Chapter War of Wartburg to Warning-Givers of W by Brewer's Readers Handbook

Captain Leather, chief magistrate of Belfast, in 1690, being shipwrecked on the Isle of Man, was told that thirteen of his crew were lost, for thirteen corpse candles had been seen moving towards the churchyard. It is a fact that thirteen of the men were drowned in this wreck.—Sacheverell: Isle of Man, 15.

(15) CRADLE. If any one rocks a cradle when it is empty, it forebodes evil to the child.—American Superstition.

(16) CRICKETS. Crickets in a house are a sign of good luck; but if they suddenly leave, it is a warning of death.

(17) CROW (A). A crow appearing to one on the left-hand side indicates some impending evil to the person; and flying over a house, foretells evil at hand to some of the inmates. (See below, “Raven.”)

Sæpe sinistra cava prædixt ab ilice cornex.
   —Virgil: Eclogue, i. 18.

(18) CROWING OF A COCK. Themistoclês was assured of his victory over Xerxes by the crowing of a cock, on his way to Artemisium the day before the battle. —Lloyd: Stratagems of Jerusalem, 285.

(19) CROWING OF A HEN indicates approaching disaster.

(20) DEATH-WARNINGS IN PRIVATE FAMILIES—

(a) In Germany. Several princes of Germany have their special warning-givers of death. In some it is the roaring of a lion, in others the howling of a dog. In some it is the tolling of a bell or striking of a clock at an unusual time, in others it is a bustling noise about the castle.—The Living Library, 284 (1621).

(b) In Berlin. A White Lady appears to some one of the household or guard, to announce the death of a prince of Hohenzollern. She was duly seen on the eve of prince Waldemar’s death in 1879.

(c) In Bohemia. “Spectrum fœminium vestitu lugubri apparere solet in arce quadam illustris familiæ, antequam una ex conjugibus dominorum illorum e vita decebat.”—Debrio: Disquisitiones Magicœ, 592.

(d) In Great Britain. In Wales the corpse candle appears to warn a family of impending death. In Carmarthen scarcely any person dies but some one sees his light or candle.

In Northumberland the warning light is called the person’s waff, in Cumberland a swarth, in Ross a task, in some parts of Scotland a fye-token.

King James tells us that the wraith of a person newly dead, or about to die, appears to his friends.—Demonology, 125.

Edgewell Oak indicates the coming death of an inmate of Castle Dalhousie by the fall of one of its branches.

(e) In Scotland. The family of Rothmurchas have the Bodachau Dun or the Ghost of the Hill.

The Kinchardines have the Spectre of the Bloody Hand.

Gartinbeg House used to be haunted by Bodach Gartin.

The house of Tulloch Gorms used to be haunted by Maug Monlach or the Girl with the Hairy Left Hand.

(21) DEATH-WATCH (The). The tapping made by a small beetle called the death-watch is said to be a warning of death.

The chambermaids christen this worm a “Deathwatch,”
Because, like a watch, it always cries “click;’
Then woe be to those in the house who are sick,
For sure as a gun they will give up the ghost,
If the maggot cries “click” when it scratches a post.
   —Swift.