r reward any evil or
wicked spirit, or _take up any dead man_, _woman_, _or child out of his_,
_her_, _or their grave_; or, the skin, bone, or any other part of any
dead person to be employed in any manner of witchcraft, sorcery, charm,
or enchantment, etc., _he shall suffer death as a felon_, without benefit
of clergy."

The law of James I. was repealed in George II.'s. reign, but even then
persons pretending to use witchcraft, tell fortunes, or discover stolen
goods, by skill in the occult sciences, were to be punished by a year's
imprisonment; and by an Act, 5 George IV., c.83, any person or persons
using any subtle art, means, or device, by palmistry, or otherwise, to
deceive his Majesty's subjects, were to be deemed rogues and vagabonds,
and to be punished with imprisonment and hard labour.

Acts of Parliament did not succeed in eradicating witchcraft. Its power
has waned, but it still exercises an influence, shadowy though it be, on
certain minds, though in its grosser forms it has disappeared.

Formerly, ailments of all kinds, and misfortunes of every description,
were ascribed to the malignant influence of some old decrepit female, and
it was believed that nature's laws could be changed by these witches,
that they could at will produce tempests to destroy the produce of the
earth, and strike with sickness those who had incurred their displeasure.
Thus Lady Macbeth, speaking of these hags, says:--

"I have learned by the perfectest report, they have more in them than
mortal knowledge. When I burned in desire to question them further
they made themselves air, into which they vanished."

_Macbeth_, Act. i, S. 5.

The uncanny knowledge possessed by witches was used, it was thought, to
injure people, and their malice towards good, hard-working, honest folk
was unmistakable. They afflicted children from sheer love of cruelty,
and bewitched animals gratuitously, or for slights which they supposed
their owners had shown towards them; consequently their knowledge was
considered to be greatly inimical to others, and particularly baneful to
the industrious, whom witches hated.

There was hardly a district that had not its witches. Children ran away
when they saw approaching them an aged woman, with a red shawl on, for
they believed she was a witch, who could, with her evil eye, injure them.
It was, however, believed that the machinations of witches could be
counteracted in various ways, and by an