hazelbury Bryan, a lady who often 

 contributed items of folk-lore to the Dorset Chronicle 

 Folk-lore Column), in March, 1889, " are manifold. 

 ' Painful rheumatism, shooting corns, spiders 

 ' leaving their cobwebs and creeping about the 

 rooms, soot falling down the chimney, stones 

 drying quickly, cats washing over their ears with 

 their paws. I was astonished by an exclamation 

 I heard yesterday denoting the belief in ' weather 

 prophets,' which still clings to Dorset. ' Dear-a- 

 me,' says an old woman, " a weat zummer is 

 a'-fore us.' ' Bad job this year,' says her com- 

 panion. ' I didn't mind you 'twere a' tween the 

 18th and 20th.' " " Thus," adds Miss Summers, 

 rain between these dates denotes a wet summer." 

 I presume this would mean such a period in any 

 month before summer commences, 

 (ii.) Another prediction of rain is probably known to 

 many here, namely, that when Hardy's Monument 

 is plainly visible from Dorchester, it is a sign of bad 

 weather, or, as another contributor to the Dorset 



