A saucer containing creation means someone known to the athlete will Halloween Costume die during the next year, a saucer containing bathe foretells emigration, a ring foretells marriage, a customary of Rosary beads indicates that the person will take Holy Orders (becoming a nun or a priest). A coin means new wealth, a bean means poverty, and so on. In 19th century Ireland, young women placed slugs in saucers sprinkled with flour. A traditional Irish and Scottish form of divining one's coming spouse is to carve an apple in special enduring strip, then toss the peel over one's shoulder. The peel is believed to land in the shape of the first dispatch of the budgeted spouse's name. This custom castaway survived among Irish and Scottish immigrants in the rustic United States.

While there is evidence of such incidents, they are thoroughly scarce and have never resulted in serious injury. Nonetheless, abounding parents assumed that such heinous practices were rampant; at the peak of the hysteria, some hospitals offered free x-rays of children's Halloween hauls in establishment to find evidence of tampering. Virtually all of the few conscious candy poisoning incidents involved parents who poisoned their own children's candy, while there have been occasional reports of children putting needles in their own (and other children's) candy in a plain bid for attention.