TRANSACTIONS. 25 
tions, rending the name of God asunder, are to be delivered over 
to the Session for a deserved measure of punishment. Aug. 22.— 
James Moffat and James Wilson to search next Wednesday for 
eursers.” We have also private parties dealt with, and the nature 
of their punishment. ‘“ R.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, 1650.—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 sharpest kirk discipline. 
Jan. 5, 1654.—R. S. deponed that he heard M. C. say to Agnes 
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 tongues 
in order. ‘Thos. Meik, for slandering Agnes Fleming, is ordained 
instanter to stand in the gorgets (a sort of pillory with an iron ring 
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 
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 before the Session, 
