1590 of North Berwick, where the devil preached to him, and many others, bidding them not spare to do evil, but to eat, drink, and be merry; for he should raise them all up gloriously at the Last Day: that the devil made him do homage, by kissing his ****. That he (the prisoner) raised the wind on the King's passage to Denmark: that he met with Satan on the King's return from Denmark; and Satan promised to raise a mist, by which his Majesty should be thrown upon the coast of England; and thereupon threw something like a football into the sea, which raised a vapour. Agnes Sampson. Agnes Sampson in Keith,t a grave matron-like woman, of a rank and comprehension above the vulgar, was accused of having renounced her baptism, and of having received the devil's mark; of raising storms to prevent the Queen's coming from Denmark; of being at the famous meeting at North Berwick, where six men, and ninety women, witches, were present, dancing to one of their number, who played to them on a Jew's harp. It was charged in the indictment, that the devil was present at this meeting; and started up in the pulpit, which was hung round with black candles: that he called them all by their names, asked them, If they had kept their promises, and been good servants, and what they had done since the last meeting: that they open Rec. of Just. Jan. 27, 1590. A story is told of this woman in Spottiswood's Hist. p. 393. which is nowise confirmed by the record. His fable is absurd; and seems to have been invented by some zealous believer in the divine right of Kings. ed up three graves, and cut off the joints from the 1590 dead bodies' fingers, and that the prisoner got for her share two joints and a winding sheet, to make powder of to do mischief: that the devil was dressed in a black gown and hat; and that he ordered them to keep his commandments, which were to do all the ill they could, and to kiss his ****. Euphan M'Calzeane. Euphan M'Calzeane was a lady possessed of a con- 1591 siderable estate in her own right. She was the daughter of Thomas M'Calzeane Lord Cliftonhall, one of the Senators of the College of Justice, whose death in the year 1581, spared him the disgrace and misery of seeing his daughter fall by the hands of the executioner. She was married to a gentleman of her own name, by whom she had three children. She was accused of treasonably conspiring the King's death by enchantments;t particularly by framing a waxen picture of the King; of raising tsorms to hinder his return from Denmark; and of various other articles of witchcraft. She was heard by counsel in her defence; was found guilty by the jury, which consisted of landed gentlemen of note; and her punishment was still severer than that commonly inflicted on the Weyward Sisters,-she was burned alive, and her estate confiscated. Her children, however, after being thus barbarously robbed of their mother, were restored by act of Parliament against the forfeiture. The act does not say that the sentence was unjust; but that the King was touched in honour and + Records of Just. 8th May, 1591. Unprinted Acts, A. D. 1592. No. 70. 1591 conscience to restore the children. But to move the wheels of his Majesty's conscience, the children had to grease them, by a payment of five thousand merks to the donator of escheat, and by relinquishing the estate of Cliftonhall, which the King gave to Sir James Sandilands of Slamanno. 1605 As a striking picture of the state of justice, humanity, and science, in those times,† it may be remarked, that this Sir James Sandilands, a favourite of the King's, (` ex interiore principis familiaritate,') who got this estate, which the daughter of one Lord of Session forfeited, on account of being a witch, did that very year murder another Lord of Session in the suburbs of Edinburgh, in the public street, without undergoing either trial or punishment. Patrick Lawrie. Among many acts of witchcraft for which Patrick Lawrie was committed to the flames, there were his consulting with, and receiving from the devil a hand belt; in one end of which appeared the similitude of four fingers and a thumb, not far different from the • claws of the Devil;'—his bewitching Bessie Sands's corns, and taking the whole strength and substance out of them for ten years successively;-his enchanting certain milk cows, which thereby, instead of milk, yielded nothing but blood and matter;-and his curing Elizabeth Crawfurd's child, which, for eight or nine years, had been afflicted with an incurable disease. * He who obtains a gift of the forfeiture. + Johnstoni Historia Rerum Britannicarum, p. 172. See also p. 174. of this work. Records of Justiciary, July 23, 1605. Margaret Wallace. Margaret Wallacet was tried before the Circuit 1620 Court of Justiciary. The Duke of Lennox, the Archbishop of Glasgow, and Sir George Erskine of Innérteil, sat as assessors to the judges, and an eminent counsel was heard in behalf of the prisoner. She was accused of inflicting and of curing diseases by inchantment; but it was not specified what spells she employed. It was libelled against her, that on being taken suddenly ill she sent for one Christian Graham, a notorious witch, who afterwards suffered a capital punishment, and that this witch transferred the disease from the prisoner to a young girl: that the girl being thus taken ill, her mother was advised by the prisoner to send for Christian Graham, who answered, that her confidence was in God, and she would have nothing to do with the devil or his instruments: the prisoner replied, that in a case of this sort Christian Graham could do as much as God himself; and that without her aid there was no remedy for the child: but the mother not consenting, the pri soner without her knowledge sent for Christian, who muttered words, and expressed signs, by which she restored the child to health, &c. Her counsel urged, that the indictment was by much too general: that it ought to have been specified, not simply that she did enchant, but also by what kind of spelis she performed her incantations: that supposing Christian Graham to have been a witch, and that the prisoner when taken ill consulted her, still he was entitled to plead that the prisoner consulted her on ac Records of Justiciary, March 20, 1620. 1620 count of her medical knowledge, and not for her skill in sorcery: that as to the blasphemous expressions, however well they might found a trial for blasphemy, they by no means inferred the crime of witchcraft; and he quoted many authorities from the civil and canon laws. He farther challenged one of the assizers, because one of the articles charged against the prisoner was her having done an injury to his brother-in-law.-The whole defences were repelled by the judges; and the jury found the prisoner guilty. 1629 Isobel Young. Isobel Young in East Barns* was accused of havwing stopped by enchantment George Sandie's mill twenty-nine years before; of having prevented his boat from catching fish while all the other boats at the herring-drave, or herring-fishery were successful; and that she was the cause of his failing in his circumstances, and of nothing prospering with him in * Records of Justiciary, Feb. 4, 1629. In this trial mention is made of the proprietor of the cattle having applied to Lockhart of Lee for the use of his curing stane to cure the cattle, and that he graciously condescended to give them some water in which it had been dipped; and the water having (I suppose) derived virtue from the stone, as the Pool of Bethsaida from the angel, the cattle were thought to be a good deal the better.—This famous instrument of superstition has maintained its reputation for many centuries. It is said to have been brought home by Lockhart of Lee, who accompanied the Earl of Douglas in carrying King Robert the Bruce's heart to the Holy Land. It is called the Lee Penny. Besides its curing of cattle, it has another virtue, that it can never be lost. It is still in the possession of that ancient family; and people from various parts of Scotland, and even of England, whose cattle were infected, have made application within these few years for water in which the stane had been dipped. |