This use of violent words or deeds in the cure of disease is as ancient almost as the race of man. The early Germans attempted to relieve sprains by reciting confidently how Baldur's horse had been cured by Woden after all the other mighty inhabitants of Valhalla had given up the task, and even earlier tribes of Europe and Asia had used for illness such a formula as: "The great mill stone that is India's is the bruiser of every worm. With that I mash together the worms as grain with a mill stone." Long after Christianity had reached the Anglo- Saxons of England, the sick often hung around their necks an image of Thor's hammer to frighten away the demon germs that sought to destroy the body. This appeal to a superior being was common to all Indo-European races, and the early Christian missionaries wisely did not attempt to stamp out a belief of such antiquity, but merely substituted the names of Christ, the Virgin Mary and the saints for those of the heathen deities. And even into the nineteenth century this ancient form of faith cure persisted; for there are living yet in Cornwall people who heard, as children, this charm for tooth-ache: Christ passed by his brother's door, Saw his brother lying on the floor; What aileth thee, brother! Pain in the teeth. Thy teeth shall pain thee no more, In the name of the Father, Son and Holy Ghost, I command the pain to be gone. Let us no longer boast of the carefulness of the modern physician; the ceremonies and directions of the Anglo-Saxon doctor were just as painstaking in minuteness and accuracy. When you feel the evil spirits entering you, immediately seek shelter under a linden tree; for out of linden wood were not battle-shields made? Long before Christianity had brought its gentler touches to English life the tribal medicine man wildly brandished such a shield, and sang defiantly to the witch maidens or disease demons: Loud were they, lo! loud, as over the land they rode; Fierce of heart were they, as over the hill they rode; Shield thee now thyself, from their spite thou may'st escape thee. Out, little spear, if herein thou be! Underneath the linden stand I, underneath the shining shield, For the might maidens have mustered up their strength, And have sent their spear screaming through the air! Back again to them will I send another, Arrow forth a-flying from the front against them! Out, little spear, if herein thou be!