WEST INDIAN SUPERSTITIONS.

Daily Telegraph (Napier), Issue 3228, 3 November 1881, Page 4

WEST INDIAN SUPERSTITIONS.

A correspondent of Notes and Queries says : If one wishes to have the power of seeing jumbies, duppies, or ghosts, all that is necessary is to put in one's eye some of the water from the eye of a piebald horse. Some people are supposed to be able to change their appearance to that of a tree, rock, or animal —" rounce "is the term used to designate these. A woman who is enceinte will not as a rule step over a rod or small branch laid in her path. The accuracy of a gun is often spoilt by its being touched by a woman. This I have often heard urged as. an excuse for bad shooting. Eruit picked by a female is apt to be sour. An old Surinam gentleman gravely assured me that a cask of wine he was bottling was spoilt because a woman came into his cellar at the time. A piece of iron, such as on old bolt or spike, driven into a calabash tree prevents the fruit falling off before it is full grown. Smiths' coals put round a plot of yams or other vegetables injure anyone who attempts to steal the crop. To secure a good crop of corn, sow it when there are ' plenty stars' in the sky, and if sown by a woman in the family way a good return is certain. A person who obtains possession of any of the hair of another has complete power over him or her. Negresses are very careful to collect and destroy the combings of their hair. Insects and reptiles bite more severely, or the effects of their bite are more severe, at full moon. • Headache can be cured by the patient standing in the sun with a bottle of water on his head. The water attracts the heat out of the brain and effects the cure. When it thunders stones of a peculiar shape fall from the sky and are found on the ground. These stones, however, are really the stone axes of the aboriginal inhabitants, and are probably laid bare by the rain washing away the soil. There is one fact, not a superstition, which is worthy of notice and deserves explanation. In St. Vincent, and I believe also Dominica, shoals of small fry, somewhat less than whitebaits, are found at tho mouths of the rivers—it is said only of such rivers as have an Rin their names. They are called "tree tree," and their appearance is always coincident with that of the sheet lightning, so much so that the people call these flashes "tree-tree lightning." The fry are caught in myriads in the sheets, towels, or any garment that is handy. They are delicious the first two or three days ; afterwards they are gritty, and therefore unpleasant to eat. Are there instances in which lightning heralds the appearnce of fish ? i