she
might be preserved from witches. Upon one occasion, in 1598, his words
were, "It may please your grace to understand that witches and sorcerers
within these last four years are marvellously increased within this your
grace's realm. Your grace's subjects pine away even unto the death; their
colour fadeth--their flesh rotteth--their speech is benumbed--their senses
are bereft! I pray God they may never practise further than upon the
_subject_!"

[Illustration: JEWELL.]

By degrees, an epidemic terror of witchcraft spread into the villages. In
proportion as the doctrine of the Puritans took root, this dread
increased, and, of course, brought persecution in its train. The Church of
England has claimed, and is entitled to the merit, of having been less
influenced in these matters than any other sect of Christians; but still
they were tainted with the superstition of the age. One of the most
flagrant instances of cruelty and delusion upon record was consummated
under the authority of the Church, and commemorated till a very late
period by an annual lecture at the University of Cambridge.

This is the celebrated case of the witches of Warbois, who were executed
about thirty-two years after the passing of the statute of Elizabeth.
Although in the interval but few trials are recorded, there is,
unfortunately, but too much evidence to shew the extreme length to which
the popular prejudice was carried. Many women lost their lives in every
part of England without being brought to trial at all, from the injuries
received at the hands of the people. The number of these can never be
ascertained.

The case of the witches of Warbois merits to be detailed at length, not
only from the importance attached to it for so many years by the learned
of the University, but from the singular absurdity of the evidence upon
which men, sensible in all other respects, could condemn their
fellow-creatures to the scaffold.

The principal actors in this strange drama were the families of Sir Samuel
Cromwell and a Mr. Throgmorton, both gentlemen of landed property near
Warbois in the county of Huntingdon. Mr. Throgmorton had several
daughters, the eldest of whom, Mistress Joan, was an imaginative and
melancholy girl, whose head was filled with stories of ghosts and witches.
Upon one occasion she chanced to pass the cottage of one Mrs., or, as she
was called, Mother Samuel, a very aged, a very poor, and a very ugly
woman. Mother Samuel was sitti