Geilie Duncan, being sent for, came and played the very tune over again, upon a Jew’s harp, before the king.

To proceed with the narrative as given in the dittay: ‘John Fian blew up the doors, and blew in the lichts, whilk were like meikle black candles sticking round about the pulpit. The devil start up himself in the pulpit, like ane meikle black man, and callit every man by his name, and every ane answerit: “Here, Master.” Robert Grierson being namit, they ran all hirdy-girdy, and were angry; for it was promisit, that he should be callit “Robert the Comptroller, alias Rob the Rower,” for expreming of his name. The first thing he demandit was, “Gif they [had] keepit all promise and been guid servants?” and “What they had done since the last time they had convenit?” On his command, they openit up the graves, twa within and ane without the kirk, and took off the joints of their fingers, taes, and knees, and partit them amang them; and the said Agnes Sampson gat for her part ane winding-sheet and twa joints, whilk she tint negligently. The devil commandit them to keep the joints upon them, while [till] they were dry, and then to make ane powder of them, to do evil withal. Then he commandit them to keep his commandments, whilk were to do all the evil they could.’ The devil then ordered them to perform an act of homage towards himself, which does not admit of description, but which may be said to have been at least one degree more humiliating than the kissing of the papal great toe. In the account of the confessions, it is stated that he inveighed against the king, and, being asked why he had such a hatred to him, answered: ‘By reason the king is the greatest enemy he hath in the world.’ According to the dittay, the devil ‘had on him ane gown and ane hat, whilk were baith black; and they that were assembled, part stood and part sat. John Fian was ever nearest the devil, at his left elbock; Graymeal keepit the door.’

Mrs Sampson was adjudged to be taken to the Castle-hill, and there strangled at a stake, and her body burned to ashes.

Barbara Napier was tried, May 8, 1591, on charges similar to those preferred against Sampson: she was found guilty of a few of the less important articles, but acquitted of being at the North Berwick convention and other more grave charges; nevertheless, she was condemned to death. The king was highly incensed at the partial acquittal, and came in person to court to preside at a trial of the jurors for wilful error, when they contrived to avert his wrath by throwing themselves on his mercy. After all, Napier had execution delayed on account of pregnancy, and in the end was set at liberty. Of the royal leniency on this occasion, the clergy did not fail to take note. It will be found that they twitted the king with it some time after.

At Sampson’s trial, the only charge against her in which the safety of the king was involved, was the helping to raise a storm to stop the coming of the queen to Scotland. But now, on the trial of Napier, more serious charges were preferred. It was alleged that at Lammas last there had been a witch-meeting at Aitchison’s Haven, and in the midst of it was the devil, ‘in likeness of ane black man.’ ‘Agnes Sampson proponit the destruction of his hieness’ person, saying to the devil: “We have ane turn to do, and we wald be at it if we could, and therefore help us to it.” The devil answerit, “he sould do what he could, but it wald be lang to, because it wald be thorterit [thwarted];” and he promisit to her and them ane picture of wax, and ordenit her and them to hing, roast, and drop ane taid [toad], and to lay the drops of the taid, mixed with strong wash, ane adder-skin, and the thing in the forehead of ane new foalit foal, in his hieness’ way, where it micht drop upon his hieness’ head or his body, for his hieness’ destruction.... Agnes Sampson was appointit to mak the picture [of the king], and to give it to the devil to be enchantit, whilk she made indeed, and gave it to him; and he promisit to give it to the said Barbara [Napier] and to Effie M‘Calyean, at the next meeting, to be roastit.... There was ane appointit to seek some of his hieness’ linen claiths, to do the turn with.’ At the North Berwick meeting on All-hallow even, ‘Robert Grierson said thir words: “Where is the thing ye promisit?” meaning the picture of wax devisit for roasting and undoing his hieness’ person, whilk Agnes Sampson gave him.... He answerit: “It sould be gotten at next meeting.”... Barbara and Effie M‘Calyean gat then ane promise of the devil, that his hieness’ picture sould be gotten to them twa, and that right soon.’ It is highly noteworthy that none of these particulars appear either in the indictments against Fian and Sampson, or in the accounts of their confessions which came out about the time of their trials.

The trial of Eupham M‘Calyean commenced on the 9th of June. She was taxed with many acts of sorcery of a common kind—such as this: ‘Consulting and seeking help at Anny Sampson, ane notorious witch, for relief of your pain in the time of the birth of your twa sons, and receiving frae her to that effect ane bored stane, to be laid under the bowster, put under your head, enchanted moulds [earth] and powder put in ane piece paper, to be usit and rowit in your hair; and at the time of your drowis [throes], your guidman’s sark to be presently ta’en off him and laid wimplit round your bed feet. The whilk being practisit by you ... your sickness was casten off you, unnaturally, in the birth of your first son, upon ane dog, whilk ran away and never was seen again: and in the birth of your last son, the same practice was usit, and your natural and kindly pain unnaturally casten off you upon the wanton cat in the house; whilk likewise was never seen thereafter.’ It was also alleged of Eupham, that, eighteen years before, she had ‘consulted with Jonet Cunningham in the Canongate-head, alias callit Lady Bothwell, ane auld indytit witch of the finest champ, for poisoning of Joseph Douglas of Pumfrastown, and that by ane potion of composit water whilk she send her servant John Tweedale for, to be brought up to Barbara Towers’s house in ane chopin stoup.’ What was more to the purpose, she was accused of her concern in the affair of the waxen picture, and of having conspired to raise a storm for stopping or drowning the queen on her way from Denmark. After a trial of three days, a verdict was returned against her on the chief points, and this unfortunate lady was condemned to be burned alive at a stake on the Castle-hill.

Throughout all the proceedings connected with these trials, as far as they have been preserved, there is no appearance of any imputation against the Earl of Bothwell; but Spottiswoode affirms that Sampson, in her confessions, had attributed to him the guilt of suggesting the picture device, adding that the devil, finding his plans of no avail against the king, said: ‘Il est un homme de Dieu.’ It also appears that James discovered further matter against Bothwell, in the course of examining the wizard Richard Graham.182 The turbulent lord was therefore committed to ward, from which he broke out only three days before the death of M’Calyean, June 22d. He was now forfaulted on a former sentence, and henceforth became a broken man, though one still able to create no small trouble to his sovereign.

A review of these circumstances leaves a strange feeling on the mind, as if we were reading that which was deficient in some of the most necessary elements of human action. It is difficult to see to what extent the so-called wizards and witches were deluders and deluded. Was there any basis in fact for the affair at North Berwick Kirk, confessed to by two or three of the culprits, though, it may be remarked, with varying circumstances? Was Geilie Duncan’s dance-tune truly repeated before the king? Or were these matters of mere hallucination? Did these women really aim at doing harm to any one, or were they only lunatics? The story reads the more inexplicably when we see so many names as of simple villagers involved in it, and find a king and all his court and clergy viewing it in a serious light.

This year was marked by ‘a plague amang the bestial.’—Chron. Perth.