r unable to utter this well-known preservative against the
malice of the Evil Ones.

The horse-shoe had been taken down from the door, and the blessed herb,
moly, was incautiously thrown aside; neither had Goody Dickisson offered
up the usual petition that evening, to be defended from the snares of
the devil. Her discontent was too great, and she was in a fitter mood
for murmuring than prayer.

Leaning her long thin chin upon a little crutch, and throwing her
bleared eyes full upon the dame, old Molly abruptly exclaimed, in a
voice like the croaking of a raven--

"Thou hast asked for children, but they are denied thee. What said I to
thee, Goody Dickisson, in the clough yonder, by the hollow trunk of the
oak? Rememberest thou, when thou saidest thou wouldst pawn thy body for
the wish of thy soul?"

Dame Dickisson waxed pale, and her knees shook; but the hag went on.

"Worship the master I serve, and thou shalt have thy desire--ay and
more!"

"More!--What meanest thou?"

"Come to the feast, as I have bidden thee. If thou likest not the savour
of our company, thou shalt depart, and without harm."

"But who shall give me a safe conduct that I come back, and harmless as
I went? Once in your possession, methinks"----

"What!" shouted the beldame, with a look of dark and devilish
malignity:--"the word of a prince! Shall Goody Dickisson, the miller's
wife, hold it in distrust? Go, poor fool, and chew thy bitterness, and
bake thy bannocks, and fret thy old husband until thy writhen flesh rot
from thy bones, and thou gnawest them for malice and vexation. Is it not
glorious to ride on the wind--to mount the stars--to kiss the moon
through the dark rolling clouds, when the blast scatters them in its
might? To ride unharmed on their huge peaks tipped with thunder? To be
for ever young in desire and enjoyment, though old and haggard, and bent
double with age and infirmities? To have our wish and our revenge--ay,
and the bodies of our enemies wasting before our spells, like wax to the
flame? But go, sneak and drivel, and mind thy meal and barley-cakes, and
go childless to thy grave."

She rose as if to depart; but Goody Dickisson's evil destiny prevailed,
and she promised to attend the feast, with this condition only, that no
harm should befall her, nor force nor entreaty should be used to win her
consent to join their confederacy. But she returned not from that
unhallowed assembly until body and soul were for ever under