Chapter Sun to Superstitions of S by Brewer's Readers Handbook

(59) Tarantula. The tarantula is poisonous.

The music of a tarantula will cure its venomous bite.

(60) Toad. Toads spit poison, but they carry in their head an antidote thereto.

… the toad ugly and venomous,
Wears yet a precious jewel in its head.
   —Shakespeare: As You Like It, act ii. sc. 1 (1600).

In the dog days, toads never open their mouths.

Toads are never found in Ireland, because St. Patrick cleared the island of all vermin.

(61) Unicorn. Unicorns can be caught only by placing a virgin in their haunts.

The horn of a unicorn dipped into a liquor will show if it contains poison.

(62) Viper. Young vipers destroy their mothers when they come to birth.

(63) Weasel. To meet a weasel is unlucky.—Congreve: Love for Love.

You never catch a weasel asleep.

(64) Wolf. If a wolf sees a man before the man sees the wolf, he will be struck dumb.

Men are sometimes changed into wolves.—Pliny: Natural History. (See Were-Wolf.)

A wolf’s tooth used at one time to be hung on the neck of a child to charm away fear.

(65) Wren. If any one kills a wren, he will break a bone before the year is out.

(66) Miscellaneous. No animal dies near the sea, except at the ebbing of the tide.—Aristotle.

‘A parted even just between twelve and one, e’en at the turning o’ the tide.—Shakespeare: Henry V. act ii. sc. 3 (Falstaff’s death, 1509).

He [Barkis] dies when the tide goes out, confirming the superstition that people can’t die till the tide goes out, or be born till it is in.—Dickens: David Copperfield (1849).

If the fourth book of the Iliad be laid under the head of a patient suffering from quartan ague, it will cure him at once.

Mæniæ Iliados quartum suppone timenti.
   —Serenus Sammonicus: Prec. 50.

(See also Talismans, p. 1074.)

N.B.—There may possibly be a spice of truth in some of the above, especially those relating to the weather.

(2) Superstitions about Precious Stones.

R. B. means Rabbi Benoni (fourteenth century); S. means Streeter, Precious Stones (1877).

(1) Agate quenches thirst, and, if held in the mouth, allays fever.—R.B.

It is supposed, at least in fable, to render the wearer invisible, and also to turn the sword of foes against themselves.