LOCAL SUPERSTITIONS. 91 
of Black Heddon, possessed one. Mr. A., of Belsay Bank Foot, 
had another. People came many miles to be rubbed. 
A boy hurt his hand with a rusty nail, near here; he was in- 
stantly sent to Winlaton, to see the Wise Man there. His 
directions were that the boy had to take the nail to a black- 
smith, to be well filed and polished, and to be rubbed each 
morning before sunrise, and each evening before sunset; by 
doing this, the wound was cured. When any one is cut with a 
sickle, it is taken home, and kept well polished, that the wound 
may be healed.—Vide, Sir Walter Scott’s “ Lay of the last Min- 
strel,” Canto i. 23., when William de Loraine was wounded— 
‘She drew the splinter from the wound, 
And with a charm she staunched the blood : 
She bade the gash be cleansed and bound : 
No longer by his couch she stood. 
But she had ta’en the broken lance, 
And washed it from the clotted gore, 
And salved the splinter oer and o’er.” 
It is more than probable that these notions, extend over-a 
wide district, and are not confined to any one portion of the 
Northern Counties. I shall now proceed to mention supersti- 
tions regarding insects and beasts. 
Bees.—It is never considered lucky to be the sole owner of 
bees. A man and woman, not man and wife, should be partners, 
if either should die, some one should go at midnight, tap each 
hive three times, and desire the bees to work for their new 
master or mistress, as the case may be. 
Spiders.—It is considered very unlucky to kill them. 
Yellow Hammers.—Boys have a superstitious dislike to this 
bird ; when they find its nest they destroy it, saying — 
Half a paddock, half a toad, 
Half a drop of deil’s blood, 
Horrid yellow yowling. 
I have found another version of this in Rodgers,— 
Half a paddock, half a toad, 
Half a yellow yeldin ; 
Gets a drop of devil’s blood, 
Ik a May morning. 
