rk and left her under the form of a black dog, and for
three days after she had a gnat constantly with her, and one morning when
she was changing her linen it sat down upon her shoulder, where she had
one of her marks. Also about the time of last Baal-fyre night (the
beginning of May) she was at a meeting in Newton-dein, where was the devil
dressed in green clothes, with a black hat on his head. And here she
denied Christ, and took upon herself to be his servant, he laying his hand
on her head, and receiving from her "all that was under his hand," when he
gave her the name of "weill-dancing Jonet," and she and a few more danced
like Tam o' Shanter's hags, and probably tired the devil out.
Beatrice Leslie[48] was a witch too, and Agnes, wife of William Young,
gave her some wholesome advice and honest reproof on the matter, whereby
Beatrice was offended, and gave her a terrible look; and that very night
William Young awakened out of his sleep all in terror and dismay, crying
out that Beatrice, with a number of cats, was devouring him. Beatrice had
a cat which two coal-heaving damsels killed by letting some coals fall on
it, afterwards adding to their offence by throwing away her coal-basket.
So Beatrice cursed them, and told them "they should see an ill sight
before eight days were past:" as it fell out, for according to her
threatening they were both killed in the coal-pit, though no one else was
hurt; and when she was brought to see and touch the corpses, the one bled
at the nose and the other at the ear, thus proving her guilt beyond the
possibility of denial. Also she helped Alexander Wilson's wife in
child-bed, by cantrips and unholy sleights; sticking a bare knife betwixt
the bed and the straw, sprinkling salt about the bed, and saying, "Lord,
let never ane worse wight waken thee, nor hes laid thee downe," with other
villanies, unwholesome to honest folk; so Beatrice Leslie saw the sun for
the last time between the cord and the flames.
THE LANTHORNE AND THE BAHR-RECHT.[49]
Christian Wilson, _alias_ the Lanthorne, which name she had gotten from
the devil at the time of her baptism, was too famous in her generation.
She lived near her brother Alexander, and there was notorious ill blood
between them, perhaps because of her notorious evil proceedings. One
evening Alexander was found dead in his own house, naked, with his face
torn and cut, but without a spot of blood anywhere. Yet a "greate lumpe of
fleisch" had
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