blue vein across his nose.'" This piece of folk-lore, which caused the anxious mother such distress, is not confined to the West of England, but crops up here and there throughout the country. While speaking of the nose, we may just note that it is the subject of various proverbs. Thus "to put the nose out of joint" means to supplant one in another's favour, and the popular one of "paying through the nose," implying extortion, may, it has been suggested, have originated in a poll-tax levied by Odin, which was called in Sweden a nose-tax, and was a penny per nose or poll. Once more, we have the term "nose of wax" applied to a person who is very accommodating, and one may occasionally hear the phrase "wipe the nose" used in the sense of affront. Leaving the nose, however, we find similar odd fancies attached to the eye. In many places we are told that "it's a good thing to have meeting eyebrows, as such a person will never know trouble," although, curious to say, on the Continent quite a different significance is attributed to this peculiarity. In Greece, for instance, it is held as an omen that the man is a vampire, and in Denmark and Germany it is said to indicate that he is a werewolf. In China, also, there is a proverb that "people whose eyebrows meet can never expect to attain to the dignity of a minister of state." There can be no doubt that, according to the general idea, meeting eyebrows are not considered lucky:-- "Trust not the man whose eyebrows meet, For in his heart you'll find deceit." Thus, Charles Kingsley, in "Two Years Ago," speaks of this idea in the following passage:--"Tom began carefully scrutinising Mrs. Harvey's face. It had been very handsome. It was still very clever, but the eyebrows clashed together downwards above her nose, and rising higher at the outward corners, indicated, as surely as the restless down-drop eye, a character self-conscious, furtive, capable of great inconsistencies, possibly of great deceit." Again, the itching of the right eye is considered a lucky omen, an idea that is very old, and may be traced as far back as the time of Theocritus, who says:-- "My right eye itches now, and I shall see my love." According to the antiquary Grose, however, who collected together so many of the superstitions prevalent in his day, "When the right eye itches, the party affected will shortly cry; if the left, they will laugh." The power of fascination has generally been considered to be a peculiar quality of the eye, a notion by no means obsolete, and numerous charms have been resorted to for counteracting its influence. In our chapter on "Birth and Infancy" we have already spoken of the danger to which young children are said to be subject from the malevolent power of some evil eye, and of the pernicious effects resulting from it. Shakespeare gives several references to it, one of which occurs in the _Merry Wives of Windsor_ (Act v., sc. 5), where Pistol says of Falstaff:--