1576.
Bessie from time to time consulted her ghostly friend about cases of sickness for which her skill was required. ‘Tom gave out of his awn hand, ane thing like the root of ane beet, and bade her either seethe or make ane saw [salve] of it, or else dry it, and make powder of it, and give it to sick persons, and they should mend.... She mendit John Jack’s bairn, and Wilson’s of the town, and her gudeman’s sister’s cow.... The Lady Johnston, elder, sent to her ane servant to help ane young gentlewoman, her doughter, now married on the young Laird of Stanley, and I thereupon askit counsel of Tom. He said to me, “that her sickness was ane cauld blude that gaed about her heart, that causit her to dwalm [faint]” ... and Tom bade her take ane part of ginger, clows, anniseeds, liquorice, and some stark [strong] ale, and seethe them together, and share it, and put it in ane vessel, and take ane little quantity of it in ane mutchkin can, and some white suckar casten amang it; take and drink thereof ilk day, in the morning; gang ane while after, before meat; and she wald be haill.... Demandit what she gat for her doing, declairit “ane peck of meal and some cheese.” ... Interrogate, gif she could tell of ony thing that was away, or ony thing that was to come, [she] answerit, that she could do naething of herself, but as Tom tauld her ... mony folks in the country [came to her] to get wit of gear stolen frae them.... The Lady Thirdpart in the barony of Renfrew sent to her and speerit at her, wha was it that had stolen frae her twa horns of gold, and ane crown of the sun, out of her purse? And after she had spoken with Tom, within twenty days, she sent her word wha had them; and she gat them again.... Being demandit of William Kyle, burgess in Irvine, as he was coming out of Dumbarton, wha was the stealer of Hugh Scott’s cloak, ane burgess of the same town? Tom answerit: ‘That the cloak wald not be gotten, because it was ta’en away by Mally Boyd, dweller in the same town, and was put out of the fashion of ane cloak in [to] ane kirtle,’ &c.
Bessie, being asked how she knew that her visitor was Tom Reid who had died at Pinkie, answered: ‘That she never knew him when he was in life, but that she should not doubt that it was he bade her gang to Tom Reid his son, now officer in his place to the Laird of Blair, and to certain others his kinsmen and friends there, whom he named, and bade them restore certain goods and mend other offences that they had done.... Interrogate gif Tom, at his awn hand, had sent her to ony person to shaw them things to come, declarit that he sent her to nae creature in middle-eard but to William Blair of the Strand, and his eldest dochter, wha was contractit and shortly to be married with .... Crawford, young Laird of Baidland, and declare unto them, “That gif she married that man she should either die ane shameful death, slay herself, or gae red-wod [mad];” whereby the said marriage was stayit, and the laird foresaid married her youngest sister.’
Bessie denied any further advances on Tom’s part than his taking her once by the apron, and asking her to go with him to Elfame, that is, Fairyland. He used to come chiefly to her at noon. She had seen him walking among the people in the kirk-yard of Dalry; also once in the High Street of Edinburgh, on a market-day, where he laughed to her. Having once ridden with her husband to Leith to bring home meal—‘ganging afield to tether her horse at Restalrig Loch, there came ane company of riders bye, that made sic ane din as heaven and eard had gane together; and incontinent they rade into the loch, with mony hideous rumble. Tom tauld it was the gude wights that were riding in middle-eard.’
Being found guilty of the sorcery and other evil arts laid to her charge, Bessie Dunlop was consigned to the flames.—Pit.
The modern student of insanity can have no difficulty with this case: it is simply one of hallucination, the consequence of diseased conditions.
1576.?
The family of Innes of that Ilk, seated in their fine old castle on the coast of Moray, near Elgin, was one of prime importance in the country. The present laird, Alexander, ‘though gallant, had something of particularity in his temper, was proud and positive in his deportment, and had his lawsuits with several of his friends; amongst the rest with Innes of Peithock, which had brought them both to Edinburgh in the year 1576, as I take it; where the laird having met his kinsman at the Cross, fell in words with him for daring to give him a citation, and in choler either stabbed the gentleman with a dagger, or pistolled him (for it is variously reported). When he had done, his stomach would not let him fly, but he walked up and down upon the spot, as if he had done nothing that could be quarrelled (his friend’s life being but a thing that he could dispose of without being bound to account for it to any other); and there stayed until the Earl of Morton, who was Regent, sent a guard and carried him away to the Castle.
‘When he found truly the danger of his circumstances, and that his proud rash action behoved to cost him his life, he was then free to redeem that at any rate; and made an agreement for a remission with the Regent, at the price of the barony of Kilmalemnock, which this day extends to twenty-four thousand merks rent yearly.