American citizen. [volume] (Canton, Miss.) 1864-1890, 1872-05-04
Curious Facts and Customs Relating
to Teeth.

/
to Teeth.
| THERE are many curious customs in re-
| lation to teeth in different countries. In
some parts of Sussex, England, there is
superstition that if you put on your
right stocking, right shoe and right trou-
ser leg, before the left, you will never
have toothache. To drink out of skull
taken from a graveyard: to take a tooth
from such skull, and wear it round the
neck; to apply the tooth to your own liv
ing but aching tooth; to put Il double nut
into your pocket; to pare your finger nails
and toe-nails, and wrap the parings in a
paper-all are charms against the tooth
ache. When an aching tooth is extracted,
mix it with salt and burn it. In other
parts of England, there is a custom of
calling the toOth-ache the ''love pain" for
which the sufferer is not entitled to any
commiseration; whether he or she fully
assents to this may perhaps be doubted.
Many other items of toothlore have no
connection with toothache. For instance:
if the teeth are set wide apart, there will
be good luck and plenty of travelling for
the fortunate pOssessor. When a tooth is
drawn, if you refrain from thrusting your
tongue into the cavity, the new tooth to
grow in its place will be lucky one.
Lady Wentworth, in letter written in
1913 to her son, Lord Stafford, spoke of
the efficacy of wolves teeth set in gold,
to assist children in cutting their teeth:
''They are very lucky thing; for my two
first ones did dye; the other bred his very
i'll, and none of we rest did, for l had one
for all the rest"
There is reason to believe that the
Greeks and Romans knew something
about false teeth. Martial, in one of his
epigrams, said that That's teeth were dis
colored, while Leucanias were white.
hx-S In 1nr
teeth, whereas the latter wore those of
some other person. One of the old Ro-
man laws allowed the gold setting of false
teeth, or the gold with which they were
bound, to be buried or burned with the
deceased. Dentistry was known in Eng
land three centuries ago. Belgrave's
Mathematical Journal, published in the
time of Queen Elizabeth, tells us that ''Sir
John Belgrave caused his teeth to be all
drawn out, and after had set of ivory in
agayne." Ben johnson, in his ''Silent Wo-
man, published in 1907, makes one of his
characters say: "A most vile face! and
yet she spends me forty pounds Il year in
mercury and hogs bones. All her teeth
were made in the Blackfriarsw An alma
nae printed in 1909 mentions one John
Watts, who was the maker of artificial
teeth in Racket Court, Fleet street.
Some barbarous nations draw the two
teeth in the middle of the jaw. The sable
females of Africa go still further, and one
of the charms they are most solicitouS to
acquire is two have four teeth deficient
two above and two below. The woman
who would want the courage to have
them drawn would be as much despised
as young girl in China with feet of the
natural size. The japanese women gild
their teeth, and those of the Indies paint
them red. A custom prevails among the
Siamese to stain their teeth with sable
varnish, which they renew annually. In
the Sandwich Islands persons DESTROYS of
going into mourning, paint the lower
part of the face black, and knock out
their front teeth. No doubt this causes a
very sincere kind of mourning for the
time.
Some years ago all Germany was in
commotion in relation to a rumor that a
child had a golden tooth. OF course it
was an eye-tooth, and everyone wanted
to see it. The Merdt were exercised over
the phenomenon. Philosophers and arat
omists wrote essays and large volumes
on the possibility of the event, and each
ascribed the freak of nature to a different
cause. But, somehow or other, not one
of them ever thought of examining the
tooth. If they had, they would have
found that shrewd imposter had covered
it with gold leaf, with a view to exhibit
the child as prodigy. The tooth was
subsequently examined, and the trick of
the Snowman discovered. The latter dis
orphan asylum.
In 1916 Lord Schwarterbury gave 49,
595 francs for tooth of Isaac Newton,
which is now set in Il ring and worn by the
eldest branch of that family.
During the days of the Iesurrectionists
or body-snatchers, when grave yards were
subjected to pillage for supplying anato-
mists with subjects for dissection, the
teeth from the dead bodies formed fire.
quent article of sale to the dentists.
Sometimes graves were opened for the
teeth alone, as being small and easily con-
cealed articles.
Mr.. Cooper, an English surgeon, relates
an instance of a man feigning to look out
for a burial place for his wife, and thus
obtained access to the vault of a meeting
house, the trap door of which he unboltGd. |
AT night he let himself down in the vault, |
and pocketed the front teeth of the |
whole of the buried congregation by
whicA he cleared $50. Mention is also
made of licensed sutler or cantineer, |
during the Peninslllar War, who drew |
the teeth of those who had fallen in bat
tie, and plundered their persons. With |
the proceeds of these adventures he built |
a hotel at Margate. But his previous oc-
cupation being discovered, his house was
y
loss. He afterward became dealer in
dead mems teeth.
Mr.. Catlin, who some years ago had an
interesting exhibition of scenery, dresses,
weapons, etc, noticed that North Ameri
can Indians have better teeth than the
whites. He accounts for the difference
in this strange way-that the reds keep
their mouths shut, whereas whites keep
them open. The teeth he says, require
moisture to keep their surface i'll good
working order; when the mouth is kept
Open and the mucous membrane has
tendency to dry up, the teeth lose their
needed supply of moisture, and thence
come discoloratiOn, toothache, ticdolou
reuX, decay, loOseness, and eventual loss
of teeth.
Shakespeare, in Aidsummer-Nigh
Dream says:
For there never yet philosopher
That could endure the tuohache patiently.
Shakespeare oHre had the toothace.
An Imperial toothache once made the
fortune of a poor barber. The Sultan of
Turkey having touch of tOothachc, sent
for the court physician. He was hunting
and could not be found. The domestic
hurried about Constanrinople, and at last
found II poor ragged barber surgeon; they
took him TO the palace, and furnished
him proper clothing. He drew the Of
Tending TOOTH and soothcd the pain of
thc Commander of the Faithful, \ nice
house and one thousand six hundred pi
lsters a month were awarded to him.
''You are IL foe to your life if you do
not masticatc WELL" says the Latin prov
,rb. Those who have good teeth and do