Cornelius Agrippa wrote on the power of numbers, which he declares is asserted by nature herself; thus the herb called cinquefoil, or five-leaved grass, resists poison, and bans devils by virtue of the number five; one leaf of it taken in wine twice a day cures the quotidian, three the tertian, four the quartan fever. He believed that every seventh son born to parents who have not had daughters is able to cure the king’s-evil by touch or word alone.[587] GIRDLES. Amongst the ancient Britons, says Meryon,[588] when a birth was attended with difficulty or danger, girdles were put round the woman, which were made for the purpose, and which gave her immediate relief. Many families in the highlands of Scotland kept such girdles until quite recently. They were marked with cabalistic figures, and were applied with certain ceremonies, which came originally from the Druids. SPITTLE. Levinus Lemnius says of saliva: “Divers experiments show what power and quality there is in man’s fasting spittle, when he hath neither eat nor drunk before the use of it; for it cures all tetters, itch, scabs, pushes, and creeping sores; and if venomous little beasts have fastened on any part of the body, as hornets, beetles, toads, spiders, and such like, that by their venome cause tumours and great pains and inflammations; do but rub the places with fasting spittle, and all those effects will be gone and dismissed.”[589] Sir Thomas Browne is not quite sure that fasting saliva really is poisonous to snakes and vipers.[590] In _Saxon Leechdoms_ a cure for the gout runs thus: “Before getting out of bed in the morning, spit on your hand, rub all your sinews, and say, ‘Flee, gout, flee, etc.’”[591] Spittle was anciently a charm against all kinds of fascination. Pliny says it averted witchcraft. Theocritus says,— “Thrice on my breast I spit, to guard me safe From fascinating charms.” Fishermen and costermongers often spit on the first money they take, for good luck.[592] TALISMANS. Talismans, says Fosbrooke,[593] are of five classes, 1. The _Astronomical_, with celestial signs and intelligible characters. 2. The _Magical_, with extraordinary figures, superstitious words, and names of unknown angels. 3. The _Mixed_, of celestial signs and barbarous words, but not superstitions, or with names of angels. 4. The _Sigilla Planetarum_, composed of Hebrew numeral letters, used by astrologers and fortune tellers. 5. _Hebrew Names and Characters._ These were formed according to the cabalistic art. Pettigrew gives a Hebrew talisman,[594] which runs thus: “It overflowed—he did cast darts—Shaddai is all sufficient—his hand is strong, and is the preserver of my life in all its variations.” SCRIPTS.