Page:A history of the Inquisition of the Middle Ages, volume 3.djvu/544

 528 WITCHCRAFT. who had been tortured without confession, had to furnish seven, and was not allowed to escape without surrendering a portion of his substance. Others had light penance, like Jennon cV Amiens, a woman who had confessed after being several times tortured, and was now only required to make a five-league pilgrimage to Xotre Dame d'Esquerchin. This was an admission that the whole affair was a fraud; and even more remarkable was the case of & fille de joie named Belotte, who had been repeatedly tortured, and had confessed. She would have been burned with the other women on May 9, but it happened, accidentally or otherwise, that her mitre was not ready, and her execution was postponed, and now she was only banished from the diocese, and ordered to make a pilgrimage to Xotre Dame de Boulogne. Of the whole number arrested nine had the constancy to endure torture — in most cases long and severe — without confession. As the terror passed away the f eelings of the people expressed themselves sportively in some verses scattered through the streets, lampooning the principal actors in the tragedy. The stanza de- voted to Pierre le Brousart runs thus : " Then the inquisitor, with his white hood, His shining nose and his repulsive mazzard, Among the foremost in the game has stood To torture these poor folk as witch or wizard. But he knows only what he has been told, For his sole thought throughout has been to hold And keep their goods and chattels at all hazard. But he has failed in this, and been cajoled." The vicars and their advocates and the assembly of experts are all held guilty, and the verses conclude by threatening them : "But you shall all be punished in a mass, And we shall learn who caused the wondrous tale Of Vaudois in our citv of Arras. 1 '* of the laws in Arras; every one did as he pleased, and no one was punished but the friendless. His statement is borne out by the cases of homicide and other crimes which he relates, and of which no notice was taken (M6m. de Jacques du Clercq, Liv. rv. ch. 22, 24, 40, 41). Yet vigorous search was made for the author of this pasquinade, and Jacotin Maupetit was arrested by an usher-at-arms of the duke on the charge of writing it. He adroitly slipped out of his doublet, and sought asylum in three successive churches, finally succeeding in getting to Paris,
 * The Chronicler of Arras tells us that at this time there was no enforcement