The Witch-cult in Western Europe Part 28

Rebecca West, a young Ess.e.x witch (1645), confessed to Matthew Hopkins that 'if shee should discover any thing, they all told the said Rebecca, shee should endure more torments on earth, then could be in h.e.l.l: and the said Rebecca told this informant that shee promised to keepe all their secrets; and moreover they all told her, that shee must never confesse any thing, although the rope were about her necke, and shee ready to be hanged'.[824]

In Fifeshire (1649) 'ane Mistres Hendersone (sister to Fordell Hendersone, in the presbytrey of Dumfermling), sometymes lady of Pittahro, being delated by many to be a witch, was apprehended and caried to Edenbroughe, wher she was keiped fast; and after her remaining in prison for a tyme, being in health att night, vpon the morne was founde dead. It was thought, and spoken by many, that she wronged her selfe, either by strangling or by poyson.'[825] The Swedish children (1670) were not spared: 'if the Children did at any time name the Names of those that had carried them away, they were again carried by force either to Blockula, or to the Cross way, and there miserably beaten, insomuch that some of them died of it.'[826]

Whether Deliverance Hobbs (1692) was actually beaten, or whether her statement was made from the knowledge of what might happen to her, cannot be certain without reference to the records of the trial itself, as Mather's bias is apt to distort the evidence: 'She now testifi'd, that this _Bishop_ tempted her to Sign the _Book_ again, and to deny what she had confess'd. She affirm'd, that it was the Shape of this Prisoner, which whipped her with Iron Rods, to compel her thereunto.'[827] Elizabeth Anderson in Renfrewshire (1696) went with her father to a witch-meeting, 'severals of them being affraid that the Declarant would Confess, and tell of them as she done formerly on her Grand-mother, they threatened to tear her all in pieces if she did so.'[828] John Reid of the same Coven-

'after his Confession had called out of his prison Window, desiring Baily Scott to keep that old body Angus Forrester, who had been his fellow prisoner, closs and secure; whereupon the company asked John when they were leaving him on Friday night the 21th of May, whether he desired company or would be afraid alone, he said he had no fear of anything: So being left till Sat.u.r.day in the Forenoon, he was found in this posture, viz. sitting upon a stool which was on the Hearth of the Chimney, with his feet on the floor and his Body straight upward, his shoulders touching the lintel of the Chimney, but his Neck tyed with his own neck-cloath (whereof the knot was behind) to a small stick thrust into a hole above the lintel of the Chimney, upon which the Company, especially John Campbel a Chyrurgeon who was called, thought at first in respect of his being in an ordinary posture of sitting, and the neck-cloath not having any drawn knot (or _run loup_) but an ordinary one which was not very strait, and the sticke not having the strength to bear the weight of his Body or the struggle, that he had not been quite dead; but finding it otherways, and that he was in such a Situation that he could not have been the Actor thereof himself, concluded that some extraordinary Agent had done it, especially considering that the Door of the Room was secured, and that there was a board set over the Window which was not there the night before when they left him.'[829]

A similar fate befell the warlock Playfair in 1597. He was found strangled in his prison at Dalkeith with the 'point' of his breeches tied round his neck.[830]

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 735: Cotton Mather, p. 160.]

[Footnote 736: De Lancre, _Tableau_, p. 123.]

[Footnote 737: Pitcairn, i, pt. ii, pp. 219, 220, 239, 240.]

[Footnote 738: Potts, B 2.]

[Footnote 739: Sinclair, pp. 46, 47.]

[Footnote 740: Kinloch, pp. 124, 129.]

[Footnote 741: Pitcairn, iii, pp. 603, 605.]

[Footnote 742: Pitcairn, iii, p. 617.]

[Footnote 743: Glanvil, pt. ii, pp. 139, 147, 148.]

[Footnote 744: Id., pt. ii, pp. 291, 293.]

[Footnote 745: Pitcairn, i, pt. iii, p. 246.]

[Footnote 746: _Spalding Club Misc._, pp. 97, 98.]

[Footnote 747: Ib., p. 115.]

[Footnote 748: Fountainhall, i, p. 14.]

[Footnote 749: Law, p. 145.]

[Footnote 750: _Spalding Club Misc._, i, p. 142.]

[Footnote 751: _Spottiswoode Misc._, ii, p. 67.]

[Footnote 752: Ib., ii, p. 68.]

[Footnote 753: Sinclair, p. 219.]

[Footnote 754: Pearson, ii, p. 26.]

[Footnote 755: _Rehearsall_, par. 26.]

[Footnote 756: _Spalding Club Misc._, i, p. 171.]

[Footnote 757: De Lancre, _L'Incredulite_, p. 36.]

[Footnote 758: Id., _Tableau_, p. 401.]

[Footnote 759: Pitcairn, iii, pp. 610, 613.]

[Footnote 760: Burr, p. 417.]

[Footnote 761: Lemoine, _La Tradition_, 1892, vi, pp. 108, 109. The italics are in the original.]

[Footnote 762: Pitcairn, i, pt. ii, p. 52.]

[Footnote 763: _Witches taken at St. Oses._]

[Footnote 764: Pitcairn, i, pt. ii, p. 245.]

[Footnote 765: _Spalding Club Misc._, i, pp. 87 seq.]

[Footnote 766: Potts.]

[Footnote 767: Goldsmid, p. 13. Translated from the French record.]

[Footnote 768: Fyfe, p. 87.]

[Footnote 769: _Scottish Antiquary_, ix, pp. 50-2.]

[Footnote 770: Kinloch, p. 114.]

[Footnote 771: From the record of the trial in the Edinburgh Justiciary Court.]

[Footnote 772: Burns Begg, pp. 219 seq.]

[Footnote 773: Pitcairn, iii, pp. 603-17.]

[Footnote 774: Glanvil, pt. ii, pp. 140 seq.]

[Footnote 775: _Surtees Soc._, xl, pp. 191, 192; _Denham Tracts_, ii, pp.

300-2, 304.]

[Footnote 776: Hector, i, pp. 51-6.]

[Footnote 777: Cooper, _Mystery_, pp. 90-2.]

[Footnote 778: Pitcairn, ii, pp. 53, 54.]