part i

. p. 304) explains by lusty, or craske, _Delicativus_, crassus, I am unable to conjecture. It is clear, that the wand in one hand is to steck, _i.e._ stake, or fasten, the latch of hell door, while the key in his other hand is to open heaven's lock.

K _b_ 3. "_Let Crizum child goe to it Mother mild._"] The chrisom, according to the usual explanation, was a white cloth placed upon the head of an infant at baptism, when the chrism, or sacred oil of the Romish Church, was used in that sacrament. If the child died within a month of its birth, that cloth was used as a shroud; and children so dying were called chrisoms in the old bills of mortality.

K _b_ 4. "_A light so farrandly._"] Farrandly, or farrantly, a word still in use in Lancashire, and which is equivalent to fair, likely, or handsome. (See _Lancashire Dialect and Glossary_.) "Harne panne," _i.e._, cranium.--_Promptorium Parvulorum_, p. 237.

K 2 _a_ 1. "_Vpon the ground of holy weepe._"] I know not how to explain this, unless it mean the ground of holy weeping, _i.e._, the Garden of Gethsemane.

K 2 _a_ 2. "_Shall neuer deere thee._"] The word to dere, or hurt, says Mr. Way, _Promptorium Parvulorum_, p. 119, is commonly used by Chaucer and most other writers until the sixteenth century:

"Fyr he schal hym nevyr dere." _Coeur de Lion_, 1638.

Fabyan observes, under the year 1194, "So fast besyed this good Kyng Richarde to vex and dere the infydelys of Sury." Palsgrave gives, "To dere or hurte a noye nuire, I wyll never dere you by my good wyll." Ang. Sax., [Anglo-Saxon: derian] _nocere_, [Anglo-Saxon: derung] _læsio_.

K 3 _a_. "_The Witches of Salmesbvry._"] Or, more properly, Samlesbury. This wicked attempt on the part of this priest, or Jesuit, Thompson, _alias_ Southworth, to murder the three persons whose trial is next reported, by suborning a child of the family to accuse them of what, in the excited state of the public mind at the time, was almost certain to consign them to a public execution, has few parallels in the annals of atrocity. The plot was defeated, and the lives of the persons accused, Jennet Bierley, Ellen Bierley, and Jane Southworth, saved, by no sagacity of the judge or wisdom of the jury, but by the effect of one simple question, wrung from the intended victims on the verge of anticipated condemnation, and which, natural as it might appear, was one the felicity of which Garrow or Erskine might have envied. It demolished, like Ithuriel's spear, the whole fabric of imposture, and laid it open even to the comprehension of Sir Edward Bromley and Master Thomas Potts. This was a case which well deserved Archbishop Harsnet for its historian. His vein of irony, which Swift or Echard never surpassed, and the scorching invective of which he was so consummate a master, would have been well employed in handing down to posterity a scene of villainy to which the frauds of Somers and the stratagems of Weston were mere child's play. We might then have had, from the most enlightened man of his age, a commentary on the statute 1st James First, which would have neutralized its mischief, and spared a hecatomb of victims. His resistless ridicule would, perhaps, have accomplished at once what was slowly and with difficulty brought about by the arguments of Scot and Webster, the establishment of the Royal Society, and a century's growth of intelligence and knowledge.

K 3 _b_ 1. "_A Seminarie Priest._"] Of this Thompson, _alias_ Southworth, I find no account in Dodd's _Catholic Church History_. A John Southworth is noticed, vol. iii. p. 303, who is described as of an ancient family in Lancashire, and who was executed at Tyburn, June 28th, 1655. His dying speech is to be found in the same volume, p. 360. The interval of time, as well as the difference of surname, excludes the presumption of his being identical with the person referred to in the text, the hero of this extraordinary conspiracy, and who was probably of the family of Sir John Southworth, after mentioned.

K 3 _b_ 2. "_A Iesuite, whereof this Countie of Lancaster hath good store._"] Lancashire was, about this period, the great hot-bed of Popish recusants. From the very curious list of recusants given (Baines's _Lancashire_, vol. i. p. 541,) it would seem that Samlesbury was one of their strongholds:--

James Cowper a seminarie prieste receipted releived and mainteined att the lodge of Sir John Southworthe in Samlesburie Parke by Mr. Tho: Southworthe, one of the younger sonnes of the said Sir John. And att the howse of John Warde dwellinge in Samlesburie Park syde. And the said Prieste sayeth Masse att the said lodge and att the said Wards howse. Whether resorte, Mr. Sowthworthe, Mres. An Sowthworthe, John Walmesley servante to Sir John Southworthe, Tho. Southworthe dwellinge in the Parke, John Gerrerde, servante to Sir John Southworthe, John Singleton, John Wrighte, James Sherples iunior, John Warde of Samlesburie, John Warde of Medler thelder, Henrie Potter of Medler, John Gouldon of Winwicke, Thomas Gouldon of the same, Roberte Anderton of Samlesburie and John Sherples of Stanleyhurst in Samlesburie.--_Baines's Lancashire_, vol. i. p. 543.

Att the lodge in Samlesburie Parke there be masses daylie and Seminaries dyuerse Resorte thither as James Cowpe, Harrisson Bell and such like, The like vnlawfull meetings are made daylie att the howse of John Warde by the Parke syde of Samlesburie all wiche matters, masses, resorte to Masses, receipting of Seminaries wilbe Justifyed by Mr. Adam Sowtheworthe Thomas Sherples and John Osbaldston.--_Ibid._, p. 544.

K 4 _b_. "_Picked her off._"] Threw her off.

L _a_. "_Hugh Walshmans._"] The wife of Hugh Walshman, of Samlesbury, is mentioned in the list of recusants; Baines, vol. i. p. 544.

L 2 _a_ 1. "_Brought a little child._"] The evidence against the Pendle witches exhibits meagreness and poverty of imagination compared with the accumulated horrors with which the Jesuit, fresh, it may be, from Bodin and Delrio, made his "fire burn and cauldron bubble." With respect to this old story of the magical use made of the corpses of infants, Ben Jonson, in a note on

"I had a dagger: what did I with that? Killed an infant to have his fat;"

tells us with great gravity:

Their killing of infants is common, both for confection of their ointment (whereto one ingredient is the fat boiled, as I have shewed before out of Paracelsus and Porta) as also out of a lust to do murder. _Sprenger in Mal. Malefic._ reports that a witch, a midwife in the diocese of Basil, confessed to have killed above forty infants (ever as they were new born, with pricking them in the brain with a needle) which she had offered to the devil. See the story of the three witches in _Rem. Dæmonola lib. cap._ 3, about the end of the chapter. And M. Phillippo Ludwigus Elich _Quæst._ 8. And that it is no new rite, read the practice of Canidia, _Epod. Horat. lib. ode_ 5, and Lucan, _lib._ 6, whose admirable verses I can never be weary to transcribe:--

Nec cessant à cæde manus, si sanguine vivo Est opus, erumpat jugulo qui primus aperto. Nec refugit cædes, vivum si sacra cruorem Extaque funereæ poscunt trepidantia mensæ. Vulnere si ventris, non quâ natura vocabat, Extrahitur partus calidus ponendus in aris; Et quoties sævis opus est, et fortibus umbris Ipsa facit maneis. Hominum mors omnis in usu est.

_Ben Johnson's Works, by Gifford_, vol. vii. p. 130.

L 2 _a_ 2. "_They said they would annoint themselues._"] Ben Jonson informs us:

When they are to be transported from place to place, they use to anoint themselves, and sometimes the things they ride on. Beside Apul. testimony, see these later, _Remig. Dæmonolatriæ lib._ 1. _cap._ 14. _Delrio, Disquis. Mag. l._ 2. _quæst._ 16. _Bodin Dæmonoman. lib._ 2 _c._ 14. _Barthol. de Spina. quæst. de Strigib. Phillippo Ludwigus Elich. quæst._ 10. _Paracelsus in magn. et occul. Philosophia_, teacheth the confection. _Unguentum ex carne recens natorum infantium, in pulmenti, forma coctum, et cum herbis somniferis, quales sunt Papaver, Solanum, Cicuta_, &c. And _Giov. Bapti. Porta, lib._ 2. _Mag. Natur. cap._ 16.--_Ben Jonson's Works by Gifford_, vol. vii. p. 119.

L 3 _a_. "_Did carrie her into the loft._"] There is something in this strange tissue of incoherencies, for knavery has little variety, which forcibly reminds us of the inventions of Elizabeth Canning, who ought to have lived in the days when witchcraft was part of the popular creed. What an admirable witch poor old Mary Squires would have made, and how brilliantly would her persecutor have shone in the days of the Baxters and Glanvilles, who acquitted herself so creditably in those of the Fieldings and the Hills.

L 4 _b_ 1. "_Robert Hovlden, Esquire._"] This individual would be of the ancient family of Holden, of Holden, the last male heir of which died without issue, 1792. (See Whitaker's _Whalley_, 418.)

L 4 _b_ 2. "_Sir John Southworth._"] In this family the manor of Samlesbury remained for three hundred and fifty years. This was, probably, the John (for the pedigree contained in Whitaker's _Whalley_, p. 430, does not give the clearest light on the subject) who married Jane, daughter of Sir Richard Sherburne, of Stonyhurst, and who took a great lead amongst the Catholics of Lancashire. What was the degree of relationship between Sir John and the husband of the accused, Jane Southworth, there is nothing in the descent to show. Family bickering might have a share, as well as superstition, in the opinion he entertained, "that she was an evil woman." Of the old hall at Samlesbury, the residence of the Southworths, a most interesting account will be found in Whitaker's _Whalley_, p. 431. He considers the centre of very high antiquity, probably not later than Edward III; and observes, "There is about the house a profusion and bulk of oak that must almost have laid prostrate a forest to erect it."

M 1 _b_. "_The particular points of the Evidence._"] What a waste of ingenuity Master Potts displays in this recapitulation, where he is merely slaying the slain, and where his wisdom was not needed. Had he applied it to the service of the Pendle witches, he would have found still grosser contrarieties, and as great absurdity. But in that case, there was no horror of Popery to sharpen his faculties, or Jesuit in the background to call his humanity into play.

M 2 _a_. "_The wrinkles of an old wiues face is good euidence to the Iurie against a Witch._"] _Si sic omnia!_ For once the worthy clerk in court has a lucid interval, and speaks the language of common sense.

M 2 _b_. "_But old Chattox had Fancie._"] A great truth, though Master Potts might not be aware of the extent of it.

M 4 _a_. "_M. Leigh, a very religious Preacher._"] Parson of Standish, a man memorable in his day. He published several pieces, amongst others the two following: 1. "The Drumme of Devotion," by W. Leigh, of Standish, 1613.--2. "News of a Prodigious Monster in Aldington, in the Parish of Standish, in Lancashire," 1613, 4to, which show him to have been an adept in the science of title-making. He was one of the tutors of Prince Henry, and was great-grandfather of Dr. Leigh, author of the _History of Lancashire_.

N 3 _b_. "_The Arraignment and Triall of Anne Redferne._"] This poor woman seems to have been regularly hunted to death by her prosecutors, who pursued her with all the dogged pertinacity of blood-hounds. Neither the imploring appeal for mercy, in her case, from her wretched mother, who did not ask for any in her own, nor the want of even the shadow of a ground for the charge, had the slightest effect upon the besotted prejudices of the judge and jury. Acquitted on one indictment, she is now put on her trial on another; the imputed crime being her having caused the death of a person, who did not even accuse her of being accessory to it, nearly eighteen years before, by witchcraft; the only evidence, true or false, being, that she had been seen, about the same period, making figures of clay or marl. Her real offence, it may well be conjectured, was her having rejected the improper advances of the ill-conditioned young man whose death she was first indicted for procuring, and to which circumstance the rancour of his relations, the prosecutors, may evidently be traced. It is gratifying to know that she had firmness of mind to persist in the declaration of her innocence to the last.

O 3 _a_. "_Alice Nutter._"] We now come to a person of a different description from any of those who have preceded as parties accused, and on whose fate some extraordinary mystery seems to hang. Alice Nutter was not, like the others, a miserable mendicant, but was a lady of large possessions, of a respectable family, and with children whose position appears to have been such as, it might have been expected, would have afforded her the means of escaping the fate which overtook her humbler companions.

"I knew her a good woman and well bred, Of an unquestion'd carriage, well reputed Amongst her neighbours, reckoned with the best." _Heywood's Lancashire Witches._

She is described as the wife of Richard Nutter of the Rough Lee, and mother of Miles Nutter, who were in all likelihood nearly related to the other Nutters whose descent has been given. The tradition is, that she was closely connected by relationship or marriage with Eleanor Nutter, the daughter of Ellis Nutter of Pendle Forest, the grandmother of Archbishop Tillotson. That she was the victim of a foul and atrocious conspiracy, in which the movers were some of her own family, there seems no reason to doubt. The anxiety of her children to induce her to confess may possibly have originated in no impure or sinister motive, but it is difficult altogether to dismiss from the mind the suspicion that her wealth was her great misfortune; and that to secure it within their grasp her own household were passive, if not active, agents in her destruction. Any thing more childish or absurd than the evidence against her--as, for instance, that she joyned in killing Henry Mitton because he refused a penny to Old Demdike--it would not be easy, even from the records of witch trials, to produce. As regards Alice Nutter, Potts is singularly meagre, and it is to be lamented that the deficiency of information cannot at present be supplied. Almost the only fact he furnishes us with is, that she died maintaining her innocence. It would have been most interesting to have had the means of ascertaining how she conducted herself at her trial and after her condemnation; and how she met the iniquitous injustice of her fate, sharpened, as it must have been, by the additional bitterness of the insults and execrations of the blind and infuriated populace at her execution. It is far from improbable that some of the correspondence now deposited in the family archives in the county hitherto unpublished may ultimately furnish these particulars.

Alice Nutter was doubtless the original of the story of which Heywood availed himself in _The Late Lancashire Witches_, 1634, 4to, which is frequently noticed by the writers of the 17th century--that the wife of a Lancashire country gentleman had been detected in practising witchcraft and unlawful arts, and condemned and executed. In that play there can be little hesitation in ascribing to Heywood the scenes in which Mr. Generous and his wife are the interlocutors, and to Broome, Heywood's coadjutor, the subordinate and farcical portions. It is a very unequal performance, but not destitute of those fine touches, which Heywood is never without, in the characters of English country gentlemen and the pathos of domestic tragedy. The following scene, which I am tempted to extract, though very inferior to the noble ones in his _Woman Killed by Kindness_, between Mr. and Mrs. Frankford, which it somewhat resembles in character, is not unworthy of this great and truly national dramatic writer:--

MR. GENEROUS. WIFE. ROBIN, _a groom._

_Gen._ My blood is turn'd to ice, and all my vitals Have ceas'd their working. Dull stupidity Surpriseth me at once, and hath arrested That vigorous agitation, which till now Exprest a life within me. I, methinks, Am a meer marble statue, and no man. Unweave my age, O time, to my first thread; Let me lose fifty years, in ignorance spent; That, being made an infant once again, I may begin to know. What, or where am I, To be thus lost in wonder?

_Wife._ Sir.

_Gen._ Amazement still pursues me, how am I chang'd, Or brought ere I can understand myself Into this new world!

_Rob._ You will believe no witches?

_Gen._ This makes me believe all, aye, anything; And that myself am nothing. Prithee, Robin, Lay me to myself open; what art thou, Or this new transform'd creature?

_Rob._ I am Robin; And this your wife, my mistress.

_Gen._ Tell me, the earth Shall leave its seat, and mount to kiss the moon; Or that the moon, enamour'd of the earth, Shall leave her sphere, to stoop to us thus low. What, what's this in my hand, that at an instant Can from a four-legg'd creature make a thing So like a wife!

_Rob._ A bridle; a jugling bridle, Sir.

_Gen._ A bridle! Hence, enchantment. A viper were more safe within my hand, Than this charm'd engine.-- A witch! my wife a witch! The more I strive to unwind Myself from this meander, I the more Therein am intricated. Prithee, woman, Art thou a witch?

_Wife._ It cannot be denied, I am such a curst creature.

_Gen._ Keep aloof: And do not come too near me. O my trust; Have I, since first I understood myself, Been of my soul so chary, still to study What best was for its health, to renounce all The works of that black fiend with my best force; And hath that serpent twined me so about, That I must lie so often and so long With a devil in my bosom?

_Wife._ Pardon, Sir. [_She looks down._]

_Gen._ Pardon! can such a thing as that be hoped? Lift up thine eyes, lost woman, to yon hills; It must be thence expected: look not down Unto that horrid dwelling, which thou hast sought At such dear rate to purchase. Prithee, tell me, (For now I can believe) art thou a witch?

_Wife._ I am.

_Gen._ With that word I am thunderstruck, And know not what to answer; yet resolve me. Hast thou made any contract with that fiend, The enemy of mankind?

_Wife._ O I have.

_Gen._ What? and how far?

_Wife._ I have promis'd him my soul.

_Gen._ Ten thousand times better thy body had Been promis'd to the stake; aye, and mine too, To have suffer'd with thee in a hedge of flames, Than such a compact ever had been made. Oh-- Resolve me, how far doth that contract stretch?

_Wife._ What interest in this Soul myself could claim, I freely gave him; but his part that made it I still reserve, not being mine to give.

_Gen._ O cunning devil: foolish woman, know, Where he can claim but the least little part, He will usurp the whole. Thou'rt a lost woman.

_Wife._ I hope, not so.

_Gen._ Why, hast thou any hope?

_Wife._ Yes, sir, I have.

_Gen._ Make it appear to me.

_Wife._ I hope I never bargain'd for that fire, Further than penitent tears have power to quench.

_Gen._ I would see some of them.

_Wife._ You behold them now (If you look on me with charitable eyes) Tinctur'd in blood, blood issuing from the heart. Sir, I am sorry; when I look towards heaven, I beg a gracious pardon; when on you, Methinks your native goodness should not be Less pitiful than they; 'gainst both I have err'd; From both I beg atonement.

_Gen._ May I presume 't?

_Wife._ I kneel to both your mercies.

_Gen._ Knowest thou what A witch is?

_Wife._ Alas, none better; Or after mature recollection can be More sad to think on 't.

_Gen._ Tell me, are those tears As full of true hearted penitence, As mine of sorrow to behold what state, What desperate state, thou'rt fain in?

_Wife._ Sir, they are.

_Gen._ Rise; and, as I do you, so heaven pardon me; We all offend, but from such falling off Defend us! Well, I do remember, wife, When I first took thee, 'twas _for good and bad_: O change thy bad to good, that I may keep thee (As then we past our faiths) 'till Death us sever. O woman, thou hast need to weep thyself Into a fountain, such a penitent spring As may have power to quench invisible flames; In which my eyes shall aid: too little, all. _Late Lancashire Witches, Act 4._

P 2 _a_ 1. "_Being examined by my Lord._"] She had evidently learned her lesson well; but this was, with all submission to his Lordship, if adopted as a test, a mighty poor one. Jennet Device must have known well the persons of the parties she accused, and who were now upon their trial, as they were all her near neighbours.

P 2 _a_ 2. "_Whether she knew Iohan a Style?_"] His Lordship's introduction of this apocryphal legal personage on such an occasion is very amusing. Had he studied Littleton and Perkins a little less, and given some attention to the Lancashire dialect, and some also to the study of that great book, in which even a judge may find valuable matter, the book of human nature, he might have been more successfull in his examination. Jack's o' Dick's o' Harry's would have been more likely to have been recognised as a veritable person of this world by Jennet Device, than such a name as Johan a Style; which, though very familiar at Westminster, would scarcely have its prototype at Pendle. But Jennet Device, young as she was, in natural shrewdness was far more than a match for his lordship.

P 3 _a_. "_Katherine Hewit, alias Movld-heeles._"] Of this person, who comes next in the list of witches, our information is very scanty. She was not of Pendle, but of Colne; and as her husband is described as a "clothier," may be presumed to have been in rather better circumstances than Elizabeth Southernes or Anne Whittle's families. She made no confession.

P 4 _a_ 1. "_Anne Foulds of Colne. Michael Hartleys of Colne._"] Folds and Hartley are still the names of families at and in the neighbourhood of Colne.

P 4 _a_ 2. "_Had then in hanck a child._"] The meaning of this term is clear, the origin rather dubious. It may come from the Scotch word, _to hanck_, i.e. to have in holdfast or secure, vide Jamieson's Scotch Dictionary, tit. hanck, or from handkill, to murder, vide Jamieson, under that word; or lastly, may be metaphorically used, from hanck, also signifying a skein of yarn or worsted which is tied or trussed up.

Q 2 _a_. "_Iohn Bulcocke, Iane Bulcocke his mother._"] The condition of these persons is not stated. It may be conjectured that they were of the lowest class.

Q 3 _a_ 1. "_At the Barre hauing formerly confessed._"] Why is not their confession given?

Q 3 _a_ 2. "_Crying out in very violent and outrageous manner, even to the gallowes._"] The latter end of these unfortunate people was perhaps similar to that of Isobel Crawford, executed in Scotland the year after for witchcraft, who, on being sentenced, openly denied all her former confessions, and died without any sign of repentance, offering repeated interruption to the minister in his prayer, and refusing to pardon the executioner.

Q 4 _a_. "_Master Thomas Lister of Westby._"] See note on p. Y _a_.

Q 4 _b_. "_The said Bulcockes wife doth know of some Witches to bee about Padyham and Burnley._"] Precious evidence this to put the lives of two poor creatures into jeopardy.

R _a_. "_Accused the said Iohn Bulcock to turne the Spitt there._"] What a fact this would have been for De Lancre. With all his accurate statistics on the subject of the witches' Sabbath, he was not aware that a turnspit was a necessary officer on such occasions, as well as a master of ceremonies. This artful and well instructed jade, Jennet Device, must have borne especial malice against John Bulcock.

R 1 _b_. "_The names of the Witches at the Great Assembly and Feast at Malking-Tower, viz. vpon Good-Friday last, 1612._"] In this list of fourteen individuals, Master Potts has omitted "the painful steward so careful to provide mutton," James Device, who made up the number to fifteen. Of these persons seven were not indicted: Jennet Hargraves, the wife of Hugh Hargraves, of Barley under Pendle; Elizabeth Hargraves, the wife of Christopher Hargraves; Christopher Howgate, the son of Old Demdike; Christopher Hargraves, who is described as of Thurniholme, or Thornholme, and as Christopher o' Jacks, and was husband of Elizabeth Hargraves; Grace Hay, of Padiham; Anne Crunkshey, of Marchden, or more properly, Cronkshaw of Marsden; and Elizabeth Howgate, the wife of Christopher Howgate. The two Howgates were, it may be, the "one Holgate and his wife," mentioned in Robinson's deposition in 1633. Alice Graie, or Gray, included in the list, was indicted, though no copy of the indictment is afforded by Potts, and, singular as it may seem, acquitted. Richard Miles' wife, of the Rough Lee, stated to have been present in some of the depositions, (G 3 _b_,) was, beyond doubt, Alice Nutter, so called as the wife of Richard and mother of Miles Nutter.

It may afford matter for speculation, whether any real meeting took place of any of the persons above enumerated, which gave occasion for the monstrous versions of the witnesses at this trial. It is far from unlikely, that on the apprehension and commitment of Old Demdike, Old Chattox, Alizon Device, and Anne Redfern to Lancaster, a meeting would take place of their near relations, and others who might attend from curiosity, or from its being rumoured that they were themselves implicated by the confessions of those apprehended, and who by such attendance sealed their dooms. In all similar fabrications there is generally some slight foundation of fact, some scintilla of homely truth, from which, like the inverted apex of a pyramid, the disproportioned fabric expands. It is possible that, from the simple occurrence of an unusual attendance at Malking Tower on Good Friday, not unnatural under the circumstances, some of the witnesses, ignorant and easily persuaded, might be afterwards led to believe in the existence of those monstrous superadditions with which the convention was afterwards clothed. However this may be, there must have been at hand for working up the materials into a plausible form, some drill sergeant of evidence behind the curtain, who had his own interest to serve or revenge to gratify. The two particulars in the narrative that one feels least disposed to question, are, that James Device stole a wether from John Robinson of Barley, to provide a family dinner on Good Friday, and that when the meat was roasted John Bulcock performed the humble, but very necessary, duty of turning the spit.

R 3 _a_. "_My Lord Gerrard._"] Thomas Gerard, son and heir of Sir Gilbert Gerard, Master of the Robes 23d Elizabeth, was raised to the peerage by the title of Lord Gerard of Gerard's Bromley, in Staffordshire, 1603. He died 1618.

S _a_. "_Kniues, Elsons, and Sickles._" In the _Promptorium Parvulorum_, p. 138, to Elsyn (elsyng^k) Sibula, Mr. Way appends this note: "This word occurs in the Gloss on Gautier de Bibelesworth, Arund. MS. 220, where a buckled girdle is described:--

"Een isy doyt le hardiloun (þe tunnge) Passer par tru de subiloun (a bore of an alsene.)

"An elsyne,--acus, subula. Cath. Ang. Sibula, an elsyn, an alle or a bodkyn. ORTUS. In the inventory of the goods of a merchant at Newcastle, A.D. 1571, occur, 'vj. doss' elsen heftes, 12_d_; 1 clowte and 1/2 a C elsen blades, viij_s_. viij_d_; xiij. clowtes of talier, needles, &c.' Wills and Inventories published by the Surtees Society, l. 361. The term is derived from the French _alene_; elson for cordwayners, alesne. Palsg. In Yorkshire and some other parts of England an awl is still called an elsen."

S _b_. "_Which the said Alizon confessing._"] In the case of this paralytic pedlar, John Law, his mishap could scarcely be called such, as it would for the remainder of his life, be an all-sufficient stock-in-trade for him, and popular wonder and sympathy, without the judge's interposition, would provide for his relief and maintenance. The near apparent connection and correspondence of the _damnum minatum_ and _damnum secutum_, in this instance, imposed upon this unfortunate woman, as it had done upon many others, and gave to her confession an earnestness which would appear to the unenlightened spectator to spring only from reality and truth.

S 3 _b_. "_Margaret Pearson._"] This Padiham witch fared better than her neighbours, being sentenced only to the pillory. Nothing affords a stronger proof of the vindictive pertinacity with which these prosecutions were carried on than the fact of this old and helpless creature being put on her trial three several times upon such evidence as follows. Chattox, like many other persons in her situation, was disposed to have as many companions in punishment, crime or no crime, as she could compass, and denounced her accordingly: "The said Pearson's wife is as ill as shee."

T _a_. "_The said Margerie did carrie the said Toade out of the said house in a paire of tonges._"] This toad was disposed of more easily than that of Julian Cox, as to which see Glanvil's _Collection of Relations_, p. 192:--

Another witness swore, that as he passed by Cox her door, she was taking a pipe of tobacco upon the threshold of her door, and invited him to come in and take a pipe, which he did. And as he was talking Julian said to him, Neighbour, look what a pretty thing there is. He look't down, and there was a monstrous great toad betwixt his leggs, staring him in the face. He endeavoured to kill it by spurning it, but could not hit it. Whereupon Julian bad him forbear, and it would do him no hurt. But he threw down his pipe and went home, (which was about two miles off of Julian Cox her house,) and told his family what had happened, and that he believed it was one of Julian Cox her devils. After, he was taking a pipe of tobacco at home, and the same toad appeared betwixt his leggs. He took the toad out to kill it, and to his thinking cut it in several pieces, but returning to his pipe, the toad still appeared. He endeavoured to burn it, but could not. At length he took a switch and beat it. The toad ran several times about the room to avoid him he still pursuing it with correction. At length the toad cryed and vanish't, and he was never after troubled with it.

Dr. More's comment on the circumstance is written with all the seriousness so important a part of a witch's supellex deserves. He commences defending the huntsman, who swore that he hunted a hare, and when he came to take it up, he found it to be Julian Cox:

Those half-witted people thought he swore false, I suppose because they imagined that what he told implied that Julian Cox was turned into an hare. Which she was not, nor did his report imply any such real metamorphosis of her body, but that these ludicrous dæmons exhibited to the sight of this huntsman and his doggs the shape of an Hare, one of them turning himself into such a form, and others hurrying on the body of Julian near the same place, and at the same swiftness, but interposing betwixt that hare-like spectre and her body, modifying the air so that the scene there, to the beholders sight, was as if nothing but air were there, and a shew of earth perpetually suited to that where the hare passed. As I have heard of some painters that have drawn the sky in an huge large landskip, so lively that the birds have flown against it, thinking it free air, and so have fallen down. And if painters and juglers by the tricks of legerdemain can do such strange feats to the deceiving of the sight, it is no wonder that these airy invisible spirits as far surpass them in all such præstigious doings as the air surpasses the earth for subtilty.

And the like præstigiæ may be in the toad. It might be a real toad (though actuated and guided by a dæmon) which was cut in pieces, and that also which was whipt about, and at last snatcht out of sight (as if it had vanished) by these aerial hocus-pocus's. And if some juglers have tricks to take hot coals into their mouth without hurt, certainly it is not surprising that some small attempt did not suffice to burn that toad. That such a toad, sent by a witch and crawling up the body of the man of the house as he sate by the fire's side, was overmastered by him and his wife together, and burnt in the fire; I have heard credibly reported by one of the Isle of Ely. _Of these dæmoniack vermin, I have heard other stories also, as of a rat that followed a man some score of miles trudging through thick and thin along with him._ So little difficulty is there in that of the toad.--_Glanvil's Collection of Relations_, p. 200.

T 2 _a_ 1. "_Isabel Robey._" This person was of Windle, in the parish of Prescot, a considerable distance from Pendle. The Gerards were lords of the manor of Windle. Sir Thomas Gerard, before whom the examinations were taken, was created baronet, 22nd May, 9th James I.; and thrice married. From him the present Sir John Gerard, of New Hall, near Warrington, is descended. Sir Thomas was determined that the hundred of West Derby should have its witch as well as the other parts of the county. A more melancholy tissue of absurd and incoherent accusations than those against this last of the prisoners convicted on this occasion, it would not be easy to find; who was hanged, for all that appears, because one person was suddenly "pinched on her thigh, as she thought, with four fingers and a thumb," and because another was "sore pained with a great warch in his bones."

T 2 _a_ 2. "_This Countie of Lancaster, which now may lawfully bee said to abound asmuch in Witches of diuers kindes as Seminaries, Iesuites, and Papists._"] Truly, the county palatine was in sad case, according to Master Potts's account. If the crop of each of these was over abundant, it was from no fault of the learned judges, who, in their commissions of _Oyer and Terminer_, subjected it pretty liberally to the pruning-hook of the executioner.

T 2 _a_ 3. "_This lamentable and wofull Tragedie, wherein his Maiestie hath lost so many Subjects, Mothers their Children, Fathers their Friends and Kinsfolk._" The Lancashire bill of mortality, under the head witchcraft, so far as it can be collected from this tract, will run thus:--

1. Robert Nutter, of Greenhead, in Pendle. 2. Richard Assheton, son of Richard Assheton, of Downham, Esquire. 3. Child of Richard Baldwin, of Wheethead, within the forest of Pendle. 4. John Device, or Davies, of Pendle. 5. Anne Nutter, daughter of Anthony Nutter, of Pendle. 6. Child of John Moore, of Higham. 7. Hugh Moore, of Pendle. 8. John Robinson, _alias_ Swyer. 9. James Robinson. 10. Henry Mytton, of the Rough Lee. 11. Anne Townley, wife of Henry Townley, of the Carr, gentleman. 12. John Duckworth. 13. John Hargraves, of Goldshaw Booth. 14. Blaze Hargraves, of Higham. 15. Christopher Nutter. 16. Anne Folds, of Colne.

Sixteen persons reported dead of this common epidemic, besides a countless number with pains and "starkness in their limbs," and "a great warch in their bones!" No wonder that Doctors Bromley and Potts thought active treatment necessary, with a decided preference for hemp, as the leading specific.

T 3 _b_. "_With great warch in his bones._"] Warch is a word well known and still used in this sense, _i.e._, pain, in Lancashire.

T 4 _b_ 1. "_The said Peter was now satisfied that the said Isabel Robey was no Witch, by sending to one Halseworths, which they call a wiseman._"] I honour the memory of this Halsworth, or Houldsworth, as I suppose it should be spelled, for he was indeed a wise man in days when wisdom was an extremely scarce commodity.

T 4 _b_ 2. "_To abide vpon it._"] _i.e._, my abiding opinion is.

X _a_. "_Elizabeth Astley, John Ramsden, Alice Gray, Isabel Sidegraues, Lawrence Hay._"] The specific charges against these persons, with the exception of Alice Gray, do not appear, nor is it said where their places of residence were. Alice Gray was reputed to have been at the meeting of witches at Malkin's Tower, and to her the judge refers, perhaps, in particular, when he says, "Without question, there are amongst you that are as deepe in this action as any of them that are condemned to die for their offences."

X _b_. "_The Execution of the Witches._"] We could have dispensed with many of the flowers of rhetoric with which the pages of this discovery are strewed, if Master Potts would have favoured us with a plain, unvarnished account of what occurred at this execution. It is here, in the most interesting point of all, that his narrative, in other respects so full and abundant, stops short, and seems curtailed of its just proportions. The "learned and worthy preacher," to whom the prisoners were commended by the judge, was probably Mr. William Leigh, of Standish, before mentioned. Amongst his papers or correspondence, if they should happen to have been preserved, some account may eventually be found of the sad closing scene of these melancholy victims of superstition.

X 2 _a_. "_Neither can I paint in extraordinarie tearmes._"] The worthy clerk is too modest. He is a great painter, the Tintoretto of witchcraft.

Y _a_ 1. "_Hauing cut off Thomas Lister, Esquire, father to this gentleman now liuing._"] Thomas Lister, of Westby, ancestor of the Listers, Lords Ribblesdale, married Jane, daughter of John Greenacres, Esquire, of Worston, county of Lancaster, and was buried at Gisburn, February 8th, 1607. His son, Thomas Lister, referred to as the "gentleman now living," married Jane, daughter of Thomas Heber, Esq., of Marton, after mentioned, and was buried at Gisburn, July 10th, 1619.

Y _a_ 2. "_Was Indicted and Arraigned for the murder of a Child of one Dodg-sonnes._"] One acquittal was no protection to these unhappy creatures. It caused only additional exasperation, and, sooner or later, they were brought within what Donne calls "the hungry statutes' gaping jaws." Whether superstition or malice prompted this prosecution, on the part of Mr. Lister, it is difficult to say. Some grudge he entertained, or cause of offence he had taken up against this Jennet Preston, might be her death warrant in those days, when it was penal for a woman to be old, helpless, ugly, and poor. She was not so fortunate as the females tried at York, nine years afterwards, for bewitching the children of Edward Fairfax, of Fuyston, in the forest of Knaresborough, to whom we owe the only English translation of Tasso worthy of the name. These females, six in number, were indicted at two successive assizes, and every effort was made by the

"Prevailing poet! whose undoubting mind Believed the magic wonders which he sung,"

to procure their conviction. Never was a more unequal contest. On the one side was a relentless antagonist, armed with wealth, influence, learning, and accomplishments, and whose family connections gave him an unlimited power in the county; and on the other, six helpless persons, whose sex, age, and poverty were almost sufficient for their condemnation, without any evidence at all. Yet, owing to the magnanimous firmness of the judge, whose name, deserving of immortal honour, I regret has not been preserved, these efforts were frustrated, and the women accused delivered from the gulph which yawned before them. The disappointment he experienced in this instance, in being defrauded, as he thought, of a conviction for which he had strained every nerve and sinew, and in not being allowed to render the forest of Knaresborough as famous as that of Pendle, cast a gloom of despondency over the remaining days of this admirable poet, who has left a narration of the whole transaction, of most singular interest and curiosity, yet unpublished. The MSS. now in my possession, and which came from Mr. Bright's collection, consists of seventy-eight closely-written folio pages. It is entitled "A Discourse of Witchcraft, as it was enacted in the family of Mr. Edward Fairfax, of Fuystone, coun. Ebor, 1621." From page 78 to 144 are a series of ninety-three most extraordinary and spirited sketches, made with the pen, of the witches, devils, monsters, and apparitions referred to in the narrative.

Y 2 _a_. "_Master Heyber._"] This was Thomas Hayber, or Heber, of Marton, in Craven, Esquire, who was buried at Marton, 7th February, 1633. He was the ancestor of Bishop Reginald Heber and the late Richard Heber, Esq.

Y 3 _a_. "_The said Iennet Preston comming to touch the dead corpes, they bled fresh bloud presently._"] On the popular superstition of touching the corpse of a murdered person, as an ordeal or test for the discovery of the innocence or guilt of suspected murderers, the reader cannot better be referred than to the very learned and elaborate essay in Pitcairne's _Criminal Trials_, vol. iii. p. 182-189. Amongst the authors there quoted, Webster is omitted, who, (see _Displaying of supposed Witchcraft_, p. 304,) discusses the point at considerable length, and with an earnest and implicit faith singularly at variance with his enlightened scepticism in other matters. But there were regions of superstition in which even this Sampson of logic became imbecile and powerless. The rationale of the bleeding of a murdered corpse at the touch of the murderer is given by Sir Kenelm Digby with his usual force and spirit:

To this cause, peradventure, may be reduced the strange effect which is frequently seen in England, when, _at the approach of the Murderer, the slain body suddenly bleedeth afresh_. For certainly the Souls of them that are treacherously murdered by surprise, use to leaue their bodies with extreme unwillingness, and with vehement indignation against them that force them to so unprovided and abhorred a passage! That Soul, then, to wreak its evil talent against the hated Murderer, and to draw a just and desired revenge upon his head, would do all it can to manifest the author of the fact! To _speak_ it cannot--for in itself it wanteth the organs of voice; and those it is parted from are now grown too heavy, and are too benummed, for to give motion unto: Yet some change it desireth to make in the body, which it hath so vehement inclination to; and therefore is the aptest for it to work upon. It must then endeavour to cause a motion in the subtilest and most fluid parts (and consequently the most moveable ones) of it. This can be nothing but THE BLOOD, which then being violently moved, _must needs gush out at those places where it findeth issue_!

In the two following Scotch cases of witchcraft, this test was resorted to. The first was that of

MARIOUN PEEBLES,[79] _alias_ Pardone, spouse to SWENE, in Hildiswick, who was, on March 22, 1644, sentenced to be strangled at a stake, and burnt to ashes, at _the Hill of Berrie_, for WITCHCRAFT and MURDER. Marion and her husband having 'ane deadlie and venefical malice in her heart' against Edward Halero in Overure, and being determined 'to destroy and put him down,' being 'transformed in the lyknes of ane pellack-quhaill, (the Devill changing her spirit, quhilk fled in the same quhaill,') and the said Edward and other four individuals being in a fishing-boat, coming from the Sea, at the North-banks of Hildiswick, 'on ane fair morning, did cum under the said boat, and overturnit her with ease, and drowned and devoired thame in the sey, right at the shore, when there wis na danger wtherwayis.' The bodies of Halero and another of these hapless fishermen having been found, Marion and Swene 'wir sent for, and brought to see thame, and to lay thair hands on thame, ... dayis after said death and away-casting, quhaire thair bluid was evanished and desolved, from every natural cours or caus, shine, and run; the said umquhill Edward _bled at the collir-bain or craig-bane_, and the said ...,[80] _in the hand and fingers, gushing out bluid thairat_, to the great admiration of the beholders--and revelation of the judgement of the Almytie! And by which lyk occasionis and miraculous works of God, made manifest in Murders and the Murderers; whereby, be many frequent occasiones brought to light, and the Murderers, be the said proof brought to judgment, conuict and condemned, not only in this Kingdom, also this countrie, but lykwayis in maist forrin Christiane Kingdomis; and be so manie frequent precedentis and practising of and tuitching Murderis and Murdereris, notourlie known: So, the forsaid Murder and Witchcraft of the saidis persons, with the rest of their companions, through your said Husband's deed, art, part, rad,[81] and counsall, is manifest and cleir to all, not onlie through and by the foirsaid precedentis of your malice, wicked and malishes[82] practises, by Witchcraft, Confessionis, and Declarationis of the said umquill Janet Fraser, Witch, revealed to her, as said is, and quha wis desyrit by him to concur and assist with you to the doing thereof; but lykways _be the declaration and revelation of the justice and judgementis of God, through the said issuing of bluid from the bodies_!' &c.

A similar and very remarkable instance is related in the following Triall: In the Dittay of CHRISTIAN WILSON, alias _the Lanthorne_,[83] accused of Murder, Witchcraft, &c., (which is founded upon the examinations of James Wilson, Abraham Macmillan, William Crichton, and Fyfe and George Erskine, &c. led before Sir William Murray of Newtoun, and other Commissioners, at Dalkeith, Jun. 14, 1661,) it is stated, that 'Ther being enimitie betuixt the said Christiane and Alexander Wilsone, her brother, and shoe having often tymes threatned him, at length, about 7 or 8 monthes since, altho' the said Alexander was sene that day of his death, at three houres afternoone, in good health, walking about his bussnesse and office; yitt, at fyve howres in that same night, he was fownd dead, lying in his owne howse, naked as he was borne, with his face torne and rent, without any appearance of a spot of blood either wpon his bodie or neigh to it. And altho' many of the neiboures in the toune (Dalkeith) come into his howse to see the dead corpe, yitt shoe newar offered to come, howbeit her dwelling was nixt adjacent thairto; nor had shoe so much as any seiming greiff for his death. Bot the Minister and Bailliffes of the towne, taking great suspitione of her, in respect of her cairiage comand it that shoe showld be browght in; bot when shoe come, shoe come trembling all the way to the howse--bot _shoe refuised to come nigh_ THE CORPS _or to_ TUITCH _it_ saying, that shoe "nevir tuitched a dead corpe in her lyfe!" Bot being arnestly desyred by the Minister, Bailliffes, and hir brother's friends who was killed, that shoe wold "bot _tuitch the corpes softlie_," shoe granted to doe it--but before shoe did it, the Sone being shyning in at the howse, shoe exprest her selfe thus, humbly desyring, that "as the Lord made the Sone to shyne and give light into that howse, that also _he wald give light to discovering of that Murder_!" And with these words, shoe TUITCHEING _the wound of the dead man, verie saftlie_, it being whyte and cleane, without any spot of blod or the lyke!--yitt IMEDIATLY, _whill her fingers was wpon it_, THE BLOOD RUSHED OWT OF IT, to the great admiratioune[84] of all the behoulders, who tooke it for _discoverie of the Murder_, according to her owne prayers.--For ther was ane great lumpe of flesh taken out of his cheik, so smowthlie, as no rasor in the world cowld have made so ticht ane incisioune, wpon flesh, or cheis--and ther wes no blood at all in the wownd--nor did it at all blead, altho' that many persones befor had tuitched it, whill[85] shoe did tuitche it! And the howse being searched all over, for the shirt of the dead man, yitt it cowld not be found; and altho' the howse was full of people all that night, ever vatching the corpes;[86] neither did any of them tuitch him that night--which is probable[87]--yitt, in the morneing, his shirt was fownd tyed fast abowt his neck, as a brechame,[88] non knowing how this come to pass! And this Cristian did immediatlie transport all her owne goods owt of her own howse into her dowghter's, purposing to flie away--bot was therwpon apprehendit and imprisoned.'--_Pitcairn's Criminal Trials_, vol. iii. p. 194.

[Footnote 79: See Dr. Hibbert's "History of Orkney," &c., to which this remarkable Trial is appended.]

[Footnote 80: The name left blank.]

[Footnote 81: Rede; advice.]

[Footnote 82: Malicious.]

[Footnote 83: The name given at her baptism by the Devil. From "Collection of Original Documents," belonging to the Society of Antiquaries of Scotland, MS. As a specimen of the other charges, take the following: "Williame Richardsone, in Dalkeith, haiving felled ane hen of the said Cristianes with ane stone, and wpone her sight thereof did imediatly threatne him, and with ane frowneing countenance told him, that he 'should newer cast ane vther stone!' And imediatly the said Williame fell into ane franicie and madnes, and tooke his bed, and newer rose agane, but died within a few dayes: And in the tyme of his sicknes, he always cryed owt, that the said Cristiane was present befor him, in the likeness of ane grey catt! And some tyme eftir his death, James Richardsone, nephew to the said Williame, being a boy playing in the said Cristiane her yaird, and be calling her Lantherne, shoe threatned, that, if he held not his peace, shoe sowld cause him to die the death his nephew (uncle) died of!' Whairby it would appeare that shoe tooke wpon hir his nepheas (uncle's) death."]

[Footnote 84: Wonder; amazement.]

[Footnote 85: Until. That is, many previous trials had been made of other persons suspected, or of those who were near neighbours, perhaps living at enmity with the deceased, who had voluntarily offered themselves to this solemn ordeal, or had been called upon thus publicly to attest their innocence of his blood.]

[Footnote 86: Holding the lyke-wake.]

[Footnote 87: Can be proved, by testimony or probation.]

[Footnote 88: The large collar which goes about a draught-horse's neck.]

Z _a_. "_Master Leonard Lister._"] This Leonard Lister was the brother of Master Thomas Lister, for whose murder Jennet Preston was indicted; and married Ann, daughter of ---- Loftus, of Coverham Abbey, county of York.

Z 2 _a_. "_His Lordship commanded the Iurie to obserue the particular circumstances._"] The judge in this case was Altham, who seems even to have been more superstitious, bigotted, and narrow-minded than his brother in commission, Bromley. Fenner, who tried the witches of Warbois, and Archer, before whom the trial of Julian Cox took place, are the only judges I can meet with, quite on a level with this learned baron in grovelling absurdity, upon whom "Jennet Preston would lay heavy at the time of his death," whether she had so lain upon Mr. Thomas Lister or not, if bigotry, habit, and custom did not render him seared and callous to conscience and pity.

Z 3 _b_ 1. "_Take example by this Gentlemen to prosecute these hellish Furies to their end._"] It is marvellous that Potts does not, like Delrio, recommend the rack to be applied to witches "in moderation, and according to the regulations of Pope Pius the Third, and so as not to cripple the criminal for life." Not that this learned Jesuit is much averse to simple dislocations occasioned by the rack. These, he thinks, cannot be avoided in the press of business. He is rather opposed, though in this he speaks doubtfully and with submission to authority, to those tortures which fracture the bones or lacerate the tendons. Verily, the Catholic and the Protestant author might have shaken hands; they were, beyond dispute, _poene Gemelli_.

Z 3 _b_ 2. "_Posterities._"] Master Potts, of the particulars of whose life nothing is known, made, as far as can be discovered, no further attempt to acquire fame in the character of an author. No subject so interesting probably again occurred, as that which had diversified his legal pursuits "in his lodgings in Chancery-lane," from the pleasing recollections associated with his Summer Circuit of 1612. He was not, however, the only person of the name of Pott, or Potts, who distinguished himself in the field of Witchcraft. The author of the following tract, in my possession, might have garnished it with various flowers from the work now reprinted, if he had been aware of such a repository: "Pott (Joh. Henr.) De nefando Lamiarum cum Diabolo coitu." 4to. Lond. 1689. The other celebrated cases of supposed witchcraft occurring in the county of Lancaster, besides those connected with the foregoing republication, are, the extraordinary one of Ferdinand, Earl of Derby, who died at Latham in 1594, for which the reader is referred to Camden's _Annals of Elizabeth_, years 1593, 1594; Kennet, 2. 574, 580; or Pennant's _Tour from Downing to Alston Moor_, p. 29;--the case of Edmund Hartley, hanged at Lancaster in 1597, for bewitching some members of the family of Mr. Starkie, of Cleworth, which will be fully considered in the proposed republication of the Chetham Society, which gives the history of that event;--and lastly, that of a person of the name of Utley, (Whitaker, p. 528; Baines, vol. i. p. 604,) who was hanged at Lancaster about 1630, for having bewitched to death Richard, the son of Ralph Assheton, Esq., Lord of Middleton, of whose trial, unfortunately, no report is in existence. Webster also mentions two supposed witches as having been put to death at Lancaster, within eighteen years before his _Displaying of supposed Witchcraft_ was published; and which occurrence, not referred to by any other historian, must therefore have taken place about the year 1654.

Manchester: Printed by Charles Simms and Co.

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Ackers, James, M.P., Heath House, Ludlow Addey, H.M., Liverpool Ainsworth, Ralph F., M.D., Manchester Ainsworth, Rev. Thomas, M.A., Hartford Hall, Cheshire Ainsworth, W.H., Kensal Manor House, Harrow-road, London Alexander, Edward N., F.S.A., Halifax Allen, Rev. John Taylor, M.A., Stradbrooke Vicarage, Suffolk Ambery, Charles, Manchester Armstrong, Thomas, Higher Broughton, Manchester Ashton, John, Warrington Atherton, Miss, Kersal Cell, near Manchester Atherton, James, Swinton House, near Manchester Atkinson, F.R., Pendleton, near Manchester Atkinson, William, Weaste, near Manchester

Balcarres, The Earl of, Haigh Hall, near Wigan Baldwin, Rev. John, M.A., Dalton, near Ulverstone Bannerman, Alexander, Didsbury, near Manchester Bannerman, Henry, Burnage, near Manchester Bannerman, John, Swinton, near Manchester Bardsley, Samuel Argent, M.D., Green Heys, near Manchester Barker, John, Manchester Barker, Thomas, Oldham Barratt, James, Jun., Manchester Barrow, Miss, Green Bank, near Manchester Barrow, Rev. Andrew, President of Stonyhurst College, near Blackburn Barrow, Peter, Manchester Bartlemore, William, Castleton Hall, Rochdale Barton, John, Manchester Barton, R.W., Springwood, near Manchester Barton, Samuel, Didsbury, Manchester Barton, Thomas, Manchester Bayne, Rev. Thos. Vere, M.A., Broughton, Manchester Beamont, William, Warrington Beard, Rev. John R., D.D., Stony Knolls, near Manchester Beardoe, James, Manchester Beever, James F., Manchester Bellairs, Rev. H.W., M.A., London Bentley, Rev. T.R., M.A., Manchester Birley, Hugh Hornby, Broom House, near Manchester Birley, Hugh, Didsbury, near Manchester Birley, Richard, Manchester Birley, Thos. H., Manchester Bohn, Henry G., London Booth, Benjamin W., Manchester Booth, John, Barton-upon-Irwell Booth, William, Manchester Boothman, Thomas, Ardwick, near Manchester Botfield, Beriah, M.P., Norton Hall, Northamptonshire Bower, George, London Brackenbury, Ralph, Manchester Bradbury, Charles, Salford Bradshaw, John, Weaste House, near Manchester Brooke, Edward, Manchester Brooks, Samuel, Manchester Broome, William, Manchester Brown, Robert, Preston Buckley, Edmund, M.P., Ardwick, near Manchester Buckley, Rev. Thomas, M.A., Old Trafford, near Manchester Buckley, Nathaniel, F.L.S., Rochdale Burlington, The Earl of, Holkar Hall

Calvert, Robert, Salford Cardwell, Rev. Edward, D.D., Principal of St. Alban's Hall and Camden Professor, Oxford Cardwell, Edward, M.P., M.A., Regent's Park, London Chadwick, Elias, M.A., Swinton Hall, near Manchester Chesshyre, Mrs., Pendleton, near Manchester Chester, The Bishop of Chichester, The Bishop of Chippindall, John, Chetham Hill, near Manchester Clare, Peter, F.R.A.S., Manchester Clarke, George, Crumpsall, near Manchester Clayton, Japheth, Pendleton, near Manchester Clifton, Rev. R.C., M.A., Canon of Manchester Consterdine, James, Manchester Cook, Thomas, Gorse Field, Pendleton, near Manchester Cooper, William, Manchester Corser, George, Whitchurch, Shropshire Corser, Rev. Thomas, M.A., Stand, near Manchester Cottam, S.E., F.R.A.S., Manchester Coulthart, John Ross, Ashton-under-Lyne Crook, Thomas A., Rochdale Cross, William Assheton, Redscar, near Preston Crossley, George, Manchester Crossley, James, Manchester Crossley, John, M.A., Scaitcliffe House, Todmorden Currer, Miss Richardson, Eshton Hall, near Skipton

Daniel, George, Manchester Darbishire, Samuel D., Manchester Darwell, James, Manchester Darwell, Thomas, Manchester Davies, John, M.W.S., Manchester Dawes, Matthew, F.G.S., Westbrooke, near Bolton Dearden, James, The Orchard, Rochdale Dearden, Thomas Ferrand, Rochdale Delamere, The Lord, Vale Royal, near Northwich Derby, The Earl of, Knowsley Dilke, C.W., London Dinham, Thomas, Manchester Driver, Richard, Manchester Dugard, Rev. George, M.A., Birch, near Manchester Dyson, T.J., Tower, London

Earle, Richard, Edenhurst, near Prescott Eccles, William, Wigan Egerton, The Lord Francis, M.P., Worsley Hall Egerton, Sir Philip de Malpas Grey, Bart., M.P., Oulton Park, Tarporley Egerton, Wilbraham, Tatton Park Ely, The Bishop of Eyton, J.W.K., F.S.A. L. & E., Elgin Villa, Leamington

Faulkner, George, Manchester Feilden, Joseph, Witton, near Blackburn Fenton, James, Jun., Lymm Hall, Cheshire Fernley, John, Manchester Ffarrington, J. Nowell, Worden, near Chorley Ffrance, Thomas Robert Wilson, Rawcliffe Hall, Garstang Fleming, Thomas, Pendleton, near Manchester Fleming, William, M.D., Ditto Fletcher, John, Haulgh, near Bolton Fletcher, Samuel, Broomfield, near Manchester Fletcher, Samuel, Ardwick, near Manchester Flintoff, Thomas, Manchester Ford, Henry, Manchester Fraser, James W., Manchester Frere, W.E., Rottingdean, Sussex

Gardner, Thomas, Worcester College, Oxford Garner, J.G., Manchester Garnett, William James, Quernmore Park, Lancaster Germon, Rev. Nicholas, M.A., High Master, Free Grammar School, Manchester Gibb, William, Manchester Gladstone, Robertson, Liverpool Gladstone, Robert, Withington, near Manchester Gordon, Hunter, Manchester Gould, John, Manchester Grant, Daniel, Manchester Grave, Joseph, Manchester Gray, Benjamin, B.A., Trinity Coll. Cambridge Gray, James, Manchester Greaves, John, Irlam Hall, near Manchester Greenall, G., Walton Hall, near Warrington Grey, The Hon. William Booth Grosvenor, The Earl Grundy, George, Chetham Fold, near Manchester

Hadfield, George, Manchester Hailstone, Edward, F.S.A., Horton Hall, Bradford, Yorkshire Hardman, Henry, Bury, Lancashire Hardy, William, Manchester Hargreaves, George J., Hulme, Manchester Harland, John, Manchester Harrison, William, Brearey, Isle of Man Harter, James Collier, Broughton Hall, near Manchester Harter, William, Hope Hall, near Manchester Hately, Isaiah, Manchester Hatton, James, Richmond House, near Manchester Hawkins, Edward, F.R.S., F.S.A., F.L.S., British Museum, London Heelis, Stephen, Manchester Henshaw, William, Manchester Herbert, Hon. and Very Rev. Wm., Dean of Manchester Heron, Rev. George, M.A., Carrington, Cheshire Heywood, Sir Benjamin, Bart., Claremont, near Manchester Heywood, James, F.R.S., F.G.S., Acresfield, near Manchester Heywood, John Pemberton, near Liverpool Heywood, Thomas, F.S.A., Hope End, Ledbury, Herefordshire Heywood, Thomas, Pendleton, near Manchester Heyworth, Lawrence, Oakwood, near Stockport Hibbert, Mrs., Salford Hickson, Charles, Manchester Hinde, Rev. Thomas, M.A., Winwick, Warrington Hoare, G.M., The Lodge, Morden, Surrey Hoare, P.R., Kelsey Park, Beckenham, Kent Holden, Thomas, Summerfield, Bolton Holden, Thomas, Rochdale Holme, Edward, M.D., Manchester Hughes, William, Old Trafford, near Manchester Hulme, Davenport, M.D., Manchester Hulme, Hamlet, Medlock Vale, Manchester Hulton, Rev. A.H., M.A., Ashton-under-Lyne Hulton, Rev. C.G., M.A., Chetham College, Manchester Hulton, H.T., Manchester Hulton, W.A., Preston Hunter, Rev. Joseph, F.S.A., London

Jackson, H.B., Manchester Jackson, Joseph, Ardwick, near Manchester Jacson, Charles R., Barton Lodge, Preston James, Rev. J.G., M.A., Habergham Eaves, near Burnley James, Paul Moon, Summerville, near Manchester Jemmett, William Thomas, Manchester Johnson, W.R., Manchester Johnson, Rev. W.W., M.A., Manchester Jones, Jos., Jun., Hathershaw, Oldham Jones, W., Manchester Jordan, Joseph, Manchester Kay, James, Turton Tower, Bolton Kay, Samuel, Manchester Kelsall, Strettle, Manchester Kendrick, James, M.D., F.L.S., Warrington Kennedy, John, Ardwick House, near Manchester Ker, George Portland, Salford Kershaw, James, Green Heys, near Manchester Kidd, Rev. W.J., M.A., Didsbury, near Manchester

Langton, William, Manchester Larden, Rev. G.E., M.A., Brotherton Vicarage, Yorkshire Leeming, W.B., Salford Legh, G. Cornwall, M.P., F.G.S., High Legh, Cheshire Legh, Rev. Peter, M.A., Newton in Makerfield Leigh, Rev. Edward Trafford, M.A., Cheadle, Cheshire Leigh, Henry, Moorfield Cottage, Worsley Leresche, J.H., Manchester Lloyd, William Horton, F.S.A., L.S., Park-square, London Lloyd, Edward Jeremiah, Oldfield House, Altringham Lomas, Edward, Manchester Lomax, Robert, Harwood, near Bolton Love, Benjamin, Manchester Lowndes, William, Egremont, Liverpool Loyd, Edward, Green Hill, Manchester Lycett, W.E., Manchester Lyon, Edmund, M.D., Manchester Lyon, Thomas, Appleton Hall, Warrington

McClure, William, Peel Cottage, Eccles McFarlane, John, Manchester McKenzie, John Whitefoord, Edinburgh McVicar, John, Manchester Mann, Robert, Manchester Marc, E.R. Le, School Lodge, Cheshire Markland, J.H., F.R.S., F.S.A., Bath Markland, Thomas, Mab Field, near Manchester Marsden, G.E., Manchester Marsden, William, Manchester Marsh, John Fitchett, Warrington Marshall, Miss, Ardwick, near Manchester Marshall, William, Penwortham Hall, Preston Marshall, Frederick Earnshaw, Ditto Marshall, John, Ditto Mason, Thomas, Copt Hewick, near Ripon Master, Rev. Robert M., M.A., Burnley Maude, Daniel, M.A., Salford Millar, Thomas, Green Heys, near Manchester Molyneux, Edward, Chetham Hill, Manchester Monk, John, Manchester Moore, John, F.L.S., Cornbrook, near Manchester Mosley, Sir Oswald, Bart., Rolleston Hall, Staffordshire Murray, James, Manchester

Nield, William, Mayfield, Manchester Nelson, George, Manchester Neville, James, Beardwood, near Blackburn Newall, Mrs. Robert, Littleborough, near Rochdale Newall, W.N., Wellington Lodge, Littleborough Newbery, Henry, Manchester Nicholson, William, Thelwall Hall, Warrington Norris, Edward, Manchester Norwich, The Bishop of

Ormerod, George, D.C.L., F.R.S., F.S.A., F.G.S., Sedbury Park, Gloucestershire Ormerod, George Wareing, M.A., F.G.S., Manchester Ormerod, Henry Mere, Manchester Owen, John, Manchester

Parkinson, Rev. Richard, B.D., Canon of Manchester Patten, J. Wilson, M.P., Bank Hall, Warrington Pedley, Rev. J.T., M.A., Peakirk-cum-Glinton, Market Deeping Peel, Sir Robert, Bart., M.P., Drayton Manor Peel, George, Brookfield, Cheadle Peel, Joseph, Singleton Brook, near Manchester Peet, Thomas, Manchester Pegge, John, Newton Heath, near Manchester Percival, Stanley, Liverpool Philips, Mark, M.P., The Park, Manchester Philippi, Frederick Theod., Belfield Hall, near Rochdale Phillips, Shakspeare, Barlow Hall, near Manchester Phillipps, Sir Thomas, Bart., Middle Hill, Worcestershire Piccope, Rev. John, M.A., Farndon, Cheshire Pickford, Thomas, Mayfield, Manchester Pickford, Thomas E., Manchester Pierpoint, Benjamin, Warrington Pilkington, George, Manchester Pilling, Charles R., Caius College, Cambridge Plant, George, Manchester Pooley, Edward, Manchester Pooley, John, Hulme, near Manchester Porrett, Robert, Tower, London Prescott, J.C., Summerville, near Manchester Price, John Thomas, Manchester

Radford, Thomas, M.D., Higher Broughton, near Manchester Raffles, Rev. Thomas, D.D., LL.D., Liverpool Raikes, Rev. Henry, M.A., Hon. Can., and Chancellor of Chester Raines, Rev. F.R., M.A., F.S.A., Milnrow Parsonage, Rochdale Reiss, Leopold, High Field, near Manchester Rickards, Charles H., Manchester Ridgway, Mrs., Ridgemont, near Bolton Ridgway, John Withenshaw, Manchester Robson, John, Warrington Roberts, W.J., Liverpool Roby, John, M.R.S.L., Rochdale Royds, Albert Hudson, Rochdale

Samuels, John, Manchester Sattersfield, Joshua, Manchester Scholes, Thomas Seddon, High Bank, near Manchester Schuster, Leo, Weaste, near Manchester Sharp, John, Lancaster Sharp, Robert C., Bramall Hall, Cheshire Sharp, Thomas B., Manchester Sharp, William, Lancaster Sharp, William, London Simms, Charles S., Manchester Simms, George, Manchester Skaife, John, Blackburn Skelmersdale, The Lord, Lathom House Smith, Rev. Jeremiah, D.D., Leamington Smith, Junius, Strangeways Hall, Manchester Smith, J.R., Old Compton-street, London Sowler, R.S., Manchester Sowler, Thomas, Manchester Spear, John, Manchester Standish, W.J., Duxbury Hall, Chorley Stanley, The Lord, Knowsley Sudlow, John, Jun., Manchester Swain, Charles, M.R.S.L., Cheetwood Priory, near Manchester Swanwick, Josh. W., Hollins Vale, Bury, Lancashire

Tabley, The Lord De, Tabley, Cheshire Tattershall, Rev. Thomas, D.D., Liverpool Tatton, Thos., Withenshaw, Cheshire Tayler, Rev. John James, B.A., Manchester Taylor, Thomas Frederick, Wigan Teale, Josh., Salford Thomson, James, Manchester Thorley, George, Manchester Thorpe, Robert, Manchester Tobin, Rev. John, M.A., Liscard, Cheshire Townend, John, Polygon, Manchester Townend, Thomas, Polygon, Manchester Turnbull, W.B., D.D., Edinburgh Turner, Samuel, F.R.S, F.S.A., F.G.S., Liverpool Turner, Thomas, Manchester

Vitrè, Edward Denis De, M.D., Lancaster

Walker, John, Weaste, near Manchester Walker, Samuel, Prospect Hill, Pendleton Wanklyn, J.B., Salford Wanklyn, James H., Crumpsall House, near Manchester Warburton, R.E.E., Arley Hall, near Northwich Ware, Samuel Hibbert, M.D., F.R.S.E., Edinburgh Wareing, Ralph, Manchester Westhead, Joshua P., Manchester Whitehead, James, Manchester Whitelegg, Rev. William, M.A., Hulme, near Manchester Whitmore, Edward, Jun., Manchester Whitmore, Henry, Manchester Wilson, William James, Manchester Wilton, The Earl of, Heaton House Winter, Gilbert, Stocks, near Manchester Worthington, Edward, Manchester Wray, Rev. Cecil Daniel, M.A., Canon of Manchester Wright, Rev. Henry, M.A., Mottram, St. Andrew's, near Macclesfield Wroe, Thomas, Manchester

Yates, Joseph B., West Dingle, Liverpool Yates, Richard, Manchester

* * * * *

WORKS PUBLISHED BY THE CHETHAM SOCIETY FOR THE YEAR 1843.

Brereton's Travels.

The Lancashire Civil War Tracts.

Chester's Triumph in Honor of her Prince.

* * * * *

WORKS IN THE PRESS.

Pott's Discovery of Witches in the County of Lancaster, from the edition of 1613.

The Life of the Rev. Adam Martindale, Vicar of Rostherne, in Cheshire, from the MS. in the British Museum. (4239 Ascough's Catalogue.)

Dee's Compendious Rehearsal, and other Autobiographical Tracts, not included in the recent Publication of the Camden Society edited by Mr. Halliwell, with his Collected correspondence.

Iter Lancastrense, by Dr. Richard James; an English Poem, written in 1636, containing a Metrical Account of some of the Principal Families and Mansions in Lancashire; from the unpublished MS. in the Bodleian Library, Oxford.

* * * * *

WORKS SUGGESTED FOR PUBLICATION.

Selections from the Unpublished Correspondence of the Rev. John Whittaker, Author of the History of Manchester, and other Works.

More's (George) Discourse concerning the Possession and Dispossession of Seven Persons in one Family in Lancashire, from a Manuscript formerly belonging to Thoresby, and which gives a much fuller Account of that Transaction than the Printed Tract of 1600; with a Bibliographical and Critical Review of the Tracts in the Darrel Controversy.

A Selection of the most Curious Papers and Tracts relating to the Pretender's Stay in Manchester in 1745, in Print and Manuscript.

Proceedings of the Presbyterian Classis of Manchester and the Neighbourhood, from 1646 to 1660, from an Unpublished Manuscript.

Catalogue of the Alchemical Library of John Webster, of Clitheroe, from a Manuscript in the Rev. T. Corser's possession; with a fuller Life of him, and List of his Works, than has yet appeared.

Correspondence between Samuel Hartlib (the Friend of Milton), and Dr. Worthington, of Jesus College, Cambridge (a native of Manchester), from 1655 to 1661, on various Literary Subjects.

"Antiquities concerning Cheshire," by Randall Minshull, written A.D. 1591, from a MS. in the Gough Collection.

Register of the Lancaster Priory, from a MS. (No. 3764) in the Harleian Collection.

Selections from the Visitations of Lancashire in 1533, 1567, and 1613, in the Herald's College, British Museum, Bodleian, and Caius College Libraries.

Selections from Dodsworth's MSS. in the Bodleian Library, Randal Holmes's Collections for Lancashire and Cheshire (MSS. Harleian), and Warburton's Collections for Cheshire (MSS. Lansdown).

Annales Cestrienses, or Chronicle of St. Werburgh, from the MS. in the British Museum.

A Reprint of Henry Bradshaw's Life and History of St. Werburgh, from the very rare 4to of 1521, printed by Pynson.

The Letters and Correspondence of Sir William Brereton, from the original MSS., in 5 vols. folio, in the British Museum.

A Poem, by Laurence Bostock, on the subject of the Saxon and Norman Earls of Chester.

Bishop Gastrell's Notitia Cestriensis, on the subject of the Ecclesiastical Antiquities of the Diocese of Chester, from the original MS.

History of the Earldom of Chester, collected by Archbishop Parker, entitled De Successione Comitum Cestriæ a Hugone Lupo ad Johannem Scoticum, from the original MS. in Ben'et College Library, Cambridge.

Volume of Funeral Certificates of Lancashire and Cheshire.

Volume of Early Lancashire and Cheshire Wills.

A Selection of Papers relating to the Rebellion of 1715, including Clarke's Journal of the March of the Rebels from Carlisle to Preston.

A Memoir of the Chetham Family, from original documents.

The Diary of the Rev. Henry Newcome, M.A., from the original MS. in the possession of his descendant, the Rev. Thomas Newcome, M.A., Rector of Shenley, Herts.

Lucianus Monacus de laude Cestrie, a Latin MS. of the 13th century, descriptive of the walls, gates, &c., of the City of Chester, formerly belonging to Thomas Allen, DD., and now in the Bodleian Library, Oxford.

Richard Robinson's Golden Mirrour, Bk. lett. 4to. Lond., 1580. Containing Poems on the Etymology of the names of several Cheshire Families; from the exceedingly rare copy formerly in the collection of Richard Heber, Esq., (see Cat. pt. iv. 2413,) and now in the British Museum.

A volume of the early Ballad Poetry of Lancashire.

The Coucher Book of Whalley Abbey.

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