See also Folk Medicine, Alternative Remedies & Herbal Cures - 100 Books on DVDrom and Alternative Medicine & Spiritual Healing - 175 Books on DVDrom
The dog does not bulk so largely in folk-medicine as might have been expected. A cake of the "thost" of a white hound baked with meal was recommended against the attack of dwarves (convulsions). In Scotland much more recently a dog licking a wound or a running sore was thought to effect a cure. [Cockayne, Saxon Leechdoms, vol. i. p. 365; Gregor, Folk-Lore of the North-East of Scotland, p. 127.] For a fever the right foot shank of a dead black dog hung on the arm is said to be a good remedy,—"it shaketh off the fever." The head of a mad dog pounded and mingled with wine was reputed to cure jaundice; if burned and the ashes put on a cancer the cancer would be healed; and if the ashes of a dog be given to a man torn by a mad dog it "casteth out all the venom and the foulness, and healeth the maddening bites." Floyer says that "mad dog's liver is given against madness." This is on the principle of taking a hair of the dog that bit you, which has been referred to above; but of the modern literal observance we have an instance in a passage in Miss Lonsdale's Life of Sister Dora. In the out-patients' ward one day she came upon a dog-bite upon which a mass of hairs had been plastered, and though it is not recorded whether the hairs were those of the animal which had caused the wound or of some other dog, the presumption is they were the hairs of the dog supposed to be mad. A negro superstition at Kingston used to be that certain large, black, hairless, india-rubber-looking dogs that were common on the beach would neutralize a fever if stretched on the body of a patient. Those "fever dogs," as they were called, were none the worse for the contact, the fever was not transferred but neutralized. The tongues of dogs were said in France as in Scotland to cure ulcers, but whether by licking or medical application I have no means of knowing. In China it is believed that the blood of a dog will reveal a person who has made himself invisible, and Mr. Giles gives a tale of a magician who was discovered by this means. It also seems to have been given as a kind of Lethe draught to what in England are called changlings. ("Now I understand," cried the girl, in tears; "I recollect my mother saying that when I was born I was able to speak; and thinking it an inauspicious manifestation they gave me dog's blood to drink, so that I should forget all about my previous state of existence.") It is to this association of something "uncanny" about a dog that we owe the dislike to its howling. The dog can see more than can be seen by men. In Rabbi Bechai's Exposition of the Five Books of Moses a passage tells how "our rabbis of blessed memory have said when the dogs howl then cometh the angel of death into the city;" and to the same effect in Rabbi Menachem von Rekenat's exposition on the same books we have, "Our rabbis of blessed memory have said when the angel of death enters into a city the dogs do howl; and I have seen it written by one of the disciples of Rabbi Jehudo the Just that upon a time a dog did howl, and clapt his tail between his legs, and went aside for fear of the angel of death, and somebody coming and kicking the dog to the place from which he had fled the dog presently died." In the Odyssey it will be remembered none knew of Athene's presence save Odysseus and the dogs. Telemachus saw her not, but with Odysseus—
"The dogs did see
And would not bark, but, whining lovingly,
Fled to the stalls' far side."
Some English peasants lay stress on the dog continuing to bark for three nights, and some German on the way in which the dog looks when he barks, for if he looks upward a recovery will be in store, and it is only if he barks while he looks downward that death may be looked for.
...........................
From the days of Pliny, the dung of almost every kind of animal has been used in medicine. Dog dung mixed with honey was prescribed for sore throat, and wolf dung as an anti-colic. Goat dung was considered of great value in tumor of the spleen, and cat dung for gout in the feet. Lion dung was an anti-epileptic, and mouse dung was used in the constipation of children. ~The Medical Age 1892
...........................
It is a common belief in the north of England that a person bitten by a dog is liable to madness, if the dog which bit them goes mad. In order to secure the bitten one from such a terrible fate, the owner of the dog is often compelled to destroy it. Should he refuse to do so, the friends of the injured party would probably poison it. The condition peculiar to the morning following a night of debauchery, is said to need “a hair of the dog that bit you,” which doubtless refers to the means taken to prevent ill effects following a dog bite. A wise saw from the Edda tells us that “Dog’s hair heals dog’s bite.” The following incident recorded in the Pall Mall Gazette, Oct. 12th, 1866, shows most gross superstition in this Victorian age. “At an inquest, held on the 5th of October, at Bradfield, (Bucks.), on the body of a child of five years of age, which had died of hydrophobia, evidence was given of a practice almost incredible in civilised England. Sarah Mackness stated that at the request of the mother of the deceased, she had fished out of the river the body of the dog by which the child had been bitten, and had extracted its liver, a slice of which she had frizzled before the fire, and had then given it to the child to be eaten with some bread. The dog had been drowned nine days before. The child ate the liver greedily, drank some tea afterwards, but died, in spite of this strange specific.” ~Medical Folk-Lore By John Nicholson 1896
...........................
The following paragraph is quoted from Our Dogs for May 3, 1902:—
"The Blackburn magistrates had a gruesome case before them the other day. A youth of the name of William Heaton was caught red-handed, as it were, decoying a valuable dog from its home for the purpose of killing it and rendering it down to fat. It appears that dog-grease, as it is called, has attained considerable local notoriety as a cure for rheumatism. As a result, the killing of canine waifs and their transformation into ointment has developed into a small industry Blackburn way. It transpired in evidence that Heaton's father has carried on the calling for years. This ointment, which is popularly supposed to have extraordinary curative properties, it was stated, is sold at is. 6d. per pound
"The Live Stock Journal refers to another example of the superstition that still exists in connection with old folklore, and reports a strange story that appeared in its columns in July, 1885. In this case a woman took a newly-born puppy, skinned and boiled it, and gave the soup made therefrom to her baby of six months old. When asked the reason for so doing, she said it was the custom, as the broth of a new-born pup had a magical effect on a weakly child, and after partaking of puppy soup, its blood changed, and it would grow up healthy and strong." P. Manning.
No comments:
Post a Comment