hlet is drawn; and
this fact points not only to the common authorship of the three tracts,
but to the imaginary character of the Huntingdon and Northampton cases.

Against these facts there is to be presented what at first blush seems a
very important piece of evidence. In the _Northamptonshire Historical
Collections_, 1st series (Northampton, 1896), there is a chapter on
witchcraft in Northamptonshire, copied from the _Northamptonshire
Handbook_ for 1867. That chapter goes into the trials of 1705 in detail,
making copious extracts from the pamphlets. In a footnote the writers
say: "To show that the burning actually took place in 1705, it may be
important to mention that there is an item of expense entered in the
overseers' accounts for St. Giles parish for faggots bought for the
purpose." This in itself seems convincing. It seems to dispose of the
whole question at once. There is, however, one fact that instantly casts
a doubt upon this seemingly conclusive evidence. In England, witches
were hanged, not burned. There are not a half-dozen recorded exceptions
to this rule. Mother Lakeland in 1645 was burned. That is easy to
explain. Mother Lakeland had by witchcraft killed her husband. Burning
was the method of execution prescribed by English law for a woman who
killed her husband. The other cases where burnings are said to have
taken place were almost certainly cases that came under this rule. But
it does not seem possible that the Northampton cases came under the
rule. The two women seem to have had no husbands. "Ralph Davis," the
ostensible writer of the account, who professed to have known them from
their early years, and who was apparently glad to defame them in every
possible way, accused them of loose living, but not of adultery, as he
would certainly have done, had he conceived of them as married. It is
hard to avoid the conclusion that they could not have been burned.

There is a more decisive answer to this argument for the authenticity of
the pamphlet. The supposed confirmation of it in the St. Giles parish
register is probably a blunder. The Reverend R. M. Serjeantson of St.
Peter's Rectory has been kind enough to examine for the writer the
parish register of St. Giles Church. He writes: "The St. Giles accounts
briefly state that _wood_ was bought from time to time--probably for
melting the lead. There is _no_ mention of _faggots_ nor witches in the
Church wardens' overseers-for-the-poor accounts. I carefully