Page:Lancashire Legends, Traditions, Pageants, Sports, Etc., with an Appendix Containing a Rare Tract.djvu/300



How some Witches, revelling in a gentleman's house, served the servants who surprised them. happened one time that a great number of Lancashire witches were revelling in a gentleman's house in his absence, and making merry with what they found, the dogs not daring to stir—they having, it seems, the power to strike them mute. However, during the frolic, some of the servants came home, and, thinking they had been ordinary thieves, went to seize them. But they happened to catch a Tartar; for, each taking one, they flew away with them, who in vain called for help, till they had lodged them on the top of very high trees; and then raised prodigious storms of thunder and lightning, with hard showers of rain, they left them there to do penance for their intrusion.

A brief Treatise on Witches in general, with several things worthy of notice. this time great search was made after witches, and many were apprehended, but most of them gave the hangman and the gaoler the slip; though some hold that when a witch is taken she hath no power to avoid justice. It happened as some of them were going in a cart to be tried, a coach passed by in which appeared a person like a judge, who, calling to one, bid her to be of good cheer and take comfort, for neither she nor any of her company should be harmed; and on that night all