Page:Folk-lore - A Quarterly Review. Volume 11, 1900.djvu/121

Rh what his brother did, for it is not everyone who can see these things, and George was too much afraid to speak of it at first. Of course it was Vachor's spirit, for his real body could not have done it. It was only an appearance, and his real body must have been sleeping somewhere. They do go to sleep when the soul leaves to do these things.

"Well, some days after, my sons were talking with the boys who worked with William Vachor, and who were with him at that very time, and they said they all at once missed him. Where he went they didn't know, but he was gone full half an hour, and they thought he had gone to sleep under a hedge. After this, one evening my son met Vachor in Milton as we were going up to chapel. He came out of his house and asked roughly what was going on down stable, and if old Tett had been again. 'No!' said George, 'It is not old Tett. We know who it is, and it had best be dropped or they will know more of it.' He made no answer, and no more noises were ever heard."

26. Dr. Hawkins, of Abbotsbury, relates that in 1890 a dairyman of Longbredy had lost a horse, and thereupon consulted a wise woman, Mrs. Bartlett, aged between sixty and seventy, who told him that he had been overlooked, and that the person who had done this would shortly try to borrow something of him. Shortly afterwards a neighbouring dairyman named Hansford, it being market day, sent up to borrow some piece of harness. He was then charged with overlooking and causing the death of the horse; and permanent ill-will was established between the two men. This wise woman was also a witch. Those persons who had been bewitched by her could escape the spell by drawing her blood, which they did by assaulting her. She was an uneducated village midwife, and died in 1896.

27. Extract from the Dorset County Chronicle for October 28, 1897.—"A peculiar case came before the Bench at Wincanton Police Court on Monday, when one woman summoned another for unlawful wounding. It appeared the defendant considered she was bewitched by the complainant, and determined to break the spell by the supposed sure means of drawing blood. In order to do this she deliberately, on meeting complainant in a factory, drew a pin across the back of her wrists and had the satisfaction of seeing the blood flow. The parties are neighbours, but are not on friendly terms. The Bench bound over the defendant to be