Note 736 — Chapter IV
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Footnote 736
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Rev. Walter Gregor, Notes on the Folk-lore of the North-East of Scotland (London, 1881), p. 186. The fumigation of the byres with juniper is a charm against witchcraft. See J.G. Campbell, Witchcraft and Second Sight in the Highlands and Islands of Scotland (Glasgow, 1902), p. ii. The "quarter-ill" is a disease of cattle, which affects the animals only in one limb or quarter. "A very gross superstition is observed by some people in Angus, as an antidote against this ill. A piece is cut out of the thigh of one of the cattle that has died of it. This they hang up within the chimney, in order to preserve the rest of the cattle from being infected. It is believed that as long as it hangs there, it will prevent the disease from approaching the place. It is therefore carefully preserved; and in case of the family removing, transported to the new farm, as one of their valuable effects. It is handed down from one generation to another" (J. Jamieson, Etymological Dictionary of the Scottish Language, revised by J. Longmuir and D. Donaldson, iii. 575, s.v. "Quarter-ill"). See further Rev. W. Gregor, op. cit. pp. 186 sq.: "The forelegs of one of the animals that had died were cut off a little above the knee, and hung over the fire-place in the kitchen. It was thought sufficient by some if they were placed over the door of the byre, in the 'crap o' the wa'.' Sometimes the heart and part of the liver and lungs were cut out, and hung over the fireplace instead of the fore-feet. Boiling them was at times substituted for hanging them over the hearth." Compare W. Henderson, Notes on the Folk-lore of the Northern Counties of England and the Borders (London, 1879), p. 167: "A curious aid to the rearing of cattle came lately to the knowledge of Mr. George Walker, a gentleman of the city of Durham. During an excursion of a few miles into the country, he observed a sort of rigging attached to the chimney of a farmhouse well known to him, and asked what it meant. The good wife told him that they had experienced great difficulty that year in rearing their calves; the poor little creatures all died off, so they had taken the leg and thigh of one of the dead calves, and hung it in a chimney by a rope, since which they had not lost another calf." In the light of facts cited below (pp. 315 sqq.) we may conjecture that the intention of cutting off the legs or cutting out the heart, liver, and lungs of the animals and hanging them up or boiling them, is by means of homoeopathic magic to inflict corresponding injuries on the witch who cast the fatal spell on the cattle.