Waldron, in his "Description of the Isle of Man" (1731), speaking of a crypt or subterranean chapel near Peel Castle, says: "Within are thirteen pillars, on which the whole chapel is supported. They have a superstition that whatsoever stranger goes to see this cavern out of curiosity, and omits to count the pillars, shall do something to occasion his being confined there." _Glastonbury Thorn._ This famous hawthorn, which grew on a hill in the church-yard of Glastonbury Abbey, was said to have sprung from the staff of Joseph of Arimathea, who, having fixed it in the ground with his own hand on Christmas day, the staff took root immediately, put forth leaves, and the _next_ day was covered with milk-white blossoms. It was declared that this thorn continued to blow every Christmas day during a long series of years, and that slips from the original plant are still preserved, and continue to blow every Christmas day to the present time. There certainly was in the abbey church-yard a hawthorne-tree which blossomed in winter, and was cut down in the time of the civil wars; but that it always blossomed on Christmas day was a mere tale of the monks, calculated to inspire the vulgar with notions of the sanctity of the place. _Buying and Selling._ There was a singular custom at Rome in connection with the purchase of provisions. Purchaser and vendor simultaneously closed, and then suddenly opened, one of their hands or some of their fingers. If the number of fingers on both sides was even, the vendor obtained the price which he had previously asked: but if the number was uneven, the buyer received the goods for the sum he had just tendered. _Fairy Treasure._ In the Leverian Museum were deposited "Orbicular sparry bodies, commonly called fairies' money, from the banks of the Tyne, Northumberland." Ramon, a character in the play of "The Fatal Dowry," 1632, says— But not a word of it, 'tis fairies' treasure; Which but reveal'd, brings on the babbler's ruine. _Hour Glasses in Coffins._