to the contrary, the charm was never broken, for all that Maundevile can tell us more is that “whan a Knyghte comethe that is so hardy as to kysse hir he schalle not dye, but he schalle turne the Damysele in to hir righte Forme and Kyndely Schapp, and he schal be Lord of alle the Contreye and Isles.” In our illustration, fig. 10, we see the newly-made knight making his way back again to his vessel with all convenient speed, his courage having entirely failed him at the critical moment. [Illustration: FIG. 10.] A belief in witches, fairies, and divers other uncanny folk was a strong article of faith with our ancestors, but to go at any just length into these points would lead us further afield than our title would perhaps justify. As we have already referred to the suspicion that attached itself to anyone who led a life somewhat outside the ordinary groove, we append an excellent illustrative passage from Spenser’s “Faerie Queene,” as it admirably conveys the popular idea. There in a gloomy hollow glen she found:— “A little cottage built of sticks and reedes In homely wise, and walled with sod around, In which a Witch did dwell, in loathly weedes And wilful want, all careless of her needes; So choosing solitarie to abide Far from all neighbours, that her devilish deedes And hellish arts from people she might hide, And hurt far off unknowne whom ever she envide.” Those who care to look the subject up may turn to Reginald Scot’s “Discoverie of Witchcraft,” “wherein the lewde dealing of Witches and Witchmongers is notablie detected, the knauerie of coniurors, the Curiositie of figure-casters, and many other things are opened which have long lien hidden;”[33] or perhaps, better still, to the book entitled “Saducismus Triumphatus, or full and plain Evidence concerning Witches and Apparitions, proving partly by Holy Scripture, partly by a choice Collection of modern Relations, the Real Existence of Apparitions, Spirits and Witches, by Jos. Glanvil, late Chaplain to His Majesty, and Fellow of the Royal Society.” The copy before us is dated 1658, and is full of tales of familiar spirits in the forms of toads, rabbits, hares, dogs, &c., diver incantations to provoke evil or to shield from it, and the like, all gravely narrated. The author, in fact, holds it rank atheism to doubt such tales, since witches are moved by evil spirits, and if people do not believe in one they do not in the other, and therefore not in spirits at all, and therefore not in God!