THE FOLK LORE OF BIRDS IN RELATION TO ESSEX.
Common Scoter. The flesh of this diving duck is so strongly-
fishy, as it lives largely on shell-fish, that it is not forbidden to
Roman Catholics on fast days and Lent. From this has arisen
the belief in Normandy that, like the Barnacle Goose, it is
derived from a bivalve, which is found adhering to the keels of
ships. A story not altogether dissimilar is told of the Gannet.
Among the more uninformed of the Scottish peasantry the idea
is said to exist that this bird grows by the bill upon the cliffs
of the Bass, Ailsa Craig and St. Kilda. This series of examples
ends with one regarding the Quail and it comes from Brittany.
It was this bird which instructed masons how to lay stones.
One of these craftsmen was building a wall, but did not know
how to make a stone stand properly, but a Quail behind him
called out "End for end" and in this way the mason learned
how to place stones.
The last section of the folk lore of birds in this contribution
is to deal with that matter which has been shown to have been
in vogue in Essex at some time or other. The folk lore which
I present is confined to five or six species and as it affects our
County I give it in full. The first bird is the Carrion Crow or
Rook. In Essex the issue of a journey is often unravelled to
the traveller by the number of Crows which cross his path, as
the following couplet showeth, and which we well recollect our
good old nurse took special care to teach us as an indispensable
part of education :
'' One Crow, bad luck ; two Crows speed ;
Three Crows, good luck; four good luck indeed."
Another version of this is said to be :
One's unlucky Four is wealth
Two's lucky Five is sickness,
Three is health and six is death.
This was published in 1839 in an article on the "Superstitions
"of Essex." The bird mentioned is the Crow, but Christy refers
this folk lore to the Rook and no doubt he was influenced by
the status of the two species in the county. In the north-west
of Essex the Carrion Crow is by no means common, whereas
the Rook is generally abundant in all suitable localities. A story
regarding the absence of Nightingales at Havering-atte-Bower
is very well known, and this is Morant's version. "An ancient
"retiring place of some of our Saxon kings, particularly of that