"_To abide vpon it._"] _i.e._, my abiding opinion is.

X _a_. "_Elizabeth Astley, John Ramsden, Alice Gray, Isabel
Sidegraues, Lawrence Hay._"] The specific charges against these
persons, with the exception of Alice Gray, do not appear, nor is it
said where their places of residence were. Alice Gray was reputed to
have been at the meeting of witches at Malkin's Tower, and to her the
judge refers, perhaps, in particular, when he says, "Without question,
there are amongst you that are as deepe in this action as any of them
that are condemned to die for their offences."

X _b_. "_The Execution of the Witches._"] We could have dispensed with
many of the flowers of rhetoric with which the pages of this discovery
are strewed, if Master Potts would have favoured us with a plain,
unvarnished account of what occurred at this execution. It is here, in
the most interesting point of all, that his narrative, in other
respects so full and abundant, stops short, and seems curtailed of its
just proportions. The "learned and worthy preacher," to whom the
prisoners were commended by the judge, was probably Mr. William Leigh,
of Standish, before mentioned. Amongst his papers or correspondence,
if they should happen to have been preserved, some account may
eventually be found of the sad closing scene of these melancholy
victims of superstition.

X 2 _a_. "_Neither can I paint in extraordinarie tearmes._"] The
worthy clerk is too modest. He is a great painter, the Tintoretto of
witchcraft.

Y _a_ 1. "_Hauing cut off Thomas Lister, Esquire, father to this
gentleman now liuing._"] Thomas Lister, of Westby, ancestor of the
Listers, Lords Ribblesdale, married Jane, daughter of John Greenacres,
Esquire, of Worston, county of Lancaster, and was buried at Gisburn,
February 8th, 1607. His son, Thomas Lister, referred to as the
"gentleman now living," married Jane, daughter of Thomas Heber, Esq.,
of Marton, after mentioned, and was buried at Gisburn, July 10th,
1619.

Y _a_ 2. "_Was Indicted and Arraigned for the murder of a Child of one
Dodg-sonnes._"] One acquittal was no protection to these unhappy
creatures. It caused only additional exasperation, and, sooner or
later, they were brought within what Donne calls "the hungry statutes'
gaping jaws." Whether superstition or malice prompted this
prosecution, on the part of Mr. Lister, it is difficult to say. Some
grudge he entertained, or cause of offence he had taken up against
this Jennet Pr