30 and, entering the room, insisted upon presenting me with his bill, amounting to fifty-eight thalers and some odd kreutzers. "If your master will only give me his word that he'll be answerable for it, I will be content," said he, after some altercation; "but that Doctor Whatd'yecallem, and the baron and all the rest of them, left the town this morning at daybreak." To this request Peter agreed; and mine host, first informing me that the other gentlemen had referred him to me for payment, said that he did not want the money then, but merely wished to know when it would be convenient to me to part with the amount. To his great surprise, I replied, solemuly, "Two thousand years hence;" a date at which even my promissory note would have been scarcely "negotiable." "What? when?" he exclaimed; and my answer was again the same. So he forthwith fell into a passion, and gave vent to sundry oaths and threats, and coarse expressions about being swindled; the result of which was that Peter took him by the shoulders, and thrust him forth into the corridor; from whence he went into the town, to tell his own tale in his own way, and thereby caused "a great sensation;" Peter, While my fame was thus spread abroad, in conjunction with that of the great philosophers, I was utterly unconscious of the distinction, having sunk into an uneasy, dreary dose, any thing but clairvoyant. however, was not idle. Taking the key of my room with him, he called upon a worthy professor, who lost no time ere he visited me; and then a doctor was summoned, who pronounced me to be under the influence of some powerful narcotic, and prescribed accordingly. But, as he was one of the ultra anti-magnetic party, his opinion was ridiculed by those of the opposite faction, who declared my case purely magnetic, and me to be an extraordinary clairvoyant. Be that as it may, it was three days ere I felt myself wide awake; and then I scrutinised and deducted twenty thalers from the egregious supper and wine bill, and paid the remainder, rather than await the result of legal proceedings in a place where I had excited such marked attention. A CHAPTER ON SORCERERS, LOUPS-GAROUX, AND OTHER "Sorcier est celuy qui par moyens diaboliques sciemment s'efforce de parvenir à THE Opinion expressed by the clown in The sorcerers, as a body, were not literally and metaphysically did the this one of the lycanthro joyments sufficient to counterbalance the invariable result of such presumed vagaries, that of being burnt alive, which, in ninety-nine cases out of a hundred, was the fate of all the soidisant sorcerers. Yet the poor wretches made it a point of honour to affect a belief in their own attributed powers, and by a strange species of self-delusion more than countenanced the accusations which were made against them. To this must be added the consciousDess of the moral power which the reputation of sorcery conferred, and the numerous opportunities it offered for gratifying every feeling of resentment or revenge, and not infrequently for the commission of abstract crime, and our surprise will be diminished at witnessing the frequent confessions of suspected witches and sorcerers. The genealogy of sorcery is a very ancient one, as from the nature of the case it accords best with the remotest and least enlightened periods. The Egyptians of old, as we find it recorded in Scripture, were skilful in the art of magic; and it was from that people the Jews acquired their knowledge of sorcery, with the practice of its most mysterious rites. Amongst the charms which were used in Egypt, we are told of one to free ary particular spot from crocodiles, by burying a leaden crocodile under the earth,-a custom which reminds us of the expedient of the brazen serpent in the wilderness. Bodin informs us that this crocodile was burnt by Mehemet Ben Thaulon, and that the reptiles have since regained their mastery in the country. But the practice of sorcery was not confined to the Egyptians; the Persians, the Greeks, and, indeed, all the nations of antiquity, have been convicted of dealing in the black art. The founder of the sect of the Manichæans, the Persian Manes, who instituted the worship of the principle of evil, is esteemed by the learned in demonology as a sorcerer of the first water; and the tuneful Orpheus, "Whom universal nature did lament,” devoted his lyre to other purposes than the praise of the gods, or the charms of his beloved Eurydice: he is represented not only as the founder of a school of magic, whose students were termed, "Orpheotellists," but as having been the instructor of the enchantress Medea, and is said to have wor shipped the devil (or Pluto), as the type or demon of vengeance. This title, by the way, was also given to the spirit Asmodeus by the Hebrews, from which signifies "to ruin." Indeed, the general appellations of " the gentleman in black" were not in old times of the most flattering kind. The universal name which he has acquired in Europe has its origin in the Greek word daßoños, "calumniator," because he watches the actions of virtuous men, and misrepresents them before the throne of God. Hence, also, in Hebrew, the name of " Sathan," or "enemy." Behemoth and Leviathan are also synonymous with the author of ill, from having been created in the beginning. One of the strangest titles by which he has been saluted is the short " קצר אפים Hebrew designation nose," or impatient," from the restlessness with which he roams up and down, "seeking whom he may devour." To return, however, from the idol to his adorers, there is scarcely a great name in antiquity, and even since the Christian era, whom the writers on sorcery have not accused of being magicians. To such an extent has this been carried, that even the Emperor Charles V. did not escape. He is not, indeed, accused by name; but there is very little doubt who is meant by " one of the greatest kings in Christendom, not long deceased," as the author of the Livre des Merveilles states, in his work written about the year 1580. According to this writer, his imperial majesty superadded the amusement of lycanthropy to the avocations of a watchmaker, in his monastic retirement. With all the great examples which were then bruited in men's ears, it is not surprising, in an age when every accomplishment or acquirement beyond those the most ordinary of attainment was considered the result of magical skill, that the influence of sorcery should prevail among the less educated classes, and that the received rites of the art should be practised by some, and be believed by all. Throughout the middle ages, while pagan observances and superstitions blended themselves with the popular belief, the power of the sorcerer held undisputed sway; and even while those great changes were preparing which were to throw a new light upon the minds of men, the faith of the great mass of the people remained little, if at all, shaken. This state of things was rather encouraged than repressed by the clergy, who held the public mind in thrall. The innovations of heresy were held to be devices of the devil, and his agency was assumed to be palpably evident. Hence the persecutions instituted against Jews, sorcerers, and heretics, who were all involved in one common lot, arising from the fear of injury, and the dread of intellectual advancement. It rarely happened that those on whom the sons of St. Dominic set the fatal stigma of heresy were not also accused of sortilège and magic, as an easy mode of excluding popular sympathy, and of obtaining a ready conviction. What, indeed, could be urged in self-defence, when not only hundreds of witnesses averred to the commission of some particular act, but when the accused himself lent a colour of probability to the transaction? Llorente's History of the Inquisition is full of instances of the deluded victims who were brought to the stake by the furious zeal of Torquemada, and other Dominicans, confessing themselves to be sorcerers and witches, and guilty of all the impossible crimes attributed to them. A prominent feature of accusation in all cases was the alleged desecration of the host, and the profanation of all sacred objects, together with the unlawful application of religious ceremonies to impious purposes. It is related, in the fifth book of Pontanus, that the French, being besieged by the Spaniards in the city of Suessa, in the kingdom of Naples, the former were reduced, for want of water, to the greatest distress; and that on the occasion certain priestly sorcerers* took a crucifix, and dragged it in the night through the streets, uttering a thousand curses and blasphemies, and threw it into the sea; they then brought a consecrated host to an ass, which (after he had eaten it) they buried alive under the portal of a church; and after divers incantations and blasphemies (which, our author says, it is as well not to repeat), there fell so violent a rain, that it seemed like a second deluge, and obliged the Spaniards to raise the siege." It was a frequent practice of the sorcerers to conceal the host, and profane it, by administering it to the vilest animals. Froissart mentions, that a certain curate of Soissons, in order to be revenged on an enemy, applied to a sorceress, who directed him to baptise a toad,-to name it, and make it eat the consecrated wafer: he followed the plan prescribed, as he afterwards confessed, for which he was burnt alive! A similar story is told in Monstrelet's Chronicle, in the account of a sorceress of Compiegne, who caused two toads to be baptised. These unhappy toads, who always shared their master's fate, were, it seems, the most familiar animals belonging to the sorcerers, who were accustomed to feed, and even dress them in a livery. In the Pays de Valois, they had a distinct name, called mirmelots. Amongst other religious ceremonies, the sorcerers observed the custom of singing three midnight masses in honour of Satan ; and it is recorded of a celebrated practitioner, one Jean Zentonie, a priest of Halberstadt, that, in the year 1271, he performed his masses the same night at Halberstadt, Cologne, and Mayence, -a celerity of movement to be rivalled only by railroad travelling. This rapidity of transition was a great feature in sorcery; witness the journeys of Apollonius Thyaneus, and others, mentioned by Dom Calmet; and the devil himself, according to St. Augustine, always travels with the utmost rapidity.† Ariel is made frequently to advert to this peculiarity :— "I'll put a girdle round the earth In forty minutes." And again, in his allusion to his visit by night to the "still-vexed Bermoothes." Besides the profanation of the rites of the church, there were other inaugural ceremonies, which, however necessary to complete the initiation of the aspirant for diabolic fame, must have been somewhat repulsive in the performance; indeed some of them were of so revolting a nature, that they carried their own punishment with them. One of the most singular, while it was one of the most necessary acts, was the ceremony of osculation,-a mode of adoration, however reverential, certainly not the most gratifying to the worshipper. It was often performed by the assistance of a lighted candle, Bodin says, that "the greatest sorcerers have always been priests, monks, and and the part saluted is, perhaps, best described in the Spanish phrase," La parte mas uzia que tenia." After this demonstration, it was customary for the wizard crew to rejoice in the presence of the devil, by dancing round him in a ring, with their backs toward the centre. On these occasions, his Satanic majesty was wont to appear under divers forms; sometimes he assumed the shape of a black goat; at others, that of an enormous raven, or crow; and sometimes that of a toad, as large as a goose, or larger. When he had to deal with a novice, he appeared in the likeness of a very pale, thin man, with very black eyes, who himself gave the kiss of initiation, which was so cold, that it made the neophite quite forget the Catholic faith. There were two modes in which the compact with the evil one was formed, -the one public, and the other private. The first was made in a general assembly of sorcerers, on the Monday night, which was called the witches' sabbath; the second in a private place, where the devil was either invoked, or made his appearance without invocation, under various forms,—sometimes as a black man, at others as a very pale one, and often as a black dog. In this latter shape he appeared to Abel de la Rue, a young Cordelier of Meaux, as appears in his confession, made before his execution on the 30th July, 1582. As he was sitting in his chamber (or, rather, sur les latrines), between five and six o'clock in the afternoon, the devil voluntarily appeared like a black dog, and desiring him to have no dread, promised him the aid of his valuable services, and disappeared immediately. Six weeks afterwards he made a second apparition, in the guise of a very pale man, with a very obnoxious breath, and other disagreeable odours, dressed in black, and with feet like a cow. He carried the Cordelier to a gibbet, where their compact was established, a preliminary somewhat ominous of the usual fate of sorcerers. The ceremonies of the Sabbath are familiar to most readers; but the following account, while it details the ordinary mode of proceeding on these occasions, may not be inappropriate to illustrate the extent of credulity which was shewn, both by the accusers and the accused. The particulars are given by Sandoval, a Benedictine monk, in his history of Charles V. It appears, then, according to his statement, that "in the year 1527 a great number of persons were discovered in Navarre, who addicted themselves to the practices of sorcery. The first intimation of their existence was conveyed in a declaration made by two girls, one of eleven and the other of nine years of age, who accused themselves as witches before the royal council of Navarre, and stated that they belonged to a large sisterhood, the several members of which they undertook to point out, on their receiving pardon for themselves. The judges having made the required promise, the children alleged that they could at once discover a witch by examining her left eye; and named a place where the witches were in the habit of assembling in large numbers. Accordingly, a commission of inquiry was named, and proceeded to the place indicated by the children, accompanied by them, and attended by a troop of fifty horsemen. On their arrival at the village, or town, where witches were supposed to be, the children were shut up in different houses, and the suspected persons were brought to them for examination." There was little likelihood of mistakes being made, when the means of discovery were the infallible judgment of two children of eleven and nine years of age; and, accordingly, we find that all the accused admitted the truth of the accusation, and made an ample confession. After detailing many particulars unfit for repetition, and admitting that the denial of the Catholic faith formed a principal feature in their proceedings, they declared that they consisted of " a goodly company," amounting to one hundred and fifty in number, who were in the habit of meeting on certain nights, where the devil appeared to them in the likeness of a black goat, pacing round and round a charmed circle. As soon as his hoarse voice was heard, all the witches thronged to the spot, and began to dance to the sound, and afterwards saluted him in the usual manner. They then indulged in a repast, consisting of bread, wine, and cheese; and when this was over, See the account of a certain heretical sect in the thirteenth century, called Stadingiens." and other orgies had taken place, they anointed their bodies with the excrements of a toad, a crow, and various reptiles, and flew away through the air to execute their malevolent intentions. They admitted having caused the deaths of several persons by poison, and owned to the commission of various crimes. It was their custom, they said, to hold their general assemblies the night before Easter, and the other great Christian festivals of the year, where numberless acts were performed contrary to decency and religion. When they celebrated a mass, the host assumed a black colour. To this notable description, Father Sandoval adds a peculiar illustration :-"The commissioner being desirous of ascertaining the truth of these statements by his own evidence, promised pardon to one of the witches, on condition of her performing some act of witchcraft in his presence, and allowing her to avail herself of the means of escaping, if they offered in the course of her performances. The old woman, having accepted the proposal, asked for a certain box of ointment which had been found on her person, and mounted a high tower, accompanied by the commissioner, whom she stationed by her side at a window. In the presence of a great number of persons, she then anointed the palm of her left hand, her wrist, the point of her elbow, her armpits, and her left side, and afterwards cried out, with a loud voice, Art thou there?' and all the spectators heard a loud voice in the air reply, Yes, I am here!' The old woman then crept out of the window, and began to descend the wall of the tower, head foremost, using her feet and hands in the same manner as a lizard. When she had descended about half way, she suddenly flew up into the air, and continued to be seen by the people until she had sailed beyond the horizon. In the midst of the astonishment into which every body was thrown by this prodigy, the commissioner declared that he would give a considerable sum of money to any one who could bring hack the sorceress. At the end of two days she was found by some shepherds; and the commissioner inquired why she had not flown beyond their reach, when she replied that her master would not carry her more than three leagues, and had left her in the field where the shepherds found her." The end of this affair was, that the judge delivered over the hundred and fifty witches to the inquisition of Estella; and, as Llorente adds, "neither the ointment nor the devil could give them wings to fly away from the flogging and imprisonment which was inflicted on them." This treatment was merciful, compared with what befel thirty poor wretches, who were convicted of similar crimes at Calahorra, and burnt in 1507.* But little satisfaction appears to have resulted from the enjoyments of witchcraft, if such they can be termed. The banquets in a certain degree resembled that of the Barmecide, appealing only to the eye, as his to the ear, and having no real existence. On the Sabbath night, the meat which was given to the guests was served without salt, and was without flavour; and every one rose from table unsatisfied. In many instances, those who ate of enchanted viands at the banquets of sorcerers suffered very severely afterwards,— a consequence which happens even at the tables of aldermen! It is recorded of a famous sorcerer, named Eon, in Lower Brittany, that those who came to see him were served with the choicest delicacies and most costly wines, and when they quitted his house they died of hunger. Bodin says that one of the Counts of Aspremont (" now living," 1587) received guests in a similar manner, and the consequences were equally fatal to man and beast. The Comte de Mascon was another instance. Hugo Floriacen asserts that he was one of the greatest sorcerers of his time; and being one day seated at table, surrounded by his guests, a man came to speak to him, who led him to the door, where a black horse was waiting, on which they both mounted, and were never seen again. This visitant was probably one of those cooks who are proverbially sent as accompaniments to bad dinners. The story seems to have furnished Dr. Southey with the incident for his version of the "Old Woman of Berkeley." The sorcerers themselves were said to be great lovers of human flesh (vide Apuleius, 4, lib, i. in Asin.); and in the 67th chapter of the Salic laws, it is declared that "if a sorceress shall be convicted of eating human flesh, she shall suffer a fine of 200 soldes." |