idered to be in
the actual service of the devil, who was then thought to be raising a
more determined opposition than ever to the spread of the kingdom of
God, and adopting the insidious means of enlisting men and women into
his service by conferring upon them supernatural powers; so that by this
contract they were bound to do mischief to all good Christian people;
and the more mischief they could do the greater would be the favours
they received from their master. This belief was not confined to the
ignorant, but was equally accepted by the educated and by the Church.
Measures were taken to frustrate the devil, and the faithful were
recommended to make search for those who had compacted with his Satanic
Majesty, and laws were enacted for the punishment of the compacters when
found. The faithful, under the belief that they were fighting the battle
of the Lord, brought numbers of poor wretches to trial, many of whom,
strangely enough, believed themselves guilty of the crime imputed to
them. After trial and conviction, they were put to death. The belief
that the devil could and did invest men and women with supernatural
powers affected all social relations, for everything strange and
unaccountable--and, in a non-scientific age, we can readily conceive how
almost everything would be brought into this category--was ascribed to
this cause, and each suspected his or her neighbour; even the truest
friendship was sometimes broken through this suspicion. The laws against
witchcraft in this country were abrogated last century, but the
abrogation of the law could not be expected to work any sudden change in
the belief of the people; at most, the alteration only paved the way for
the gradual departure of the superstition, and since the abrogation of
the law the belief has been decaying, but still in many parts of the
country it lingers on till the present time, instances of which appear
every now and again in the newspapers of the day.

CHAPTER II.

_BIRTH AND CHILDHOOD._

When writing of fairies I noticed,--but as it is connected with birth, I
may here mention it again,--a practice common in some localities of
placing in the bed where lay an expectant mother, a piece of cold iron
to scare the fairies, and prevent them from spiriting away mother and
child to elfland. An instance of this spiriting away at the time of
child-bearing is said to have occurred in Arran within these fifty
years. It is given by a correspondent i