THE WITCH. CHARACTERS. Old Servant in the Family of Sir Francis Fairford. Stranger. SERVANT. ONE summer night Sir Francis, as it chanced, Was pacing to and fro in the avenue That westward fronts our house, Among those aged oaks, said to have, beeu planted Three hundred years ago By a neighb'ring prior of the Fairford name, gate, And begged an alms. Some say he shoved her rudely from the gate For she was one who practised the black arts, And served the devil, being since burnt for witchcraft. She looked at him as one that. meant to blast him, And with a frightful noise, ('Twas partly like a woman's voice, And partly like the hissing of a snake,) She nothing said but this : (Sir Francis told the words) A mischief, mischief, mischief, And a nine-times-killing curse, By day and by night, to the caitif wight, Who shakes the poor like snakes from his door, And shuts up the womb of his And still she cried purse. A mischief, And a nine-fold-withering curse: For that shall come to thee that will undo thee, Both all that thou fearest and worse. So saying, she departed, Leaving Sir Francis like a man, beneath Whose feet a scaffolding was suddenly falling; So he described it. STRANGER. A terrible curse! What followed? SERVANT. Nothing immediate, but some two months after And sure I think He bore his death-wound like a little child; And, when they asked him his complaint, he laid His hand upon his heart to shew the place, And thereupon Sir Francis called to mind STRANGER. But did the witch confess? SERVANT. All this and more at her death. STRANGER. I do not love to credit tales of magic. Heaven's music, which is Order, seems unstrung; And this brave world (The mystery of God) unbeautified, Disorder'd, marr'd, where such strange things are acted. |