Barbour County index. [volume] (Medicine Lodge, Kan.) 1880-current, 1890-01-29
PORTUGUESE BuGABoos.

Gloomy Traditional Beliefs Existing
Among the Peasants of Portugal.
The most sOmber of the Evolutionary
beliefs in rural Portugal certainly go
back to far beyond the time Of the
Moors, beyond even the period of the
entry into the peninsula of the nations
from Central Europe. The wehr-wolf
legend come from Roman times. The
term for the man-wolf in Portuguese Is
Ioo's-hon1en, hardly a change from the
Latin tupus-homO, though it is more than
likely that in substance if not in form
the lycanthropic myth is far older than
the Roman nation itself. The legend
OF human being assuming a VOLTS
shape Is certainly one of the most gener-
ally diffused through the world. 1t takes
many forms in Portugal. A common
belief is that when there are seven
children of the same parents, one, either
SON or daughter, is fated before the age
Of puberty arrives to turn into a corredor
"a night-ranger-that is, to become
that which is preliminary to being
true wehr-wolf, or Lobis-hOmem. The
eorrcdor need not necessarily assume a
VOLTS shape-indeed, he often takes
that of hare, a wildcat or fox, but Of
nights he must put on the likeness of
one OF these animals and range through
woods and desert places. The corredor
by all can learn harms no one but him
self, and is unconscious of his nightly
wanderings as soon as he returns to his
human shape and right senses, but he is
always to be recognized by excessive
leanness, wild eyes, and pale and bag
gard face. The cOrredor steals from his
bed, and climbing the highest tree in the
neighborhood, strips to the skin and
hides his clothesin the branches; thende-
scending naked to the ground, he is in
stantly transformed into bestial shape,
with all the habits belonging to the
beast whose form he has put on. He is
endowed with supernatural speed and
can outstrip man and all other animals
The child with this fate to undergo
passes q novitiate of seven years as a
cOTredor, and then unless the spell is
broken he turns to a true Lo6is-hGmen, .
eersI-peths, wolf-man or wolf-woman.
The female of this terrible human wild
beast Is known as b6eirG. Male or
female, 1t Is fierce creature, with ap-
petites exaggerating those of the wolf
1t resembles. and whose strength and
swiftness are greater than those of the
wolf. The creature is now no longer
harmless, but leaps upon and preys on
other animals, and its special delight is
in the slaughter and devouring of
children When once the change into
the true to6ie-h0naen or Io6esrG has
taken place / understand that
the wolf man or woman can never again
be reclaimed into the ranks of our COM
mon humanity. but the spell upon a
cOTTedOr can be broken It needs but
for its clothes to be found and burned.
or for blood to be drawn from its BODY
while in the form of beast; then the
spell is broken, the animal returns into
human shape-waking amazed asst from
a sleep-walking dream and recovering
the reyersion of the human soul. 81
which the true b6is-h05sena must iraeyita-
bly, forfeit the tenure. Tales are MANY
where particularly savage wolf, being
sorely wounded by peasant in mid
night fray. has yet escaped by SEEM
ing miracle. The next morning the I'M
suspected brother or sister Of the peas
ant himself is seen with q wound of
ldentically the same nature, and 50 has
proved TO be nothing less than foul
1bis-AOnsem or b6sira.-The Fortnightly
Revian.