ON THE ETHNOGRAPHICAL SURVEY OF THE UNITED KINGDOM. 481 



ing. A day or two before the death took place, one dog in particular 

 gave way to extraordinary howling. It all ceased after the death. 



514. Balmaghie. — Chairs cracking in a house is a portent of death in 

 the family. 



515. Dairy. — Doctor Trottar was one day called to visit a patient. 

 When setting out, the horse stumbled and fell. Those who saw what 

 took place said the patient would die. The patient died. (Told by his 

 daughter. ) 



516. Kirkmaiden. — My informant's grandfather, a carpenter, said he 

 always heard the noise of a saw during the night before he got the order 

 to make a coffin. 



517. My informant's father, a carpenter, said he always heard one 

 knock on the end of his own bedstead before he got an order to make a 

 coffin. 



518. Kells. — If one dies, and lies unburied over Sunday in a parish, 

 another will die within the week. 



519. Rerrick. — A dog howling at night is an omen of death. A young 

 woman at a farm in Rerrick was seized with inflammation of the lungs. 

 After she fell ill, the dog began to howl, and no means could be found to 

 stop the animal while she was lying ill. She died, and after the death the 

 dog ceased his howling. 



520. My informant at Burnfoot was one afternoon entertaining a 

 friend or two at tea. As they were making ready to leave three extra- 

 ordinary knocks were heard in a room on the other side of the lobby. The 

 guests and she immediately went into the room to try to find out the 

 cause of the knocks. One of the guests searched all round and under the 

 table from which the knocks seemed to proceed. Nothing could be seen. 

 A post or two after brought intelligence of the death of a very intimate 

 friend, who had died about the time the knocks had been heard. 



521. A man named James Whyte died at Burnfoot. On his death his 

 son went to the house of my informant's father, tapped on the window, 

 and said his father had just died. Immediately before the news of the 

 death was given, a very loud crash, as if something had fallen and been 

 smashed to pieces, was heard in one of the rooms. 



522. My informant's grandmother told her that when a child of hers, 

 twenty-one months, was lying ill in the cradle, a most sweet sound was 

 heard to begin near the door of the apartment in which the cradle stood, 

 and move round the apartment, past the fireplace, to the cradle, where it 

 stopped. When the mother looked into the cradle, the child was dead. 



523. Bahnaclellan. — When one of the ministers of Balmaclellan was 

 lying very ill and low, his niece was one night watching him. All at once 

 the sweetest music she had ever heard began. Her uncle heard it too, 

 and said : 'That's a call for me. I will not be long here.' He died not 

 long after. (Told by the minister's niece to my informant.) 



524. Laurieston. — If a dead body lies unburied over Sunday, there will 

 be ' other tway deaths within the week,' or if not within the week within, 

 a short time. 



Death Customs. 



525. Kirkmaiden. — All the doors and windows of the house in which 

 one lay dying used to be thrown open. My informant has seen her sister 

 do so. 



1897. I 1 



