Page:Folk-lore - A Quarterly Review. Volume 28, 1917.djvu/278

246 One detail in the ceremony of admission appears to be of late date, and not to belong to the original ritual; and that is the reward given to witches who brought new members into the society, or to the converts themselves when of adult age. The amount varied greatly; in France ten or twenty crowns or even a handful of gold were paid to the witch-missionary. In Great Britain the money was evidently regarded as an earnest of the wealth and fertility to follow. It was usually "good and sufficient Money," though a few instances occur of its being changed, like fairy gold, into rubbish.

It is often objected that, though the witches gave up everything, they got nothing out of their contract with the Devil; yet it is quite clear that both men and women, young and old, entered into it very willingly. They promised absolute obedience and fidelity, and the greater number carried out their part of the contract to the end; for the number of witches who died "blaspheming and impenitent" was very great. The Devil was looked upon by the witches, and even by himself, as the incarnate God, and this point of view must be kept in mind when studying the cult. It seems to be that cult of "man-worshiping" which was so strictly forbidden in the Ecclesiastical Canons of King Edgar. The attitude of mind of the witches is best expressed by de Lancre, though it can be seen in the accounts in Great Britain: "When they