when this was done by the proprietor or tenant, there were many who would prophesy that death or some other great calamity would overtake, within a twelvemonth, the family of the perpetrator.  To possess a hen which took to crowing like a cock boded ill to the possessor or his family if it were not disposed of either by killing or selling.  They were generally sold to be killed.  Only a few years ago I had such a prodigy among a flock of hens which I kept about my works, and one day it was overheard crowing, when one of the workmen came to me, and, with a solemn face, told the circumstance, and advised me strongly to have it destroyed or put away, as some evil would surely follow, relating instances he had known in Ireland.  This superstition has found expression in the Scotch proverb:  “Whistling maids and crowing hens are no canny about a house.”

Seeing magpies before breakfast was a good or bad omen according to the number seen up to four.  This was expressed in the following rhyme, which varies slightly in different localities.  The following version was current in my native village:—­

   “One bodes grief, two’s a death,
    Three’s a wedding, four’s a birth.”

Chambers in his Scottish Rhymes has it thus:—­

   “One’s joy, two’s grief. 
    Three’s a wedding, four’s a birth.”

I knew a man who, if on going to his work he had seen two piets together, would have refrained from working before he had taken breakfast, believing that if he did so it would result in evil either to himself or his family.

If a cock crew in the morning with its head in at the door of the house, it was a token that a stranger would pay the family a visit that day; and so firm was the faith in this that it was often followed by works, the house being redd up for the occasion.  I remember lately visiting an old friend in the country, and on making my appearance I was hailed with the salutation, “Come awa, I knew we would have a visit from strangers to-day, for the cock crowed thrice over with his head in at the door.”  If a horse stood and looked through a gateway or along a road where a bride or bridegroom dwelt, it was a very bad omen for the future happiness of the intending couple.  The one dwelling in that direction would not live long.

If a bird got any human hair, and used it in building its nest, the person on whose head the hair grew would be troubled with headaches, and would very soon get bald.

It is still a common belief that crows begin to build their nests on the first Sabbath of March.

A bird coming into a house and flying over any one’s head was an unlucky omen for the person over whose head it flew.

It was said that eggs laid upon Good Friday never got stale, and that butter made on that day possessed medicinal properties.

If a horse neighed at the door of a house, it boded sickness to some of the inmates.