‘Philomathes. Then to make an ende of our conference, since I see it drawes late, what forme of punishment thinke yee merites these Magicians and Witches? For I see that yee account them to be al alike guiltie.
Epistemon. They ought to be put to death according to the Law of God, the civill and imperiall Law, and municipall Law of all Christian nations.
Phi. But what kinde of death, I pray you?
Epi. It is commonly used by fire, but that is an indifferent thing to be used in every countrey, according to the Law or custome thereof.
Phi. But ought no sexe, age, nor ranke to bee exempted?
Epi. None at al (being so used by the lawful magistrate) for it is the highest point of Idolatry, wherein no exception is admitted by the Law of God.
Phi. Then bairnes may not be spared?
Epi. Yea, not a haire the lesse of my conclusion. For they are not that capable of reason as to practise such things.’
Before quitting the subject of witches for cases of witchcraft, it occurs to me that I have omitted one or two peculiarities relating to them. First of all, one personal peculiarity they had, according to the infallible authority Bodin—an inability to weep, or, at all events, they could only screw out three tears. And this was a great test, so much so that a form of conjuration is given in the ‘Malleus Maleficarum,’ and translated by Scot, which bears strongly upon this point: ‘I coniure thee by the amorous teares, which Jesus Christ our Saviour shed upon the crosse for the saluation of the world; and by the most earnest and burning teares of his mother the most glorious virgine Marie, sprinkled upon his wounds late in the euening; and by all the teares which euerie saint and elect vessell of God hath poured out heere in the world, and from whose eies he hath wiped away all teares; that, if thou be without fault, thou maist poure downe teares abundantlie; and, if thou be guiltie, that thou weepe in no wise: In the name of the father, of the sonne, and of the holie ghost: Amen. And note (saith he) that the more you coniure, the lesse she wepeth.’
But the same authority says: ‘She must be well looked unto, otherwise she will put spettle priuilie upon hir cheeks, and seeme to weepe.’ King James says, ‘Not so much as their eies are able to shead teares, (threaten and torture them as yee please) ... albeit the women kinde especially, be able otherwaies to shead teares at every light occasion when they will, yea, although it were dissemblingly like the Crocodiles.’
He also says, with reference to their inability to sink in water: ‘It appeares that God hath appointed (for a supernatural signe of the monstrous impiety of Witches) that the water shall refuse to receive them in her bosome, that have shaken off them the sacred Water of Baptisme, and wilfully refused the benefite thereof.’
This ordeal by water has been practised to a very late date, and ‘swimming her for a witch’ has been often heard in this century. The scientific and proper method of preparing the witch is by tying her right thumb to her left great toe, and vice versâ, and this ordeal had this simplicity: If the putative witch sank well, she was innocent; and if she swam, she could either be ducked and ill treated till she died, as too often was the case, or she was ipso facto a confessed witch.
Another ordeal was, to take a piece of the thatch from off the reputed witch’s cottage, and set fire to it; if she came to the person so burning the thatch, her witchcraft was incontestable.
Another was, to weigh the witch against the church Bible, and this test, too, has come down to modern times. One instance will suffice. ‘One Susana Hannokes, an elderly woman of Wingrove, near Aylesbury, was accused by a neighbour for bewitching her spinning wheel, so that she could not make it go round, and offered to make oath of it before a magistrate; on which, the husband, in order to justify his wife, insisted upon her being tried by the church Bible, and that the accuser should be present: accordingly, she was conducted to the parish church, where she was stript of all her cloathes to her shift and under-coat, and weighed against the Bible; when, to the no small mortification of her accuser, she out-weighed it, and was honourably acquitted of the charge.’39
But in this nineteenth century of ours, with all its boasted civilization, witchcraft is still believed in in England, as the following two or three instances will testify:
S. A. S., writing in Notes and Queries, June 25, 1853, says, ‘A cottager, who does not live five minutes’ walk from my house, found his pig seized with a strange and unaccountable disorder. He, being a sensible man, instead of asking the advice of a veterinary surgeon, immediately went to the white witch (a gentleman who drives a flourishing trade in this neighbourhood). He received his directions, and went home, and implicitly followed them. In perfect silence, he went to the pigsty; and, lancing each foot and both ears of the pig, he allowed the blood to run into a piece of common dowlas. Then, taking two large pins, he pierced the dowlas in opposite directions; and, still keeping silence, entered his cottage, locked the door, placed the bloody rag upon the fire, heaped up some turf over it, and, reading a few verses of the Bible, waited till the dowlas was burned. As soon as this was done, he returned to the pigsty; found his pig perfectly restored to health, and, mirabile dictu! as the white witch had predicted, the old woman, who it was supposed had bewitched the pig, came to inquire after the pig’s health. The animal never suffered a day’s illness afterwards. My informant was the owner of the pig himself.
‘Perhaps, when I heard this story, there may have been a lurking expression of doubt upon my face, so that my friend thought it necessary to give me farther proof. Some time ago, a lane in this town began to be looked upon with a mysterious awe, for every evening a strange white rabbit would appear in it, and, running up and down, would mysteriously disappear. Dogs were frequently put on the scent, but all to no purpose, the white rabbit could not be caught; and rumours began to assert pretty confidently that the white rabbit was nothing more nor less than a witch. The man whose pig had been bewitched was all the more confident, as, every evening when the rabbit appeared, he had noticed the bedroom window of his old enemy’s window open! At last, a large party of bold-hearted men, one evening, were successful enough to find the white rabbit in a garden, the only egress from which is through a narrow passage between two cottages, all the rest of the garden being securely surrounded by brick walls.
‘They placed a strong guard in this entry, to let nothing pass, while the remainder advanced as skirmishers among the cabbages: one of these was successful, and caught the white rabbit by the ears, and, not without some trepidation, carried it towards the reserve in the entry. But, as he came nearer to his friends, his courage grew, and gradually, all the wrongs his poor pig had suffered took form and vigour in a powerful kick at the poor little rabbit. No sooner had he done this than, he cannot tell how, the rabbit was out of his grasp; the people in the entry saw it come, but could not stop it; through them all it went, and has never been seen again.
‘But now to the proof of the witchcraft. The old woman, whom all suspected, was laid up in her bed for three days afterwards, unable to walk about, all the consequence of the kick she had received in the shape of a white rabbit!’
Chapter XV.
Commencement of Witchcraft in England—Dame Eleanor Cobham—Jane Shore—Lord Huntingford—Cases from the Calendars of State Papers—Earliest Printed Case, that of John Walsh—Elizabeth Stile—Three Witches tried at Chelmsford—Witches of St. Osyth—Witches of Warboys—Witches of Northamptonshire.
At what date the higher cult of sorcery or magic became the drivel known as witchcraft is uncertain. I am almost inclined to place it (in England) at 1441; but then the charge was purely political, and I think that the Calendars of State Papers for nearly a century afterwards bear the statement out, that for some time afterwards they were so. The case of Dame Eleanor Cobham is very tersely told in ‘Baker’s