enlightened England. Existing, however, in these "She was accused of making, with these two persons," utilitarian days, they cannot boast the bright or (Roger Bolinbroke and Margery Gurdemain, or Jorromantic colouring that was theirs once; over what- dain, as Shakspeare calls her,) "the king's image in ever would in other times have been a fearful tale wax, and that, placing it before a gentle fire, ske there now must always hang a veil of the prevailing intended the king's strength should waste insensibly common-place. Witches no longer, although feared and as the image was all dissolved." Stow's "Annals of hated, have much dignity to interest the imagination; England," published in 1601, gives an account of they never now shine forth with some of the beauty" certain instruments with which the said Roger of a fallen angel about them, like the witch who stood "Her darkening eyes, Her fine face, raised to heaven, Her white hair flowing like the silver streams Neither can they boast an appearance so awe-inspiring as hers, the fearful witch, who shone forth in the darkness, whose "Flaming hair curls up, All living, like meteor locks of light; Her eyes are like the sickly moon." The witch of the present day is more like the description we have of the witch of Wookey before the holy water of the priest turned her and her familiars into stone, always herself to remain the imperishable monument of her own crime "Her haggard face was foul to see, Her mouth unmeet a mouth to be, She nought devised but neighbour's ill, But change as they may in outward appearance, their doings remain the same in all ages, although there, too, the common-place again prevails in the manner, though not in the action. See what that same witch of the "meteor-locks" did in her day, and we can relate a tale of the present time the same in substance, though we must frankly own not so romantic in colouring "In a cavern of the wood she sits, By magic accents, to the mystic shape, With the mandrake and the machineel Glows with emitted fire A fire to kindle that strange fuel meet. "Before the fire she placed the imaged wax,- This happened, it is true, " once upon a time;" we cannot give any exact date in which it took place, but such a belief has prevailed through all ages, from the time of the Greeks and Romans down to our own days, although perhaps many would be loth to acknowledge that such ignorance remained. Eleanor of Gloster well knew how to rid herself even of a king when he stood in her way, when she resolved that Henry VI. should fall a victim to her magic power and that of her accomplices. Rapin says, should use his craft of negromancy against the faith," which consisted of "a chayre, painted, wherein he used to sit, upon the four corners of which chayre stood four swords, and upon every sword an image of copper, hanging, with many other instruments, holding a sword in his right hand, and a sceptre in his left, arrayed in a marvellous attire"-these "instruments" being certainly very mysterious, but scarcely very awful. And now again, in this present day, in this most unbelieving age, the same story may be met with; but instead of having to deal entirely with a magic land, or with the witches of classic antiquity, or with spells practised against the life of kings, we must make a long stride, and reach the quiet cottages far away from the strife and trouble of cities, where bosomed high in tufted trees" of a country village, peace and goodwill ought to exist if anywhere; but unfortunately, in just such quiet nooks the witches make their strongholds, and the evil passions of man's nature, hate and revenge, will spring up, however beautiful the scene around may be, whatever sights may lie before the eyes, to raise the mind to higher and better thoughts. There were in this village two women, one young and the other old. The younger one came as a rival in trade, and the matron looked indignantly upon the intrusion; while, as she found her own business deneither day nor night till she might compass the decrease, and her neighbour's increase, she knew rest struction of the young girl. For this end she made herself ready to overcome every difficulty, and to bear all fatigue. There were high hills all round her home, but these were allowed to be no barrier to her wishes; and starting one fine summer morning, she crossed their fresh heathy summits, her evil designs against her rival in no way softened by the beauty around her; but, as when they have a bad purpose in their hearts people only too often do, she proceeded on her way steadily and doggedly, looking neither to the right nor left. It is very strange how much more steadily people pursue a bad object than a good one,-how immovably their eyes are fixed upon their goal; nothing distracts, nothing turns them. The path was long, but the journey was soon over; when the woman stopped at the door of a hut, wherein dwelt one of those powerful beings formerly denominated a witch, but now more commonly known as a cunning || woman. Entrance was soon given, and after remaining for some time in close consultation with the sibyl, || she started again on her homeward journey, armed with a spell by which she could ensure herself against any further trouble or annoyance from her unfortunate young rival. i " It is to be supposed she met with no adventure on the broad lonely hills as she recrossed them in the evening twilight, had no meeting with spirit of good or evil; for certain it is she returned in safety with her spell, which she immediately proceeded to use in the following manner. She took a large nail that had never been used, and a powder she had received from the witch, which she placed at the foot of a myrtle tree, driving the nail through it, and at the same time repeating the following somewhat rude verse :— "It is not this powder I mean to stick, It is Mary Wilson's heart I mean to prick: So long as she do bide in this place!" dreadful; and being out of the witch's hands, the woman recovered. But let this be a warning to others "how in a conjuror's books they read," for in a short time falling sick again, she declared that she was again bewitched, and that by the gentleman who then had possession of the magic volumes! The power of the witch is almost always exerted against mankind, to whom, from time immemorial, the whole race has borne an unaccountable hatred. Let any one who wishes to be satisfied of it only give halfan-hour's study to Glanvil's "Sadducismus Triumphatus," and see the accounts he there gives of their malice; yet, sometimes, especially where it happens to suit their own interest, they can be very strong in their assistance. It is sometimes well to have a witch for a wife, as a certain bricklayer found, who having lost his trowel, and not having the slightest idea as to what had become of it-whether it had been stolen, and if it had, who was the culprit-came to his power The witch had evidently not received a first-rate education; but, however rude the language of the spell, it answered its purpose, for as the powder melted away and mixed with the earth, the poor inoffensive rival faded away and died. That she did so actually fade and die, from the moment of the pow-ful wife, and told her his misfortune; upon which she der's melting, in spite of another witch who was sum- instantly bade him disturb himself no more about it, moned to her assistance, is a fact, though for the she knew who had stolen it, and before the sun rose cause of death we will not vouch. It is highly pro- the next morning, the thief should himself bring the bable the knowledge of the charms employed against stolen property, and restore it to its rightful owner. her would so act upon a timid and sensitive mind, that Accordingly, in the morning early the good man was the victim would work out the completion of the spell waked from his sleep by a loud knocking at the door, against herself, although she herself denied its having and there stood a neighbour whom he had little susany effect upon her. Sir Walter Scott, in his "De-pected as being the delinquent, with his clothes hangmonology and Witchcraft," gives a very similar story, where a Scotch witch devotes the sons of a gentleman, against whom she bears some grudge, "to wasting sickness," by the following lines, placing at the same time in the fire figures composed of clay mixed with paste to represent the object :: "We put this water amongst this meal, We put it in into the fire, To burn them up stook and stour- The witches' mysterious powders are sometimes used for the cure of friends as well as the destruction of enemies. A "cunning woman" gave one to a poor woman suffering from some severe illness, with the direction that it was to be burnt on the hearth as the clock struck the hour of midnight, and she would recover; it being supposed that the sickness was caused by the evil power of a witch exerted against her, and therefore of course no cure could be effected in the ordinary way. This powder, however, did not seem to have the desired effect, the woman still continuing ill, and declaring that all her suffering was caused by a neighbour who was a witch, and who learnt her spells from some "ould ancient books" that she had in her possession. A gentleman in the neighbourhood thinking it a nervous illness, and that, if once the impression of the bewitching could be removed from her mind, her health would soon regain its tone, went to the witch, and obtaining possession of the mysterious books, told the sick woman what he had done, and returned home. As might be supposed, the books, to other eyes at any rate, contained nothing very ing wet and tattered about him, his face and hands torn and bleeding, looking the picture of exhaustion, shame, and misery; having been compelled to make his way straight to the cottage of the injured man over every obstacle that lay in his way-high thorny hedges, pointed fences, deep streams-nothing being allowed to stay the headlong course that the unseen power of the witch compelled him to follow. But it is not always that the power of the witch is exercised on so legitimate an object as the restoration of stolen property to its rightful owner, at the same time dealing appropriate punishment on the offender. On the contrary, her power is far oftener directed towards the accomplishment of some evil to mankind, either for the gratification of her own private revenge, or merely for the pleasure of causing distress and pain; an occupation which from time immemorial has been acknowledged as an enjoyment of the highest kind for any of the order. One of the chief amusements of a certain wellknown witch was to hang her unlucky victims by their hair to a beam in the roof, there to be suspended till she permitted their descent; and it is a well-known fact that there was one family especially persecuted by her, where the goodman and his wife would continually be raised from their quiet seats by their own fireside, and without an instant's preparation be carried up the broad chimney, and suspended there till it should be the witch's good pleasure to allow their descent; and for the truth of this, and numberless other such freaks, it is no hard matter to find most determined and sturdy vouchers, by whom a bare smile at the recital would be held as a most unpardonable affront. The days of the were-wolf are gone by, but doubt. less only because wolves no longer exist in our favoured land; for it can scarcely be imagined that the power of self-transformation that witches have enjoyed as far back as there are any records to tell of their doings, can, in these enlightened days, be entirely lost —and we have present proof to the contrary, the only change being in the animal chosen for the temporary abiding place of the sorceress. There are numberless accounts of the transformations that took place some centuries back, given in the before-quoted "Demonology and Witchcraft." In one instance, the witch being sent by her lord and master on some message to her neighbours, adopted a favourite disguise of the sisterhood-that of a hare-and proceeded on her way, when she was unfortunately met by some labourers and hounds, who immediately sprang upon the disguised witch: and then, in her own words, she tells us, "I ran a very long time, but being hard pressed, was forced to take to my own house, the door being open, and there took refuge behind a chest." But the hounds came in, and the witch only escaped by getting into another house, and gaining time to say the disenchanting rhyme: "Hare, hare, God send thee rare; I am in a hare's likeness now, We are not told how the enchantment was in the first place produced, whether it was by daring, with Spenser's sorcerer "To call by name Great Gorgon, prince of darkness and dead night, At which Cocytus shakes, and Styx is put to flight;" or by what equally unknown power they effected their transformation; but, whatever the secret was, the witches of the present day still retain it, and often show greater wisdom and courage in their use of it under much the same circumstances, than this poor timid member of the weird sisterhood. In one gaining upon it by degrees, they followed closer and closer in its track, until they came within a few feet of their victim, giving it no way of escape except through the open window of a little cottage that stood exactly in its path, and accordingly, through this with one high bound it leapt. The huntsmen, delighted at the prospect of capturing at last the ignis fatuus that had so long danced them in its train, sprang from their horses, and pushed open the cottage door, where, instead of the panting hare, lay an old woman extended on the floor in the last stage of exhaustion and want of breath. Nothing was to be done; no hare could be discovered, and the disappointed huntsmen were obliged to return, their prey having again escaped them. But from that day forward, the young man never presented himself again with his offers of assistance; and when a hare was started it ran an ordinary course, and was quietly killed by the gallant dogs, as a mere natural, every-day, inoffensive hare ought to be; and it was discovered beyond all doubt that the old woman in the cottage was a witch-the young man, her son, whose mother, in the "hare's likeness," ran this rather fatiguing race for the sake of the money the youth obtained by finding a hare for the hunt. This witch certainly showed considerable cunning in her use of this disguise; but many of the sisterhood having, as Glanvil assures us, a great delight in all kinds of freakish tricks with no purpose whatever to answer, assume it for the mere sake of amusement, at any rate as far as uninitiated eyes can perceive. There was one old woman, well known to be a witch, who made her dwelling on the summit of a chain of hills, often with no roof above her but the bright one that the heavens afforded, but whose mind was too much shadowed by the evil influence, like a dull pool with a tree across it, to reflect their light back again. This hag exercised her power in unmercifully "overlooking" her neighbours. Her age was a riddle; she certainly was more than eighty, part of the west of England, where the hounds were and yet her step was as strong as ever; miles were in the habit of meeting, on every field-day a young nothing to her, and her long hair had not one single man invariably came forward, and offered his assist- grey line to mix with its masses of raven black. She ance in starting a hare for the hunt, which, in an was an "eerie" creature to meet, especially in the astonishingly short time, he always succeeded in twilight, if you stood by the stile close by the little doing. The hare was a very fine one, and very strong church, with its old grey tower looming mysteriously; beside, invariably giving them a splendid run, leaving while the steep cliffs of her hills formed a wild backthe swiftest dogs of the pack far and far behind; ground to the stooping figure that advanced towards and at last, when many a mile of rough country had you, with head bent down, and hands moving restbeen crossed, entirely distancing huntsmen and lessly about, and ever muttering something to herself hounds, and disappearing bodily. This went on as she walked along; and then, when she came close, time after time, till the huntsmen began to grow she would raise her sharp black eyes suddenly, fix impatient, and one day they resolved, come what them piercingly on your face-ay, and keep them would, not to be conquered in this manner again. there too, look as you would, with a glance that The fleetest hounds were in readiness, the swiftest seemed to see a great way farther than other eyes. horses were mounted, the hare was again started, and let them be the brightest and clearest that any mere away they went, over hill and valley, rough field and man or woman ever boasted. There were plenty of broad stream, with the mysterious hare well in ad-proofs that she was a witch, but one (and that one vance. Whether the hare was foot-sore from its surely most conclusive) was her having been known many runs, or whether the hounds were more than to assume the witch's favourite disguise. usually eager in their pursuit, is not recorded, but victim of her malice and power whom she had "over One poor looked," or, in the more usual phrase, bewitched, was sitting one winter evening moping over her cottage fire, when opposite to her, from under some large piece of furniture, she perceived two fiery eyes glaring at her through the dim light; after remain ing a few moments stationary, to the distraction of the trembling woman the eyes began to move slowly and fiercely towards her, till in another moment a huge hare made a bound across the room, and sprang through the door. open And now comes the wonderful part of the story. This she knew to be the witch, from its having on its head the blach silk bonnet which her persecutor was constantly in the habit of wearing doubtless, the witch, being anxious to witness the working of her spells, had stolen into the cottage in the twilight, having assumed a form in which she was not so likely to be recognised; probably, in her hurry and excitement, forgetting to pull off the unlucky bonnet, which had been the means not only of revealing her identity, but her real character as no mere mortal woman. We might multiply instances, but we have already quoted enough to prove that "Despite the schoolmaster, And going a-head faster, The arts and the sciences, And all their appliances," strength and weakness, of pliability and stubbornness; which qualities at one time operated in unison, while affection. Thus she had turned the hardness of her at another they were separated by inclination and character against her father, in a manner which seemed to me fearful; but as she was as love-needy as any human being can be, she turned her affection wholly upon me." His mother, whose education was now supposed to be finished, had taken refuge from the ennui of her home in what was then the Evangelical school in Frankfort at the head of the pious ladies of her acquaintance stood the Fraulein von Klettenberg- the same person whose conversations and letters suggested the "Confessions of a Beautiful Soul," which are found incorporated in Wilhelm Meister. She was an interesting and elegant woman, who had suffered ill health from youth to middle age, with unfailing patience and resignation: she was a teacher in her way; and she found in Goethe exactly zealous disciple of Count Zinzendorf, and a great the character that suited her, with his ardent and powerful mind, and his vacillating opinions upon all spiritual subjects: and now she told him plainly and truly, that his unrest, his impatience, his strivings and longings and doubts, proceeded from his not being at peace with God; but as she thought that disease of the body in his case accompanied and increased that of the mind, she set herself to find remedies for both. The physician and surgeon who prescribed for the whole of her circle were "pious Separatists," or Herrnhutters; the former was, besides being very ab superstition is not entirely banished from the cottage struse, a sly-looking, friendly-spoken man, who had homes of Merric England. THE YOUTH OF GOETHE.' BY E. 0. ON his return to Leipzig, Goethe devoted great part of his time, with fresh enthusiasm, to etching and engraving; but whether or not the aquafortis which he used during the latter process, or the coldwater system, which was then coming into fashion, injured his health, or the Merseburg beer and strong coffee had the same effect, he became under alternate regimens so ill, that he was forced to go back once more to his paternal roof, to be nursed by his mother and sister-greatly to his father's vexation, who seems to have had an especial horror of everything approaching to bad health. He found that after his departure his father had concentrated all his fondness for teaching on the luckless Cornelia; and in a house completely shut up, and in a state of peaceful security, had denied her every kind of out-door recreation. Besides compelling her to practise on the harpsichord the greater part of the day, and to write and study French, English, and Italian, he had converted her correspondence with her brother into a medium for his own exhortations. That must have been a curious set of letters over which they now looked and laughed together; for Goethe had been almost equally instructive, transferring to his epistles whatever had struck him most in the lectures of Gellert, and the other professors of Leipzig, without at all considering whether Cornelia stood in need of the advice bestowed upon himself and his fellow-students. "My sister," he says, was and still continued to be an undefinable creature, the most singular compound of gained the greatest confidence in the course of his practice; it was only to the select few that he disclosed somewhat of its more hidden mysteries, and ventured now and then to talk of a wonderful salt which might only be had recourse to in cases of the extremest danger, and whose effects no one had yet experienced these, however, Goethe was destined to prove in a state so nearly bordering on death, that his gradual recovery, after taking a dose of the universal medicine, filled the sisterhood and himself also with the liveliest faith, and enhanced his industry to make himself acquainted with so great a treasure. Fraulein von Klettenberg had already established a little airfurnace, alembics, and retorts of moderate size, in an apartment of her own house; and, in accordance with the hints of Welling, and the significant winks of the physician, she operated principally on iron, in which the most healing power was supposed to be concealed, if only one could get at it. Scarcely was Goethe sufficiently recovered, when, in the same gable chamber in which had once stood his altar, he also laid in a little apparatus, and began experiments in alchemy. "Strange and disconnected," continues he, as these operations were, I yet learned many things from them. I paid strict attention to all the crystallizations that occurred, and became acquainted with the external forms of many natural substances; and, inasmuch as I well knew that chemical subjects were treated more methodically in modern days, so I wished to gain a general idea of them, though, as a half-adept, I had very little respect for the apothecaries, and all those who operated with common fire." Time," says Goethe, "is infinitely long, and each day is a vessel into which much may be poured, if one will actually fill it up" he employed his in an endless variety of occupations and pursuits, amongst which drawing continued to be his favourite; but it was with great joy that he found his health and youthful 66 member having ever torn up or thrown away one of his letters, or even a mere envelope from his hand." "How far I must have been behindhand in modern literature, may be gathered from the mode of life I led at Frankfort, and from the studies to which I devoted myself; but Herder, with his great knowledge, brought many other aids besides the later publications; among these he announced to us the Vicar of Wakefield' as an excellent work, with the German translation of which he would make us acquainted by reading it aloud to us himself." This delightful romance produced, as might be expected, a great effect on his audience; but its immediate consequence on Goethe was that of making him see the family circle of the worthy Dr. Primrose, in one which bore only a very slight resemblance to that which Goldsmith has described; and his admiration of the clergyman's youngest daughter, whom he chose to consider the image of Sophia, led him into the inexcusable error of seeking and winning affections he had no serious intention of returning with more than a high degree of portie spirits once more returning, and left the occult | writing exercised a magic power over me. I do not rescience and theological discussions for the student-life of Strasburg, where his father intended that he should take his degree. On alighting at the Ghost Tavern in that town, he hastened at once to satisfy his most carnest desire, and to approach the Minster, which had been before his eyes for a great distance. He felt unable to analyse the impression it made upon him, and he therefore made no delay in ascending the building, so as not to lose the glorious sunshine which was to disclose to him all the region in which he was come to fix his abode. It lay before him in its rich and varied beauty, like an unwritten tablet, on which no personal joys or sorrows were yet recorded; but a presentiment of the future disquieted his heart, and an unsatisfied craving seemed to demand in secret what it was that should or might come, and what character the place would asume from it, whether for good or for ill. When he had descended, he still tarried awhile before the face of that venerable pile; he could not help regarding it as a monster which must have terrified him, if it had not at the same time appeared compre-homage. He thus describes his impression on first | hensible by its regularity, and even pleasing by its finish. Yet," he continues, "I by no means busied myself with meditating on this contradiction, but suffered a monument so extraordinary quietly to work on me by its presence." seeing Frederica in the country parsonage of Sesenheim, at some distance from Strasburg. At this instant she really entered the door, and then truly a most charming star arose in this rural heaven. Both daughters still wore nothing but German, as they used to call it, and this almost obsolete national costume became Frederica particularly well. A short, white, full skirt, with a furbelow not so long but that the neatest little feet were visible up to the ancle; a tight white bodice, and a black taffeta apron-thus she stood on the boundary between a country and a city girl. Slender and light, she tripped along as if she had nothing to carry, and her neck seemed almost too delicate for the large fair braids on her elegant little head. From cheerful blue eyes she looked very plainly! round, and her pretty turned up nose peered as freely into the air as if there could be no care in the world; her straw hat hung on her arm; and thus, at the first glance, I had the delight of seeing her and acknowledging her at once in all her grace and loveliness." Goethe's associates at Strasburg were chiefly the professors and students of medicine, to the pursuit of which science he devoted great part of his time with the utmost enthusiasm. His most influential acquaintance, however, was the one he formed with the celebrated Herder, who was detained at Strasburg by the necessity of undergoing an operation to remedy a complaint in his eyes, at which Goethe was enabled to be present by his previous exercise in the power of witnessing surgical operations with composure. Her der was then only five years older than his friend, but he had already gained a high reputation by his critical works, and had won a place by the side of the most eminent men in Germany: he found him a useful but not altogether a congenial companion. "I most carefully concealed from him my interest in certain In the course of the day Frederica sang her Swiss subjects which had rooted themselves in me, and were and Alsatian songs in the open air; and the whole by little and little moulding themselves into poetic family, who regarded Goethe as a poor scholar (for he form. These were Götz von Berlichengen and Faust. had assumed a threadbare garb for the occasion), were The biography of the former had seized my inmost charmed by his conversation and merry flow of spirits. heart. The figure of a rude well-meaning self-helper, "His mother," he observes, "had thoroughly qualified in a wild anarchical time, awakened my deepest sym-him for social intercourse, and he was so near slipping pathy. The significant puppet-show fable of the latter resounded and vibrated many-toned within me. I also had wandered about in all sorts of science, and had early enough been led to see its vanity. I had, morcover, tried all sorts of ways in real life, and had always returned more unsatisfied and troubled. Now these things, as well as many others, I carried about with me, and delighted myself with them during my solitary hours, but without writing anything down. But most of all, I concealed from Herder my mysticocabalistical chemistry, and everything relating to it, although at the same time I was still very fond of secretly busying myself in working it out more consistently than it had been communicated to me. Of my poetical labours, I believe, I laid before him 'Die Mitschuldigen,' but I do not recollect that on this account I received either correction or encouragement on his part. Yet with all this he remained what he was; whatever proceeded from him had an important if not a cheering effect, and even his hand out of his pretended character, that the friend who had brought him to the parsonage proposed a walk by moonlight, in which pleasant ramble he had an opportunity for ingratiating himself still further with both the girls." The following morning he appeared in more becoming attire; and from that time he was a constant and welcome guest at Sesenheim. Her "There are women," he says, "who especially please us in a room; others who look better in the open air: Frederica belonged to the latter. whole nature, her form, never appeared more charming than when she moved along an elevated footpath; the grace of her deportment seemed to vie with the flowery earth, and the indestructible cheerfulness of her countenance with the blue sky. This refreshing atmosphere which surrounded her she carried home; and it might soon be perceived that she understood how to reconcile difficulties, and obliterate with ease the impression made by little unpleasant circumstances." |