alous because the attitude of the
public and of the courts was more friendly to the accused witch. This
explanation is at best, however, nothing more than a suggestion. We have
not the material for confident generalization.

One other form of evidence must be mentioned. The town of Newcastle,
which in 1649 had sent to Scotland for a witchfinder, was able in 1673
to make use of home-grown talent. In this instance it was a woman, Ann
Armstrong, who implicated a score of her neighbors and at length went
around pointing out witches. She was a smooth-witted woman who was
probably taking a shrewd method of turning off charges against herself.
Her testimony dealt with witch gatherings or conventicles held at
various times and places. She told whom she had seen there and what they
had said about their crimes. She told of their feasts and of their
dances. Poor woman, she had herself been compelled to sing for them
while they danced. Nor was this the worst. She had been terribly
misused. She had been often turned into a horse, then bridled and
ridden.[38]

It would not be worth while to go further into Ann Armstrong's stories.
It is enough to remark that she offered details, as to harm done to
certain individuals in certain ways, which tallied closely with the
sworn statements of those individuals as to what had happened to them at
the times specified. The conclusion cannot be avoided that the female
witchfinder had been at no small pains to get even such minute details
in exact form. She had gathered together all the witch stories of that
part of Northumberland and had embodied them in her account of the
confessions made at the "conventicles."

What was the ruling of the court on all this evidence we do not know. We
have only one instance in which any evidence was ruled out. That was at
the trial of Julian Cox in 1663. Justice Archer tried an experiment in
that trial, but before doing so he explained to the court that no
account was to be taken of the result in making up their verdict. He had
heard that a witch could not repeat the petition in the Lord's Prayer,
"Lead us not into temptation." The witch indeed failed to meet the
test.[39]

In the course of this period we have two trials that reveal a connection
between witchcraft and other crimes. Perhaps it would be fairer to say
that the charge of witchcraft was sometimes made when other crimes were
suspected, but could not be proved. The first case concerned a rich
farmer