except one, which already burned blue in the socket.  The arrival of the experienced sage changed the scene:  he brought the spirit to reason; but, unfortunately, while addressing a word of advice or censure to his rash brother, he permitted the ghost to obtain the last word; a circumstance which, in all colloquies of this nature, is strictly to be guarded against.  This fatal oversight occasioned his falling into a lingering disorder, of which he never recovered.

A curious poem, upon the laying of a ghost, forms article No.  V. of the Appendix.]

It is unnecessary to mention the superstitious belief in witchcraft, which gave rise to so much cruelty and persecution during the seventeenth century.  There were several executions upon the borders for this imaginary crime, which was usually tried, not by the ordinary judges, but by a set of country gentlemen, acting under commission from the privy council[52].

[Footnote 52:  I have seen, penes Hugh Scott, Esq. of Harden, the record of the trial of a witch, who was burned at Ducove.  She was tried in the manner above mentioned.]

Besides these grand articles of superstitious belief, the creed of the borderers admitted the existence of sundry classes of subordinate spirits, to whom were assigned peculiar employments.  The chief of these were the Fairies, concerning whom the reader will find a long dissertation, in Volume Second.  The Brownie formed a class of beings, distinct in habit and disposition from the freakish and mischievous elves.  He was meagre, shaggy, and wild in his appearance.  Thus, Cleland, in his satire against the Highlanders, compares them to

  “Faunes, or Brownies, if ye will,
  Or satyres come from Atlas hill.”

In the day time, he lurked in remote recesses of the old houses which he delighted to haunt; and, in the night, sedulously employed himself in discharging any laborious task which he thought might be acceptable to the family, to whose service he had devoted himself.  His name is probably derived from the Portuni, whom Gervase of Tilbury describes thus:  “Ecce enim in Anglia daemones quosdam habent, daemones, inquam, nescio dixerim, an secretae et ignotae generationis effigies, quos Galli Neptunos, Angli Portunos nominant.  Istis insitum est quod simplicitatem fortunatonum colonorum amplectuntur, et cum nocturnas propter domesticas operas agunt vigilias, subito clausis januis ad ignem califiunt, et ranunculus ex sinu projectas, prunis impositas concedunt, senili vultu, facie corrugata, statura pusilli, dimidium pollicis non habentes.  Panniculis consertis induuntur, et si quid gestandum in domo fuerit, aut onerosi opens agendum, ad operandum se jungunt citius humana facilitate expediunt.  Id illis insitum est, ut obsequi possint et obesse non possint.”—­Otia.  Imp. p. 980.  In every respect, saving only the feeding upon frogs, which was probably an attribute of the