hat the drummer, who must have known that his name would be
connected with the affair, failed to realize the risk he was running
from the witch hunters. He was indicted on minor felonies of another
sort, but the charges which Mompesson brought against him seem to have
been passed over. The man was condemned for stealing and was
transported. With his departure the troubles at Tedworth ceased. But the
drummer, in some way, escaped and returned to England. The angry
Mompesson now brought him to the assizes as a felon on the strength of
the statute of James I. Unhappily we have no details of this trial, nor
do we know even the name of the judge; but we do know that the jury gave
a verdict of acquittal.

In 1671 Cornwall was stirred up over a witch whose crimes were said to
be directed against the state. She had hindered the English fleet in
their war against the Dutch, she had caused a bull to kill one of the
enemies in Parliament of the Non-Conformists, she had been responsible
for the barrenness of the queen. And for all these political crimes the
chief evidence was that some cats had been seen playing ("dancing") near
her house. She was committed, along with several other women who were
accused. Although at the assizes they were all proved to have had cats
and rats about them, they went free.[30]

In 1682, the same year in which the three women of Devonshire had been
condemned, there was a trial at Southwark, just outside of London, which
resulted in a verdict of acquittal. The case had many of the usual
features, but in two points was unique. Joan Butts was accused of having
bewitched a child that had been taken with fits.[31] Nineteen or twenty
witnesses testified against the witch. One of the witnesses heard her
say that, if she had not bewitched the child, if all the devils in hell
could help her, she would bewitch it. Joan admitted the words, but said
that she had spoken them in passion. She then turned on one of the
witnesses and declared that he had given himself to the Devil, body and
soul. Chief Justice Pemberton was presiding, and he called her to order
for this attack on a witness, and then catechized her as to her means of
knowing the fact. The woman had thoughtlessly laid herself open by her
own words to the most serious suspicion. In spite of this, however, the
jury brought her in not guilty, "to the great amazement of some, ... yet
others who consider the great difficulty in proving a Witch, thought the
j