In 1708, William Stensgar, of Southside, in Orkney, had rheumatism. He
sent to an old beggar-woman, called Catherine Taylor--a cripple herself,
but none the less qualified to heal others by her magic arts. She came to
him about an hour before sunrise and took the case in hand, bidding him
follow her till they came to a certain kind of gate or stile, called a
slap or grind; William's wife accompanying them with a stoup of water. At
this slap Catherine touched his knee, saying, "As I was going by the way I
met the Lord Jesus Christ in the likeness of another man; he asked me what
tidings I had to tell? I said I had no tidings to tell, but I am full of
pain, and can neither gang nor stand. Thou shalt go to the holy kirk, and
thou shalt gang round about, and then sit down upon thy knees, and say thy
prayers to the Lord, and then thou shalt be as heal as the hour when
Christ was born." After this precious charm, which the old cripple said
had been taught her when a child, she repeated the 23rd Psalm; and then
the evil spirit which had caused the rheumatism was assumed to be "telled
out" into the stoup of water; at all events William Stensgar would have no
more of it. Then the water was emptied out over the slap or gate so that
the next person passing by the stile might get it instead of William. One
man who had watched this devilry from the beginning, evaded the foul fiend
by pushing his way through the hedge higher up; but another unfortunate
wretch, not so lucky or not so early a riser, coming blundering over the
stile as usual, got laid hold of by the fiend which William Stensgar had
shaken off, and was holden by it hardly.