"Wee Jenny to her granny says,
'Will ye gae wi' me, granny?
I'll eat the apple at the glass
I gat frae uncle Johnny.'
She fuff't her pipe wi' sic a lunt,
In wrath she was sae vap'rin,
She notic't na an aizle brunt
Her braw new worset apron
Out thro' that night.
'Ye little skelpie limmer's face!
I daur you try sic sportin'
As seek the foul thief ony place,
For him to spae your fortune;
Nae doubt but ye may get a sight!
Great cause ye hae to fear it,
For mony a ane has gotten a fright,
And lived and died deleeret
On sic a night.'"
Hallowe'en also is still a favourite anniversary for all kinds of nut-
charms, and St. Thomas was long invoked when the prophetic onion
named after him was placed under the pillow. Rosemary and thyme
were used on St. Agnes' Eve with this formula:
"St. Agnes, that's to lovers kind,
Come, ease the troubles of my mind."
In Austria, on Christmas Eve, apples are used for divination.
According to Mr. Conway, the apple must be cut in two in the dark,
without being touched, the left half being placed in the bosom, and the
right laid behind the door. If this latter ceremony be carefully carried
out, the desired one may be looked for at midnight near the right half.
He further tells us that in the Erzgebirge, the maiden, having slept on St.
Andrew's, or Christmas, night with an apple under her pillow, "takes her stand
with it in her hand on the next festival of the Church thereafter; and the first
man whom she sees, other than a relative, will become her husband."
Again, in Bohemia, on Christmas Eve, there is a pretty practice for
young people to fix coloured wax-lights in the shells of the first nuts they
have opened that day, and to float them in water, after silently assigning
to each the name of some fancied wooer. He whose little barque is the
first to approach the girl will be her future husband; but, on the other
hand, should an unwelcome suitor seem likely to be the first, she blows
against it, and so, by impeding its progress, allows the favoured barque to win.