Balder The Beautiful, Vol. I. by Sir James George Frazer

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Again, the wounds inflicted on a witch-hare or a witch-cat are to be
seen on the witch herself, just as the wounds inflicted on a were-wolf
are to be seen on the man himself when he has doffed the wolfs skin. To
take a few instances out of a multitude, a young man in the island of
Lismore was out shooting. When he was near Balnagown loch, he started a
hare and fired at it. The animal gave an unearthly scream, and then for
the first time it occurred to him that there were no real hares in
Lismore. He threw away his gun in terror and fled home; and next day he
heard that a notorious witch was laid up with a broken leg. A man need
be no conjuror to guess how she came by that broken leg.[774] Again, at
Thurso certain witches used to turn themselves into cats and in that
shape to torment an honest man. One night he lost patience, whipped out
his broadsword, and put them to flight. As they were scurrying away he
struck at them and cut off a leg of one of the cats. To his astonishment
it was a woman's leg, and next morning he found one of the witches short
of the corresponding limb.[775] Glanvil tells a story of "an old woman
in Cambridge-shire, whose astral spirit, coming into a man's house (as
he was sitting alone at the fire) in the shape of an huge cat, and
setting her self before the fire, not far from him, he stole a stroke at
the back of it with a fire-fork, and seemed to break the back of it, but
it scambled from him, and vanisht he knew not how. But such an old
woman, a reputed witch, was found dead in her bed that very night, with
her back broken, as I have heard some years ago credibly reported."[776]
In Yorkshire during the latter half of the nineteenth century a parish
clergyman was told a circumstantial story of an old witch named Nanny,
who was hunted in the form of a hare for several miles over the
Westerdale moors and kept well away from the dogs, till a black one
joined the pack and succeeded in taking a bit out of one of the hare's
legs. That was the end of the chase, and immediately afterwards the
sportsmen found old Nanny laid up in bed with a sore leg. On examining
the wounded limb they discovered that the hurt was precisely in that
part of it which in the hare had been bitten by the black dog and, what
was still more significant, the wound had all the appearance of having
been inflicted by a dog's teeth. So they put two and two together.[777]
The same sort of thing is often reported in Lincolnshire. "One night,"
said a servant from Kirton Lindsey, "my father and brother saw a cat in
front of them. Father knew it was a witch, and took a stone and hammered
it. Next day the witch had her face all tied up, and shortly afterwards
died." Again, a Bardney bumpkin told how a witch in his neighbourhood
could take all sorts of shapes. One night a man shot a hare, and when he
went to the witch's house he found her plastering a wound just where he
had shot the hare.[778] So in County Leitrim, in Ireland, they say that
a hare pursued by dogs fled to a house near at hand, but just as it was
bolting in at the door one of the dogs came up with it and nipped a
piece out of its leg. The hunters entered the house and found no hare
there but only an old woman, and her side was bleeding; so they knew
what to think of her.[779]

[Wounded witches in the Vosges.]

Again, in the Vosges Mountains a great big hare used to come out every
evening to take the air at the foot of the Mont des Fourches. All the
sportsmen of the neighbourhood tried their hands on that hare for a
month, but not one of them could hit it. At last one marksman, more
knowing than the rest, loaded his gun with some pellets of a consecrated
wafer in addition to the usual pellets of lead. That did the trick. If
puss was not killed outright, she was badly hurt, and limped away
uttering shrieks and curses in a human voice. Later it transpired that
she was no other than the witch of a neighbouring village who had the
power of putting on the shape of any animal she pleased.[780] Again, a
hunter of Travexin, in the Vosges, fired at a hare and almost shot away
one of its hind legs. Nevertheless the creature contrived to escape into
a cottage through the open door. Immediately a child's cries were heard
to proceed from the cottage, and the hunter could distinguish these
words, "Daddy, daddy, come quick! Poor mammy has her leg broken."[781]

[Wounded witches in Swabia.]

In Swabia the witches are liable to accidents of the same sort when they
go about their business in the form of animals. For example, there was a
soldier who was betrothed to a young woman and used to visit her every
evening when he was off duty. But one evening the girl told him that he
must not come to the house on Friday nights, because it was never
convenient to her to see him then. This roused his suspicion, and the
very next Friday night he set out to go to his sweetheart's house. On
the way a white cat ran up to him in the street and dogged his steps,
and when the animal would not make off he drew his sword and slashed off
one of its paws. On that the cat bolted. The soldier walked on, but when
he came to his sweetheart's house he found her in bed, and when he asked
her what was the matter, she gave a very confused reply. Noticing stains
of blood on the bed, he drew down the coverlet and saw that the girl was
weltering in her gore, for one of her feet was lopped off. "So that's
what's the matter with you, you witch!" said he, and turned on his heel
and left her, and within three days she was dead.[782] Again, a farmer
in the neighbourhood of Wiesensteig frequently found in his stable a
horse over and above the four horses he actually owned. He did not know
what to make of it and mentioned the matter to the smith. The smith said
quietly, "The next time you see a fifth horse in the stable, just you
send for me." Well, it was not long before the strange horse was there
again, and the farmer at once sent for the smith. He came bringing four
horse-shoes with him, and said, "I'm sure the nag has no shoes; I'll
shoe her for you." No sooner said than done. However, the smith
overreached himself; for next day when his friend the farmer paid him a
visit he found the smith's own wife prancing about with horse-shoes
nailed on her hands and feet. But it was the last time she ever appeared
in the shape of a horse.[783]

[The miller's wife and the two grey cats.]

Once more, in Silesia they tell of a miller's apprentice, a sturdy and
industrious young fellow, who set out on his travels. One day he came to
a mill, and the miller told him that he wanted an apprentice but did not
care to engage one, because hitherto all his apprentices had run away in
the night, and when he came down in the morning the mill was at a stand.
However, he liked the looks of the young chap and took him into his pay.
But what the new apprentice heard about the mill and his predecessors
was not encouraging; so the first night when it was his duty to watch in
the mill he took care to provide himself with an axe and a prayer-book,
and while he kept one eye on the whirring, humming wheels he kept the
other on the good book, which he read by the flickering light of a
candle set on a table. So the hours at first passed quietly with nothing
to disturb him but the monotonous drone and click of the machinery. But
on the stroke of twelve, as he was still reading with the axe lying on
the table within reach, the door opened and in came two grey cats
mewing, an old one and a young one. They sat down opposite him, but it
was easy to see that they did not like his wakefulness and the
prayer-book and the axe. Suddenly the old cat reached out a paw and made
a grab at the axe, but the young chap was too quick for her and held it
fast. Then the young cat tried to do the same for the prayer-book, but
the apprentice gripped it tight. Thus balked, the two cats set up such a
squalling that the young fellow could hardly say his prayers. Just
before one o'clock the younger cat sprang on the table and fetched a
blow with her right paw at the candle to put it out. But the apprentice
struck at her with his axe and sliced the paw off, whereupon the two
cats vanished with a frightful screech. The apprentice wrapped the paw
up in paper to shew it to his master. Very glad the miller was next
morning when he came down and found the mill going and the young chap at
his post. The apprentice told him what had happened in the night and
gave him the parcel containing the cat's paw. But when the miller opened
it, what was the astonishment of the two to find in it no cat's paw but
a woman's hand! At breakfast the miller's young wife did not as usual
take her place at the table. She was ill in bed, and the doctor had to
be called in to bind up her right arm, because in hewing wood, so they
said, she had made a slip and cut off her own right hand. But the
apprentice packed up his traps and turned his back on that mill before
the sun had set.[784]

[The analogy of were-wolves confirms the view that the reason for
burning bewitched animals is either to burn the witch or to compel her
to appear.]

It would no doubt be easy to multiply instances, all equally well
attested and authentic, of the transformation of witches into animals
and of the damage which the women themselves have sustained through
injuries inflicted on the animals.[785] But the foregoing evidence may
suffice to establish the complete parallelism between witches and
were-wolves in these respects. The analogy appears to confirm the view
that the reason for burning a bewitched animal alive is a belief that
the witch herself is in the animal, and that by burning it you either
destroy the witch completely or at least unmask her and compel her to
reassume her proper human shape, in which she is naturally far less
potent for mischief than when she is careering about the country in the
likeness of a cat, a hare, a horse, or what not. This principle is still
indeed clearly recognized by people in Oldenburg, though, as might be
expected, they do not now carry out the principle to its logical
conclusion by burning the bewitched animal or person alive; instead they
resort to a feeble and, it must be added, perfectly futile subterfuge
dictated by a mistaken humanity or a fear of the police. "When anything
living is bewitched in a house, for example, children or animals, they
burn or boil the nobler inwards of animals, especially the hearts, but
also the lungs or the liver. If animals have died, they take the inwards
of one of them or of an animal of the same kind slaughtered for the
purpose; but if that is not possible they take the inwards of a cock, by
preference a black one. The heart, lung, or liver is stuck all over with
needles, or marked with a cross cut, or placed on the fire in a tightly
closed vessel, strict silence being observed and doors and windows well
shut. When the heart boils or is reduced to ashes, the witch must
appear, for during the boiling she feels the burning pain. She either
begs to be released or seeks to borrow something, for example, salt or a
coal of fire, or she takes the lid off the pot, or tries to induce the
person whose spell is on her to speak. They say, too, that a woman comes
with a spinning-wheel. If it is a sheep that has died, you proceed in
the same way with a tripe from its stomach and prick it with needles
while it is on the boil. Instead of boiling it, some people nail the
heart to the highest rafter of the house, or lay it on the edge of the
hearth, in order that it may dry up, no doubt because the same thing
happens to the witch. We may conjecture that other sympathetic means of
destruction are employed against witchcraft. The following is expressly
reported: the heart of a calf that has died is stuck all over with
needles, enclosed in a bag, and thrown into flowing water before
sunset."[786]

[There is the same reason for burning bewitched things; similarly by
burning alive a person whose form a witch has assumed, you compel the
witch to disclose herself.]

And the same thing holds good also of inanimate objects on which a witch
has cast her spell. In Wales they say that "if a thing is bewitched,
burn it, and immediately afterwards the witch will come to borrow
something of you. If you give what she asks, she will go free; if you
refuse it, she will burn, and a mark will be on her body the next
day."[787] So, too, in Oldenburg, "the burning of things that are
bewitched or that have been received from witches is another way of
breaking the spell. It is often said that the burning should take place
at a cross-road, and in several places cross-roads are shewn where the
burning used to be performed.... As a rule, while the things are
burning, the guilty witches appear, though not always in their own
shape. At the burning of bewitched butter they often appear as
cockchafers and can be killed with impunity. Victuals received from
witches may be safely consumed if only you first burn a portion of
them."[788] For example, a young man in Oldenburg was wooing a girl, and
she gave him two fine apples as a gift. Not feeling any appetite at the
time, he put the apples in his pocket, and when he came home he laid
them by in a chest. Two or three days afterwards he remembered the
apples and went to the chest to fetch them. But when he would have put
his hand on them, what was his horror to find in their stead two fat
ugly toads in the chest. He hastened to a wise man and asked him what he
should do with the toads. The man told him to boil the toads alive, but
while he was doing so he must be sure on no account to lend anything out
of the house. Well, just as he had the toads in a pot on the fire and
the water began to grow nicely warm, who should come to the door but the
girl who had given him the apples, and she wished to borrow something;
but he refused to give her anything, rated her as a witch, and drove her
out of the house. A little afterwards in came the girl's mother and
begged with tears in her eyes for something or other; but he turned her
out also. The last word she said to him was that he should at least
spare her daughter's life; but he paid no heed to her and let the toads
boil till they fell to bits. Next day word came that the girl was
dead.[789] Can any reasonable man doubt that the witch herself was
boiled alive in the person of the toads?

[The burning alive of a supposed witch in Ireland in 1895.]

Moreover, just as a witch can assume the form of an animal, so she can
assume the form of some other human being, and the likeness is sometimes
so good that it is difficult to detect the fraud. However, by burning
alive the person whose shape the witch has put on, you force the witch
to disclose herself, just as by burning alive the bewitched animal you
in like manner oblige the witch to appear. This principle may perhaps be
unknown to science, falsely so called, but it is well understood in
Ireland and has been acted on within recent years. In March 1895 a
peasant named Michael Cleary, residing at Ballyvadlea, a remote and
lonely district in the county of Tipperary, burned his wife Bridget
Cleary alive over a slow fire on the kitchen hearth in the presence of
and with the active assistance of some neighbours, including the woman's
own father and several of her cousins. They thought that she was not
Bridget Cleary at all, but a witch, and that when they held her down on
the fire she would vanish up the chimney; so they cried, while she was
burning, "Away she goes! Away she goes!" Even when she lay quite dead on
the kitchen floor (for contrary to the general expectation she did not
disappear up the chimney), her husband still believed that the woman
lying there was a witch, and that his own dear wife had gone with the
fairies to the old _rath_ or fort on the hill of Kylenagranagh, where he
would see her at night riding a grey horse and roped to the saddle, and
that he would cut the ropes, and that she would stay with him ever
afterwards. So he went with some friends to the fort night after night,
taking a big table-knife with him to cut the ropes. But he never saw his
wife again. He and the men who had held the woman on the fire were
arrested and tried at Clonmel for wilful murder in July 1895; they were
all found guilty of manslaughter and sentenced to various terms of penal
servitude and imprisonment; the sentence passed on Michael Cleary was
twenty years' penal servitude.[790]

[Sometimes bewitched animals are buried alive instead of being burned.]

However, our British peasants, it must be confessed, have not always
acted up to the strict logical theory which seems to call for death by
fire as the proper treatment both of bewitched animals and of witches.
Sometimes, perhaps in moments of weakness, they have merely buried the
bewitched animals alive instead of burning them. For example, in the
year 1643, "many cattle having died, John Brughe and Neane Nikclerith,
also one of the initiated, conjoined their mutual skill for the safety
of the herd. The surviving animals were drove past a tub of water
containing two enchanted stones: and each was sprinkled from the liquid
contents in its course. One, however, being unable to walk, 'was by
force drawin out at the byre dure; and the said Johnne with Nikclerith
smelling the nois thereof said it wald not leive, caused are hoill to be
maid in Maw Greane, quhilk was put quick in the hole and maid all the
rest of the cattell theireftir to go over that place: and in that
devillische maner, be charmeing,' they were cured."[791] Again, during
the prevalence of a murrain about the year 1629, certain persons
proposed to stay the plague with the help of a celebrated "cureing
stane" of which the laird of Lee was the fortunate owner. But from this
they were dissuaded by one who "had sene bestiall curet be taking are
quik seik ox, and making are deip pitt, and bureing him therin, and be
calling the oxin and bestiall over that place." Indeed Issobell Young,
the mother of these persons, had herself endeavoured to check the
progress of the distemper by taking "ane quik ox with ane catt, and ane
grit quantitie of salt," and proceeding "to burie the ox and catt quik
with the salt, in ane deip hoill in the grund, as ane sacrifice to the
devill, that the rest of the guidis might be fred of the seiknes or
diseases."[792] Writing towards the end of the eighteenth century, John
Ramsay of Ochtertyre tells us that "the violent death even of a brute is
in some cases held to be of great avail. There is a disease called the
_black spauld_, which sometimes rages like a pestilence among black
cattle, the symptoms of which are a mortification in the legs and a
corruption of the mass of blood. Among the other engines of superstition
that are directed against this fatal malady, the first cow seized with
it is commonly buried alive, and the other cattle are forced to pass
backwards and forwards over the pit. At other times the heart is taken
out of the beast alive, and then the carcass is buried. It is remarkable
that the leg affected is cut off, and hung up in some part of the house
or byre, where it remains suspended, notwithstanding the seeming danger
of infection. There is hardly a house in Mull where these may not be
seen. This practice seems to have taken its rise antecedent to
Christianity, as it reminds us of the pagan custom of hanging up
offerings in their temples. In Breadalbane, when a cow is observed to
have symptoms of madness, there is recourse had to a peculiar process.
They tie the legs of the mad creature, and throw her into a pit dug at
the door of the fold. After covering the hole with earth, a large fire
is kindled upon it; and the rest of the cattle are driven out, and
forced to pass through the fire one by one."[793] In this latter custom
we may suspect that the fire kindled on the grave of the buried cow was
originally made by the friction of wood, in other words, that it was a
need-fire. Again, writing in the year 1862, Sir Arthur Mitchell tells us
that "for the cure of the murrain in cattle, one of the herd is still
sacrificed for the good of the whole. This is done by burying it alive.
I am assured that within the last ten years such a barbarism occurred in
the county of Moray."[794]

[Calves killed and buried to save the rest of the herd.]

Sometimes, however, the animal has not even been buried alive, it has
been merely killed and then buried. In this emasculated form the
sacrifice, we may say with confidence, is absolutely useless for the
purpose of stopping a murrain. Nevertheless, it has been tried. Thus in
Lincolnshire, when the cattle plague was so prevalent in 1866, there
was, I believe, not a single cowshed in Marshland but had its wicken
cross over the door; and other charms more powerful than this were in
some cases resorted to. I never heard of the use of the needfire in the
Marsh, though it was, I believe, used on the wolds not many miles off.
But I knew of at least one case in which a calf was killed and solemnly
buried feet pointing upwards at the threshold of the cowshed. When our
garthman told me of this, I pointed out to him that the charm had
failed, for the disease had not spared that shed. But he promptly
replied, "Yis, but owd Edwards were a soight too cliver; he were that
mean he slew nobbutt a wankling cauf as were bound to deny anny road; if
he had nobbutt tekken his best cauf it wud hev worked reight enuff;
'tain't in reason that owd skrat 'ud be hanselled wi' wankling
draffle."[795]

Notes:

[262] See Jacob Grimm, _Deutsche Mythologie_*[4] (Berlin, 1875-1878), i.
502, 510, 516.

[263] W. Mannhardt, _Der Baumkultus der Germanen und ihrer
Nachbarstaemme_ (Berlin, 1875), pp. 518 _sq._

[264] In the following survey of these fire-customs I follow chiefly W.
Mannhardt, _Der Baumkultus_, kap. vi. pp. 497 _sqq._ Compare also J.
Grimm, _Deutsche Mythologie_,*[4] i. 500 _sqq._; Walter E. Kelly,
_Curiosities of Indo-European Tradition and Folk-lore_ (London, 1863),
pp. 46 _sqq._; F. Vogt, "Scheibentreiben und Fruehlingsfeuer,"
_Zeitschrift des Vereins fuer Volkskunde_, iii. (1893) pp. 349-369;
_ibid._ iv. (1894) pp. 195-197.

[265] _The Scapegoat_, pp. 316 _sqq._

[266] The first Sunday in Lent is known as _Invocavit_ from the first
word of the mass for the day (O. Frh. von Reinsberg-Dueringsfeld,
_Fest-Kalender aus Boehmen_, p. 67).

[267] Le Baron de Reinsberg-Dueringsfeld, _Calendrier Belge_ (Brussels,
1861-1862), i. 141-143; E. Monseur, _Le Folklore Wallon_ (Brussels,
N.D.), pp. 124 _sq._

[268] Emile Hublard, _Fetes du Temps Jadis, les Feux du Careme_ (Mons,
1899), pp. 25. For the loan of this work I am indebted to Mrs. Wherry of
St. Peter's Terrace, Cambridge.

[269] E. Hublard, _op. cit._ pp. 27 _sq._

[270] A. Meyrac, _Traditions, coutumes, legendes et contes des Ardennes_
(Charleville, 1890), p. 68.

[271] L.F. Sauve, _Le Folk-lore des Hautes-Vosges_ (Paris, 1889), p. 56.
The popular name for the bonfires in the Upper Vosges (_Hautes-Vosges_)
is _chavandes_.

[272] E. Cortet, _Essai sur les fetes religieuses_ (Paris, 1867), pp.
101 _sq._ The local name for these bonfires is _bures_.

[273] Charles Beauquier, _Les mois en Franche-Comte_ (Paris, 1900), pp.
33 _sq._ In Bresse the custom was similar. See _La Bresse Louhannaise,
Bulletin Mensuel, Organe de la Societe d'Agriculture et d'Horticulture
de l'Arrondissement de Louhans_, Mars, 1906, pp. 111 _sq._; E. Cortet,
_op. cit._ p. 100. The usual name for the bonfires is _chevannes_ or
_schvannes_; but in some places they are called _fouleres, foualeres,
failles_, or _bourdifailles_ (Ch. Beauquier, _op. cit._ p. 34). But the
Sunday is called the Sunday of the _brandons, bures, bordes_, or
_boides_, according to the place. The _brandons_ are the torches which
are carried about the streets and the fields; the bonfires, as we have
seen, bear another name. A curious custom, observed on the same Sunday
in Franche-Comte, requires that couples married within the year should
distribute boiled peas to all the young folks of both sexes who demand
them at the door. The lads and lasses go about from house to house,
making the customary request; in some places they wear masks or are
otherwise disguised. See Ch. Beauquier, _op. cit._ pp. 31-33.

[274] Curiously enough, while the singular is _granno-mio_, the plural
is _grannas-mias_.

[275] Dr. Pommerol, "La fete des Brandons et le dieu Gaulois Grannus,"
_Bulletins et Memoires de la Societe d'Anthropologie de Paris_, v.
Serie, ii. (1901) pp. 427-429.

[276] _Op. cit._ pp. 428 _sq._

[277] H. Dessau, _Inscriptiones Latinae Selectae_, vol. ii. Pars i.
(Berlin, 1902) pp. 216 _sq._, Nos. 4646-4652.

[278] (Sir) John Rhys, _Celtic Heathendom_ (London, 1888), pp. 22-25.

[279] Emile Hublard, _Fetes du Temps Jadis, les Feux du Careme_ (Mons,
1899), p. 38, quoting Dom Grenier, _Histoire de la Province de
Picardie_.

[280] E. Hublard, _op. cit._ p. 39, quoting Dom Grenier.

[281] M. Desgranges, "Usages du Canton de Bonneval," _Memoires de la
Societe Royale des Antiquaires de France_, i. (Paris, 1817) pp. 236-238;
Felix Chapiseau, _Le folk-lore de la Beauce et du Perche_ (Paris, 1902),
i. 315 _sq._

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