t for a small garden, which was sometimes inundated by the high tides.
Between the port of St. Sampson and the creek of Houmet Paradis, rises a
steep hill, surmounted by the block of towers covered with ivy, and
known as Vale Castle, or the Chateau de l'Archange; so that, at St.
Sampson, the Bu de la Rue was shut out from sight.

Nothing is commoner than sorcerers in Guernsey. They exercise their
profession in certain parishes, in profound indifference to the
enlightenment of the nineteenth century. Some of their practices are
downright criminal. They set gold boiling, they gather herbs at
midnight, they cast sinister looks upon the people's cattle. When the
people consult them they send for bottles containing "water of the
sick," and they are heard to mutter mysteriously, "the water has a sad
look." In March, 1857, one of them discovered, in water of this kind,
seven demons. They are universally feared. Another only lately bewitched
a baker "as well as his oven." Another had the diabolical wickedness to
wafer and seal up envelopes "containing nothing inside." Another went so
far as to have on a shelf three bottles labelled "B." These monstrous
facts are well authenticated. Some of these sorcerers are obliging, and
for two or three guineas will take on themselves the complaint from
which you are suffering. Then they are seen to roll upon their beds, and
to groan with pain; and while they are in these agonies the believer
exclaims, "There! I am well again." Others cure all kinds of diseases,
by merely tying a handkerchief round the patient's loins, a remedy so
simple that it is astonishing that no one had yet thought of it. In the
last century, the Cour Royale of Guernsey bound such folks upon a heap
of fagots and burnt them alive. In these days it condemns them to eight
weeks' imprisonment; four weeks on bread and water, and the remainder of
the term in solitary confinement. _Amant alterna catenae._

The last instance of burning sorcerers in Guernsey took place in 1747.
The city authorities devoted one of its squares, the Carrefour du
Bordage, to that ceremony. Between 1565 and 1700, eleven sorcerers thus
suffered at this spot. As a rule the criminals made confession of their
guilt. Torture was used to assist their confession. The Carrefour du
Bordage has indeed rendered many other services to society and religion.
It was here that heretics were brought to the stake. Under Queen Mary,
among other Huguenots burnt here, w