wife, his own Margaret, well he knew where she
would be! watching for him from the lattice of their chamber, where
she was ever the first to catch sight of him on his return, as she
had been the last to bid him farewell on his departure.

At this point the good Judge's meditations were suddenly interrupted
by his groom, who, spurring his horse on a level with his Master's,
pointed respectfully, with upraised whip, towards several moving
specks that were hastening across the estuary.

The softest bit of sand was over now, the travellers were reaching
firmer ground, where it was possible to go at a quicker pace. Setting
spurs to his horse the Judge hastened forward, his face flushing with
an anxiety he took no pains to conceal.

In those days, when posts were rare and letters difficult to get or to
send, an absence of many weeks always meant the possibility of finding
bad news at home on the return from a journey.

'Heaven send they bring me no ill tidings!' Judge Fell said to himself
as he cantered anxiously forward. Before long, it was possible to make
out that the moving specks were a little company of horsemen galloping
towards them over the sands. A few minutes later the Judge was
surrounded by a group of breathless riders and panting horses, with
bits and bridles flecked with foam.

The Judge's fears increased as he recognised all his most important
neighbours. Their excited faces also struck him with dread. 'You bring
me bad news?' he had called out, as soon as the cavalcade came within
earshot. At the answering shout, 'Aye, the worst,' his heart had sunk
like lead. And now here he was actually in their midst, and not one of
them could speak. 'Out with it, friends,' he commanded, 'let me know
the worst. To whom hath evil happened? To my wife? My son? My
daughters?'

But even he was hardly prepared for the answer, low-breathed and
muttering like a roll of thunder: 'To all.'

'To all!' cried the agonised father. 'Impossible! They cannot all be
dead!' Again came the ominous rejoinder, 'Worse, far worse,' and then,
in a shout from half-a-dozen throats at once, 'Far, far worse. They
are all bewitched!' Bewitched! that was indeed a word of ill-omen in
those days, a word at which no man, be his position ever so exalted,
could afford to smile. Ever since the days of the first Parliament of
the first Stuart king, the penalties for the sin of witchcraft had
been made increasingly severe. Although the country was now