Note 118 — Chapter III · TOTEMISM AND FETISHISM.

It was used in Scotland to foretell the future at Allhallow Eve. Divination was performed with a pair of shears and a sieve. Aubrey describes how “the shears are stuck in a sieve, and the maidens hold up the sieve with the top of their fingers by the handle of the shears, then say, ‘By St. Peter and St. Paul, he hath not stolen it.’ After many adjurations the sieve will turn at the name of the thief.”118