School: Gráinseach Ailt an Chaistín (St. Johnston)

Location:
Saint Johnstown, Co. Donegal
Teacher:
Seán Ó Seanacháin

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Local Cures

Archival Reference

The Schools’ Collection, Volume 1106, Page 75

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Whooping Cough: Catch a trout in the river and bring it in water to the person who has the Whooping Cough. Give the child three drops out of the fishes mouth, and then liberate the trout in the exact spot you caught it. Put the child three times under a young ass foal that has never worn a saddle. Finish the cure with a drink of spring-water mixed with the juice of flax-seed. Another cure is to give the sufferer milk which has been left by a ferret after if has had enough.
Measles: Any person owning a piebald horse has power over this disease. Whatever such person gives the sufferer to eat or drink will effect a cure. If a person whose father and mother had the same surname were to give a piece of bread to the sufferer it would cure them.
Rickets: This is cured by a black =smith whose people, for three generations have handled the sledge. The parents hold the child on the anvil, and the blacksmith makes three strokes at the infant, while reciting certain prayers.
A Burn: Roast an egg, and when hard take out the yolk and grind it into a powder. Boil for half an hour in three sizes of itself of fresh butter, and strain through a piece of fine muslin. Strainings to be applied at

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Collector
John B. Shannon
Gender
male
Address
Saint Johnstown, Co. Donegal
Informant
Frank Hegarty
Gender
male
Address
Saint Johnstown, Co. Donegal
Language
English