Then, of course, from time immemorial all kinds of charms have been observed on St. Valentine’s Day to produce prophetic dreams.  A popular charm consisted of placing two bay leaves, after sprinkling them with rose-water, across the pillow, repeating this formula:—­

“Good Valentine, be kind to me,
In dream let me my true love see.”

St. Luke’s Day was in years gone by a season for love-divination, and among some of the many directions given we may quote the subjoined, which is somewhat elaborate:—­

                                       “Take marigold flowers, a sprig of
 marjoram, thyme, and a little wormwood; dry them before a fire, rub them
 to powder, then sift it through a fine piece of lawn; simmer these with
 a small quantity of virgin honey, in white vinegar, over a slow fire;
 with this anoint your stomach, breasts, and lips, lying down, and repeat
 these words thrice:—­

’St Luke, St. Luke, be kind to me,
In dream let me my true love see!’

This said, hasten to sleep, and in the soft slumbers of night’s repose,
the very man whom you shall marry shall appear before you.”

Lastly, certain plants have been largely used by gipsies and fortune-tellers for invoking dreams, and in many a country village these are plucked and given to the anxious inquirer with various formulas.

Footnotes: 

1.  “Primitive Culture,” 1873, ii. 416, 417.

2.  See Dorman’s “Primitive Superstition,” p. 68.

3.  Thorpe’s “Northern Mythology,” 1851, ii. 108.

4.  “Primitive Superstitions,” p. 67.

5.  “Plant-lore Legends and Lyrics,” p. 265.

6.  Quoted in Brand’s “Popular Antiquities,” 1849, iii. 135.

7.  See Friend’s “Flower-Lore,” i. 207.

8.  Folkard’s “Plant-lore Legends and Lyrics,” p. 477.

CHAPTER X.

PLANTS AND THE WEATHER.

The influence of the weather on plants is an agricultural belief which is firmly credited by the modern husbandman.  In many instances his meteorological notions are the result of observation, although in some cases the reason assigned for certain pieces of weather-lore is far from obvious.  Incidental allusion has already been made to the astrological doctrine of the influence of the moon’s changes on plants—­a belief which still retains its hold in most agricultural districts.  It appears that in years gone by “neither sowing, planting, nor grafting was ever undertaken without a scrupulous attention to the increase or waning of the moon;"[1] and the advice given by Tusser in his “Five Hundred Points of Husbandry” is not forgotten even at the present day:—­

  “Sow peas and beans in the wane of the moon,
  Who soweth them sooner, he soweth too soon,
  That they with the planet may rest and rise,
  And flourish with bearing, most plentiful-wise.”