[Gutenberg 44177] • The Myths and Fables of To-Day

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Excerpt from book:

WEATHER LORE " Fair is foul, and foul is fair." Shakespeare. r I "HERE is a certain class of so-called -- signs, that from long use have become so embedded in the every-day life of the people as to pass current with some as mere whimsical fancies, with others as possessing a real significance. At any rate, they crop out everywhere in the course of common conversation. Most of them have been handed down from former generations, while not a few exhale the strong aroma of the native soil itself. Of this class of familiar signs or omens, affecting only the smaller and more casual happenings one may encounter from day to day, or from hour to hour, those only will be noticed which seem based on actual superstition. Many current weather proverbs accord so exactly with the observations of science as to exclude them from any such classification. They are simply the homely records of a simple folk, drawn from long experience of nature in all her moods. As even the prophecies of the Weather Bureau itself often fail of fulfilment, it is not to be wondered at if weather proverbs sometimes prove no better guide, especially when we consider that "all signs fail in a dry time." The following are a few examples selected from among some hundreds: When a cat races playfully about the house, it is a sign that the wind will rise. It is a sign of rain if the cat washes her head behind her ears; of bad weather when Puss sits with her tail to the fire. Spiders crawling on the wall denote rain. If adog is seen eating green grass it is a sign of coming wet weather. Hang up a snake skin for rain. If the grass should be thickly dotted in the morning with cobwebs of the ground spider, glistening with dew, expect rain. Some say it portends the exact opposite. This puts u...