Christian antiquities -- Great Britain; Folklore -- Great Britain; Great Britain -- Social life and customs; Manners and customs
from his nostrils.' At this awful witness, the murderer fell on the ground
and avowed the crime, which he had secretly committed, and the most just
judgment of God had brought to light." The murderer was tried before one
of His Majesty's judges, and the circumstances of the crime fully stated.
He was condemned to death, and the sentence was duly carried out by the
hangman.
Another strange story comes down to us from the days when the first
Charles was king. It relates to Herefordshire. Johan Norkeff was found
dead, and it was believed that she had laid violent hands upon herself.
After she had been buried about a month, circumstances caused it to be
suspected that she had met her death by foul play. The case came under the
consideration of a coroner and jury, and they finally resolved to have the
body exhumed, and cause the four suspected persons to touch it. The result
of the ordeal was narrated at the assizes by an old minister as follows:
"The body being taken out of the grave and laid on the grass, the accused
were required to touch it. On laying on their hands on the brow, which
before was of a livid and carrion colour, it began to have a dew or
gentle sweat upon it, which increased by degrees until the sweat ran down
the face. The brow then turned to a lifelike and flesh colour, and the
dead woman opened one of her eyes and shut it again, and this opening of
the eye was done three times. She likewise thrust out the ring or marriage
finger three times, and the finger dropped blood on the grass." The old
minister swore to the correctness of the foregoing, and, says James Grant,
in "The Mysteries of all Nations," from whom we draw the evidence, another
clergyman corroborated it. Sir Nicholas Hyde, the eminent lawyer, who rose
to be Lord Chief Justice, questioned the correctness of the evidence, but
the members of the jury did not agree with him, finding three of the
prisoners guilty of murder. Two were executed, and the third, a woman, was
reprieved.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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