Lancashire Legends, Traditions, Pageants, Sports, &c./Part 6/Superstitions respecting Hair
HAIR.
The folk-lore of hair contains several curious items. We are told that if a horse-hair be placed in a stream of running water it will soon become alive; but those who are only very slightly acquainted with natural history will be able to correct and also to explain the origin of this mistake. If a hair be placed on a schoolboy's hand, it is expected to split the cane with which the school-master is punishing him. When the splitting does not take place, the hair will so deaden the pain as to make it scarcely felt. Youths generally pluck hairs from the heads of their playmates on each return of their birthdays. They also pull the hair upwards at the back of the head, in order to ensure them a lucky and prosperous year. This is locally termed "randling." When a child is bitten by a dog, the bite is said to be effectually cured by binding a few hairs from the dog over the wound. As "like cures like," no hydrophobia can possibly result. During 1872 an assault case was heard before two of our county magistrates, which arose from the owner of a dog refusing to give some of its hairs to the mother of a child that had been bitten. Red-haired persons, we are told, do not soon turn grey; their passions are more intense than those whose hair is of a different colour; and they are not unfrequently reproached with having descended from the Scots and Danes. Red-haired children are supposed to indicate infidelity on the part of the mother; they are consequently looked upon as unlucky, and are not wanted in a neighbour's house on the morning of New Year's Day. Hair on the arms is considered to betoken coming riches; for "When hairy mich, you'll soon be rich;" and when the hair of the eyebrows meets over the bridge of the nose, it is taken as an indication that the person who possesses this peculiarity will certainly be hanged