Page:Shetland Folk-Lore - Spence - 1899.pdf/148

 they commonly adopted such means as were considered most effectual in detecting the witch and bringing back the lost profit. This was sometimes a most elaborate affair, and required a considerable amount of nerve for its performance.

The following was related to me many years ago as having been done. A woman who suspected that her cows had been witched repaired to a march between two lairds' lands, and pulled fifteen green nettles by the roots. These were bound in a sheaf and placed on the looder of a water-mill.

Then the woman, providing herself with a triangular clipping of skrootie claith, two noralegs, a flint and steel, and a box of tinder, went to the mill at the hour of midnight, and taking the bundle of nettles, wended her way to the kirkyard of the parish. Arriving there, she went to the east side of the yard, and crossed the dyke back foremost.