save, as the
farmer said, 'his flocks from spells which had been cast on 'em.'"[746]
In a recent account of the fire-festivals of Wales we read that "I have
also heard my grandfather and father say that in times gone by the
people would throw a calf in the fire when there was any disease among
the herds. The same would be done with a sheep if there was anything the
matter with a flock. I can remember myself seeing cattle being driven
between two fires to 'stop the disease spreading.' When in later times
it was not considered humane to drive the cattle between the fires, the
herdsmen were accustomed to force the animals over the wood ashes to
protect them against various ailments."[747] Writing about 1866, the
antiquary W. Henderson says that a live ox was burned near Haltwhistle
in Northumberland "only twenty years ago" to stop a murrain.[748] "About
the year 1850 disease broke out among the cattle of a small farm in the
parish of Resoliss, Black Isle, Ross-shire. The farmer prevailed on his
wife to undertake a journey to a wise woman of renown in Banffshire to
ask a charm against the effects of the 'ill eye.' The long journey of
upwards of fifty miles was performed by the good wife, and the charm was
got. One chief thing ordered was to burn to death a pig, and sprinkle
the ashes over the byre and other farm buildings. This order was carried
out, except that the pig was killed before it was burned. A more
terrible sacrifice was made at times. One of the diseased animals was
rubbed over with tar, driven forth, set on fire, and allowed to run till
it fell down and died."[749] "Living animals have been burnt alive in
sacrifice within memory to avert the loss of other stock. The burial of
three puppies 'brandise-wise' in a field is supposed to rid it of weeds.
Throughout the rural districts of Devon witchcraft is an article of
current faith, and the toad is thrown into the flames as an emissary of
the evil one."[750]

[The calf is burnt in order to break a spell which has been cast on the
herd.]

But why, we may ask, should the burning alive of a calf or a sheep be
supposed to save the rest of the herd or the flock from the murrain?
According to one writer, as we have seen, the burnt sacrifice was
thought to appease the wrath of God.[751] The idea of appeasing the
wrath of a ferocious deity by burning an animal alive is probably no
more than a theological gloss put on an old heathen rite; it would
hardly occur to the sim