Transactions. 25 



tions, rending the name of God asunder, are to be delivered over 

 to the Session for a deserved measure of punishment. Ang. 22. — 

 James Moffat and James Wilson to search next Wednesday for 

 cursers." We have also private parties dealt with, and the nature 

 of their punishment. " K. S., for habitual cursing and drunken- 

 ness, to declare his repentance next Sabbath, and is enacted under 

 the penalty of banishment not to be found in the like sins. M. 

 B., for cursing her husband, to sit two days in the pillar. J. T., 

 sword sharper, to be rebuked for ordinary cursing." We come 

 next to a matter that caused much excitement all over the country 

 at this time — the crime of witchcraft ; and from the records here 

 the Session seems to have had its feelings far more under control 

 than in many other places. "Jan. 17, 1G50.— The minister is to 

 intimate that whosoever person shall brand any man or woman 

 with the common upcast of witchcraft, unless they have pregnant 

 and warranted grounds, shall have the sharj)est kirk discipline. 

 Jan. 5, 1654. — E. S. deponed that he heard M. C. say to Af^nes 

 J. ' That the devil rode on her back seven years, and that she was 

 but a dyvour,' or witch." The sin of talking scandal seems to 

 have been put down with a firm hand at this time, and the various 

 punishments meted out are of a kind fitted to keep unruly ton<'-ues 

 in order. " Thos. Meik, for slandering Agnes Fleming, is ordained 

 instanter to stand in the gorgets (a sort of pillory with an iron rino' 

 for the neck) at the Trone till 12 o'clock, and thereafter upon his 

 bare knees to ask her forgiveness at the Mercat Cross." "Janet 

 Jardine is enacted, under the pain of twenty pounds, never hence- 

 forth to be heard scolding." " Catherine Purdie, for calling Bessie 

 Harper a lewd lown, debusht, mainsworn glutton, filthy lown and 

 thief, wabster's get, skemland stable raker, and praying ane black 

 sight to Bessie and her bairns, to be rebuked from the body of the 

 church." A departure from virtue such as is now commonly 

 brought before the Divorce Courts was dealt with as follows : 

 " Allan Cunningham, for adultery, is ordained to appear before the 

 Presbytery in sackcloth, and there confess his fault, and thereafter 

 be remitted to the Session. John Black, for the same offence, to 



I sit seven Sabbaths in sackcloth, and the first and last to stand 

 barefooted at the church door between the second and last bell." 

 For a departure from virtue for the fourth time on the part of a 

 woman, she is ordained " to be carted from the town." Absence 

 from worship was a frequently recurring subject 1)efore the Session, 

 I 



