the stroke of twelve, as he was still reading with the axe lying on
the table within reach, the door opened and in came two grey cats
mewing, an old one and a young one. They sat down opposite him, but it
was easy to see that they did not like his wakefulness and the
prayer-book and the axe. Suddenly the old cat reached out a paw and made
a grab at the axe, but the young chap was too quick for her and held it
fast. Then the young cat tried to do the same for the prayer-book, but
the apprentice gripped it tight. Thus balked, the two cats set up such a
squalling that the young fellow could hardly say his prayers. Just
before one o'clock the younger cat sprang on the table and fetched a
blow with her right paw at the candle to put it out. But the apprentice
struck at her with his axe and sliced the paw off, whereupon the two
cats vanished with a frightful screech. The apprentice wrapped the paw
up in paper to shew it to his master. Very glad the miller was next
morning when he came down and found the mill going and the young chap at
his post. The apprentice told him what had happened in the night and
gave him the parcel containing the cat's paw. But when the miller opened
it, what was the astonishment of the two to find in it no cat's paw but
a woman's hand! At breakfast the miller's young wife did not as usual
take her place at the table. She was ill in bed, and the doctor had to
be called in to bind up her right arm, because in hewing wood, so they
said, she had made a slip and cut off her own right hand. But the
apprentice packed up his traps and turned his back on that mill before
the sun had set.[784]

[The analogy of were-wolves confirms the view that the reason for
burning bewitched animals is either to burn the witch or to compel her
to appear.]

It would no doubt be easy to multiply instances, all equally well
attested and authentic, of the transformation of witches into animals
and of the damage which the women themselves have sustained through
injuries inflicted on the animals.[785] But the foregoing evidence may
suffice to establish the complete parallelism between witches and
were-wolves in these respects. The analogy appears to confirm the view
that the reason for burning a bewitched animal alive is a belief that
the witch herself is in the animal, and that by burning it you either
destroy the witch completely or at least unmask her and compel her to
reassume her proper human shape, in which she is naturall