* * *

ROGER OUTLAWE.

(Vol. vii., p. 332.)

MR. ELLACOMBE will find some account of this personage, who was Prior of
Kilmainham, and for several years served the office of Lord Justice of
Ireland, in Holinshed's _Chronicles of Ireland_, sub anno 1325, _et
seq._: also in "The Annals of Ireland," in the second volume of Gibson's
_Camden_, 3rd edition, sub eod. anno. He was nearly related to the lady
Alice Kettle, and her son William Utlawe, al. Outlaw; against whom that
singular charge of sorcery was brought by Richard Lederede, Bishop of
Ossory. The account of this charge is so curious that, for the benefit
of those readers of "N. & Q." who may not have the means of referring to
the books above cited, I am tempted to extract it from Holinshed:

"In these daies lived, in the Diocese of Ossorie, the Ladie
Alice Kettle, whome the Bishop ascited to purge hir selfe of the
fame of inchantment and witchcraft imposed unto hir, and to one
Petronill and Basill, hir complices. She was charged to have
nightlie conference with a spirit called Robin Artisson, to
whome she sacrificed in the high waie nine red cocks, and nine
peacocks' eies. Also, that she swept the streets of Kilkennie
betweene compleine and twilight, raking all the filth towards
the doores of hir sonne William Outlaw, murmuring and muttering
secretlie with hir selfe these words:

"'To the house of William my sonne
Hie all the wealth of Kilkennie towne.'

"At the first conviction, they abjured and did penance; but
shortlie after, they were found in relapse, and then was
Petronill burnt at Kilkennie: the other twaine might not be
heard of. She, at the hour of hir death, accused the said
William as privie to their sorceries, whome the bishop held in
durance nine weeks; forbidding his keepers to eat or to drinke
with him, or to speake to him more than once in the daie. But at
length, thorough the sute and instance of Arnold le Powre, then
seneschall of Kilkennie, he was delivered, and after corrupted
with bribes the seneschall to persecute the bishop: so that he
thrust him into prison for three moneths. In rifling the closet
of the ladie, they found a wafer of sacramentall bread, having
the divel's name stamped thereon insteed of Jesus Christ's; and
a pipe of ointment, wherewith she greased a staffe, upon which
she ambled and gallopped thorou