spat upon the
horse-shoe, and expressed her sorrow that she could do no harm while it
remained there. After spitting upon, and kicking it again and again,
she coolly turned round and left the house, without saying a word to
anybody. This poor creature perhaps intended a joke, but the
probability is that she imagined herself a witch. In Saffron Hill,
where she resided, her ignorant neighbours gave her that character, and
looked upon her with no little fear and aversion.

More than one example of the popular belief in witchcraft occurred in
the neighbourhood of Hastings so lately as the year 1830. An aged
woman, who resided in the Rope-walk of that town, was so repulsive in
her appearance, that she was invariably accused of being a witch by all
the ignorant people who knew her. She was bent completely double; and
though very old, her eye was unusually bright and malignant. She wore a
red cloak, and supported herself on a crutch: she was, to all outward
appearance, the very beau ideal of a witch. So dear is power to the
human heart, that this old woman actually encouraged the popular
superstition: she took no pains to remove the ill impression, but
seemed to delight that she, old and miserable as she was, could keep in
awe so many happier and stronger fellow-creatures. Timid girls crouched
with fear when they met her, and many would go a mile out of their way
to avoid her. Like the witches of the olden time, she was not sparing
of her curses against those who offended her. The child of a woman who
resided within two doors of her, was afflicted with lameness, and the
mother constantly asserted that the old woman had bewitched her. All
the neighbours credited the tale. It was believed, too, that she could
assume the form of a cat. Many a harmless puss has been hunted almost
to the death by mobs of men and boys, upon the supposition that the
animal would start up before them in the true shape of Mother * * * * *.

In the same town there resided a fisherman,--who is, probably, still
alive, and whose name, for that reason, we forbear to mention,--who was
the object of unceasing persecution, because it was said that he had
sold himself to the devil. It was currently reported that he could
creep through a keyhole, and that he had made a witch of his daughter,
in order that he might have the more power over his fellows. It was
also believed that he could sit on the points of pins and needles, and
feel no pain. His brother-fisher