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When they wanted to destroy the crops of an enemy, they yoked toads to his plough, and on the following night Satan himself ploughed the land with his team, and blasted it for the season. The witches had power to assume almost any shape; but they generally chose either that of a cat or a hare, oftenest the latter.
And he was pixy-led all that night, my Lady, was the old Jimmy, and when he come home all his money was gone; so I reckon that the pixies is in league with the witches." "I suspect that Jimmy had drunk too much cider," said Lady Eleanor severely; "he should have kept sober or stuck to the road, and then he would not have brought back foolish stories about pixies and witches.
And absurd as the belief in witches capering through the air on broomsticks, changing themselves into black cats, raising storms, and causing sickness absurd though all this may be, it yet serves to keep alive the temper of mind on which supernaturalism lives. Michelet has also dealt with this matter in his vivid and picturesque work, The Sorceress.
He had had some experience with witches we have mentioned them in another connection and he was prompted by them to tell a story of Dr. Harvey, with whom he was "very familiarly acquainted." "I once asked him what his opinion was concerning witchcraft; whether there was any such thing. Hee told mee he believed there was not." Harvey now laid a plan to get rid of the woman.
Whale and witches sank; the sea grew red with their blood; the waves were calmed. Again the sun smiled over the hardy sailors. But many of the crew were worn out by the battle with the elements and had to be carried ashore by Frithiof and Björn when they reached the Orkney Islands.
Even lately, a working woman told me not to turn a stray black cat from my house; for, if I did, I should never have any prosperity afterwards. Captain Brown tells us that on Hallowe'en, it was usual in Scotland for families to tie up their cat, in order to preserve it from being used as a pony by the witches that night.
It is therefore the opinion of the court that the first selectman of Smyrna, as chief municipal officer, should investigate this case under the law made and provided for the detection of witches, and for that purpose I have put this writing in the hands of Mr. Gammon that he may summon the proper authority, same being first selectman aforesaid."
To show this, it will be necessary to review briefly the facts about the Worcester pamphlet described above, § 4. What seems to be the second edition of a pamphlet entitled The full Tryalls, Examinations and Condemnations of Four Notorious Witches, At the Assizes held at Worcester on Tuseday the 4th of March, was published at London with the date 1700.
And from this time the thoughts of Macbeth were all bloody and dreadful. The first thing he heard when he got out of the witches' cave, was that Macduff, thane of Fife, had fled to England, to join the army which was forming against him under Malcolm, the eldest son of the late king, with intent to displace Macbeth, and set Malcolm, the right heir, upon the throne.
They were: "Hare! hare! God send thee care! I am in a hare's likeness now; But I shall be a woman e'en now! Hare! hare! God send thee care!" If witches, when in this shape, were bitten by the dogs, they always retained the marks in their human form; but she had never heard that any witch had been bitten to death.
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