examination, and belief without proof, pass as the
righteous operations of faith, so long will superstition and credulity
reign supreme over the mind, and the functions of critical reason be
abandoned and foresworn. And as it seems to me that credulity is even a
less desirable frame of mind than scepticism, I have set forth this
collection of witch stories as landmarks of the excesses to which a blind
belief may hurry and impel humanity, and perhaps as some slight aids to
that much misused common sense which the holders of impossible theories
generally consider "enthusiastic," and of "a nobler life" to tread under
foot, and loftily ignore.

THE END.

LONDON: PRINTED BY W. CLOWES AND SONS, STAMFORD STREET.

Footnotes:

[1] Pitcairn's 'Scottish Criminal Trials.'

[2] Pitcairn's 'Scottish Criminal Trials.'

[3] Pitcairn.

[4] Pitcairn.

[5] Pitcairn.

[6] Pitcairn.

[7] An iron instrument so constructed, that by means of a hoop which
passed over the head, a piece of iron having four prongs or points, was
forcibly thrust into the mouth, two of these being directed to the tongue
and palate, the others pointing outwards to each cheek. This infernal
machine was secured by a padlock. At the back of the collar was fixed a
ring, by which to attach to a staple in the wall of her cell.--_Pitcairn's
'Scottish Criminal Trials.'_

[8] Fountainhall says that she was convict and burnt; but is this not a
mistake? Pitcairn gives the actual trial, and King James's angry letter
against the contumacious assisa.

[9] Pitcairn.

[10] Dr. Jamieson conjectures the word to signify "warm hose." After
encircling the leg with an iron framework, it was put into a moveable
furnace or chauffer, and during the progress of heating the iron, the
intended questions were successively put.--_Note in Pitcairn's 'Scottish
Criminal Trials.'_

[11] Pitcairn's 'Scottish Criminal Trials.'

[12] Chambers' 'Domestic Annals of Scotland.'

[13] 'Antiquarian Researches of Aberdeen, by Gavin Turriff: Spalding Club
Miscellany. Chambers' 'Domestic Annals,' to the end of the Aberdeen
trials.

[14] Apparently untranslateable.

[15] Patrick Anderson's MS. history of Scotland, quoted by Robert
Chambers, in his 'Domestic Annals of Scotland.'

[16] Pitcairn.

[17] Pitcairn and Chambers.

[18] Pitcairn.

[19] Pitcairn.

[20] Dalyell's 'Darker Superstitions of Scotland.'

[21] Scott's 'Demonology and Witchcraft.'

[22] Pitcairn.

[