The Medical mythology of Ireland Author:James Mooney Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: shall the sea be calm unto you, for I know that for my sake this great tempest is upon you. So they took up Jonah and cast him forth into the sea, and the sea... more » ceased from her raging" (Jonah, i: 11, 12, 15). Another belief, which exists alike in Ireland and among the Indians, is that certain localities are the abode of invisible malignant spirits, which visit sickness and death upon those who come within their reach. These evil spirits are overhead in the air, and are quite a different order of beings from the fairies, who live upon or under the ground, and on the whole are rather regarded as benevolent. If sickness or death occurs in a new house, it is frequently ascribed to this cause, and the house will be removed, or torn down and rebuilt in another place. There is also a way by which the pains of maternity'can be transferred from the woman to her husband. This secret is so jealously guarded that a correspondent in the west of Ireland, who had been asked to investigate the matter, was at last obliged to report: " In regard to putting the sickness on the father of a child, that is a well-known thing in this country, but after making every inquiry I could not make out how it is done. It is strictly private." It came out, however, in a chance conversation with a woman who, when a child, had once been selected to wait upon a nurse on such an occasion. At a critical moment the nurse "hunted her out of the room," and then, taking the husband's vest, she put it upon the sick woman. The child had hid behind the door in the next room and saw the whole operation, but was too far off to hear the words which were probably repeated at the same time. It is assorted by some that the husband's consent must first be obtained, but tho gonoral opinion is that he feels all the pain, and e...« less