Fig. 351.—From Proceedings Soc. Ant. Scot.
It was popularly supposed that all the witches of West Cornwall used to meet at midnight on Midsummer Eve at Trewa (pronounced Troway) in the parish of Zennor, and around the dying fires renewed their vows to the Devil, their master. In this wild Zennor (supposedly holy land) district is a witch’s rock which if touched nine times at midnight reputedly brought good luck.
The “Troy Town” of Welsh children is the Hopscotch of our London pavements; at one time every English village seems to have possessed its maze (or Drayton?), and that the mazes were the haunts of fairies is well known:—
... the yellow skirted fays
Fly after the night steeds
Leaving their moon-loved maze.
In A Midsummer-Night’s Dream Titania laments:—
The nine men’s morris is filled up with mud
And the quaint mazes in the wanton green
For lack of tread are indistinguishable.