A superstition exists in some parts of the county that if pieces of the alder tree are carried in the waistcoat pocket they will be a safeguard against rheumatism. In Wyre Forest, near Bewdley, is a botanical curiosity, namely, the celebrated old _Pyrus domestica_, said to be the only tree of the kind growing wild in England. It is of the same kind as the "Rowan," or mountain ash, which was and even now is vulgarly worn as a remedy against witchcraft. It is most thought of by the common people, and there are various traditions concerning it. The name given to the tree is "the witty pear-tree"--the mountain ash being also called "the whitty tree," and the leaves of this tree are very similar. One of our Naturalist Field Clubs visited it in August, 1853: vegetation was then entirely confined to its top boughs, which however still held a few pears on them. Some hermit, or reputed "wise man," probably planted this tree, and derived part of his subsistence by distributing its leaves and fruit, as a protection against witchcraft. In April, 1856, a poor woman, residing in a village about three miles from Pershore, acting upon the advice of her neighbours, brought her child, who was suffering from whooping cough, to that town, for the purpose of finding out a married couple answering to the names of Joseph and Mary, and soliciting their interference on behalf of her afflicted child, as she had been informed that if two married persons having those names could but be induced to lay their hands on her child's head, the whooping cough would be immediately cured. After scouring the town for a considerable time in search of "Joseph and his fair lady," they were at length discovered in the persons of a respectable tradesman and his wife residing in Bridge Street, to whom the poor silly woman made known her foolish request, which at first excited a smile from the good woman of the house, but was quickly followed, not by "the laying on of hands," but by good advice, such as mothers only know how to give in these matters. The poor mother then thankfully departed a wiser woman. In the rural districts great faith is put in rings made of the shillings and sixpences given at the sacrament, and many clergymen have told me of repeated applications having been made to them for sacrament shillings, for the purpose of keeping away the evil spirit, or as a remedy for fits. Mr. Watson, in his History of Hartlebury, says that he believes nearly every person in that district who was subject to fits wore such a ring. And there is another parish in the county where I am told even Protestant poor go to the Romanist priest to have the relics of saints applied for the cure of diseases.