Sabbath. And whiles they sing and danse, euerie one hath a broome in hir hand, and holdeth it up aloft. Item he saith that these night-walking, or rather, night-dansing witches, brought out of Italie into France that danse which is called La Volta.’
He also says that, according to Danæus, if the witches ‘be lame, the diuell deliuereth them a staffe, to conueie them thither inuisiblie through the aire; and that then they fall a dansing and singing of foule songs, wherein he leadeth the danse himselfe; which danse, and other conferences being ended, he supplieth their wants of powders and roots to intoxicate withall; and giueth to euerie nouice a marke, either with his teeth, or with his clawes, and so they kisse the diuell’s bare buttocks, and depart; not forgetting euery daie afterwards to offer to him, dogs, cats, hens, or bloud of their owne.’
In ‘A Pleasant Treatise of Witches,’ London, 1673, we have the following account of the Sabbat: ‘They [witches] are likewise reported to have each of them a Spirit or Imp attending on, and assigned to them, which never leave those to whom they are subject, but assist and render them all the service they command. These give the witches notice to be ready on all solemn appointments and meetings, which are ordinarily on Tuesday or Wednesday night, and then they strive to separate themselves from the company of all other creatures, not to be seen by any; and, night being come, they strip themselves naked, and anoint themselves with their Oyntments. Then they are carryed out of the house, either by the Window, Door, or Chimney, mounted on their Imps in the form of a Goat, Sheep, or Dragon, till they arrive at their meeting-place, whither all the other Wizards and Witches, each one upon his Imp, are also brought. Thus brought to the designed place, which is sometimes many hundred miles from their dwellings, they find a great number of others arrived there by the same means; who, before Lucifer takes his place on his Throne, as King, do make their accustomed homage, adoring and proclaiming him their Lord, and rendring him all Honour.
‘This solemnity being finished they sit to Table, where no delicate meats are wanting to gratifie their appetites, all dainties being brought in the twinkling of an eye, by those spirits that attend the assembly. This done, at the sound of many pleasant instruments (for we must expect no Grace in the company of Devils,) the table is taken away, and the pleasing consort invites them to a Ball; but the dance is strange and wonderful, as well as diabolical, for, turning themselves back to back, they take one another by the arms and raise each other from the ground, then shake their heads to and fro like Anticks, and turn themselves as if they were mad. Then, at last, after this Banquet, Musick, and Ball, the lights were put out....
‘At last, before Aurora brings back the day, each one mounts on his Spirit, and so returns to his respective dwelling place, with that lightness and quickness, that, in little space, they find themselves to be carryed many hundred miles; but are charged by their spirit on the way, not to call in any wise on the name of God, or to bless themselves with the sign of the Cross, upon pain of falling, with peril of their lives, and being grievously punished by their Demon.
‘Sometimes, at their solemn assemblies, the Devil commands that each tell what wickedness he hath committed, and, according to the hainousness and detestableness of it he is honoured and respected with a general applause. Those, on the contrary, who have done no evill, are beaten and punished. At last, when the assembly is ready to break up, and the Devil to despatch them, he publisheth this law with a loud voice, Revenge yourselves, or else you shall dye: then each one, kissing the posteriors of the Devil, returns upon their aiery Vehicles to their habitations.’
Chapter XIII.
Waxen Figures—Witches change into Animals—Witch Marks—Testimony against Witches—Tests for, and Examination of, Witches.
Among other things done at the Sabbat, the Devil instructed witches in the art of making waxen images, the use of which is to torment those against whom they have a spite. King James I. (‘Demonologie,’ lib. ii., cap. v.) says:
‘To some others, at these times, he teacheth how to make pictures of waxe or clay: That by the roasting thereof, the persons that they beare the name of, may be continually melted or dried away by continuall sickenesse.... They can bewitch and take the life of men or women, by roasting of the pictures, which, likewise, is verie possible to their Maister to performe, for, although that instrument of waxe haue no vertue in that turne doing, yet may hee not very well, euen by the same measure that his coniured slaves melts that waxe at the fire, may hee not, I say, at these same times, subtily, as a spirite, so weaken and scatter the spirites of life of the patient, as may make him, on the one part, for faintnesse, to sweate out the humour of his bodie. And on the other part, for the not concurrence of these spirites which cause his digestion, so debilitate his stomache, that this humour radicall, continually sweating out on the one part, and no good sucke being put in the place thereof, for lacke of digestion, on the other, he, at last, shall vanish away, euen as his picture will doe at the fire? And that knauish and cunning workeman, by troubling him, onely at sometimes, makes a proportion, so neere betwixt the working of the one and the other, that both shall end, as it were, at one time.’
In ‘The Witch’ we find the following:
‘Heccat. Is the hart of Wax
Stuck full of magique needles?
Stadlin. ’Tis done, Heccat.
Hec. And is the Farmer’s picture, and his wives,
Lay’d downe to th’ fire yet?
Stad. They are a roasting both too.
Hec. Good:
Then their marrowes are a melting subtelly,
And three monethes sicknes sucks up life in ’em.
They denide me often floure, barme and milke,
Goose-greaze and tar, when I nere hurt their churnings,
Their brew-locks, nor their batches, nor fore spoake
Any of their breedings. Now I’ll be meete with ’em.
Seaven of their yong piggs I have bewitch’d already,
Of the last litter; nine ducklyngs, thirteene goselings, and a hog,
Fell lame last Sonday after evensong too.
And mark how their sheepe prosper; or what soupe
Each milch-kine gives to th’ paile: I’le send these snakes
Shall milke ’em all before hand; the dew’d skirted dayrie wenches
Shall stroak dry duggs for this, and goe home cursing:
I’ll mar their sillabubs, and swathie feastings
Under cowes bellies with the parish-youthes.’
Some witches had the power of transforming themselves into divers animals, and Boguet gives a long list of witches who confessed to so doing, having become, for the nonce, wolves, pigs, asses, cats, horses, frogs or toads, and hares. Indeed, in France and Germany, the belief in loup-garou and währwolf has hardly yet died out. But not only could they change themselves into beasts, but others also, quite after the fashion of the enchantments in the ‘Arabian Nights.’ Reginald Scot tells a story (lib. v., cap. iii.) too good to be omitted:
‘It
