The History of Witchcraft in Europe. Брэм СтокерЧитать онлайн книгу.
extraordinary story, the elder Robinson deposed that he had certainly sent his son to bring in the kine; that, thinking he was away too long, he had gone in search of him, and discovered him in such a distracted condition that he knew neither his father nor where he was, and so continued for very nearly a quarter of an hour before he came to himself.
The persons implicated by the boy Robinson were immediately arrested, and confined in Lancaster Castle. Some of them—for he told various stories, and in each introduced new characters—he did not know by name, but he protested that on seeing them he should recognise them, and for this purpose he was carried about to the churches in the surrounding district to examine the congregations. The method adopted is thus described by Webster: ‘It came to pass that this said boy was brought into the church of Kildwick, a large parish church, where I (being then curate there) was preaching in the afternoon, and was set upon a stall (he being but about ten or eleven years old) to look about him, which moved some little disturbance in the congregation for awhile. And, after prayers, I inquiring what the matter was, the people told me it was the boy that discovered witches, upon which I went to the house where he was to stay all night, where I found him and two very unlikely persons that did conduct him and manage his business. I desired to have some discourse with the boy in private, but they utterly refused. Then, in the presence of a great many people, I took the boy near me and said: “Good boy, tell me truly, and in earnest, didst thou see and hear such strange things of the meeting of witches as is reported by many that thou dost relate, or did not some person teach thee to say such things of thyself?” But the two men, not giving the boy leave to answer, did pluck him from me, and said he had been examined by two able justices of the peace, and they did never ask him such a question; to whom I replied, the persons accused therefore had the more wrong.’
In all, some eighteen women, married and single—the charge was generally made against women, as probably less capable of self-defence, and more impressionable than men—were brought to trial at Lancaster Assizes. There was really no evidence against them but the boy Robinson’s, and to sustain it his unfortunate victims were examined for the stigmata, or devil-marks, which, of course, were found in ample quantity. Against seventeen a verdict of guilty was returned, one or two being convicted on their own confessions—the most perplexing incident in the whole case, for as these confessions were unquestionably false, they who made them were really lying away their own lives. By what impulse of morbid vanity, or diseased craving for notoriety, or strange mental delusion, were they inspired? And whence came the wild and even foul ideas which formed the staple of their delirious narratives? How did these quiet, stolid, unlettered Lancashire peasant-women become possessed of inventions worthy of the grimmest of German tales of diablerie? It is easier to ask these questions than to answer them; but when the witch mania was once kindled in a neighbourhood it seems, like a pestilential atmosphere, to have stricken with disease every mind that was predisposed to the reception of unwholesome impressions.
The confession of Margaret Johnson, made on March 9, 1613, has been printed before, but it has so strong a psychological interest that I cannot omit it here. It may be taken as a type of the confessions made by the victims of credulity under similar circumstances:
‘Betweene seven or eight yeares since, shee being in her house at Marsden in greate passion and anger, and discontented, and withall oppressed with some want, there appeared unto her a spirit or devill in the similitude and proportion of a man, apparelled in a suite of black, tied about with silke pointes, whoe offered her, yff shee would give him her soule, hee would supply all her wantes, and bring to her whatsoever shee wanted or needed, and at her appointment would helpe her to kill and revenge her either of men or beastes, or what she desired; and, after a sollicitation or two, shee contracted and condicioned with the said devill or spiritt for her soule. And the said devill bad her call him by the name of Memillion, and when shee called hee would bee ready to doe her will. And she saith that in all her talke and conference shee called the said Memillion her god.
‘And shee further saith that shee was not at the greate meetinge of the witches at Hare-stones in the forest of Pendle on All Saintes Day last past, but saith shee was at a second meetinge the Sunday after All Saintes Day at the place aforesaid, where there was at that time betweene thirty and forty witches, which did all ride to the same meetinge. And thead of the said meetinge was to consult for the killing and hunting of men and beastes; and that there was one devill or spiritt that was more greate and grand devill than the rest, and yff anie witch desired to have such an one, they might have such an one to kill or hurt anie body. And she further saith, that such witches as have sharpe boanes are generally for the devill to prick them with which have no papps nor duggs, but raiseth blood from the place pricked with the boane, which witches are more greate and grand witches than they which have papps or dugs (!). And shee being further asked what persons were at their last meetinge, she named one Carpnell and his wife, Rason and his wife, Pickhamer and his wife, Duffy and his wife, and one Jane Carbonell, whereof Pickhamer’s wife is the most greate, grand, and anorcyent witch; and that one witch alone can kill a beast, and yf they bid their spiritt or devill to goe and pricke or hurt anie man in anie particular place, hee presently will doe it. And that their spiritts have usually knowledge of their bodies. And shee further saith the men witches have women spiritts, and women witches have men spiritts; that Good Friday is one of their constant daies of their generall meetinge, and that on Good Friday last they had a meetinge neere Pendle water-side; and saith that their spirit doeth tell them where their meetinge must bee, and in what place; and saith that if a witch desire to be in anie place upon a soddaine, that, on a dogg, or a tod, or a catt, their spiritt will presently convey them thither, or into anie room in anie man’s house.
‘But shee saith it is not the substance of their bodies that doeth goe into anie such roomes, but their spiritts that assume such shape and forme. And shee further saith that the devill, after hee begins to sucke, will make a papp or a dug in a short time, and the matter hee sucketh is blood. And further saith that the devill can raise foule wether and stormes, and soe hee did at their meetinges. And shee further saith that when the devill came to suck her pappe, he came to her in the likeness of a catt, sometimes of one collour, and sometimes of another. And since this trouble befell her, her spirit hath left her, and shee never saw him since.’
Happily, the judge who presided at the trial of these deluded and persecuted unfortunates was dissatisfied with the evidence, and reprieved them until he had time to communicate with the Privy Council, by whose orders Bridgman, Bishop of Chester, proceeded to examine into the principal cases. Three of the supposed criminals, however, had died of anxiety and suffering before the work of investigation began, and a fourth was sick beyond recovery. The cases into which the Bishop inquired were those of Margaret Johnson, Frances Dicconson, or Dickinson, Mary Spencer, and Mrs. Hargrave. Margaret Johnson the good Bishop describes as a widow of sixty, who was deeply penitent. ‘I will not add,’ she said, ‘sin to sin. I have already done enough, yea, too much, and will not increase it. I pray God I may repent.’ This victim of hallucination had confessed herself to be a witch, as we have seen, and was characterized by the Bishop as ‘more often faulting in the particulars of her actions.’ Frances Dicconson, however, and Mary Spencer, absolutely denied the truth of the accusations brought against them. Frances, according to the boy Robinson, had changed herself into a dog; but it transpired that she had had a quarrel with the elder Robinson. Mary Spencer, a young woman of twenty, said that Robinson cherished much ill-feeling against her parents, who had been convicted of witchcraft at the last assizes, and had since died. She repeated the Lord’s Prayer and the Apostles’ Creed, and declared that she defied the devil and all his works. A story had been set afloat that she used to call her pail to follow her as she ran. The truth was that she often trundled it down-hill, and called to it in jest to come after her if she outstripped it. She could have explained every circumstance in court, ‘but the wind was so loud and the throng so great, that she could not hear the evidence against her.’
This last touch, as Mr. S. R. Gardiner remarks, completes the tragedy of the situation. ‘History,’ as he says, ‘occupies itself perforce mainly with the sorrows of the educated classes, whose own peers have left the records of their wrongs. Into the sufferings of the mass of the people, except when they have been lashed by long-continued injustice into frenzy, it is hard to gain a glimpse. For once the veil is lifted, and we see, as by a