'...In the country districts around Belfast, and probably in other parts of Ireland, there is an old and popular method of treating a complaint occurring on edge of eyelids popularly called "a sty" or "stihan" i.e., by puncturing, or pointing at the little abscess with a thorn yet firmly believed in by the peasantry. I have never been able to discover the origin of this method of treatment. Why the thorn should always be that of a gooseberry bush is peculiar. Sometimes one from an ordinary white thorn is used, but the former is preferred, and said to be more efficacious, especially so if the "sty" be pricked through a gold ring. In County Down, a gooseberry thorn is pointed nine times at the "sty" quite close, but not touching, and then the thorn thrown over the left shoulder...'
– Ulster Journal of Archaeology (1896)
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