MOUNTAIN ASH TREE. 251 



" The last line of this stanza, 11 continues Dr. Hunter, 

 " leads to the true reading of a line in Shakspeare's 

 tragedy of Macbeth. The sailor's wife, on the witch's 

 requesting some chestnuts, hastily answers, * A rown 

 tree, witch P but all the editions have it ' Aroint thee, 

 witch P which is nonsense, and evidently a corruption. 1 " 

 Dr. Hunter's suggestion appears so rational as almost to 

 carry conviction with it, did we not require further elu- 

 cidations of this strange term, where this sense can 

 scarcely be made to apply. What means Edgar in 

 King Lear ? 



" Saint Withold footed thrice the wold ; 

 He met the night-mare, and her nine-fold ; 

 Bid her alight, 

 And her troth plight, 



And aroint thee, witch ! aroint thee !" 



** 



This is generally supposed to signify avaunt ; but it 

 is found in no other author than Shakspeare. Hone, in 

 his Religious Mysteries, has a chapter on this subject, in 

 which he gives a fac-simile of an old drawing, called the 

 Descent into Hell, in which Christ is represented as 

 approaching the mouth of hell, while a devil addresses 

 him, " Out, out, artmgtf a word supposed to be a 

 corruption of aroint ; or rather they are both said to be 

 corrupted from the word arougt. It would be too long, 

 and perhaps not very interesting to readers in general, to 

 quote all that relates to this subject : those who have 

 any curiosity to see it will find it in the sixth chapter of 

 that curious work : but a person animated with the zeal 

 of a favourite theory might certainly perceive that the 

 figure intended for Christ pays this visit under the pro- 

 tection of a roan-tree cross, which he bears in the left 



