the dominion
of the destroyer.

The mill went merrily on no more, and the miller's song was still. He
looked a heavy and a doomed man. Strange suspicions haunted him. His
wife's ill-humour he could have borne; but her very laugh now made him
tremble: it was as if the functions of mind and body were animated by a
being distinct from herself. Her countenance showed not that her
thoughts mingled in either mirth or misery, except at times, when
terrible convulsions seemed to pass over like the sudden roll of the
sea, tossed by some unseen and subterraneous tempest. The neighbours
began to shun his dwelling. His presence was the signal for stolen looks
and portentous whispers. To church his wife never came; but the bench,
her usual sitting-place, was deserted. At the church-doors, after
sermon, when the price of grain, the weather, and other marketable
commodities were discussed and settled, Giles was evidently an object of
avoidance, and left to trudge home alone to his own cheerless and gloomy
hearth.

Dick Hargreave's only cow was bewitched. The most effectual and
approved method of ascertaining under whose spell she laboured was as
follows:--

The next Friday, a pair of breeches was thrown over the cow's horns; she
was then driven from the shippen with a stout cudgel. The place to which
she directed her flight was carefully watched, for there assuredly must
dwell the witch. To the great horror and dismay of Giles Dickisson, the
cow came bellowing down the lane, tail up, in great terror--telling, as
plain as beast could speak, of her distress, until she came to a full
pause, middle deep in his own mill-dam. This was a direct confirmation
to his suspicions; but the following was a more undeniable proof, if
need were, of his wife's dishonest confederacy with the powers of
darkness.

One morning, ere his servant-man Robin had taken the grey mare from the
stable, Giles awoke early, and found his wife had not lain by his side.
He had beforetime felt half roused in the night from a deep but uneasy
slumber; but he was too heavy and bewildered to recollect himself, and
sleep again overcame him ere he could satisfy his doubts. He had either
dreamt, or fancied he had dreamt, that his wife was, at some seasons,
away for a whole night together, and he was rendered insensible by her
spells. This morning, however, he awoke before the usual time, probably
from some failure in the charm, and he met her as she was ascending the
stai