Act 2 — THE WITCH;
Reading edition
A DRAMATIC SKETCH OF THE SEVENTEENTH CENTURY.
CHARACTERS.
OLD SERVANT in the Family of SIR FRANCIS FAIRFORD. STRANGER.
Servant. One summer night Sir Francis, as it chanced,
Was pacing to and fro in the avenue
That westward fronts our house,
Among those aged oaks, said to have been planted
Three hundred years ago,
By a neighb'ring prior of the Fairford name.
Being o'ertasked in thought, he heeded not
The importunate suit of one who stood by the gate,
And begg'd an alms.
Some say he shoved her rudely from the gate
With angry chiding; but I can never think
(Our master's nature hath a sweetness in it)
That he could use a woman, an old woman,
With such discourtesy; but he refused her—
And better had he met a lion in his path
Than that old woman that night;
For she was one who practised the black arts,
And serv'd the devil, being since burnt for witchcraft.
She look'd at him as one that meant to blast him,
And with a frightful noise,
('Twas partly like a woman's voice,
And partly like the hissing of a snake,)
She nothing said but this
(Sir Francis told the words):—
A mischief, mischief, mischief, And a nine-times killing curse, By day and by night, to the caitiff wight, Who shakes the poor like snakes from his door, And shuts up the womb of his purse.
And still she cried—
A mischief, And a ninefold withering curse: For that shall come to thee that will undo thee, Both all that thou fearest and worse.
So saying, she departed,
Leaving Sir Francis like a man, beneath
Whose feet a scaffolding was suddenly falling;
So he described it.
Stranger. A terrible curse! What follow'd?
Servant. Nothing immediate, but some two months after,
Young Philip Fairford suddenly fell sick,
And none could tell what ail'd him; for he lay,
And pined, and pined, till all his hair fell off,
And he, that was full-flesh'd, became as thin
As a two-months' babe that has been starved in the nursing.
And sure I think
He bore his death-wound like a little child;
With such rare sweetness of dumb melancholy
He strove to clothe his agony in smiles,
Which he would force up in his poor pale cheeks,
Like ill-timed guests that had no proper dwelling there;
And, when they ask'd him his complaint, he laid
His hand upon his heart to show the place,
Where Susan came to him a-nights, he said,
And prick'd him with a pin.—
And thereupon Sir Francis call'd to mind
The beggar-witch that stood by the gateway
And begg'd an alms.
Stranger. But did the witch confess?
Servant. All this and more at her death.
Stranger. I do not love to credit tales of magic.
Heaven's music, which is Order, seems unstrung,
And this brave world
(The mystery of God) unbeautified,
Disorder'd, marr'd, where such strange things are acted.