helped Abomilique Bluebeard Bashaw of Babelmandel beat down an abominable bumblebee at Balsora.”
But to the other witches. Their charms were repeated sometimes in their own language and sometimes in gibberish. When the Scotch witches wanted to fly away to their “Witches’ Sabbath,” they straddled a broom-handle, a corn stalk, a straw, or a rush, and cried out “Horse and hattock, in the Devil’s name!” and immediately away they flew, “forty times as high as the moon,” if they wished. Some English witches in Somersetshire used instead to say, “Thout, tout, throughout and about;” and when they wished to return from their meeting they said “Rentum, tormentum!” If this form of the charm does not manufacture a horse, not even a saw-horse, then I recommend another version of it, thus:
“Horse and pattock, horse and go!
Horse and pellats, ho, ho, ho!”
German witches said (in High Dutch:)
“Up and away!
Hi! Up aloft, and nowhere stay!”
Scotch witches had modes of working destruction to the persons or property of those to whom they meant evil, which were strikingly like the negro obeah or mandinga. One of these was, to make a hash of the flesh of an unbaptised child, with that of dogs and sheep, and to put this goodly dish in the house of the victim, reciting the following rhyme:
“We put this untill this hame
In our Lord the Devil’s name;
The first hands that handle thee.
Burned and scalded may they be!
We will destroy houses and hald,
With the sheep and nolt (i. e. cattle) into the fauld; And little shall come to the fore (i. e. remain,) Of all the rest of the little store.”
Another, used to destroy the sons of a certain gentleman named Gordon was, to make images for the boys, of clay and paste, and put them in a fire, saying:
“We put this water among this meal
For long pining and ill heal,
We put it into the fire
To burn them up stock and stour (i. e. stack and band.) That they be burned with our will, Like any stikkle (stubble) in a kiln.”
In case any lady reader finds herself changed into a hare, let her remember how the witch Isobel Gowdie changed herself from hare back to woman. It was by repeating:
“Hare, hare, God send thee care!
I am in a hare’s likeness now;
But I shall be woman even now—
Hare, hare, God send thee care!”
About the year 1600 there was both hanged and burned at Amsterdam a poor demented Dutch girl, who alleged that she could make cattle sterile, and bewitch pigs and poultry by saying to them “Turius und Shurius Inturius.” I recommend to say this first to an old hen, and if found useful it might then be tried on a pig.
Not far from the same time a woman was executed as a witch at Bamberg, having, as was often the case, been forced by torture to make a confession. She said that the devil had given her power to send diseases upon those she hated, by saying complimentary things about them, as “What a strong man!” “what a beautiful woman!” “what a sweet child!” It is my own impression that this species of cursing may safely be tried where it does not include a falsehood.
Here are two charms which the German witches used to repeat to raise the devil with in the form of a he goat:
“Hare, hare, God send thee care!
I am in a hare’s likeness now;
But I shall be woman even now—
Hare, hare, God send thee care!”
The two last words to be screamed out quickly. This second one, it must be remembered, is to be read backward except the two last words. It was supposed to be the strongest of all, and was used if the first one failed:
“Anion, Lalle, Sabolos, Sado, Poter, Aziel,
Adonai Sado Vagoth Agra, Jod,
Baphra! Komm! Komm!”
In case the devil staid too long, he could be made to take himself off by addressing to him the following statement, repeated backward:
“Zellianelle Heotti Bonus Vagotha
Plisos sother osech unicus Beelzebub
Dax! Komm! Komm!”
Which would evidently make almost anybody go away.
A German charm to improve one’s finances was perhaps no worse than gambling in gold. It ran thus:
“As God be welcomed, gentle moon—
Make thou my money more and soon!”
To get rid of a fever in the German manner, go and tie up a bough of a tree, saying, “Twig, I bind thee; fever, now leave me!” To give your ague to a willow tree, tie three knots in a branch of it early in the morning, and say, “Good morning, old one! I give thee the cold; good morning, old one!” and turn and run away as fast as you can without looking back.
Enough of this nonsense. It is pure mummery. Yet it is worth while to know exactly what the means were which in ancient times were relied on for such purposes, and it is not useless to put this matter on record; for just such formulas are believed in now by many people. Even in this city there are “witches” who humbug the more foolish part of the community out of their money by means just as foolish as these.
VIII. ADVENTURERS.
CHAPTER XXXIX.
THE PRINCESS CARIBOO; OR, THE QUEEN OF THE ISLES.
Bristol was, in 1812, the second commercial city of Great Britain, having in particular an extensive East India trade. Among its inhabitants were merchants, reckoned remarkably shrewd, and many of them very wealthy; and quite a number of aristocratic families, who were looked up to with the abject toad-eating kind of civility that follows “the nobility.” On the whole, Bristol was a very fashionable, rich, cultivated, and intelligent place—considering.
One fine evening in the winter of 1812-13, the White Lion hotel, a leading inn at Bristol, was thrown into a wonderful flutter by the announcement that a very beautiful and fabulously wealthy lady, the Princess Cariboo, had just arrived by ship from an oriental port. Her agent, a swarthy and wizened little Asiatic, who spoke imperfect English, gave this information, and ordered the most sumptuous suite of rooms in the house. Of course, there was great activity in all manner of preparations; and the mysterious character of this lovely but high-born stranger caused a wonderful flutter of excitement, which grew and grew until the fair stranger at length deigned to arrive. She came at about ten o’clock, in great state, and with two or three coaches packed with servants and luggage—the former of singularly dingy complexion and fantastic vestments, and the latter of the most curious forms and material imaginable. The eager anticipations of hosts and guests alike were not only fully justified but even exceeded by the rare beauty of the unknown, the oriental style and magnificence of her attire and that of her attendants, and the enormous bulk of her baggage—a circumstance that has no less weight at an English inn than any where else. The stranger, too, was most liberal with her fees to the servants, which were always in gold.
It was quickly discovered that her ladyship spoke not one word of English, and even her agent—a dark, wild, queer little fellow,—got along with it but indifferently, preferring all his requests in very “broken China” indeed. The landlord thought