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Show Valentine Customs and Superstitions of Old There were certain superstitions during dur-ing early times which now seem entirely en-tirely to have passed away. For Instance, In-stance, If a young girl, on the eve of St. Valentine day, went alone and waited until midnight on the porch of a church, then started for home, scattering scat-tering hempseed on the way, It was believed she would see her own true love in a winding sheet raking the hampseed behind her. Why he was supposed to be seen in a winding sheet has not been explained. Another superstition was most Interesting. In-teresting. If a young girl got five bay ' leaves and pinned one on each of the four corners of her pillow, the remaining remain-ing one to be placed in the center, and if that night her sweetheart appeared in her dreams they would be married before the end of the year. It is written of one young lady of those times that she confessed, in order or-der to make the charm more potent, to having boiled an egg perfectly hard, 1 removed the yolk, filled the vacant place with salt and, upon going to bed, eaten the entire egg, salt, shell and all, without drinking or speaking to any one after she had finished the eating of it. But the really, truly way to find out the name of your own true love was to write the name of all your admirers admir-ers upon bits of paper, roll them up in clay, put them in a vessel of water and the first one to rise to the surface sur-face was surely the one. The practice of sending comic valentines val-entines is a much later one. These caricatures which poked fun at people's peo-ple's personal appearance, their clothe and even the work In which they were engaged had their greatest popularity perhaps 40 or 50 years ago. Fortunately, Fortu-nately, they now seem to have lost their vogue. There Is no doubt that many friendships were severed and enemies made because of these frequently fre-quently offensive missives being sent with malice aforethought Meanwhile, the pretty valentines all hearts, paper lace and cupids seem to grew finer each year. Beautiful Beauti-ful hand-painted cards and painted and beautifully decorated boxes for confections con-fections are sold in great numbers. Not the least Interesting of the present-day valentines are the various and I numerous assortments of packages filled with all the paraphernalia ready to be assembled Into lovely valentines which children love to prepare for their teachers, friends and family. As it has now become more a day for i children than for grown-ups, these ' packages afford much pleasure to the i sender and to the recipient I |