Witch Stories Part 9

Elizabeth } bewitched Robert Stanneuet, vii milch Ewstace } beasts, w{h} gaue blood in steede of milke, and seuerall of his Swine dyed.

Little Okley. 9. Annys Herd } bewitched {Richard Harrisons wife, and } to death { two wives of William { Dowsinge, as it is { supposed.

Annys Herd } bewitched Cartwright two beasts, } made, sheepe, and lambes xx; West } swine, and pigs; Diborne, a brewing } of beere, and seuerall other losses } of milke and creame.

Walton. 10. Joan Robinson} bewitched beasts, horses, swine, and } pigs, of seuerall men.

"The sayd Ursley Kemp had foure spyrites, viz., their names Tettey a hee like a gray Cat, Jack a hee like a black Cat, Pygin a she like a black Toad, and Tyffin a she like a white Lambe. The hees were to plague to death, and the shees to punish with bodily harme, and to destroy cattell.

"Tyffyn, Ursley's white Spirit, did tell her alwayes (when she asked) what the other witches had done: and by her the most part were appelled, which spirit telled her alwayes true. As is well approved by the other Witches confession.

"The sayd Ales Newman had the sayd Ursley Kemps spirits to vse at her pleasure. Elizabeth Bennet had two spirits, viz., their names Suckyn, a hee like a blacke Dog: and Lyard, red lyke a Lyon or Hare.

"Ales Hunt had two spirits lyke Colts, the one blacke, the other white.

"11. Margery Sammon had two spirits lyke Toads, their Names Tom and Robyn.

"Cysley Celles had two spirits by seuerall names, viz., Sotheons, Hercules, Jack, or Mercury.

"Ales Manfield and Margaret Greuell had in common by agreement, iiii Spirits, viz., their names Robin, Jack, Will, Puppet, alias Mamet, whereof two were hees, and two were shees, lyke vnto black Cats.

"Elizabeth Ewstace had iii Impes or Spirits of colour white, grey, and black.

"Annis Herd had vi Impes or Spirites, like auises and black byrdes, and vi other like Kine, of the bygnes of Rats, with short hornes; the Auises shee fed with wheat, barley, otes, and bread, the Kine with straw and hay.

Annys Glasc.o.c.ke. } These have not confessed any thing touching 12. Joan Pechey. } the hauing of spirits.

13. Joan Robinson.}

Annis Glasc.o.c.ke } bewitched { Mych.e.l.l Steuens Childe.

} to death { The base Childe at Pages.

{William Pages Childe.

Thus did W. W. and Bryan Darcey finish their respective works, in which, perhaps, this formal tabular statement, this pretence at scientific arrangement and accuracy, is the strangest and most revolting element.[105]

Another rare and curious[106] black-letter pamphlet gives a marvellous account of a woman's possession, as it happened in Somersetshire; which perchance we of the light-minded and sceptical nineteenth century might interpret differently to what the believing sixteenth held likely.

THE WOMAN AND THE BEAR.

One Stephen Cooper, of Ditchet, a yeoman of honest reputation, good wealth, and well beloved by his neighbours, being sick and weak, sent his wife Margaret to a farm of his at Rockington, Gloucestershire, where she remained a few days--not finding all to her liking, she said. When she returned she found her husband somewhat better, but she herself was strange and wild, using much idle talk to him concerning an old groat which her little son had found and which she wanted to see, and raving about the farm in Gloucestershire, as if she had been bewitched, and knew not what she said. Then she began to change in very face, and to look on her husband with "a sad and staring countenance;" and, one night, things came to a climax, for she got very wild and bad, and shook so frightfully that they could scarce keep her down in the bed; and then she began talking of a headless bear, which, she said, she had been into the town to beat away during the time of her fit, and which had followed her from Rockington: as the sequel proved was true. Her friends and husband exhorted her to prayer and patience, but she still continued marvellously holden, the Devil getting quite the better of her until Sunday night, when she seemed to come to her worst. Suddenly the candle, which they had not been noticing, went out, and she set up a lamentable cry; they lighted another, but it burnt so dim it was almost useless, and the friends and neighbours themselves began to be disquieted. Wildly and hurriedly cried Margaret, "Look! do you not see the Devil?" herself all terrified and disturbed. They bade her be still and pray. Then said Margaret, "Well, if you see nothing now, you shall see something by and bye;" and "forthwith they heard a noise in the streete, as it had been the coming of two or three carts, and presently they in the chamber cried out, 'Lord helpe us, what manner of thing is this that commeth here!'" For up to the bedside where the woman lay with heaving b.r.e.a.s.t.s and dilated eyes, came a thing like a bear, only that it had no head and no tail; a thing "half a yard in height and half a yard in length" (no bigger, Margaret? not so big as a well-trussed man on all-fours?) which, when her husband saw, he took a joyn'd stool, and "stroke" at it, and the blow sounded as though it had fallen on a feather bed. But the creature took no notice of the man: it wanted only Margaret. Slowly it paddled round the bed, then smote her thrice on the feet, took her out of bed, and rolled her to and fro in the chamber, round about the floor and under the bed; the husband and friends, sore amazed and affrighted, only calling on G.o.d to a.s.sist them, not daring to lift a hand for themselves or her. And all the while the candle grew dimmer and dimmer, so that they could scarce see each other: which was what Margaret and the headless bear, no doubt, desired. Then the creature took her in its arms, thrust her head between her legs so that he made her into a round ball, and "so roulled her in a rounde compa.s.se like an Hoope through three other Chambers, downe an highe paire of staires, in the Hall, where he kept her for the s.p.a.ce of a quarter of an hour." The people above durst not come down, but remained above, weeping pitifully and praying with loud and fervent prayer. And there was such a terrible stench in the hall, and such fiery flames darting hither and thither, that they were fain to stop their noses with clothes and napkins, expecting every moment to find that h.e.l.l was opening beneath their feet, and that they would be no longer able to keep out of harm's way and the Devil's. Then Margaret cried out, "He is gone. Now he is gone!" and her husband joyfully bade her come up to him again; which she did, but so quickly that they greatly marvelled at it, and thought to be sure the Devil had helped her.

Yet she proved to be none the worse for the encounter: which was singular, as times went. They then put her in bed, and four of them kept down the clothes, praying fervently. Suddenly the woman was got out of bed: she did not move herself by nerves, muscles, or will, of course; but she was carried out by a supernatural power, and taken to the window at the head of the bed. But whether the devil or she opened the window, the pamphlet does not determine. Then her legs were thrust out of the window, and the people heard a thing knock at her feet as if it had been upon a tub; and they saw a great fire, and they smelt a grievous smell; and then, by the help of their prayers, they pulled Margaret into the room again, and set her upon her feet. After a few moments she cried out, "O Lord, methinks I see a little childe!" But they paid no heed to her. Twice or thrice she said this, and ever more earnestly; and at last they all looked out at the window, for they thought to be sure she must have some meaning for her raving. And "loe, they espied a thing like unto a little child, with a bright shining countenaunce casting a greate light in the chamber." And then the candle, which had hitherto burnt blue and dim, gave out its natural light so that they could all see each other. Whereupon they fell to joyful prayer, and gave thanks to G.o.d for the deliverance. And Margaret Cooper was laid in her bed again, calm, smiling, and collected, never more to be troubled by a Headless Bear which rolled her about like a ball, or by a bright shining child looking out from the c.h.i.n.ks of a rude magic lantern. As for the bear, I confess I think he was nearer akin to man than devil; that he was known about Rockington in Gloucestershire; and that Margaret Cooper understood the conduct of the plot from first to last. But then this is the sceptical nineteenth century, wherein the wiles of human cunning are more believed in than the power of the devil, or the miracles of supernaturalism. Yet this was a case which, in spite of all its fraud and folly so patently displayed, was cited as one of the most notorious and striking instances of the power of Satan over the bodies as well as the souls of those who gave themselves up to the things of the world.

THE WITCHES OF WARBOIS.[107]

In 1589, Robert Throckmorton, Esquire, lived at Warbois, in Huntingdonshire. He had five daughters, the eldest of whom, Miss Joan, was fifteen, while the rest came down in steps, two years or so between each, in the ordinary manner. On the tenth of November, Mistress Jane, being then near ten years of age, was suddenly seized with a kind of fit. She "screeked" loud and often, lay as if in a trance for half an hour or more, shook one leg or one arm and no other, "as if the Palsie had been in it,"

made her body so stiff and rigid that no man could bend her, and went through the usual forms of a young girl's hysteria. A neighbour, one Alice Samuel, who lived next door to the Throckmortons, went in to see the afflicted child; for all the neighbours were flocking in to see her as a kind of curiosity; and, stepping up into the chimney-side, sat hard down by her, she being held in another woman's arms by the fire. Suddenly the child cried out, "Did you ever see one more like a Witch than she is?"

pointing to Mother Samuel; "take off her black-thrumb'd cap, for I cannot abide to look at her."

Nothing was thought of her words at the time, the mother merely chiding her for her lightness of speech; but "the old woman hearing her, sat still, without saying a word, yet looked very dismally, as those that saw her remembered very well." And as well she might, poor old soul; for she must have known that Mrs. Jane's light speech would in all probability be heavy enough to bring her down to the grave.

Doctoring did the child no good. Dr. Barrow of Cambridge, the most noted man of the district, gave the distemper no satisfactory name, and his remedies were powerless to remove it; Mr. Butler, another skilful man, was equally at fault; and when, about a month after Mrs. Jane had been attacked, two other daughters were driven to the like extremity, and "cry'd out upon Mother Samuel, 'Take her away, look where she standeth there before us in a black thrumb'd Cap (which she commonly wore, though not then); it's she that hath bewitched us, and she will kill us if you don't take her away,'" the parents were moved to believe the whole thing supernatural, and that Mother Samuel had indeed bewitched them as they said. About a month after the affliction of these two, a younger child, not quite nine years old, was taken like the rest; and soon after Mrs.

Joan, of fifteen, went the same way--only more severely handled than them all. Mrs. Joan had a specialty in her fits. She was not only hysterical like her sisters, but she had a Spirit, and this Spirit sounded in her ears information of things to come: as, that the servants as well as the five children should be bewitched--which they were, but did not become so notorious as the little impostors of better blood; all recovering so soon as they left the house for other situations, and nothing more being heard of them. Things went on then in this manner, the children being perpetually tormented with fits, and for ever crying out against old dame Samuel, when, in February of the next year (1590), it was resolved to bring her to the house that the children might "scratch" her, and so relieve themselves somewhat. Whereupon she, her young daughter Agnes, and one Cicely Burder--both of whom were accused of the same malpractices as herself--were haled to Mr. Throckmorton's, there to undergo their preliminary ordeal. Every care was taken to prevent the mother from holding any communication with her daughter Agnes; but at the entry she managed to lean over and whisper to her. Mr. Pickering, the children's uncle, who had undertaken to conduct this Scratching, was ready to swear that she said, "I charge thee do not confess anything;" but Mother Samuel swore, in her turn, that she had only charged her to hasten home to get her father his dinner; for that same father was a terrible old Turk, and not likely to wait patiently for his dinner or aught else.

When the women went into the house the children were standing by the fire, perfectly well; but the instant they saw Mother Samuel, they fell down in their fits, leaping and springing about like fishes newly taken out of the water, drawing their heads and heels backwards, and throwing out their arms with great groans that were terrible and troublesome to those that beheld them. They screamed and struggled to get at the old woman, scratching at the bed-clothes, or the maids' ap.r.o.ns, or anything they could touch, crying out, "O! that I had her! O! that I had her!" And when Mr. Pickering forced Mother Samuel's hand within theirs, they scratched at it with so much vehemence that one of them splintered her nails "with her eager desire of revenge;" doing the same by Cicely Burder, who thus, we are not told how or why, found herself in a dangerous and equivocal position, but seems to have got well out of it in time. Or perhaps she died between whiles, happily for herself.

For the next few months it was Mrs. Elizabeth Throckmorton who kept up the ball. Mr. Pickering took her away with him to his own house, where she fooled them all to the top of their bent, crying out to Mother Samuel to take away her mouse, for she would have none of it, and exclaiming in piteous tones that Mother Samuel was trying to force a cat, or a frog, or sometimes a toad, into her mouth; hopping about on one leg, pretending to be utterly incapable of putting the other to the ground; sometimes going for two steps at a time, when "she would halt and give a beck with her head as low as her knees;" asking if no one heard the spirit within her lapping the milk she had just taken; playing at cards with her eyes shut, or seemingly so; and falling into drowsy fits which took her even in the midst of meals, or any while else specially untimely. Her bewitchment took a certain controversial turn too, and witnessed for the Pope and the Devil; for "on the Eleventh, one asked her if she loved the Word of G.o.d; whereupon she was much troubled and tormented. When they asked, Love you Witchcraft? she was content. Love you the Bible? it shaked her. Love you Papistry? the Devil within her was quiet. Love you Prayer? it raged. Love you the Ma.s.s? it was still. Love you the Gospel? it heaved up her Belly; so that every good thing it disliked; but whatever concerned Popish Idolatry it was pleased with." Mr. Pickering kept this sectarian young lady from March to September, and then it pleased Mistress Elizabeth to require change of air and scene, and she demanded to be taken back to her father's house at Warbois. There she played off her tricks with new vigour, when Lady Cromwell, wife of Sir Henry Cromwell, Knt., hearing of these heavy afflictions came to visit the children and comfort the parents. The children of course went off into their customary state; it was not their game to disappoint my Lady; "and were so grievously Tormented that it moved the good Lady's Heart with Pity, so that she could not forbear Tears, and caused old Mother Samuel to be sent for, who durst not deny to come, because her Husband was Tenant to Sir Henry Cromwell."

As soon as she came in, the children were so much worse that the Lady, transported beyond herself, and exceedingly angry that Mother Samuel would not confess to her crime, seized hold of her as she was struggling to get free of their hands and slip out of the room, pulled off her kircher, and cut off a lock of her hair, which she gave privately to Mrs. Throckmorton together with the old dame's hairlace; bidding her burn them. The old woman turning against the Lady, said, half sorrowfully, "Madam, why do you use me thus? I never did you any harm as yet:" words to be remembered and treasured up against her, when the hour came. That very night Lady Cromwell had bad dreams concerning Mother Samuel and her cat, which she said came to strip all the flesh from her--and awakened, crying mightily and much distressed. From that time she had fits, and continued very hardly holden till her dying day, which was one year and a quarter after the visit to Warbois. So Mother Samuel's words were held to have been witch's threats, and the whole country was convinced that Lady Cromwell had died by her magic arts, and bewitched. As she was, poor lady, with nervous fear and superst.i.tion and ignorance.

The next year, in the winter of 1591, Mr. Henry Pickering, a young student at Cambridge, tried to make Dame Samuel confess, but she would not suffer him or his companions to speak, and when they desired her to speak softlier, answered: "She was born in a Mill, begot in a Kiln, and must have her Will, and could speak no softlier." Then Mr. Henry began to question her on her faith, but got only tart answers; so, losing patience, he said that if she did not repent and confess to having worked that wickedness on the children, he hoped one day to see her burn at the stake, and that he would bring wood and f.a.ggots and the children should blow the coals. To which old Dame Samuel replied that she "would rather see him doused over head in the pond;" and so went away home, to be beaten for gossiping and staying late, by that terrible old Turk of hers.

And now the children would be well only when the dame was with them; so the parents sought to engage her to live with them, but the old Turk would not give his consent, and beat her severely with a cudgel on the slightest pretext. The whole thing angered him, and his dame could not do right let her do what she would. However, he was prevailed on to spare her for eight or nine days, during which time the lying little girls professed themselves cured of all their haunting spirits--dun chickens, naked babes, and the like; to the old woman's extreme consternation and pa.s.sionate a.s.surances of innocence. Then the children turned against Agnes Samuel, the daughter, declaring that she had bewitched them equally with the mother: whereupon the father, Mr. Throckmorton, went to bring her to the house; when she hid herself in an attic or loft, barricading herself in by sacks of wool piled up on the trapdoor. She was forced to come down at last, and her fear was made the chief evidence against her. The hour had come round for her on Time's cruel dial, and she could not escape the inevitable decree that had gone forth. All this while the old mother was forcibly detained at Mr. Throckmorton's house; the children pretending that they could be well only in her presence, and absolutely refusing to let her go, though she was sick and fearful and weary, and cried to get home again to her daughter and husband. That uncompromising oaken cudgel of his was less terrible than the awful suspicion under which she was living here; and the hara.s.sing uncertainty of her life--never knowing what new lie the children might frame against her, nor how much nearer they might bring her to the gallows by some wicked fancy or delusion--was infinitely worse than all the oaths and ill-usage of home, of which she knew at least the extent and end. She seems to have been a gentle-spirited old creature in spite of her crusty tongue; and at the beck of every one who chose to knock her about and require from her service and submission.

When Mr. Throckmorton had teased and threatened and exhorted her, till she was completely "dazed and mazed" with all she heard--and when the children had acted their fits with such power and accuracy that they simulated nature to the life, and had impressed even her with all the wicked things which their Spirits told them of her and of her daughter--her mind, enfeebled by suffering and terror, gave way, and she was deluded into a confession of sin and penitence; after which she obtained leave to go home. As her husband gave her but a harsh welcome, angry with her for her weakness in confessing, she recanted as of course; when Mr. Throckmorton, getting hold of her by an open window beneath which his friends were stationed, bullied and deluded her once more into making a confession which they might hear; and on the strength of which he carried off both dame and daughter, to be examined by the Bishop of Lincoln.

The Bishop found her easy. Yes, she had an imp; a dun chicken which sucked on her chin, and which she had sent to torment the Throckmorton girls. The dun chicken and the rest of the spirits were now at the bottom of her stomach, and made her so full and heavy that she could not lace her coat, nor was the horse on which she rode able to carry her all the way: she had three spirits, all like dun chickens--Pluck, Catch, and White, which had been given her by an "upright man," extremely hard, of the name of Langland, of no particular dwelling and now gone beyond seas; and she had sent all three to the children and had plagued them sorely. This she said at various times, at each clause conjuring the devil and her spirits to inform her of the facts required by the Right Reverend Father in G.o.d.

After her examination she and her daughter were committed to gaol; but Mr.

Throckmorton got Agnes out on bail that he might take her home to the children, and see what they would say of her. This seemed to him the best way to complete the evidences of guiltiness against her, which at present were very slight and worthless. So the net closed tighter and tighter round this hapless family, and soon the deep black waves, rolling onward, dashed over their devoted heads.

When they heard that Agnes was brought back to Warbois, the children fell into their fits again, each saying, "I am glad, I am glad; none so glad as I." They knew the cruel sport preparing for them, and were in no hurry to abandon the pleasant excitement of their Possession, during which they were made so many centres of public interest, petted and commiserated and looked at and talked about and made of more consequence than the finest lady in the land. When the game was over they must sink down into the humdrum lives of good little girls in a country town, of no possible interest to living being outside their own house door. Surely an event to be deferred to the latest moment possible! For the first three or four days after Agnes' arrival they condescended to be well, but, being by that time tired of their new companion, they fell back into their former state, and cried out against her more bitterly than they had ever done against her mother. She was more helpless, too, than the mother, and more entirely in their power; so that the sport was greater, and the fear of opposition or detection less. Specially did Mistress Joan, the eldest girl, torment her; who, being at this time seventeen, had other ideas of spirits than dun chickens, mice, or frogs, which were all very well in the days of her infancy but quite uninteresting to her now. The manner in which she introduced her Spirits was singular. One day, just after her nose had bled, and she had said "it would be a good thing to throw her handkerchief into the fire, and burn the young witch," she suddenly looked about her smiling, and said, "What is this in G.o.d's Name that comes tumbling to me?

It tumbles like a Foot-bal, it looks like a puppit-player, and appears much like its Dame's old thrumb Cap. 'What is your Name, I pray you?' said she. The Thing answered, his Name was Blew. To which she answered, 'Mr.

Blew you are welcome, I never saw you before; I thought my Nose bled not for nothing, what News have you brought? What,' says she, 'dost thou say I shall be worse handled than ever I was? Ha! what dost thou say? that I shall now have my Fits, when I shall both hear and see and know every Body? that's a new Trick indeed. I think never any of my Sisters were so used, but I care not for you: do your worst, and when you have done, you will make an end.'" Then she cried out that Agnes Samuel had too much liberty, and must be more strictly looked to; for that Mr. Blew had told her she should have no peace till she and the old dame were hanged.

Mrs. Joan had opened a most prolific and amusing vein. Her imagination stopped at nothing, and she showed herself no mean hand at romance. She was very consecutive too, and kept up the likeness well. In the evening Mr. Blew appeared again, chiefly for the purpose of telling her that young Nan Samuel was his Dame, and to ask when the Spirit Smack, of whom he was jealous, had been with her. Mrs. Joan said she knew of no Smack. "You do,"

says the Thing, "and it is he that tells you all these things, but I will curse him for it." "Do your worst to me or him, I care not for you," says she. "Farewel," says the Thing. "Do you bid me farewel?" says she; "farewel, and be hanged; and come again when you are sent for." So then she came out of her fit. The next day a strange gentleman coming, Mrs.

Elizabeth pa.s.sed off into one of her wild states, and Mr. Throckmorton, "to show the gentleman a wonder," sent for young Agnes, and made her say after him, "I charge thee, thou Devil, as I love thee, and have Authority over thee, and am a Witch, and guilty of this matter, that thou suffer this Child to be well at this present." Upon which Mrs. Elizabeth wiped her eyes, and was perfectly well; and the wretched young girl was by so many steps nearer to her doom. The next day was a grand field-day for Mrs. Joan. Her spirits were in admirable disorder. Mr. Smack came from fighting with Pluck about her, for they were both in love with her, and had fought with great cowl staves last night in old dame's back yard, and Smack had broken Pluck's head, for which Mrs. Joan was not at all thankful, but, when he looked for a little loving word of grat.i.tude, answered, scornfully, that she wished Pluck had broke his neck also, and so bid him go and be hanged for she would have nought to do with him.

Presently in came Mr. Pluck, hanging down his broken head and looking very sheepish, but jealous and angry with Smack who seemed to have the best chance of them all with the young lady. Another day it was Catch who came in limping, with a broken leg got from the redoubtable Smack; but when Mrs. Joan tried to break his other leg with a stick she had in her hand--for she was a very scornful young lady to them--she could not; for ever as she struck at him he leaped over the stick, "just like a Jack-an-apes," as she said. Mr. Blew's turn came next. He appeared before her at supper with his arm in a sling: Smack had broken it. So Smack broke Pluck's head, Catch's leg, and Blew's arm, and then came himself to tell her that he would beat them all again, with the help of his cousin another Smack, and one Hardname, whose "Name standeth upon eight Letters, and every Letter standeth for a Word, but what his Name is otherwise we know not." Then Smack and she conversed about the propriety of "scratching"

Agnes Samuel; and it was agreed between them that she should not scratch her then, because her face would be healed by the a.s.sizes, but just before that time when all the world might see the marks.

And now began a scene of painful brutality. Whenever the children fell into their fits, they would only consent to be got out of them by Agnes'

repeating a form of conjuration, in which she acknowledged herself to be a witch and guilty of their disease, commanding the devil, whom she had sent into them, to leave them. Then they came round, and were well until strangers called, when they invariably went off into their fits--which we can quite well understand--or until they got tired of the monotony of health. The most terrible threats were held out against Nan Samuel; and each child talked to its particular spirit with pa.s.sion and fury of scratching her. It came at last: the little diabolical tempers which rose higher and higher with each fresh indulgence, getting weary of only fits and muttered communications with spirits and the thirst for blood grew into a frenzy. One of the younger children, Mrs. Mary, one day fell into a "very troublesome Fit," which held her half an hour, and at the last, growing better, she said, "Is it true? Do you say this is the day I must scratch the young Witch? I am glad of it; I will pay her home both for myself and Sisters." The young Pickering men who were standing by, hearing this, sent for Agnes to come into the room; when she came in the child cried out, "Art thou come, thou young Witch, who hath done all this mischief?" At which Agnes seemed surprised, this being the first time Mrs.

Mary had abused her. Then one of the company told her to take Mary in her arms, and carry her down stairs; but she had no sooner got hold of her than the child fell to scratching her head and face with eager fierceness; the poor girl standing still and holding down her head, not defending herself but only crying out pitifully, while the child scratched on her face a broad and bleeding wound. When she was out of breath and thus forced to leave off, she cried and said "she was sorry for her cruelty, but the Thing made her do it, so that she could not help herself." Another day it was another of them who fell upon the maid, she not defending herself or resenting, but "crying out sadly, desiring the Lord to pitty her." Then they abused her, saying, "Thy Mother is a Witch, thy Father is a Witch, and thou art a Witch, and the worst of all;" and then they clamoured for the father, the old Turk, and would have him in to scratch him too. Just at that moment old Samuel chanced to come in to see his daughter--for he knew what kind of treatment she had to undergo--when a great hubbub arose. The children cried out against him, and--wretched young hypocrites!--exhorted him in the G.o.dliest terms to confess and repent; called him witch and naughty man and all the rest of the injuries then current; while he retorted fiercely and rudely, and told one of the little baggages she lied--as she did. But Mr. Throckmorton got angry, and would not let him go till he had p.r.o.nounced the same conjuration as that by which his poor daughter was forced to "fyle" herself; and when he had said the words, the child came out of her fit, and acted amazement and shame to the life. So it went on: the children having their fits, being visited by their spirits, of whom there were nine now afloat--three Smacks, Pluck, Blew, Catch, White, Callicot, and Hardname--and every day or so scratching poor Nan till her face and back and hands were one ma.s.s of scars and wounds. And then the a.s.size time came, and the three Samuels--father, mother, and daughter--were put upon their trial for bewitching Lady Cromwell to death, and tormenting Mrs. Joan Throckmorton and her sisters. There could be no mistake about it now, for not only had they all three convicted themselves by their own confessions in the conjuration which they had been obliged to repeat, but even before the judge, Mrs. Jane played off the like trick, falling into a terrible fit which only old Samuel could get her out of by repeating the charm. At first he was obstinate and st.u.r.dily refused to say the words; but on the judge telling him that he should be brought in guilty if he did not, he consented, and had no sooner said--"As I am a witch, and did consent to the death of the Lady Cromwell, so I charge thee, Devil, to suffer Mrs.

Jane to come out of her Fit at this present"--than Mrs. Jane wiped her eyes, looked round her, and said, "O Lord father where am I?" pretending to be quite amazed at her position. No hand is wanting when there is stoning to be done. Now that the Samuels were fairly convicted of witchcraft in one instance, witnesses came forward to prove them guilty of the like in others. It was remembered how certain persons had died who had offended the old dame; how others had lost their cows and whole farm stock in consequence of giving her rough language; how, even since she had been in gaol, she had bewitched to his death one of the turnkeys who had chained her to a bedpost, and had cruelly afflicted the gaoler's own son, so that he could not be recovered but by "scratching" her; with the further proof that when the grand jury returned a true bill, "billa vera,"

against them, old father Samuel burst out pa.s.sionately to her with, "A plague of G.o.d light on thee, for thou art she that has brought us all to this, and we may thank thee for it." So the judge, "after good divine counsel given to them, proceeded to Judgment, which was to death." But the poor old woman set up a plea of being with child, though she was near fourscore years of age; at which all the court laughed, and she herself most of all, thinking it might save her. Some one standing near to Agnes counselled her to try the like plea; but the brave young girl, who had something of her father's spirit in her, indignantly refused. "No," said Agnes, with the gallows straight before her, and this desperate plea perhaps able to save her--"no; it shall never be said that I was both Witch and ----." She died with the same haughty courage maintained to the last: but old mother Samuel maundered through a vast number of confessions--implicated her husband--confessed to her spirits--but with one affecting touch of nature, through all her drivel and imbecility steadily refused to criminate her daughter. No, her Nan was no witch; she was clear and pure before G.o.d and towards man; and neither force nor cajolery could make her forswear that bit of loving truth.

When those three helpless wretches were fairly dead, the children, upon whose young souls lay the ineffaceable stain of Murder, and whose first steps in life had been through innocent blood, gave up the game and p.r.o.nounced themselves cured: so we hear no more of their fits or their spirits, or Mrs. Joan's ghostly lovers fighting with cowl staves and breaking each other's heads out of jealousy and revenge: and the last record of the case is, that Sir Henry Cromwell left an annual sum of forty shillings to provide for a yearly sermon against witchcraft, to be preached at Huntingdon by a B.D. or D.D. member of Queen's College, Cambridge. How terrible to think that three human lives were sacrificed for such wild and wilful nonsense, and that sane and thoughtful and n.o.ble-minded people of this present day walk on the way towards the same faith! Better by far the most chill and desolate scepticism, which at least will light no Smithfield fires for any forms of creed or monstrous imaginings of superst.i.tion, than beliefs which can only be expressed and maintained by blood, and the culmination of which is in the suffering and destruction of all dissentients.

THE MAN OF HOPE AND THE DEVIL.[108]

A young lawyer, a Mr. Darrel, had a call to the ministry. He was made aware of this by the extraordinary sluggishness that came upon him when he turned to open a law book; so, as preaching puritanical sermons extempore was less toilsome and cost less study than learning the intricacies of the Codex Anglica.n.u.s, he became converted to extreme doctrines, and was princ.i.p.ally regarded as a Man of Hope, skilful in casting out devils and marvellously apt at discovering witchcraft. His first essay at this work was in 1587 with Katherine Green, a young girl of seventeen, who had some hysterical affection which caused her to swell to an enormous size and led her to fancies and delusions, as, that she saw shapes and apparitions, and a young child without feet or legs looking at her from out a well. She also had fits, which she afterwards confessed were simulated in order to make her father-in-law, who was generally exceedingly severe with her, more kind and pliable: but Mr. Darrel said they were the fits of possession, and, as a proof, cast eight devils out of her; specially one st.u.r.dy devil, called Middlecub, which had been sent into her by Margaret Roper. Mr. Darrel at once seized Margaret Roper, accusing her of this Middlecub imp, and sending her off to the magistrate, Mr. Fouliamb; and in the meanwhile Katherine suffered herself to be repossessed, having been imprudent enough to talk with the devil in the likeness of a handsome young man who met her in the lanes, where he entertained her with propositions of marriage, and gave her some bread to eat. Mr. Fouliamb happened to be a man of sense, and discharged Margaret Roper, at the same time threatening to send Darrel to prison in her stead if he took on himself to calumniate honest folk without cause. This rebuff cooled the young lawyer parson's ardour a little; but in 1594 the Starkies of Lancashire announced themselves possessed, and Mr. Darrel must needs go down to vex the foul fiend that had gotten them. For he was so holy a man that the devils hated him mightily, being sorely vexed in his presence, and crying out, "Now he is gone; now he is gone; now blacke coate is gone," as soon as he quitted them, wearied with his wrestling. The story of the Starkies was this:--

Anne, aged nine, and John, of ten, were taken with "dumpish heavie countenances," and fearful startings of their bodies, loud shouting fits, and convulsions. The father went to Hartley, a known conjuror, who came to their aid with popish charms and certain herbs; and so stilled them for a year and a half. But when he "fained as thought he would haue gone into another countrey," the children fell ill again, and Mr. Starkie thought it best to secure the perpetual services of the conjuror by a fee of forty shillings yearly. But Hartley wanted more, and thereupon began a quarrel which ended in the Possession of the children, of three scholars living at the Starkies, of Margaret Byron, and lastly of Hartley himself. Now Hartley had a devil, and whomsoever he kissed he inoculated with this devil and breathed it into them. And as he was always kissing some one--John for love often, the little wenches in jest, to Margaret Hardman "promising a thraue of kisses," "wrestling with Johan Smyth, a maid, to kiss her"--he had given the devil in rich proportion all through the Starkies' house, and only Mr. Darrel could exorcise him. The possessed leaped about like goats, and crawled on all fours like beasts, and barked like dogs, and had communications from a white dove, and saw horned devils under the beds, and had visions of big black dogs with monstrous tails and bound with chains, and huge black cats and big mice that knocked them down at a blow, and left them speechless, cold, and dead. And then they took to "slossinge up their meat like greedy dogges or hogges," and they made the same noises as a broken-winded horse; and they howled and shrieked; and one of them, Jane Ashton the servant aged thirty, fell foul of Edmund Hartley for all his kisses and promises of marriage; and they "yelled and whupped;" and there was in very truth the devil to pay in that horrible house when Mr. More and Mr. Darrel went to exorcise the fiends and restore the possessed to their senses. After some days of prayer, and of fighting with the devil who would cry out when Mr. Darrel was preaching, "Bible bable, he will never have done prating, prittle prattle;" and "I must goe, I must away; I cannot tarrie; whither shall I goe? I am hot, I am too hot, I will not dye!" and such like, six of them were delivered, and visibly and bodily dispossessed. With one, Mary Byron, the devil came up from her stomach to her breast, then to her throat, when it gave her "a sore lug,"

whilst a mist dazzled her eyes. Then she felt it go out of her mouth, leaving behind it a sore throat and a filthy smell, and it was in the likeness of a crow's head, and it sat in a corner of the parlour in the dark; but suddenly flashing out all a fire it flew out of the window, and the whole place was in a blaze, according to her imagination. John Starkie lost his in the shape of a man with a humpback and very ill-favoured, who, when he had gone out wished much to re-enter, but Master John withstood him, and had the best of it. He was like a "foule ugly man with a white beard and a 'bulch' on his back." The same tale had little Ellin Holland and Anne Starkie to tell, all save the white beard. Elinor Hardman lost hers as an urchin, but presently returning through a little hole in the parlour, he offered her gold and silver in any quant.i.ty if she would let him enter again, and when she resisted he threatened to cast her into the fire and the pit, and to break her neck; all of which threats being unheeded by the little maid of ten, he left her again in his old form of "urchin." The next day, and the next, all these devils came again, seeking to repossess the children. They came in various forms--as a black raven; a black boy, with his head bigger than his body; a black rough dog with a firebrand in his mouth; five white doves; a brave fellow like a wooer; two little whelps that played on the table, and ran into a dish of b.u.t.ter; an ape; a bear with fire in his mouth; a haystack--all, haystack as well as the rest, promising them bags of gold and silver if they might come into them again, but threatening to break their necks and their backs, and throw them into the pit and the fire, and out of the window, if denied.

But Messrs. More and Darrel were instant in prayer, and successfully withstood them. The children were p.r.o.nounced finally dispossessed: all save Jane Ashton, who went away to a popish family and became popish herself; wherefore the devil recovered her, says Mr. Darrel, and her last state was worse than her first. As for Edmund Hartley, he was hanged at Lancaster, chiefly through Mr. Darrel's exertions.

In 1596 Mr. Darrel had more work. Thomas Darling, "the Boy of Burton," had offended old Alice Goodridge; so Alice possessed him, and Mr. Darrel was sent for the undoing. His chief weapon in this case was a ranting tract called "The Enemie of Securitie," which the devil could not abide any how, and during the reading of which he would cry out--through the earthly medium of the Boy of Burton--"Radulphus, Belzebub can doe no good, his head is stricken off with a word."--"We cannot prevaile (against the church and Mr. Darrel), for they will not be holpen by witches. Brother Radulphus, we cannot prevaile; let us go to our mistress and torment her; I have had a draught of her blood to-day." "Againe--'There is a woman earnest at prayer, get her away.' 'Nay,' quoth John Alsop (a man that was present), with a loude voice, 'we cannot spare her.' Thus the Boy graced Mistress Wightman, his aunt. And againe, 'Brother Gla.s.sop (another devil), we cannot prevaile, his faith is soe strong. And they fast and pray, and a preacher prayeth as fast as they.'" And "I bayted my hooke often, and at last I catcht him. Heere I was before, and heere I am againe, and heere I must stay, though it be but for a short tyme. I leade them to drink, carouse, and quaffe. I make them to sweare. I have leave given mee to doe what I will for a time. What is wightier than a Kinge in his owne lande? A King I am, in whome I raigne, heere I am King for a time." With much more of the same kind. In the mean time old Alice Goodridge, who had wrought all this mischief, died in prison, while her devilish spirit or imp, Minnie, whom she had sent into the boy, racketed and rioted in his soul and body, and Mr. Darrel wrestled against him with prayer and "the Enemie of Securitie." He finally prevailed, and after Thomas Darling had been possessed and dispossessed and repossessed again, delivered him from Radulphus and Minnie and Gla.s.sop and Beelzebub, and so had leisure to turn to some one else when needed.

That some one else was soon found; for there was Will Somers, a lad living with Mr. Brakenbury at Ashby-de-la-Zouch during the time of Mr. Darrel's ministry there, who was now at Nottingham, and one of the most accomplished demoniacs of the day. Nothing would satisfy Will but that Mr.