rhymes for counting Magpies

Subject: RE: rhymes for counting Magpies
From: Mrrzy
Date: 10 Mar 19 - 10:24 AM

Fascinating. Reminds me of love me love me not with daisies (quite different in French than English, too, as are the sneeze counts).

Subject: RE: rhymes for counting Magpies
From: GUEST,Philippa
Date: 20 Sep 19 - 05:41 PM

I was looking up … three for a letter, four for something better... as that version is quoted by a character in Rebecca Tope's "A Cotswold Mystery".

Poems for counting sneezes have many of the same lines found in poems for counting magpies or crows. I see "Mouldy" mentioned this overlap in an older message.

Subject: RE: rhymes for counting Magpies
From: GUEST,Dave Hunt
Date: 21 Sep 19 - 10:10 AM

Does anyone still say to the first Magpie you see each day " Good morning Sir!" supposed to be bad luck if you don't do it

Subject: RE: rhymes for counting Magpies
From: BruceL
Date: 21 Sep 19 - 11:09 AM

As a young lad I was told to say 'Good Morning, Mrs Magpie' - but I can't remember if that was from my parents [Scottish] or locals in the Cotswolds, where I lived. Apparently, as magpies mate for life [this may not be true] a single magpie must have lost its partner so to ignore it would be bad luck. I still say 'Good morning/afternoon/evening' to lone magpies if I remember.

Subject: RE: rhymes for counting Magpies
From: The Sandman
Date: 21 Sep 19 - 05:03 PM

good morning my lord, is what i was taught, and yes Dave i still say it

Subject: RE: rhymes for counting Magpies
From: The Sandman
Date: 21 Sep 19 - 05:06 PM

I saw one last wednesday , the same day i decided to back a horse called lasting legacy, which won at 66 to one , now if i had not said good morning my lord three times .the horse might still be running

Subject: RE: rhymes for counting Magpies
From: GUEST,Philippa
Date: 21 Sep 19 - 07:04 PM

I need to correct a reference in my message of 20 Sept. The novel in which I came across a version of the magpie rhyme is called "A Grave in the Cotswolds". It is one of a series of Cotswold mysteries by Rebecca Tope.

Subject: RE: rhymes for counting Magpies
From: GUEST,Peter Laban
Date: 22 Sep 19 - 11:36 AM

Fiddler Tommy Peoples, in his book From Time to Time gives the following in the notes to his composition 'Two for joy' (a reel):

One for sorrow, two for joy
Three for a girl, four for a boy
Five for silver, six for gold
Seven for a secret, never to be told
Eight for diamonds, nine for love
Ten for a mystery from above.