e
supporting evidence offered at any trial in the seventeenth century in
England went so far towards establishing the actual appearance of the
so-called imps of the witches.

How are we to account for these phenomena? What was the nature of the
delusion seemingly shared by eight people? It is for the psychologist to
answer. Two explanations occur to the layman. It is not inconceivable
that there were rodents in the gaol--the terrible conditions in the
gaols of the time are too well known to need description--and that the
creatures running about in the dark were easily mistaken by excited
people for something more than natural. It is possible, too, that all
the appearances were the fabric of imagination or invention. The
spectators were all in a state of high expectation of supernatural
appearances. What the over-alert leaders declared they had seen the
others would be sure to have seen. Whether those leaders were themselves
deceived, or easily duped the others by calling out the description of
what they claimed to see, would be hard to guess. To the writer the
latter theory seems less plausible. The accounts of the two are so
clearly independent and yet agree so well in fact that they seem to
weaken the case for collusive imposture. With that a layman may be
permitted to leave the matter. What hypnotic possibilities are inherent
in the story he cannot profess to know. Certainly the accused woman was
not a professed dealer in magic and it is not easy to suspect her of
having hypnotized the watchers.

Upon Elizabeth Clarke's confessions five other women--"the old beldam"
Anne West, who had "been suspected as a witch many yeers since, and
suffered imprisonment for the same,"[12] her daughter Rebecca,[13] Anne
Leech, her daughter Helen Clarke, and Elizabeth Gooding--were arrested.
As in the case of the first, there was soon abundance of evidence
offered about them. One Richard Edwards bethought himself and remembered
that while crossing a bridge he had heard a cry, "much like the shrieke
of a Polcat," and had been nearly thrown from his horse. He had also
lost some cattle by a mysterious disease. Moreover his child had been
nursed by a goodwife who lived near to Elizabeth Clarke and Elizabeth
Gooding. The child fell sick, "rowling the eyes," and died. He believed
that Anne Leech and Elizabeth Gooding were the cause of its death. His
belief, however, which was offered as an independent piece of
testimony, seems to have res