Page:Notes on the folk-lore of the northern counties of England and the borders.djvu/235

 Rh the mermaid, yet fell a prey to Lord Soulis and the Liddesdale Lancers when they forced him into the brook, for—

Auld Nan Hardwick possessed, it would seem, a power beyond that of the mighty masters of the black art in old days. By the kindness of the late Dr. Johnson, of Sunderland, we may compare this Cleveland witch with her Northumbrian sister Nannie Scott. He wrote thus to me respecting her: “We find in this locality many relics of the Scandinavian superstitions, varied and mixed up with modern customs and phraseology. The old keelmen (once numbering some hundreds) on the Weir were brimful of superstitious stories and legends, and their nightly rambles on shore and river, to seek their vessels and bring them in with the tide, are very amusing. I remember, when a boy, a witch who resided in a little hovel near us, in Sunderland, and with whom I was on most friendly terms, much to the disgust of my nurse. She told fortunes by the stars, practised the black art, and sold a compound of treacle, &c. called by us “claggum.” Her hatred was considered certain death; and children once under her protection were sure to be lucky in life. She had a black cat and a black dog, both unmitigated savages and thieves (the poor animals, being deemed familiars, were pelted and persecuted into ferocity), and few women were more coaxed and toadied than was Nannie Scott. She prayed for fair winds for sailors’ wives; she sold love-charms to bring together sulking sweethearts; and she did all with an air of solemn strong-mindedness that bore down any approach to discredit. She lived to a very great age, and died about twenty years ago.”

From Mr. J. Stott, of Perth, formerly a schoolmaster in the West Riding of Yorkshire, I learn some particulars respecting “Auld Betty,” who was held in great dread as a witch not many years ago by both old and young for miles round in a neighbourhood not twenty miles from Halifax. My informant knew her well in his youth, and tells me that she gained her livelihood by