t all from those to be met with
in other countries.

THE WERWOLVES OF LAPLAND

In Lapland werwolves are still much to the fore. In many families the
property is hereditary, whilst it is not infrequently sought and
acquired through the practice of Black Magic. Though, perhaps, more
common among males, there are, nevertheless, many instances of it among
females.

The following case comes from the country bordering on Lake Enara.

The child of a peasant woman named Martha, just able to trot alone, and
consequently left to wander just where it pleased, came home one morning
with its forehead apparently licked raw, all its fingers more or less
injured, and two of them seemingly sucked and mumbled to a mere pulp.

On being interrogated as to what had happened, it told a most astounding
tale: A very beautiful lady had picked it up and carried it away to her
house, where she had put it in a room with her three children, who were
all very pretty and daintily dressed. At sunset, however, both the lady
and her children metamorphosed into wolves, and would undoubtedly have
eaten it, had they not satiated their appetites on a portion of a girl
which had been kept over from the preceding day. The newcomer was
intended for their meal on the morrow, and obeying the injunctions of
their mother, the young werwolves had forborne to devour the child,
though they had all tasted it.

The child's parents were simply dumbfounded--they could scarcely credit
their senses--and made their offspring repeat its narrative over and
over again. And as it stuck to what it had said, they ultimately
concluded that it was true, and that the lady described could be none
other than Madame Tonno, the wife of their landlord and patron--a person
of immense importance in the neighbourhood.

But what could they do? How could they protect their children from
another raid?

To accuse the lady, who was rich and influential, of being a werwolf
would be useless. No one would believe them--no one dare believe
them--and they would be severely punished for their indiscretion. Being
poor, they were entirely at her mercy, and if she chose to eat their
children, they could not prevent her, unless they could catch her in the
act.

One evening the mother was washing clothes before the door of her house,
with her second child, a little girl of four years of age, playing about
close by. The cottage stood in a lonely part of the estate, forming
almost an island in