In a dismal dell or hollow glen, which had been worn from the side of a hill, in the course of ages by a streamlet, filled with brambles, nettles, and the slime of rotting vegetation, was a squalid hut, and therein dwelt an old blear-eyed, toothless hag, named Gammer Gatch.
By common repute she was a witch, and would long since have tasted of a lighted tar-barrel, and a few faggots to help, but for the protection extended to her by her landlord, Sir John.
Years of persecution had made her a lonely misanthrope, believing absolutely in her communion with Satan, and her power for evil; poor wretch, whatever may have been her degree of Satanic inspiration she was guilty in intention; and when, after her temporary protector was gone, she was at last brought to trial, she gloried in her supposed alliance with Satan, and so made it easy for the judge and jury to send her with clear consciences to the stake.
Those who read the terrible literature which exists on this subject will be puzzled about many things, but will not doubt that several who suffered for impossible crimes, lacked but the power, not the will to have performed them.
It has often been noticed that men who have renounced their belief in Christianity, or even in a God, have become willing captives to the grossest forms of superstition, a truth not lacking examples in our own days; and thus it came to pass that Sir John, denying the existence of God, believed, instead, in Gammer Gatch; and thither he was bound now.
Leaving Nicholas on the brink of the glen in charge of the horses, he descended into the dell, and entered the hut which was avoided by all Christian people, save a few, who despite of their creed, came to consult the “wise woman” in divers difficulties.
Lying, littered about, were human bones, a few grinning skulls, unclean reptiles, uncouth wax figures; the wall was blackened by cabalistic signs. The hut was built against the rocky side of the glen, and a ragged curtain concealed an aperture in the natural wall.
“Mother,” said Sir John, “I have business to talk over; there are foes who hide from me, foes of mine, and of the king, whom I would fain crush; canst thou help me to discover their whereabouts?”
“The blackamoor may help us, if thou hast courage to face him.”
Sir John winced;—“I would rather not see him if it can be done without.”