Sampson, I have no doubt that the drawing for the masque was actually made in the theatre, for although this kind of costly and decorative entertainment was almost always designed for court or some great nobleman’s house we know that The World tost at Tennis was produced with considerable success on the public stage “By the Prince his Seruants.” The dress, then, of “the Devil” at the Sabbats seems frequently to have been an elaborate theatrical costume, such as might have been found in the stock wardrobe of a rich playhouse at London, but which would have had no such associations for provincial folk and even simpler rustics.
From time to time the sceptics have pointed to the many eases upon record of a victim’s sickness or death following the witch’s curse, and have incredulously inquired if it be possible that a malediction should have such consequences. Whilst candidly remarking that personally I believe there is power for evil and even for destruction in such a bane, that a deadly anathema launched with concentrated hate and all the energy of volition may bring unhappiness and fatality in its train, I would—since they will not allow this—answer their objections upon other lines. When some person who had in any way annoyed the witch was to be harmed or killed, it was obviously convenient, when practicable, to follow up the symbolism of the solemn imprecation, or it might be of the melted wax image riddled with pins, by a dose of subtly administered poison, which would bring about the desired result, whether sickness or death; and from the evidence concerning the witches’ victims, who so frequently pined owing to a wasting disease, it seems more than probable that lethal drugs were continually employed, for as Professor A. J. Clark records “the society of witches had a very creditable knowledge of the art of poisoning,”18 and they are known to have freely used aconite, deadly nightshade (belladonna), and hemlock.
So far then from the confessions of the witches being mere hysteria and hallucination they are proved, even upon the most material interpretation, to be in the main hideous and horrible fact.
In choosing examples to demonstrate this I have as yet referred almost entirely to the witchcraft which raged from
