t un homme
de Dieu_. The poor woman also acknowledged that she had held a meeting
with those of her sisterhood, who had charmed a cat by certain spells,
having four joints of men knit to its feet, which they threw into the
sea to excite a tempest. Another frolic they had when, like the weird
sisters in Macbeth, they embarked in sieves with much mirth and jollity,
the Fiend rolling himself before them upon the waves, dimly seen, and
resembling a huge haystack in size and appearance. They went on board of
a foreign ship richly laded with wines, where, invisible to the crew,
they feasted till the sport grew tiresome, and then Satan sunk the
vessel and all on board.

Fian, or Cunninghame, was also visited by the sharpest tortures,
ordinary and extraordinary. The nails were torn from his fingers with
smith's pincers; pins were driven into the places which the nails
usually defended; his knees were crushed in _the boots_, his finger
bones were splintered in the pilniewinks. At length his constancy,
hitherto sustained, as the bystanders supposed, by the help of the
devil, was fairly overcome, and he gave an account of a great
witch-meeting at North Berwick, where they paced round the church
_withershinns_, that is, in reverse of the motion of the sun. Fian then
blew into the lock of the church-door, whereupon the bolts gave way, the
unhallowed crew entered, and their master the devil appeared to his
servants in the shape of a black man occupying the pulpit. He was
saluted with an "Hail, Master!" but the company were dissatisfied with
his not having brought a picture of the king, repeatedly promised, which
was to place his majesty at the mercy of this infernal crew. The devil
was particularly upbraided on this subject by divers respectable-looking
females--no question, Euphane MacCalzean, Barbara Napier, Agnes Sampson,
and some other amateur witch above those of the ordinary profession. The
devil on this memorable occasion forgot himself, and called Fian by his
own name, instead of the demoniacal _sobriquet_ of Rob the Rowar, which
had been assigned to him as Master of the Rows or Rolls. This was
considered as bad taste, and the rule is still observed at every
rendezvous of forgers, smugglers, or the like, where it is accounted
very indifferent manners to name an individual by his own name, in case
of affording ground of evidence which may upon a day of trial be brought
against him. Satan, something disconcerted, concluded the