And Ulenspiegel went back to the inn and said to himself:
“Seven florins shall he pay; seven florins. And that shall be the first of my Masses for the dead!”
And Ulenspiegel departed from that place, and the blind men likewise.
XXV
Now in those days Katheline had effected a cure, by means of herbs, on three sheep, an ox, and a pig, all belonging to a certain man named Speelman. She also attempted to cure a cow, the property of one Jan Beloen, but in this she was not successful. Jan Beloen promptly accused her of being a witch, asserting that she had laid a charm on the animal, inasmuch as all the time she was giving the herbs she had caressed it and talked to it, in the Devil’s own language, as was evident—for what business has an honest Christian woman to go talking with an animal...?
Jan Beloen added that he was a neighbour of Speelman’s, the man whose ox had been cured, together with three sheep and a pig as aforesaid, and if Katheline had now killed his cow, it was doubtless at the instigation of Speelman, who was jealous at seeing his, Beloen’s, land better and more profitably cultivated than his own. Pieter Meulmeester, a man of good life and reputation, and Jan Beloen himself both testified that Katheline was commonly reputed to be a witch by the people of Damme, and that she had certainly killed the cow; and on this testimony Katheline was arrested and condemned to be tortured until she had confessed her crimes and malpractices.
She was cross-examined by a certain alderman who was notorious for his ill-temper, for he was accustomed to drink brandy all the day long. And he ordered her to be placed on the seat of torture in the presence of himself and the members of the Town Council.
The torturer put her on the seat stark naked, and then shaved off her hair, looking carefully to see that no charm was concealed anywhere about her person. Finding none, he bound her with cords to the seat of torture. And she said:
“It shames me to be naked before these men. O Mother Mary, let me die!”