CHAPTER IX.
Illustrations of Early Manners—Sorcery—The Knight and the Necromancer—Waxen Figures—Degeneracy of Witches—The Clerk and the Image—Gerbert and Natural Magic—Elfin Chivalry—The Demon Knight of the Vandal Camp—Scott’s Marmion—Assumption of Human Forms by Spirits—The Seductions of the Evil One—Religious Origin of Charges of Witchcraft.
“The attention of the king’s daughter to the wounded knight,” remarked Herbert, “reminds me strongly of the patriarchal habits described by Homer in his Odyssey. The daughter of Nestor thinks it no disgrace or indelicacy to attend to the bath of the wandering Telemachus, and Helen herself seems to have performed a like office for his father.”
“The tales of chivalry are replete with instances of these simple manners,” rejoined Lathom; “the king’s daughter, the fair virgin princess, is ever the kind attendant on the honored guest, prepares his bath after the fatigues of the day, and ministers to his wounds by her medicinal skill.”
“Your old monk’s tales,” said Thompson, “have no little merit, as illustrations of the manners and habits of the middle ages.”
“Indeed, the light is curious that is thrown by these tales on the habits of the middle ages,” answered Lathom; “in these vivid and strongly delineated fictions, I seem to fight, to tilt, to make love and war, to perform penances, and to witness miracles with the actors themselves.”
“We cannot but feel, however,” remarked Herbert, “that we are more inclined to laugh at the regulations of their chivalry, than to appreciate them. The absurd penances with which imaginable crimes were visited in those days cannot but raise a smile, whilst the utter carelessness with which enormous sins were committed, excites extreme regret.”
“What fragrant viands furnish forth
Our evening’s entertainment?”
said Thompson.
“Some illustrations of witchcraft and sorcery; that most prevalent belief, from the middle ages, to the days of the sapient James the First.”
“Among all curious discoveries, this would be the most curious,” said Herbert: “to find a people in whom there never has existed a belief that human beings could be gifted with supernatural powers, for the purpose of accomplishing some good or evil object of their desire.”
“Wherever Christianity spread, witchcraft must be regarded as a recognized form in which the powers of evil contended with the Almighty.”
“Of what sex is your witch?” asked Thompson.
“Oh, in this case, the good and the bad sorcerers are both of the male sex.”
“Your writer, therefore,” replied Thompson, “does not seem to have held the ungallant notions of Sprenger, that from the natural inferiority of their minds, and wickedness of their hearts, the Devil always preferred women for his agents. But to the story.”
“Well, then, as the old chronicler would say, here begins the tale of