Do modern children, those of to-day, children of the period, have their own omens, portents, spells, little superstitions, as did the children of fifty years ago ?

I knew intimately two children of those old days, — there is but one now, — and have been recalling some of the many signs and tokens, the scarcely formulated beliefs, dreads, fears which were half hopes, filling their young lives with mystery. Where did they find these things from which they snatched so many a fearful joy ? Were they intuitive, inherited, or learned from their nurses or from other children ?

The father of this boy and girl was a very practical man, of strong common sense and little imagination. One of his favorite topics of conversation was the absurdity of popular superstitions; he himself, he said, held none of these baseless beliefs. Yet these children remembered to mature age how, each month, their father lifted them, one at a time, that each might see the little new moon, a slender crescent in the sky, and always the children, the dark-haired boy, the fairhaired girl, felt at such times a strong, gentle hand lightly pressing the left side of each little head, and so turning it almost imperceptibly toward the right. Somehow they knew — I cannot remember just how they knew — that this was to help them see the thin little moon over the right shoulder, and that this was best.

That they often heard their father in wise talk inveigh against such idle customs, even instancing this very superstition concerning the first glimpses of the new moon as particularly silly and not to be believed or regarded with any seriousness by sensible Christian children, — this made little difference to the boy and girl. Such talk was the sound parental counsel one expected from a father at his best, or at least his wisest, but it was vague, unimpressive, meaningless, compared with that significant though perhaps involuntary pressure of the strong, gentle hand on the left side of the curly head. I know that one of these children, the girl, feels still that touch of a vanished hand when the new young moon is in the sky, and turns in response to see the crescent as of old over the left shoulder. Does the boy, too, remember ?

There were many of these half-beliefs which the children held but loosely, not allowing them to interfere seriously with their simple pleasures, but which were never quite dropped or forgotten. The late Laurence Hutton in his delightful story of a New York city boyhood speaks of one of these, the sort of fear or dread of stepping on the cracks or divisions between the flags of a pavement or sidewalk. With this dread the boy and girl were quite familiar. There were few paved walks in the little seashore village, at that time, but in passing over those few the children carefully observed the unwritten rule, and lifted their small feet over each dividing line, never by any chance stepping upon these cracks or boundaries. There were some board walks, too, and here the same practice was followed. But best of all was carrying out the rule in stepping only upon the natural stones which cropped up everywhere in Rockby. With great care, close attention, and some very long strides and agile leaps, they could go all over the village without touching their feet to the level ground. They could go to and from school in this way, or vary their course by turning one corner where in front of a few scattered houses lay a board walk. Here they stepped cautiously in the middle of each board, avoiding the cracks or seams, till they came to the little street on which was the post office and the few village stores. They then took to the flagged sidewalk, still following strictly their rule till they were again in the rocky road and near home. If by any chance a passer-by crowded the little pilgrims till one foot touched the forbidden line, the day seemed spoiled, and nothing went quite right. I do not know why this was, and no one can tell me. But I know that it was a very serious and grave business. I can see so plainly in memory the quaint little pair, going solemnly upon their interrupted way; the girl’s gray eyes and the boy’s black ones bent earnestly upon the ground, as for a time they took short, mincing steps over the small, uneven flags of the rude pavement, then sprang far out, one after the other, to reach and rest upon a large stone whose top just showed above the soil. The girl’s two pigtail braids of flaxen hair swung wildly in that leap, and the boy’s black curls were tossed about, as they clung, panting and triumphant, to each other upon the rock they had safely reached. The children carried this custom into the house, also. The kitchen floor was uncarpeted, and its boards narrow, so that the avoidance of the cracks in walking over it became a difficult matter. Therefore one of their unwritten but well understood creeds was that, though it was safer to observe the time-honored custom of stepping only upon the centre of each board and skipping the dividing lines, still one could change this procedure when in a hurry, — when “mother called,” for instance, — without dire consequences.

To show what a grave matter all this was, I must tell you that when the girl first heard the expression “crack of doom,” — I think it was in a sermon, — she at once jumped at its meaning. It was the crack between two boards or flag stones upon which you must not step, and was a most fitting and appropriate term. She did not speak of this to her brother. Perhaps this was because she thought him too young to appreciate and understand; perhaps because she feared the mysterious and awesome words might frighten him; he was so small, full two years her junior. But often, after this, the old-fashioned girl, as she trod cautiously the uneven pavement, or the narrow board walk, said to her own grave little self, but under her breath so that nobody heard, “I must not touch that line; it is the crack of doom.”

Peggy McMahon, a rosy young Irish lass employed in the family, was responsible for many of the children’s superstit ions. She told them many strange things, and they thought they believed them all. Peggy said that if any one approached a sleeping cat and spoke these strange words, “Salamander is dead,” something wonderful would follow. Pussy would “lep up,” dash frantically away, and never, never return to her old haunts. The children knew that their belief in this was well founded, for Peggy had explained the whole matter to them. Salamander, she said, was king of all cats, and every pussy in the world had hopes of some day succeeding him as sovereign. Therefore when they heard of his death — le roi est mort — they were excited and full of eager hope, each one thinking it might be chosen reigning monarch. Thus the children understood the tale. After they heard it, no cat in the neighborhood ever enjoyed an unbroken nap. The whole village was scoured in search of drowsy feline listeners to the tragic cry, “Salamander is dead.” And as they invariably accompanied their loudly yelled announcement of the mournful event with jumps and bounds at or over the sleeping animal, with waving arms and other lively demonstrations, the experiment was always successful, the poor, frightened, abruptly awakened creatures “lepping up” and fleeing from their vision. That these identical cats were soon after seen in the old places, calmly pursuing the duties and pleasures of cat-life, in no wise shook the children’s cherished faith in the story. Clinging to the belief they loved to hold, or to think they held, they always ignored the reappearance of the animals, never speaking to one another of the return, which according to Peggy should never have taken place. When they grew up they learned that the Irish girl’s story was founded upon one of the well-known folk-tales of the world, existing in different forms in many lands.

Then there was the story of the banshee, the wailing, lamenting spirit that came at night to warn people of approaching death. Peggy herself had once heard it, before her grandmother was killed by falling downstairs. Though the children questioned her closely as to the nature of the sound, she could never make them understand it, nor why it was so dreadful. They asked her if it was like crying, and she said it was “a thrifle,” but she added that itwas“jist the laste bit like laughin’, too.” Once, after she had heard of this sorrowful voice, the little girl woke at night in her bedroom with its east window looking out upon the sea, and heard a mournful sound. Like Peggy’s banshee, it was a “thrifle like cryin’, but the laste bit like laughin’,” — a wild cry, a dreadful laugh. The little girl drew the bedclothes over her head and tried not to hear. As she lay thus, panting, perspiring, her heart throbbing wildly with a terror that was half a joy, a soft hand drew away the coverings. Mother was awake — do mothers ever sleep ? — and had come to see how her child fared. Before the girl could tell what had frightened her, the melancholy, hysterical cry rang out again.

“The loon is awake, too,” said the mother; “the pretty black and white bird is swimming about out there, and singing his song.”

Well, she might think so, the child said to herself, half relieved at the practical explanation, half disappointed ; but she herself should not accept the theory; birds did not laugh or cry, and as for singing, this was never a song. And always afterward the little girl believed — or rather made believe — that she had heard a real banshee. To be sure, nobody she knew died soon afterwards, but some one somewhere had died, and the banshee knew it was to happen, and she had heard the telling of it.

There were only pleasant thrills, halffears that were almost comfortable ones, associated with these semi-beliefs of which I have spoken. But there was one real terror which haunted the little girl in those days, and which even now is fearful in memory. It was a strange one, and I have no idea as to its beginning or origin. Perhaps it arose from some story told by Peggy or black Ephraim; perhaps from some picture only half understood. The child herself does not know when it began, but it seems to her as if it was with her even from babyhood. This was the consciousness of a hand, a real human hand, following her. It was a slender, white hand, with a ring on one finger, and a wide ruffle of lace about the wrist. And it walked, or progressed, not by gliding like a snake or lizard, but by a curious motion like stepping or treading, the fingers first lightly touching the ground, then the wrist doing the same. As soon as dusk came on she began to fear it, to dread seeing it behind her. That she never did see it with her bodily eyes mattered not. She was afraid of it, deadly afraid. If she went upstairs she felt that it was climbing after her. When she came down again it was slipping from step to step behind her, and she dared not look around to see if it was really there. She never told any one of this terror. A sort of shame, a fear of being ridiculed, kept her from speaking of it to her mother, Peggy, or any grown person; and she felt that she ought not to burden her small brother with the dreadful thing. So she suffered alone, and it was real, acute suffering, as I well know. Whether the boy, too, had a private and personal terror of his own, unshared by any, I cannot say. But he once told his sister in confidence that he had “made up a sign,” and explained it at great length. The details are forgotten after all these long years, but it had something to do with hopping a certain distance on one foot and then “turnin’ round as fast as you can ” before entering the schoolhouse in the morning. This was “to keep things from happenin ’, ” the boy said. He was a restless, mischievous, fearless little lad, and things often did happen, if the teacher attended to her duties and maintained order. So such a spell as this professed to be would have been a blessing. But the girl would have none of it.

“You can’t make up signs yourself,” she said, “they’d never come true.”

“Somebody made ’em first, did n’t they?” asked the boy scornfully.

“No,” replied the little maid, with decision, “they were n’t made up, ever, they just came so.”