you that; for if any that passeth on the bridge make the signe of the crosse on hym, all shall go to noughte, and they that be on the bridge shall fall into the see. Then the Duke began to laugh; and a certain of young knightes, that were there present, said, Syr, for godsake, let the mayster essay his cunning; we shal leve making of any signe of the crosse on us for that tyme." The Earl of Savoy, shortly after, entered the tent, and recognized in the enchanter, the same person who had put the castle into the power of Sir Charles de la Payx, who then held it, by persuading the garrison of the Queen of Naples, through magical deception, that the sea was coming over the walls. The sage avowed the feat, and added, that he was the man in the world most dreaded by Sir Charles de la Payx. "By my fayth, quod the Erl of Savoy, ye say well; and I will that Syr Charles de la Payx shall know that he hath gret wronge to fear you. But I shall assure him of you; for ye shall never do enchauntment to deceyve hym, nor yet none other. I wolde nat that in tyme to come we shulde be reproached that in so hygh an enterprise as we be in, wherein there be so many noble knyghtes and squyers assembled, that we shulde do any thyng be enchauntment, nor that we shulde wyn our enemys by suche crafte. Than he called to hym a servaunt, and sayd, go and get a hangman, and let hym stryke of this mayster's heed without delay; and as sone as the Erle had commaunded it, incontynent it was done, for his heed was

S

stryken of before the Erle's tent."-FROISSART, Vol. I. ch. 391,

392.

The art of glamour, or other fascination, was anciently a principal part of the skill of the jongleur, or juggler, whose tricks formed much of the amusement of a Gothic castle. Some instances of this art may be found in the Minstrelsy of the Scottish Border, Vol. III. p. 119. In a strange allegorical poem, called the Houlat, written by a dependant of the house of Douglas, about 1452-3, the jay, in an assembly of birds, plays the part of the juggler. His feats of glamour are thus described:

He gart them see, as it semyt, in samyn houre,
Hunting at herdis in holtis so hair;
Soune sailand on the see schippis of toure,
Bernis battalland on burd brim as a bare;
He coulde carye the coup of the kingis des,
Syne leve in the stede,

Bot a black bunwede;

He could of a henis hede,

Make a man mes.

He gart the Emproure trow, and trewlye behald,
That the corncruik, the pundare at hand,
Had poyndit all his pris hors in a poynd fald,
Because thai ete of the corn in the kirkland.
He could wirk windaris, quhat way that he wald;
Mak a gray gus a gold garland,

A lang spere of a bittile for a berne bald,
Nobilis of nutschelles, and silver of sand.

Thus joukit with juxters the janglane ja,

Fair ladyes in ringis,

Knychtis in caralyngis,

Bayth dansis and singis,

It semyt as sa.

Note IV.

Now, if you ask who gave the stroke,

I cannot tell, so mot I thrive;

It was not given by man alive.-P. 80.

Dr Henry More, in a letter prefixed to Glanville's Saducismus Triumphatus, mentions a similar phenomenon.

"I remember an old gentleman in the country, of my acquaintance, an excellent Justice of Peace, and a piece of a mathematician; but what kind of a philosopher he was, you may understand from a rhyme of his own making, which he commended to me at my taking horse in his yard, which rhyme is this:

Ens is nothing till sense finds out :

Sense ends in nothing, so naught goes about.

Which rhyme of his was so rapturous to himself, that, on the reciting of the second verse, the old man turned himself about upon his toe as nimbly as one may observe a dry leaf whisked round in the corner of an orchard-walk by some little whirlwind. With this philosopher I have had many discourses concerning the immortality of the soul and its distinction; when I have run him quite down by reason, he would but

laugh at me, and say, this is logic, H. (calling me by my Christian name;) to which I replyed, this is reason, father L. (for I used and some others to call him ;) but it seems you are for the new lights, and immediate inspiration, which I confess he was as little for as for the other; but I said so only in way of drollery to him in those times, but truth is, nothing but palpable experience would move him; and being a bold man, and, fearing nothing, he told me he had used all the magical ceremonies of conjuration he could, to raise the devil or a spirit, and had a most earnest desire to meet with one, but never could do it. But this he told me, when he did not so much as think of it, while his servant was pulling off his boots in the hall, some invisible hand gave him such a clap upon the back, that it made all ring again; so, thought he now, I am invited to the converse of my spirit, and therefore, so soon as his boots were off, and his shoes on, out he goes into the yard and next field, to find out the spirit that had given him this familiar clap on the back, but found none neither in the yard nor field next to it.

"But though he did not feel this stroke, albeit he thought it afterwards (finding nothing came of it) a mere delusion; yet, not long before his death, it had more force with him than all the philosophical arguments I could use to him, though I could wind him and non-plus him as I pleased; but yet all my arguments, how solid soever, made no impression upon him; wherefore, after several reasonings of this nature, whereby I would prove to him the soul's distinction from the body,

and its immortality, when nothing of such subtile considerations did any more execution on his mind than some lightning is said to do, though it melts the sword, on the fuzzy consistency of the scabbard,—Well, said I, father L., though none of these things move you, I have something still behind, and what yourself has acknowledged to me to be true, that may do the business :-Do you remember the clap on your back when your servant was pulling off your boots in the hall? Assure yourself, said I, father L., that goblin will be the first that will bid you welcome into the other world. Upon that his countenance changed most sensibly, and he was more confounded with this rubbing up his memory, than with all the rational or philosophical argumentations that I could produce."

Note V.

The running stream dissolved the spell.-P. 83.

It is a firm article of popular faith, that no enchantment can subsist in a living stream. Nay, if you can interpose a brook betwixt you and witches, spectres, or even fiends, you are in perfect safety. Burns's inimitable Tam o' Shanter turns entirely upon such a circumstance. The belief seems to be of antiquity. Brompton informs us, that certain Irish wizards could, by spells, convert earthen clods, or stones, into fat pigs, which they sold in the market; but which always re-assumed their proper form, when driven by the deceived purchaser across a running stream. But Brompton is severe