The Brandon news. (Brandon, Miss.) 1892-1961, 1906-09-27
HORSEsHOEs AND LUCK.
Right Way and Wrong Way to Invoke
Goddess oftFortune.

Goddess OfsFOrtune.
There is right way and wrong
IN the picking up of a horseshoe. I
was walking with a countrybred boy
along a Somerset lane and saw one
lying In the crumbling summer rut.
There is horseshoe" said /. The
lad sprang forward, but stopped sud-
denly before his fingers touched the
iron. "But won't pick it up" said
he. "or ! shall spoil your luck" 1t
may perhaps have been only a point
Of etiquette, but he assured me that
horseshoe of my finding could bring
luck neither to him nor to me II he
touched it before me.
The origin of this superstition,
says the London Evening Standard,
now lingering chiefly as saying and
a jest, is perhaps earlier than the
horseshoe, and has nothing whatever
to do with it. It was from the in
fuence Of the new moon that good
was to be expected, and still there
are some who turn the money in their
pockets when they first see her in the
sky. The early horseshoe was a
simple crescent, and the superstition
has fingered around an object that at
first was only a convenient symbol.
It was to the protection Of some
moon goddesses, therefore, that the
householder first trusted when he
kept the witch out of his dwelling by
hanging horseshoe on the door.
Neither spell nor malignant wish, nor
the power Of the evil eye could cross
the threshold in the presence Of her
symbol. Even the pixies, who
brougne a certain whimsical merri-
ment into their practical Joking,
were no good in the face of that.
Cheated out of their nocturnal rides
they might as well retire under
ground at ore if a horseshoe barred
their try to the stable.
/, For these troublesome elves, in
days gone by, had way of working
the cattle by night for their own
amusement, and when the good man
came in the morning he found the
poor beasts "all terrified like, an
out in lather o. sweat" And they
had even a worse trick than this.
They would get at the good -vife's
vat and wantonly spoil the brew. To
prevent this she drew with her finger
two hearts and a criss-cross upon the
mash, and thus the beer was saved.
Whether crescent or cross, no matter.
The pixies would stink away abashed
by the sign of it.
To this day there are horseshoes
on the doors of many cottages in
quiet villages. Doubtless the cot
tagers do but put them up for a
whim, or in the same half jocular,
half serious spirit, yet with secret
satisfaction, too, in which so many
Of us perform obsolete practices "just
for luck" And why not I, who find a
secret delight in it's forgotten signifi-
canoe?
1t was rusty, with crooked horse
nail still hanging in one of the holes.
There are some who think there is
virtue in the rust. But that is nom
sense. I polished mine until it was
bright as the silver moon, and indeed
might almost be mistaken for the
metal sacred to Diana. There is a
right way and a wrong in putting up
the horseshoe on your door. One
thing is thoroughly established; if
you turn it upside down it cannot
hold the luck.
And where ought it to be placed?
The old world. folk often nailed it
on the threshold. The growing moon
has her horns always toward the left,
and only on the wane does she point
them to the right. I would have this
true crescent, waxing every day.