Magpies are made the subject of superstition. To see a single one strutting across your path is a sad mishap. There is luck in three, or more, however. _Holy Water._--Church superstitions and rites are not within our province, unless they are objectionable in a sanitary point of view. If the holy water is clean, it is just as good as any other pure water; but I have seen it poured upon my Irish patients--years ago in Hartford and elsewhere--when there were "wrigglers" in it from long exposure in an unstopped bottle or tea-cup. I approve of holy water, therefore, in large quantities, with other rites, tending to a sanitary object. Have plenty of water--with soap. [Illustration: THE PROPER USE OF "HOLY WATER."] _Bells._--Few useful articles have been held in greater reverence and superstition. Their origin is of great antiquity. The first Jewish priests adorned their blue tunics with golden bells, as also did the Persian kings. The Greeks put bells upon criminals going to execution, as a warning, as it was an ill omen to see a criminal and his executioner walking. The superstition respecting bells began more particularly with the tenth century, when the priests exorcised and blessed them, giving them the names of saints, making the rabble believe that when they were rung for those ceremonies they had the power to drive devils out of the air, making them quake and tremble; also to restrain the power of the devil over a corpse; hence bell-ringing at funerals. There are many legends wherein the evil spirits' dislike to bells is promulgated. As "the devil hates holy water," so he does bell-ringing. Dr. Warner, a clergyman of the Church of England, in his "Hampshire," enumerates the virtues of a bell, by translating some lines from the "Helpe to Discourse." "Men's deaths I tell by doleful knell; Lightning and thunder I break asunder; On Sabbath all to church I call; The sleepy head I raise from bed; The winds so fierce I doe disperse; Men's cruel rage I do asswage." I think the beautiful music discoursed by a chime of bells would be more effectual "men's cruel rage" to tranquillize, than a battery of seven cannons. Aside from all superstitious notions, there is an irresistible charm about the music of bells, and I rejoice that they are gradually being redeemed from the superstition and monopoly of one ignorant denomination, as the sacred cross may be, to the use and blessing of all mankind. _Fear of Thunder and Lightning._--These have ever been sources of superstitious terror. The ancients considered thunder and lightning as direct manifestations of divine wrath; hence whatever the lightning struck was accursed. The corpses of persons so killed were allowed to remain where they fell, to the great inconvenience, often, of the living.