444 



NOTES AND QUERIES. 



[No. 84. 



'Twas mine thro' days yet brighter, 



The joyous years of youth, 

 When never had affliction 



Bow'd down mine ear to truth. 

 'Twas mine when deep devotion 



Hung breathless on each line 

 Of pardon, peace, and promise, 



Till I could call them mine ; 

 Till o'er my soul's awakening 



The gift of Heavenly love, 

 The spirit of adoption, 



Descended from above. 

 Unmark'd, unhelp'd, unheeded. 



In heart I've walk'd alone ; 

 Unknown the prayers I've utter'd, 



The hopes I held, unknown ; 

 Till in the hour of trial, 



Upon the mighty train. 

 With strength and succour laden, 



To bear the weight of pain. 

 Then, Oh ! I fain would leave thee. 



For now my hours are few. 

 The hidden mine of treasure. 



Whence all my strength I drew. 

 Take then the gift, my mother. 



And till thy path is trod. 

 Thy child's last token cherish — 



It is the Book of God. 



■WITCHCRAFT IN THE SEVENTEENTH CENTURY. 



Sir Roger Twysden, with all his learning, could 

 not rise above the credulity of his age; and was, to 

 the last, as firm a believer in palmistry and witch- 

 craft, and all the illusions of magic, as the gene- 

 rality of his cotemporaries. His commfmplace- 

 books furnish numerous instances of the childlike 

 simplicity with which he gave credence to any 

 tale of superstition for which the slightest shadow 

 of authenticity could be discovered. 



The following amusing instance of this almost 

 infantine credulity, I have extracted from one of 

 his note-books ; merely premising that his wife 

 Isabella was daughter of Sir Nicholas Saunders, 

 the narrator of the tale : — 



" The 24th September, 163'2, Sir Nicholas 

 Saunders told me hee herd my lady of Arundall, 

 widow of Phylip who dyed in y'= Tower 159.5, a 

 virtuous and religious lady in her way, tell the 

 ensuing relation of a Cat her Lord had. Her 

 Lord's butler on a tyme, lost a cuppe or bowle of 

 sylver, or at least of y' prise he was much troubled 

 for, and knowing no other way, he went to a wy- 

 zard or Conjurer to know what was become of it, 

 who told him he could tell him where he might 

 see the bowle if he durst take it. The servant 

 sayd he would venture to take it if he could see 

 it, bee it where it would. The wyzard then told 

 hym in such a wood there was a bare place, where 

 if he hyed himself for a tyme he appoynted, be- 



hind a tree late in the night he should see y* 

 Cuppe brought in, but w"' all advised him if he 

 stept in to take it, he should make hast away w"" 

 it as fast as myght bee. The servant observed 

 what he was commanded by y" Conjurer, and 

 about Mydnyght he saw his Lord's Cat bring in 

 the cup was myst, and divers other creatures 

 bring in severall other things ; hee stept in, went, 

 and felt y" Cuppe, and hyde home : where when 

 he came he told his fellow servants this tale, so y' 

 at y'^ last it was caryed to my Lord of Arun- 

 del's eare ; who, when his Cat came to him, purr- 

 ing about his leggs as they used to doo, began 

 jestingly to speake to her of it. The Cat pre- 

 sently upon his speech flewe in his face, at his 

 throat, so y' w^'out y'^ help of company he had 

 not escaped w^'out hurt, it was w"' such violence: 

 and after my lord being rescued got away, un- 

 known how, and never after scene. 



" There is just such a tale told of a cat a Lord 

 Willoughliy had, but this former coming from so 

 good hands I cannot but believe. — R. T." 



L. B. L. 



Witchcraft. — In the 13th year of the reign of 

 King William the Third — 



" One Hathaway, a most notorious rogue, feigned 

 himself bewitched and deprived of his sight, and pre- 

 tended to have fasted nine weeks together ; and con- 

 tinuing, as he pretended, under this evil influence, he 

 was advised, in order to discover the person supposed 

 to have bewitched him, to boil his own water in a glass 

 bottle till the bottle should break, and the first that 

 came into the house after, should be the witch ; and 

 that if he scratched the body of that person till he 

 fetched blood, it would cure him ; which being done, 

 and a poor old woman coming by chance into the 

 house, she was seized on as the witch, and obliged to 

 submit to be scratched till the blood came, whereupon 

 the fellow pretended to (ind present ease. The poor 

 woman hereupon was indicted for witchcraft, and tried 

 and acquitted at Surrey assizes, before Holt, chief justice, 

 a man of no great faith in these things ; and the fellow 

 persisting in his wicked contrivance, pretended still to 

 be ill, and the poor woman, notwithstanding the ac- 

 quittal, forced by the mob to suffer herself to be 

 scratched by him. And this being discovered to be all 

 imposition, an information was filed against him." — 

 Modern Reports, vol. xli. p. 556. 



Q.D. 



INDULGENCES PROPOSED TO BENEFACTORS TO THE 

 CHURCH or ST. GEORGE THE MARTYR, SOUTH- 

 W^ARK. 



As I believe little is known of the early history 

 of this church, which was dependent upon the 

 Abbey and Convent of Bermondsey, the following 

 curious hand-bill or affiche, printed in black letter 

 (which must have been promulgated previous to the 

 disgrace of Cardinal Wolsey, and the suppression 

 of religious houses in the reign of Henry VIIL), 

 seems worthy of preservation. It was part of the 



