slandered by her sister-in-law, Janet Lyal, the spouse of John Dein,
brother of Archibald, and by John Dein himself, as guilty of some act of
theft. Upon this provocation Margaret Barclay raised an action of
slander before the church court, which prosecution, after some
procedure, the kirk-session discharged by directing a reconciliation
between the parties. Nevertheless, although the two women shook hands
before the court, yet the said Margaret Barclay declared that she gave
her hand only in obedience to the kirk-session, but that she still
retained her hatred and ill-will against John Dein and his wife, Janet
Lyal. About this time the bark of John Dein was about to sail for
France, and Andrew Train, or Tran, provost of the burgh of Irvine, who
was an owner of the vessel, went with him to superintend the commercial
part of the voyage. Two other merchants of some consequence went in the
same vessel, with a sufficient number of mariners. Margaret Barclay, the
revengeful person already mentioned, was heard to imprecate curses upon
the provost's argosy, praying to God that sea nor salt-water might never
bear the ship, and that _partans_ (crabs) might eat the crew at the
bottom of the sea.
When, under these auspices, the ship was absent on her voyage, a
vagabond fellow, named John Stewart, pretending to have knowledge of
jugglery, and to possess the power of a spaeman, came to the residence
of Tran, the provost, and dropped explicit hints that the ship was lost,
and that the good woman of the house was a widow. The sad truth was
afterwards learned on more certain information. Two of the seamen, after
a space of doubt and anxiety, arrived, with the melancholy tidings that
the bark, of which John Dein was skipper and Provost Tran part owner,
had been wrecked on the coast of England, near Padstow, when all on
board had been lost, except the two sailors who brought the notice.
Suspicion of sorcery, in those days easily awakened, was fixed on
Margaret Barclay, who had imprecated curses on the ship, and on John
Stewart, the juggler, who had seemed to know of the evil fate of the
voyage before he could have become acquainted with it by natural means.
Stewart, who was first apprehended, acknowledged that Margaret Barclay,
the other suspected person, had applied to him to teach her some magic
arts, "in order that she might get gear, kye's milk, love of man, her
heart's desire on such persons as had done her wrong, and, finally, that
she might obtain the fruit of sea and land." Stewart declared that he
denied to Margaret that he possessed the said arts himself, or had the
power of communicating them. So far was well; but, true or false, he
added a string of circumstances, whether voluntarily declared or
extracted by torture, which tended to fix the cause of the loss of the
bark on Margaret Barclay. He had come, he said, to this woman's house in
Irvine, shortly after the ship set sail from harbour. He went to
Margaret's house by night, and found her engaged, with other two women,
in making clay figures; one of the figures was made handsome, with fair
hair, supposed to represent Provost Tran. They then proceeded to mould a
figure of a ship in clay, and during this labour the devil appeared to
the company in the shape of a handsome black lap-dog, such as ladies use
to keep.[80] He added that the whole party left the house together, and
went into an empty waste-house nearer the seaport, which house he
pointed out to the city magistrates. From this house they went to the
sea-side, followed by the black lap-dog aforesaid, and cast in the
figures of clay representing the ship and the men; after which the sea
raged, roared, and became red like the juice of madder in a dyer's
cauldron.
[Footnote 80: This may remind the reader of Cazotte's "Diable
Amoureux."]
This confession having been extorted from the unfortunate juggler, the
female acquaintances of Margaret Barclay were next convened, that he
might point out her associates in forming the charm, when he pitched
upon a woman called Isobel Insh, or Taylor, who resolutely denied having
ever seen him before. She was imprisoned, however, in the belfry of the
church. An addition to the evidence against the poor old woman Insh was
then procured from her own daughter, Margaret Tailzeour, _a child of
eight years old_, who lived as servant with Margaret Barclay, the person
principally accused. This child, who was keeper of a baby belonging to
Margaret Barclay, either from terror or the innate love of falsehood
which we have observed as proper to childhood, declared that she was
present when the fatal models of clay were formed, and that, in plunging
them in the sea, Margaret Barclay her mistress, and her mother Isobel
Insh, were assisted by another woman, and a girl of fourteen years old,
who dwelt at the town-head. Legally considered, the evidence of this
child was contradictory and inconsistent with the confession of the
juggler, for it assigned other particulars and _dramatis personæ_ in
many respects different. But all was accounted sufficiently regular,
especially since the girl failed not to swear to the presence of the
black dog, to whose appearance she also added the additional terrors of
that of a black man. The dog also, according to her account, emitted
flashes from its jaws and nostrils to illuminate the witches during the
performance of the spell. The child maintained this story even to her
mother's face, only alleging that Isobel Insh remained behind in the
waste-house, and was not present when the images were put into the sea.
For her own countenance and presence on the occasion, and to ensure her
secrecy, her mistress promised her a pair of new shoes.
John Stewart, being re-examined and confronted with the child, was
easily compelled to allow that the "little smatchet" was there, and to
give that marvellous account of his correspondence with Elfland which we
have noticed elsewhere.
The conspiracy thus far, as they conceived, disclosed, the magistrates
and ministers wrought hard with Isobel Insh to prevail upon her to tell
the truth; and she at length acknowledged her presence at the time when
the models of the ship and mariners were destroyed, but endeavoured so
to modify her declaration as to deny all personal accession to the
guilt. This poor creature almost admitted the supernatural powers
imputed to her, promising Bailie Dunlop (also a mariner), by whom she
was imprisoned, that, if he would dismiss her, he should never make a
bad voyage, but have success in all his dealings by sea and land. She
was finally brought to promise that she would fully confess the whole
that she knew of the affair on the morrow.
But finding herself in so hard a strait, the unfortunate woman made use
of the darkness to attempt an escape. With this view she got out by a
back window of the belfry, although, says the report, there were "iron
bolts, locks, and fetters on her," and attained the roof of the church,
where, losing her footing, she sustained a severe fall and was greatly
bruised. Being apprehended, Bailie Dunlop again urged her to confess;
but the poor woman was determined to appeal to a more merciful tribunal,
and maintained her innocence to the last minute of her life, denying all
that she had formerly admitted, and dying five days after her fall from
the roof of the church. The inhabitants of Irvine attributed her death
to poison.
The scene began to thicken, for a commission was granted for the trial
of the two remaining persons accused, namely, Stewart, the juggler, and
Margaret Barclay. The day of trial being arrived, the following singular
events took place, which we give as stated in the record:--
"My Lord and Earl of Eglintoune (who dwells within the space of one mile
to the said burgh) having come to the said burgh at the earnest request
of the said justices, for giving to them of his lordship's countenance,
concurrence and assistance, in trying of the foresaid devilish
practices, conform to the tenor of the foresaid commission, the said
John Stewart, for his better preserving to the day of the assize, was
put in a sure lockfast booth, where no manner of person might have
access to him till the downsitting of the Justice Court, and for
avoiding of putting violent hands on himself, he was very strictly
guarded and fettered by the arms, as use is. And upon that same day of
the assize, about half an hour before the downsitting of the Justice
Court, Mr. David Dickson, minister at Irvine, and Mr. George Dunbar,
minister of Air, having gone to him to exhort him to call on his God for
mercy for his bygone wicked and evil life, and that God would of his
infinite mercy loose him out of the bonds of the devil, whom he had
served these many years bygone, he acquiesced in their prayer and godly
exhortation, and uttered these words:--"I am so straitly guarded that it
lies not in my power to get my hand to take off my bonnet, nor to get
bread to my mouth." And immediately after the departing of the two
ministers from him, the juggler being sent for at the desire of my Lord
of Eglintoune, to be confronted with a woman of the burgh of Air, called
Janet Bous, who was apprehended by the magistrates of the burgh of Air
for witchcraft, and sent to the burgh of Irvine purposely for that
affair, he was found by the burgh officers who went about him, strangled
and hanged by the cruik of the door, with a _tait_ of hemp, or a string
made of hemp, supposed to have been his garter, or string of his bonnet,
not above the length of two span long, his knees not being from the
ground half a span, and was brought out of the house, his life not being
totally expelled. But notwithstanding of whatsoever means used in the
contrary for remeid of his life, he revived not, but so ended his life
miserably, by the help of the devil his master.
"And because there was then only in life the said Margaret Barclay, and
that the persons summoned to pass upon her assize and upon the assize of
the juggler who, by the help of the devil his master, had put violent
hands on himself, were all present within the said burgh; therefore, and
for eschewing of the like in the person of the said Margaret, our
sovereign lord's justices in that part particularly above-named,
constituted by commission after solemn deliberation and advice of the
said noble lord, whose concurrence and advice was chiefly required and
taken in this matter, concluded with all possible diligence before the
downsitting of the Justice Court to put the said Margaret in torture; in
respect the devil, by God's permission, had made her associates who were
the lights of the cause, to be their own _burrioes_ (slayers). They used
the torture underwritten as being most safe and gentle (as the said
noble lord assured the said justices), by putting of her two bare legs
in a pair of stocks, and thereafter by onlaying of certain iron gauds
(bars) severally one by one, and then eiking and augmenting the weight
by laying on more gauds, and in easing of her by offtaking of the iron
gauds one or more as occasion offered, which iron gauds were but little
short gauds, and broke not the skin of her legs, &c.
"After using of the which kind of _gentle torture_, the said Margaret
began, according to the increase of the pain, to cry and crave for God's
cause to take off her shins the foresaid irons, and she should declare
truly the whole matter. Which being removed, she began at her former
denial; and being of new essayed in torture as of befoir, she then
uttered these words: 'Take off, take off, and before God I shall show
you the whole form!'
"And the said irons being of new, upon her faithfull promise, removed,
she then desired my Lord of Eglintoune, the said four justices, and the
said Mr. David Dickson, minister of the burgh, Mr. George Dunbar,
minister of Ayr, and Mr. Mitchell Wallace, minister of Kilmarnock, and
Mr. John Cunninghame, minister of Dalry, and Hugh Kennedy, provost of
Ayr, to come by themselves and to remove all others, and she should
declare truly, as she should answer to God the whole matter. Whose
desire in that being fulfilled she made her confession in this manner,
but (_i.e.,_ without) any kind of demand, freely, without interrogation;
God's name by earnest prayer being called upon for opening of her lips,
and easing of her heart, that she, by rendering of the truth, might
glorify and magnify his holy name, and disappoint the enemy of her
salvation."--_Trial of Margaret Barclay, &c_., 1618.
Margaret Barclay, who was a young and lively person, had hitherto
conducted herself like a passionate and high-tempered woman innocently
accused, and the only appearance of conviction obtained against her was,
that she carried about her rowan-tree and coloured thread, to make, as
she said, her cow give milk, when it began to fail. But the _gentle
torture_--a strange junction of words--recommended as an anodyne by the
good Lord Eglinton--the placing, namely, her legs in the stocks, and
loading her bare shins with bars of iron, overcame her resolution; when,
at her screams and declarations that she was willing to tell all, the
weights were removed. She then told a story of destroying the ship of
John Dein, affirming that it was with the purpose of killing only her
brother-in-law and Provost Tran, and saving the rest of the crew. She at
the same time involved in the guilt Isobel Crawford. This poor woman was
also apprehended, and in great terror confessed the imputed crime,
retorting the principal blame on Margaret Barclay herself. The trial was
then appointed to proceed, when Alexander Dein, the husband of Margaret
Barclay, appeared in court with a lawyer to act in his wife's behalf.
Apparently, the sight of her husband awakened some hope and desire of
life, for when the prisoner was asked by the lawyer whether she wished
to be defended? she answered, "As you please But all I have confest was
in agony of torture; and, before God, all I have spoken is false and
untrue." To which she pathetically added, "Ye have been too long in
coming."
The jury, unmoved by these affecting circumstances, proceeded upon the
principle that the confession of the accused could not be considered as
made under the influence of torture, since the bars were not actually
upon her limbs at the time it was delivered, although they were placed
at her elbow ready to be again laid on her bare shins, if she was less
explicit in her declaration than her auditors wished. On this nice
distinction they in one voice found Margaret Barclay guilty. It is
singular that she should have again returned to her confession after
sentence, and died affirming it; the explanation of which, however,
might be either that she had really in her ignorance and folly tampered
with some idle spells, or that an apparent penitence for her offence,
however imaginary, was the only mode in which she could obtain any share
of public sympathy at her death, or a portion of the prayers of the
clergy and congregation, which, in her circumstances, she might be
willing to purchase, even by confession of what all believed respecting
her. It is remarkable that she earnestly entreated the magistrates that
no harm should be done to Isobel Crawford, the woman whom she had
herself accused. This unfortunate young creature was strangled at the
stake, and her body burnt to ashes, having died with many expressions of
religion and penitence.
It was one fatal consequence of these cruel persecutions, that one pile
was usually lighted at the embers of another. Accordingly in the present
case, three victims having already perished by this accusation, the
magistrates, incensed at the nature of the crime, so perilous as it
seemed to men of a maritime life, and at the loss of several friends of
their own, one of "whom had been their principal magistrate, did not
forbear to insist against Isobel Crawford, inculpated by Margaret
Barclay's confession. A new commission was granted for her trial, and
after the assistant minister of Irvine, Mr. David Dickson, had made
earnest prayers to God for opening her obdurate and closed heart, she
was subjected to the torture of iron bars laid upon her bare shins, her
feet being in the stocks, as in the case of Margaret Barclay.
She endured this torture with incredible firmness, since she did
"admirably, without any kind of din or exclamation, suffer above thirty
stone of iron to be laid on her legs, never shrinking thereat in any
sort, but remaining, as it were, steady." But in shifting the situation
of the iron bars, and removing them to another part of her shins, her
constancy gave way; she broke out into horrible cries (though not more
than three bars were then actually on her person) of--"Tak aff--tak
aff!" On being relieved from the torture, she made the usual confession
of all that she was charged with, and of a connexion with the devil
which had subsisted for several years. Sentence was given against her
accordingly. After this had been denounced, she openly denied all her
former confessions, and died without any sign of repentance, offering
repeated interruption to the minister in his prayer, and absolutely
refusing to pardon the executioner.
This tragedy happened in the year 1613, and recorded, as it is, very
particularly and at considerable length, forms the most detailed
specimen I have met with of a Scottish trial for
witchcraft--illustrating, in particular, how poor wretches, abandoned,
as they conceived, by God and the world, deprived of all human sympathy,
and exposed to personal tortures of an acute description, became
disposed to throw away the lives that were rendered bitter to them by a
voluntary confession of guilt, rather than struggle hopelessly against
so many evils. Four persons here lost their lives, merely because the
throwing some clay models into the sea, a fact told differently by the
witnesses who spoke of it, corresponded with the season, for no day was
fixed in which a particular vessel was lost. It is scarce possible that,
after reading such a story, a man of sense can listen for an instant to
the evidence founded on confessions thus obtained, which has been almost
the sole reason by which a few individuals, even in modern times, have
endeavoured to justify a belief in the existence of witchcraft.
The result of the judicial examination of a criminal, when extorted by
such means, is the most suspicious of all evidence, and even when
voluntarily given, is scarce admissible without the corroboration of
other testimony.
We might here take leave of our Scottish history of witchcraft by barely
mentioning that many hundreds, nay perhaps thousands, lost their lives
during two centuries on such charges and such evidence as proved the
death of those persons in the trial of the Irvine witches. One case,
however, is so much distinguished by fame among the numerous instances
which occurred in Scottish history, that we are under the necessity of
bestowing a few words upon those celebrated persons, Major Weir and his
sister.
The case of this notorious wizard was remarkable chiefly from his being
a man of some condition (the son of a gentleman, and his mother a lady
of family in Clydesdale), which was seldom the case with those that fell
under similar accusations. It was also remarkable in his case that he
had been a Covenanter, and peculiarly attached to that cause. In the
years of the Commonwealth this man was trusted and employed by those who
were then at the head of affairs, and was in 1649 commander of the
City-Guard of Edinburgh, which procured him his title of Major. In this
capacity he was understood, as was indeed implied in the duties of that
officer at the period, to be very strict in executing severity upon such
Royalists as fell under his military charge. It appears that the Major,
with a maiden sister who had kept his house, was subject to fits of
melancholic lunacy, an infirmity easily reconcilable with the formal
pretences which he made to a high show of religious zeal. He was
peculiar in his gift of prayer, and, as was the custom of the period,
was often called to exercise his talent by the bedside of sick persons,
until it came to be observed that, by some association, which it is more
easy to conceive than to explain, he could not pray with the same warmth
and fluency of expression unless when he had in his hand a stick of
peculiar shape and appearance, which he generally walked with. It was
noticed, in short, that when this stick was taken from him, his wit and
talent appeared to forsake him. This Major Weir was seized by the
magistrates on a strange whisper that became current respecting vile
practices, which he seems to have admitted without either shame or
contrition. The disgusting profligacies which he confessed were of such
a character that it may be charitably hoped most of them were the fruits
of a depraved imagination, though he appears to have been in many
respects a wicked and criminal hypocrite. When he had completed his
confession, he avowed solemnly that he had not confessed the hundredth
part of the crimes which he had committed. From this time he would
answer no interrogatory, nor would he have recourse to prayer, arguing
that, as he had no hope whatever of escaping Satan, there was no need of
incensing him by vain efforts at repentance. His witchcraft seems to
have been taken for granted on his own confession, as his indictment was
chiefly founded on the same document, in which he alleged he had never
seen the devil, but any feeling he had of him was in the dark. He
received sentence of death, which he suffered 12th April, 1670, at the
Gallow-hill, between Leith and Edinburgh. He died so stupidly sullen and
impenitent as to justify the opinion that he was oppressed with a kind
of melancholy frenzy, the consequence perhaps of remorse, but such as
urged him not to repent, but to despair. It seems probable that he was
burnt alive. His sister, with whom he was supposed to have had an
incestuous connexion, was condemned also to death, leaving a stronger
and more explicit testimony of their mutual sins than could be extracted
from the Major. She gave, as usual, some account of her connexion with
the queen of the fairies, and acknowledged the assistance she received
from that sovereign in spinning an unusual quantity of yam. Of her
brother she said that one day a friend called upon them at noonday with
a fiery chariot, and invited them to visit a friend at Dalkeith, and
that while there her brother received information of the event of the
battle of Worcester. No one saw the style of their equipage except
themselves. On the scaffold this woman, determining, as she said, to die
"with the greatest shame possible," was with difficulty prevented from
throwing off her clothes before the people, and with scarce less trouble
was she flung from the ladder by the executioner. Her last words were in
the tone of the sect to which her brother had so long affected to
belong: "Many," she said, "weep and lament for a poor old wretch like
me; but alas! few are weeping for a broken Covenant."
The Scottish prelatists, upon whom the Covenanters used to throw many
aspersions respecting their receiving proof against shot from the devil,
and other infernal practices, rejoiced to have an opportunity, in their
turn, to retort on their adversaries the charge of sorcery. Dr. Hickes,
the author of "Thesaurus Septentrionalis," published on the subject of
Major Weir, and the case of Mitchell, who fired at the Archbishop of St.
Andrews his book called "Ravaillac Redivivus," written with the unjust
purpose of attaching to the religious sect to which the wizard and
assassin belonged the charge of having fostered and encouraged the
crimes they committed or attempted.
It is certain that no story of witchcraft or necromancy, so many of
which occurred near and in Edinburgh, made such a lasting impression on
the public mind as that of Major Weir. The remains of the house in which
he and his sister lived are still shown at the head of the West Bow,
which has a gloomy aspect, well suited for a necromancer. It was at
different times a brazier's shop and a magazine for lint, and in my
younger days was employed for the latter use; but no family would
inhabit the haunted walls as a residence; and bold was the urchin from
the High School who dared approach the gloomy ruin at the risk of seeing
the Major's enchanted staff parading through the old apartments, or
hearing the hum of the necromantic wheel, which procured for his sister
such a character as a spinner. At the time I am writing this last
fortress of superstitious renown is in the course of being destroyed, in
order to the modern improvements now carrying on in a quarter long
thought unimprovable.
As knowledge and learning began to increase, the gentlemen and clergy of
Scotland became ashamed of the credulity of their ancestors, and witch
trials, although not discontinued, more seldom disgrace our records of
criminal jurisprudence.