The Evil Eye

1912

It is probably that the "evil eye," for which many hapless old women were harried to their death on the suspicion of witchcraft in "the good old days," was no more than a common squint, a "cast" in the eye, or "bossing," as it is called in many parts of the country to this day, writes Dr. N. Bishop Harman in the British Journal of Children's Diseases. Not only was the squint though to be of evil significance, but the defect itself was considered to be the work of evil spirits. In "King Lear" we find the following in the scene on the heath at night:

"This is the foul fiend Flibbertigibbet. He begins at curfew and walks till the first cock; he gives the web and the pin, squints the eye and makes the harelip, mildews the white meat and hurts the poor creature of earth."


Knew His Man

George Bubb, better known as Bubb Doddington, one of the wits of the eighteenth century, always dined well and always liked to doze after the repast. Falling asleep one day after dinner with Sir Richard Temple and Lord Cobham, the latter reproached Doddington with his drowsiness. Doddington denied having been asleep and to prove he had not offered to repeat all Lord Cobham had been saying. Cobham challenged him to do so. Doddington repeated a story, and Lord Cobham owned he had been telling it. "Well," said Doddington, "and yet I did not hear a word of it, but I went to sleep because I knew that about this time of the day you would tell that story."

—The Kingston Daily Freeman, Kingston, New York, June 30, 1916, page 5.