J.B.Arthur,Ulster Folklife, 1957, p43:
"In addition to the crosses, imitation ladders and spinning wheels are also  woven from the rushes, (of St. Brrghid's Day Feb. 1), two or three rushes each being used for the purpose.  That night the young men and young women sleep with these under their pillow, the men having the spinning-wheels and the women the ladders.  One's future partner would subsequently first be seen climbing a ladder or spinning at a wheel."
These were often exchanged as love tokens- the man made the ladder the girl made the spinning wheel. They exchanged these and then if they dreamed of each other will be sure to marry- Danaher, Kevin, The Year in Ireland., Mercier, Minneapolis1972.

"Marriage in May was considered most unlucky. On the other hand May-Eve, was one of the nights when marriage divination might be successful. The girl who looked at the reflection of the "young May Moon" in her mirror or in a well might see her future husband looking over her shoulder.-Danaher, Kevin, The Year in Ireland., Mercier, Minneapolis1972. p.125.

Lady Wilde Wrote in Ancient Cures, Charms and Usages, 1890 (p.106-7)

"On May morning, before sunrise go out to the garden, and the first snail you see take up, and put it on a plate sprinkled lightly with flour, place a cabbage-leaf over, and so leave it till after sunrise, when you will find the initial letters of your lover's name traced on the flour.(this can be done between two plates as well)   "Should the snail be quite within his house when you take him up, your lover will be rich; but should the snail be almost out of his shell, then your future husband will be poor, and probably will have no house or home to take you to when you wed him.  Therefore take good heed of the warning given to you by the snail, or avoid trying your future fate if you are afraid of the result."

 On page 101 she says:
"Among others it is thought right and proper to have the threshold swept clean on May-Eve.  Ashes are then lightly sprinkled over it, and in the morning the print of a foot is looked for. If it turn inward a marriage is certain, but if outward then a death will happen in the family before the year is out."

Sir William Wilde wrote in  Irish Popular Superstitions, ( p. 49)of the Midsummer fire:
"As the fire sunk low, the girls tripped across it to procure good husbands;..

"In many places and especially in south Leinster, young men and women joined hands in couples and jumped together.....the onlookers took it for granted that there was some intention of marriage between the pair and the wiseacres claimed to be able to foretell the outcome from the way in which the flames flickered as the couple jumped."-Danaher, Kevin, The Year in Ireland., Mercier, Minneapolis1972.p:144.

On St. John's Eve or between St. John's Eve and Old St. John's day or little St. John's Day (June 29- July 4)  "Yarrow (Achillea millefolium) was  gathered....for medicinal use . It was also used in marriage divination by girls who recited while plucking it these words:

Good morrow, good yarrow, good morrow to thee
Send me this night my true love to see
The clothes htat he'll wear, the colour of his hair
And if he'll wed me.

The plant was put under the pillow and the girl dreamed of her future husband.-Danaher, Kevin, The Year in Ireland., Mercier, Minneapolis1972. p148.

Of the last sheaf of the End of the  Harvest: " The last  sheaf was held by many to affect the destiny of its cutter....Some held that  whoever cut or bound it would die unmarried. In county Carlow the girls were asked each to have a stroke at it with a reaping hook, and she who felled it at  one blow would be married within the year."-Danaher, Kevin, The Year in Ireland., Mercier, Minneapolis1972.p. 191.

Around Samhain:

"the custom of roasting  beans and nuts.  The girl who placed the bean watched where this would leap, some ampitious youth perhaps making a wide front on the landscape....Many a maiden and many a youth secretly spread shift or shirt before a fire and watched from safe coign of vantage to see who would turn these articles late at night. The reel of thread was cast into a lime kiln to find out who would wind it up again......As a girl, one November Eve, she ate up a salt  herring in three bites in the hope that her future husband might appear to her in a dream offering her a drink of water.  When she confessed this high crime, the parish priest said: "Were you not afraid that the devil would choke you?".....a ring concealed in one of the cakes (Bairin Breac-a fruit cake) foretold (early) marriage.-Danaher, Kevin, The Year in Ireland., Mercier, Minneapolis1972..202.

M.J. Murphy in At Slieve Gullion's Foot, P. 45 writes:
"A  marriage ring was  often mixed in the champ. Here boys and girls gathered round a pot on the floor, and armed with big spoons, tried to be first to get the ring in their mouths.  The winner would be married ere next Hallow Eve..."Sometimes a little circle of withy was used instead of a wedding ring.Danaher, Kevin, The Year in Ireland., Mercier, Minneapolis1972.p.219

The: Journal of the Kildare Archaeological Society, 1908, p.448 describes two other games-
"Two hazel-nuts ,walnuts or chestnuts, or even two grains of wheat, were selected and named after some boy and girl who were supposed to be courting.  They were then placed side by side on a bar of the grate, or in the turf-ashes, and according as to whether they burned quietly, or jumped apart from one another, so would be the future before them"...Four plates having been set down on a table, water was poured into one, a ring placed on another, some clay in the third, and in the fourth was placed either some straw, salt, or meal.  A person would then be blindfolded and led up to the table, and into whichever plate he or she placed their hand, so would their future turn out.  The water signified migration, the ring marriage, the clay death, and the fourth plate prosperity. On  re-arranging the order of the plates others would be blindfolded and led up in like manner."

"In county Kerry two beans were named for couples, first heated and then dropped into a vessel of water, with the words:
"Piosam,Po/sam, La/namha pho/ire, I me/isin uisce, I la/r na teine, Is ta/ mo la/namha po/sta.

"Piosam, Poisam, A pair of beans in a dish of water in the middle of the fire And my pair are married"

"If both beans sank at once, then the named pair are sure to marry and live in harmony.  If one sinks and one floats, they will not marry, if both float they will marry and quarrel."-Danaher, Kevin, The Year in Ireland., Mercier, Minneapolis1972. p.220.

Miss. A. Watson notes in Folklore, 1893, p.361-2:

"When we were children Hallow Eve was always an occasion for practicing mysterious rites, the end and aim of each being to foretell the future.  The first thing always was to get an old Iron spoon, filled with lead in scraps; this was held over a hot fire till it melted.  Then a key which must be the hall-door key, was held over a tub of cold water and the hot lead was poured through the wards of the key.  The lead cooled in falling through  the water, and when it had all settled in the bottom of the tub, the old nurse proceeded to read its surface.........the lead would take the form of the trade or profession of the future husband.

In Ancient Legends of Ireland Lady Wilde on p. 111. describes another  game:
"Another spell is the building of the house.  Twelve couples are taken., each being made of two holly twigs tied together with a hempen thread; these are all named and struck round in a circle in the clay.  A live coal is then placed in the centre, and whichever couple catches fire first will assuredly be married.  Then the future husband is invoked in the name of the Evil One to appear and quench the flame.On one occasion a dead man in his shroud answered the call, and silently drew away the girl from the rest of the party.  The fright turned her brain, and she never recovered her reason afterwards."

Bryan Merryman of County Clare describes a divination in his long Irish poem: Cu/irt an Mheadhon Oi/dhche (lines 287-306)

No trick of which you'd read or hear
At dark of moon, or where it's clear,
At shrove or Samhain or through the year,
That I've not tried to find my dear!
Under my pillow I've kept all night
A stocking stuffed with apples tight,
For hours a pious fast kept up
Without a thought of bite  or sup.
My shift I'd draw against the stream
In hope of my  sweetheart to dream.

The stack I'd sweep without avail
Left in the embers hair and nail.
The flail against the gable laid.
Under my bolster put the spade.
My distaff in the oast would lie.
I'd drop spun yarn in the lime-kiln's eye
Flax seed upon the road I'd fling.
A cabbage head to bed I'd bring.
There is no trick of these I mention
That I've not tried for the Devil's intention. "

....All the things mentioned were to induce a dream of the future partner....bairin breac, the first spoonful of colcannon ...the last left on the plate....were  put into the girl's left stocking and tied with her right garter or nine ivy leaves with the words:
"Nine ivy leaves I place under my head
to dream of the living and not of the dead,
to dream of the man I am going to wed,
and to see him tonight at the foot of my bed"

Fasting inducing thirst was thought to cause dreams of the intended offering a drink. Salt herring eaten at bedtime, salted porridge or flour salt and soot would also work.  If you dried out your shift on the river bank, on which  the figure of the lover will be seen on the opposite bank, or his face reflected on the water.Others said that it must be hung up to dry, and the watching girl would see her future husband turning it during the night.  Sometimes a young man would dip and dry his  shirt in this way to see his future wife.

 If you sweep around the base of the corn stack with a broom three times you will see your future partner or his name will be spoken aloud. Sometimes you just have to walk around the stack three times.

Drop hair and nail clippings into the last embers of a fire and you will  have a  dream of your husband  or wife to be.

A flail or spade will bring a vision of the man. A cuigeal or distaff of the spinning wheel should be placed in the corn-drying kiln to reveal the same.

Drop a ball of woollen thread into the pit of a limekiln  and wind it back slowly . If the string caught the girl asks who is holding it and the voice of the future husband should answer.

You can also drop a ball of yarn out the window and  according to  General Vallency in Collectanaea de Rebus Hibernicus, xii, 460   the Pater Noster should be said backwards while winding in the thread.

If a girl went to the crossroads at night and sprinkled flax seed on the road or put a su/ga/n  across it her intended husband would step across it at midnight.

If  an apple is peeled in one long strip and then it is let fall  on the ground it will form the initials of a future husband. If a girl eats an apple in f ront of a mirror the future husband will be seen looking over the girl's shoulder.

If you wash your face but do not  dry it before bed the lover will appear in a dream proferring a towel.

Put the letters of the alphabet on pieces of paper. Float these face downwards on  a basin of water. In the morning they  should be found to  have sunk to the bottom and those which have turned over to show the letters will show the initials or spell the name of the future spouse.

"A daring girl might take a mouthful of water, and holding it in the  mouth  without  swallowing, creep close to the door or window of a neighbour's house and listen until the name of a young unmarried man was mentioned in the conversation by somebody within, when by virtue of the charm of youth would become her husband. A  grain of wheat held  between the teeth was believed by  some to be equally potent."

"Three stalks of corn  pulled from the stack at the dead of  night could also tell their tale.  The first two were discarded, but the state of  the third ear would surely reveal, by its form and size, how rich and how handsome would be the desired husband or wife."

"A head of cabbage, pulled up by the root gave much information on the crucial marriage question: A.J. Pollock, in Ulster Folklife, 1960,62 gives a version from County Down of this  very  widespread custom:
"The girls were blindfolded and sent out in pairs, hand in hand, up the garden or field and told to pull the first cabbage they found . Its size and shape-whether it was big or small, streight or crooked - would indicate the shape and nature of their future spouse.  If there was only a little they would be poor.  The taste of the "custoc", i.e. the heart would tell them his temper and disposition, according to whether it was sweet or bitter.  Finally the "runts" or stems were hung above the door,  each  was given a number and the name of a boy friend, for example Barney might be the name given to the third runt.  If Barney was the third person to enter the house on the night, this was considered to be a good omen."
Other versions go further and say that if the young man indicated in the charm can by some means be induced to eat part of the same cabbage head, he will inevitably lead the girl to the altar."

A.J. Pollock in the source cited above also gives this charm from the County Down p.63:
"If none of these charms worked you could always try to  "winnow three wechts of nothing", the wecht being the skin of a winnowing tray. You had to go alone to a barn, open both doors and take them off their hinges.  This was important, for the Being that would appear might otherwise shut the doors and do you harm.  You then took the wecht and went through the motions of winnowing corn in a strong wind.  This was repeated three times, and on the third occasion an apparition would pass through the barn, in at the "windy" door and out through the other.  The face would be that of your future husband, and the clothes he wore and the tools he carried would tell you both his occupation and station in life."

 The Journal of the Kildare Archaeological Society, 1908,449  mentions a similar  charm:
A boy  would go to a barn and sow  oats along its floor, in the name of the devil, from one end to the other.  Having done that, he would go to  the door, open it, and expect to see the fetch of his future wife standing outside.  Instances have been known where, in place of the fetch, a coffin has appeared and this foretells to the beholder that he will not be alive on that night twelve-month."

Another charm from County Down comes from R.H. Buchanan in Ulster Folklife, 1963, 68.:
"In many parts of Co. Down salt was used in another way.  Here the girl would sprinkle salt on the four corners of the bed and repeat the following verse:
"Salt, salt, I salt thee
In the name of God in unity.
If I'm for a man or a man for me
In my first sleep may I see him
The colour of his hair, the clothes he'll wear
The day he weds with me"

Rose Shaw, in Carleton's Country, 57, writing of the Clogher Valley in county Tyrone mentions again the ladders and spinning wheels of rushes:
"Also they had made wee ladders with rushes cut in the Three Counties Hollow, and they would hang the ladders above their beds that night- a sure way for a girl to see "himself" walk up the ladder in her  dreams."

Ca/it Ni Bhra/daigh in Be/aloideas, 1936,268-9 notes:
"Put three knots on the left garter, and at every knot say:
"This knot, this knot ,this knot to see
The thing I never saw yet.
To see my love in his array
And what he walks in every day,
And what his occupation,
This night may I in my dream see
And if my love be clad in green,
His love for me it is well seen,
And if my love be clad in grey,
His love for me is far away.
And if my love is clad in blue,
His love for me is very true."
"Go to bed, place the knotted garter under your pillow, and you will see your future husband in a dream."
"Cut nine stalks of yarrow with a black-handled knife.  When all are gone to bead say:
"Good morrow, good morrow, my pretty yarrow!
I pray before this time to-morrow
You will tell who my true love shall be
The clothes that he wears, and the name that he bears,
And the day that he'lll come to wed me"

On New Years Eve put out holly and ivy leaves, or a sprig of mistletoe  under a pillow to bring  a dream of the future husband you can recite:

"Oh, ivy green and holly red,
Tell me, tell me whom I shall wed!
 

-Danaher, Kevin, The Year in Ireland., Mercier, Minneapolis1972.p222.

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