Water Witch

“ Neither flowers nor grass grew there; nothing but bare, gray, sandy ground stretched out to the whirlpool, where the water, like foaming mill wheels, seized everything that came within its reach and cast it into the fathomless deep. Through the midst of these crushing whirlpools the little mermaid was obliged to pass before she could reach the dominions of the sea witch. Then, for a long distance, the road lay [148] across a stretch of warm, bubbling mire, called by the witch her turf moor. ”

“ This is akin to the theme that Matthew Arnold uses, [152] though with a different treatment, showing similarity to Hans Christian Andersen’s tale of The Little Mermaid. The cailleachuisge, or the water-witch, and the maighdeanmhara, the mermaid, and the kelpie, the sea-beast, are cursed with dæmonic spells and live forever in their witchery. When mortals forsake the earth and follow them their children are beings that have no souls. ”

“ All the ordeals for witches turn on the efficacy of certain things to which reference has been already made as scarers of evil spirits.
Thus, the ordeal of walking over hot coals and on heated ploughshares was a common method of testing a witch both in India and in Europe.31 Zâlim Sinh, however, generally used the water ordeal, a test which is known all over the world.32 Even Pliny knew that Indian witches could not sink in water.33 Manu prescribes water as a form of oath, and to this day it is a common form of oath ordeal for a man to stand in water when he is challenged to swear. ”

“ If any man should take in his hand from the garden fence anything which a witch has laid there, he will in the same year fall sick, and if he has played with it he must die. There be land-witches and water-witches--whoever goes to swim in a place where these latter are found will drown and his body never be recovered. ”

“ If the Witch lives where there is no Tile but Thatch, then take a great handfull thereof, and wet it is the parties water, or else in common water mixed with some salt, then lay it in the fire, so that it may molter and smother by degrees and in a long time, setting a Trevet over it. ”

“ But he that cannot urine presently falleth down dead, and all the people, great and small, fall upon him with their knives and beat and cut him into pieces. But I think the witch that giveth the water is partial, and giveth to him whom he will have to die, the strongest water, but no man can perceive it that standeth by. ”

“ Oh! the dead people swaying to and fro on the water! She prayed they might be gone back to their graves before the grey witch reached them with her long, clutching fingers; she prayed in a frenzy of fear for herself, calling to Christ and Mary Mother of God, to save her from the grey witch. She rocked herself backwards and forwards, praying and moaning, and almost falling from the tree, and at last in reckless desperation opened her eyes, and glared out over the dam—and saw that the dawn had come. ”

“ The parents are represented as having been dishonest, unreliable, ignorant and superstitious, and the sons seemed to have inherited all these peculiarities. A part of the business of the father was that of "water witch," in which capacity he went about the country with a hazel rod divining where water could be found by digging wells, by the writhings of the rod when held in the hands in a peculiar manner. ”

“ A milder form of treatment is to make the witch drink the filthy water of a washerman’s tank, which is believed to destroy her skill.61 The punishment in vogue in Central India was to make witches drink the water used by curriers, leather being, as we have seen, a scarer of evil spirits, and drinking such water involves degradation from caste. ”

“ Old women say that when the moon shines, all those who have been drowned come out to warm themselves in its rays, and that they are led by the witch's stepdaughter. One night she saw her stepmother by the pool, caught hold of her, and dragged her screaming into the water. ”

“ When, at last, the rain did leave off, those who went to see, found that the old Witch's cottage had been quite washed away. Nothing remained to show where once it had been but one or two rotting casks, and a worn-out elastic bag. The old Witch herself was never seen or heard of in the village again, but she is probably still wandering about somewhere. So don't be too anxious for the rain to leave off, in case she should hear you, and come and steal all your water!
LITTLE MISS MUFFET "Cowards are cruel
But the brave
Have mercy, and delight to save" ”

“ King James, in his "Demonologie," which is quoted in this pamphlet, says witches float on the water by the special appointment of God, in the same way as a dead carcase gushes forth blood on the approach of the murderer. Application was usually made to a justice of the peace, and, on his order, the thumbs and great toes of the suspected person were tied together crosswise, a rope was fastened round the body, and the ends being held up by men standing on the opposite banks, the witch was thrown into the water. ”

“ Said the witch-wife: Didst thou see aught else? Yea, said Birdalone, and was weeping somewhat now; which forsooth was not hard for her to do, over-wrought as she was betwixt hope and fear: yea, I saw my white doe and her fawn, and they passed close by me; and two herons flew over my head toward the water; and . . . But the witch turned sharply and said: Thrall! hast thou seen a woman to-day in the wood? A woman? said Birdalone, and what woman, my lady, said Birdalone. Hath any woman come to the house, and passed forth into the wood? ”

“ The cask on the left holds Weak Water, and whoever drinks from it is made quickly powerless. As soon as the witch appears, seize tightly her pestle before she lays it down, and loose not thy grip as thou lovest thy life. She will try to shake thee off, but thou art now so strong that she will not be able to do so. ”

“ The widow Coman that was counted a witch was buried." The intervening links need hardly be supplied, but the Reverend Mr. Boys has given them: "whether by the cold she got in the water, or by some other means, she fell very ill and dyed."
It must have been very diverting, this experimentation by water, and it had become so popular by the beginning of the eighteenth century that Chief Justice Holt [49] is said to have ruled that in the future, where swimming had fatal results, those responsible would be prosecuted for murder. ”

“ In Tahiti and Hawaii the priest was sent for on similar occasions. After some prayers he caused a hole to be dug in the floor of the house, and filled with water. He continued his incantations with a young plantain in his hand until he observed the image of the thief in the water.16.5 In the Isle of Man a notorious witch is reported to have made use of a bowl of {17} water in order to divine as to the safety of a herring-fleet.17.1 The Otando fetish-man of Equatorial Africa also uses a vessel of water ”

“ And as for her being a witch, ye can all see that she fears neither holy water nor a crucifix. But I believe that these women here, her nurse and daughter, have filled our ears with lies, and that the nurse herself is the sorceress who hath done the evil deed. Now, I propose that we take all three, the fly, the mother, and daughter, and hang the room with verbena, which I have provided, and sprinkle the three with much holy water, all of us making the castagna and jettatura, and see what will come of it.’
“Then the two witches began to scream and protest in a p. ”

“ Of all the witches that may be found in all the fairy tales ever told there is none more delightfully sociable than the Sand Witch. This Witch, who lives underneath the heaps of sand at the ocean's edge, where, in the summertime, you dig with your shovel, is not at all like other witches. She never rides on a broomstick, and she never goes down chimneys. In the first place there are no broomsticks or chimneys on the beach at the sea-shore, and in the second place she would not know how to ride on a broomstick or climb down a chimney, if there were. ”

“ In his prose he tells how ‘thought can with difficulty visit the intricate and winding chambers which it inhabits. It is like a river, whose rapid and perpetual stream flows outward.... The caverns of the mind are obscure and shadowy; or pervaded with a lustre, beautiful and bright indeed, but shining not beyond their portals.’ When the Witch has passed in her boat from the caverned river, that is doubtless her own destiny, she passes along the Nile ‘by Moeris and the Mareotid lakes,’ and sees all human life shadowed upon its waters in shadows that ‘never are erased but tremble ever’ ”

“ My poultry die strangely and mysteriously, and my dog has fits. Even my poor cat hath fallen under the evil spell which you cast on all about me. Alas, Cora Waters, you are bold and bad. Charles Stevens, beware how you are seen about her, lest the wrath that will fall upon her head involve you in ruin."
Cora Waters, leaning against a tree, covered her face with her hands and murmured:
"Oh, God! wilt thou save me from the wrath of these misguided people?"
"See how she blasphemes! For a witch to call on the name of God is blasphemy of the very worst kind. ”

“ So a sail it was. They dropped down around the island and, skimming along over a faultless sea, came at last just as the shadows were deepening to Witches Cove.
“Let’s drop anchor and have our supper here,” suggested Pearl.
“Three gray witches may rise from the water and ask to join us,” said Ruth with a low laugh.
[202]
“Let them,” said Pearl, sending the anchor with a plunk into the sea. “There are worse creatures about than gray witches. Here’s hoping they don’t come too close to us.” ”

“ All the Sand Witch knows how to do is to sink into the sand when anything scares her, and to come up through the sand when she sees a chance to get acquainted with a person she never was acquainted with before. So now you know what a Sand Witch is. And if Junior Jenks, seven years old, and dreadfully sunburnt, had known what you know, he would have been much better prepared to face the one that came up right under his nose all of a sudden one hot July morning. ”

“ Forbidden by the worthy burghers to harbour in the town, she had selected, as more in unison with her wild and wandering life, and the mysterious character she claimed, a lonely abode, once a fisherman's lodge, on the rocky islet on the right of the outlet of Hurl Gate, still known as the Witch's Rock. Here she performed her unholy rites, and far and wide her fame spread as a sorceress. Seamen, as they shot through the dangerous pass, propitiated her; and those who would have fair winds sought them of her in full faith. The good came to her for good, and the evil for evil. ”

“ That in many cases the imagination acting on the nervous system acts curatively "goes without saying." It is that which really operates in the faith cures and in the Lourdes miracles. What a bad time witches, white or black, must have had when the short way with any one suspected was to throw her into a pond! If she sank, why she sank and was drowned, but had the satisfaction of being aware that her character was cleared, whereas if she floated, she was a convicted witch and was burnt. ”

“ The tinker again looked aslant. “Most of your witches are old women. At their Sabbats you’ll see a hundred withered gammers, dancing and leaping around a fire with the Devil sitting in the midst, and all sing-songing a charm and brewing in a kettle a drink with which to freeze men’s blood! But each crew hath always one young witch that they call the maiden. A young and well-looking wench with red lips and she calls the dance. ”

“ The Witch of Fraddam still floats up and down, over the seas, around the coast, in her coffin, followed by the crock, which seems like a punt in attendance on a jolly-boat. She still works mischief, stirring up the sea with her ladle and broom till the waves swell into mountains, which heave off from their crests, so much mist and foam, that these wild wanderers of the winds can scarcely be seen through the mist. Woe to the mariner who sees the witch!
The Lord of Pengerswick alone had power over her. ”

“ During next lines Black Witch raises arms aloft in supplication and backs toward place of Mirth’s entrance.)
Black Witch (Moving backwards, hands aloft in earnest supplication.) Come, Wind of night! oh, Night Wind come! Thy blasting fury loose upon this world! (Pauses, drops arms, no response, again muses sadly.) Ah! Wind of Night, on which I’ve drifted through the sky these thousand years, hast thou too deserted me? (Again raises arms aloft and cries in desperation) Will none come forth to do my will? ”

“ Water’s a thing human beings can’t breathe, isn’t it? Well, you are breathing. So this can’t be water.”
“I see that,” said Mavis, “but the soft seaweed won’t stand up in air, and it does in water.”
“Oh, you’ve found out, have you?” said the Mermaid. “Well, then, perhaps it is water. Only you see it can’t be. Everything’s like that down here.”
“Once you said you lived in water, and you wanted to be wet,” said Mavis.
“Mer-people aren’t responsible for what they say in your world. I told you that, you know,” the Mermaid reminded them. ”

“ The way they do with the critters there is a little the cutest. If they want to tell for sartin if an old woman's a real witch, they throw her into a pond. If she's drownded she's no witch; but if she swims, its gospel proof she is—coz what old woman could swim if she warn't a nat'ral witch. They then tie her to a stake and set fire to her."
"Mit your leave, goot peoplesh, I vill shay vat dey doesh mit vitches in mine countree," said the Dutch burgher, deliberately taking the pipe from his mouth. ”