_The Examination of John Walsh, before Master Thomas Williams, Commissary to the Reverend father in God, William, bishop of Excester, upon certayne Interrogatories touchyng Wytch-crafte and Sorcerye, in the presence of divers gentlemen and others, the XX of August, 1566._ 1566. Black letter. John Ashton (_The Devil in Britain and America_, London, 1896, p. 202) has called this the "earliest English printed book on witchcraft pure and simple"; but it did not deal with witches and it was preceded by the first Chelmsford pamphlet. _The discloysing of a late counterfeyted possession by the devyl in two maydens within the Citie of London._ [1574.] Black letter. The case is that of Agnes Bridges and Rachel Pinder, mentioned above (pp. 59, 351). _The Wonderfull Worke of God shewed upon a Chylde, whose name is William Withers, being in the Towne of Walsam ... Suffolk, who, being Eleven Yeeres of age, laye in a Traunce the Space of Tenne Days ... and hath continued the Space of Three Weeks_, London, 1581. Written by John Phillips. This pamphlet is mentioned by Sidney Lee in his article on John Phillips in the _Dict. Nat. Biog._ _A Most Wicked worke of a Wretched Witch (the like whereof none can record these manie yeares in England) wrought on the Person of one Richard Burt, servant to Maister Edling of Woodhall in the Parrish of Pinner in the Countie of Myddlesex, a myle beyond Harrow. Latelie committed in March last, An. 1592 and newly recognized acording to the truth. By G. B. maister of Artes._ [London, 1593.] See Hazlitt, Collections and Notes, 1867-1877. The pamphlet may be found in the library of Lambeth Palace. The story is a curious one; no action seems to have been taken. _A defensative against the poyson of supposed prophecies, not hitherto confuted by the penne of any man; which being eyther uppon the warrant and authority of old paynted bookes, expositions of dreames, oracles, revelations, invocations of damned spirits ... have been causes of great disorder in the commonwealth and chiefly among the simple and unlearned people._ Henry Howard, afterwards Earl of Northampton, was the author of this "defensative." It appeared about 1581-1583, and was revised and reissued in 1621. Three Elizabethan ballads on witches are noted by Hazlitt, _Bibliographical Collections and Notes_, 2d series (London, 1882): _A warnynge to wytches_, published in 1585, _The scratchinge of the wytches_, published in 1579, and _A lamentable songe of Three Wytches of Warbos, and executed at Huntingdon_, published in 1593. Already in 1562-3 "a boke intituled _A poosye in forme of a visyon, agaynste wytche Crafte, and Sosyrye_," written "in myter" by John Hall, had been published (_Stationers' Registers_, 1557-1570, p. 78).