ed, they are all amused by a
dance of toads. Thousands of these creatures spring out of the
earth, and, standing upon their hind legs, dance while the Devil
plays the bagpipes or the trumpet. These toads are all endowed with
the faculty of speech, and entreat the witches there to reward them
with the flesh of unbaptized infants for their exertions to give
them pleasure. The witches promise compliance. The Devil bids them
remember to keep their word, and then, stamping his foot, causes
all the toads to sink into the earth in an instant. The place
being thus cleared, preparations are made for the banquet, where
all manner of disgusting things are served and greedily devoured by
the demons and witches--although the latter are sometimes regaled
with choice meats and expensive wines from golden plates and
crystal goblets; but they are never thus favoured unless they have
done an extraordinary number of evil deeds since the last period of
meeting. After the feast they begin dancing, but such as have no
relish for any more exercise in that way amuse themselves by
mocking the holy sacrament of baptism. For this purpose the toads
are again called and sprinkled with filthy water, the Devil making
the sign of the cross, and the witches calling out [oath omitted].
When the Devil wishes to be particularly amused, he makes the
witches strip off their clothes and dance before him, each with a
cat tied round her neck and another dangling from her body in the
form of a tail. When the cock crows they all disappear, and the
Sabbath is ended...."

There, reader, is a very fair idea of the monstrous form of belief held
during the Middle Ages. Scarcely anything that was fanciful and
diabolical was not conjured up to the mind and said to happen at these
Sabbaths. There was also a certain amount of ingenious theorizing afoot
in order to account for certain facts, as, for instance, the cloven
hoof, which it was said must always appear, no matter how concealed--it
being due to the fact that the devil took the form of a goat so often
that he finally acquired the hoof. Sir Thomas Browne explains it to us
thus:

"The ground of this opinion at first might be his frequent
appearing in the shape of a goat, which answers this description.
This was the opinion of the Ancient Christians concerning the
apparitions o