Page:A history of the Inquisition of the Middle Ages, volume 3.djvu/517

 THE SABBAT. 501 avoid suspicion, they must say " By leave of our Master," and they were to bring him as many converts as they could, and work all possible evil to their neighbors. There was usually a dance, which was unlike any seen at honest gatherings. At Como and Brescia a number of children from eight to twelve years of age, who had frequented the Sabbat, and had been reconverted by the inquisi- tors, gave exhibitions in which their skill showed that they had not been taught by human art. The woman was held behind her partner and they danced backwards, and when they paid rever- ence to the presiding demon they bent themselves backwards, lifting a foot in the air forwards. The rites ended with indiscrim- inate intercourse, obliging demons serving as incubi or succubi as required. The reality of all this did not depend alone upon the confessions of the accused, for there was a well-known case occur- ring about the year 1450, when the Inquisitor of Como, Bartolo- meo de Homate, the podesta Lorenzo da Concorezzo, and the no- tary Giovanni da Fossato, either out of curiosity or because they doubted the witches whom they were trying, went to a place of assembly at Mendrisio and witnessed the scene from a hiding-place. The presiding demon pretended not to know their presence, and in due course dismissed the assembly, but suddenly recalled his fol- lowers and set them on the officials, who were so beaten that they died within fifteen days.* All this was, of course, well fitted to excite the horror of the faithful and stimulate the zeal of the inquisitor, but it was only the pastime of the witch, and the reward given to her by her mas- ter for her labors and her allegiance. Her serious occupation was in works of evil. She was abandoned, body and soul, to Satan, and was the instrument which he used to effect his malignant pur- poses. The demonologists argued that the witch was as necessary to the demon as the demon to the witch, and that neither could operate without the other. She was not like the magicians and sorcerers, who merely earned their livelihood by selling their ser- vices, sometimes for good purposes and sometimes for bad, but she was a being wholly evil, delighting in the exercise of her powers ann. 1460 (Martene Ampl. Coll. V. 502).— Bernardi Comensis de Strigiis c. 3 — Prieriat. de Strigiuiag. Lib. i. c. 2, 14; Lib. n. c. 1, 4.
 * Memoires de Jacques du Clercq, Liv. iv. ch. 4.— Chron. Cornel. Zantfliet