Witch Country

London my home is: though by hard fate sent

Into a long and irksome banishment.

--Robert Herrick

Miss Elizabeth Sams sat atop a mountain of bedding, quilts and blankets, ticking and counterpanes as the ox- cart slowly wended its way through the busy streets of London. Only fifteen and never conspicuous in public, Elizabeth blushed to receive any notice from the street, though the people who noticed –the loitering apprentice, the beggar, the chapman, and thief—saw only of the pink cheeks on the bare slip of a girl passing by.

At the Tower of London, there came a loud blast over the high walls of the Tower Zoo. The Behemoth!

“Oh, Biddie, do you hear?”

Biddie turned her scrawny neck around from her seat at the ox-cart’s footboard. “Oh, yes, Cousin Elizabeth, do you know what I think it is?”

“The Behemoth,” answered Elizabeth.

“Like what’s in the Bible?” asked Slope holding the reins in his big hands.

“What was that?” her father asked reining his horse beside the cart.

Slope snorted. “The women have been tittle-tattling about a biblical beast let loose in London.”

“The royal menagerie has a new animal,” Elizabeth said. “I had hoped to see it before we left.”

“Oh, yes,” said Biddie, her eyes widening, “tis a gruesome beast with a tail in front and a tail in back.”

“A pachyderm,” said Richard Sams. “A gift of the Great Cham,” he told his daughter.

“How can you tell which end is which?” asked Slope.

“That you must take up with the Great Cham,” her father replied.

They were along the wharf now overlooking the River Thames. Elizabeth’s hand shielded her eyes as she looked down the river toward Gravesend where the great ships were in harbor, ships that traversed the world traveling to the Continent, Africa, even the West Indies. Elizabeth had never seen an ocean. She had only been to Essex twice, and only once that she remembered. Now it was home.

The cart lumbered on to Aldgate through the narrow gate flanked by square towers and up to the Aldgate Pump. The old stone pump was a fountain that looked like a monument. Father took out a little silver cup and held it under a wolf-shaped spigot.

“Stopping here, Squire?” asked Slope. “Taint nothing here but drunkards, fools, and thieves.”

“Those you may find anywhere, not just the East End,” said father. “Here, Elizabeth,” he said, handing her the cup. When she reached for it, he pulled away with a jerk, and then she reached for it with her other hand. On the cart lumbered through the crowded streets, the smells of commerce—fish, cheese, bacon, rum, onions, and damp straw—everywhere.

At White Chapel Road the way widened and straightened, and Elizabeth knew she was leaving London—crowded, familiar London—behind. A proper thoroughfare, the road allowed carts, coaches, and wagons to pass each other with ease. The only moment of worry occurred when suddenly came the cry, “Oh, Boy!” and they were swarmed with blue-smocked apprentices swinging sticks.

“Is this the habit of London folk, Squire, brawling in the streets?” said Slope, pulling on the reins.

“These apprentices will use any excuse to leave their labors. One such cry and they all come a running, and no one seems to stop them,” said father. “Come, let’s use our whips. They’ll let us pass.”

In time they reached the outskirts of London and the Old Ford that crossed the River Lee. “Hold tight, Elizabeth,” her father cried when the cart dropped into the water, “there are places here where the water is deep and the current strong.” Elizabeth looked down at the swirling water separating her from all she had known.

From Old Ford they traveled the old Roman road leading east through the marshes where Essex lay. God’s Country according to Mr. Slope, who was clearly glad to get back to Langford Hall. There he would be father’s new bailiff now that father was taking over Langford Hall to become its squire. Slope had arrived at sunrise with the horse and oxcart to move their belongings to Essex. Elizabeth and Biddie had already packed the scant furnishings that made their home at the Middle Temple where father practiced chancery law. They stood waiting in the cold early morning while Slope and her father disassembled the marriage bed to place in the cart as a frame for the bedding. Not that the bed was needed at Langford Hall, but they should have some of their own there so as not to feel out of place.

At noon, father stopped his party at Bromley-on-Bow where they decided to break fast. “Here is the bun shop I told you of,” he said helping his daughter down.

Elizabeth smoothed her surcoat and soothed the hair behind her little lace cap. Ahead was a dark doorway leading to the dingy bun shop. Inside one full wall was covered in what seemed dusty bricks.

“They are all hot-crossed buns, each for an Easter left unclaimed,” her father said.

The four sat at a table while Richard gestured to the old woman behind the counter. Richard Sams explained. “The old woman once had a son who went to sea years ago. To cheer his mother before he went away, he kissed her and told her to bake a hot-crossed bun for him to eat at Easter on his return. “ Here Elizabeth’s father paused. All four sat in silence as the little cook brought them buns and cider. When she left, father continued, “So she did, but he did not return that Easter, and so she has ever since saving the old to show him when he does return.” He gestured around them. From the ceiling hung bags of hardened buns all bearing the marks of crosses.

Elizabeth looked around wonderingly. “There must be hundreds of buns here!”

Her father looked arch. “This story is over a hundred years old.”

Elizabeth glanced at the old woman’s receding back hunched over a tray. “But that cannot be the same woman.”

“Unless she were a witch,” said Mr. Slope, “I might doubt her, but for the crosses on the buns.”

“She has a wart on her nose like a witch, “conceded Biddie.

“She is just an old woman making her living as old women have for the past hundred years,” said father. He gently patted Elizabeth’s hand that reached for the butter and placed it back in her lap. “Pay them no mind, Elizabeth. Lots of odd people are in this world, not all are witches.” Elizabeth blushed and reached for the butter with her other hand.

Having broken their fast, they traveled the High Road toward Essex through all the little hamlets and towns, each with its church and green and inn. Elizabeth, who could read, nevertheless spent her time guessing the names of taverns by the signs they bore. There were the easy ones like the Dog and the Duck at Stratford, or the Fox and Grapes at Chingford. The Pig and Whistle at Cheshunt was more difficult, and then there was headless woman, which turned out to be The Silent Wife, at Ware.

The High Road was busy with carts and wagons and the occasional carriage. Men on horseback winked at the pretty young girl perched high on bedding as they rode by. The farther from London, the wider the road seemed with fewer people on it. Elizabeth was becoming used to the familiar pattern of woods turning to meadows becoming fields leading to towns bordering woods again, all along the River Lee.

Only one incident caused any excitement. At Middlesex a coach rushed onto the bridge just as the oxen had started across. It was a narrow bridge which only allowed traffic one way at a time. The coachman had hoped to have the right of way, but there were no means of turning the oxen around once on the bridge. The coachmen swore loudly pulling up on the reins, stopping his coursers. The closed carriage halted with a jolt! An old lady in a white mantilla looked out and glared at Elizabeth while the oxen made their careful way past the stymied coach and four on the narrow bridge.

Gradually the River Lee quickened its pace the farther upstream they traveled until it finally flowed white by a moss-covered mill outside of Ware. Two little girls came out to watch them pass. They waved at Elizabeth. Elizabeth raised her hand, thought better of it, and bowed instead. The two curtseyed then before running away. Elizabeth watched them until they faded from view.

The road took a turn, and Elizabeth was surprised to see the river widen. The Lee looked more like a lake than a river.

“We are at the weir at Ware,” said father, “just before the crossroads that lead to Hertfordshire and Suffolk. Soon we shall reach the road that goes through the town of Bumstead, near Langford.”

“Haven’t we a cousin in Hertford?” asked Elizabeth.

“Yes,” said father, “he owns a tavern there, named the Cat and the Fiddle. On market day, I shall take you there. “

The by-way to Bumstead cut through the High Road. There at the crossroads, they passed a gallows. “Now we be in Essex,” said Slope, “that there’s the gibbet where they hanged Nanny Bee.”

“A witch?” cried Biddie.

“Essex is known for its witches,” said Slope. “The constable cut her down before her hand was taken.”

“No!” gasped Biddie.

“The Hand of Glory.” Slope nodded. “Witches cut off a hanged corpse’s arm at the elbow.”

“Mr. Slope, I must ask you to stop this impious talk,” spoke father crossly.

Mr. Slope asked his master, “Squire Sams, you are to be the new Justice of the Peace. You must believe in witches. They’re in the Bible!”

“I am a scientific man, Slope, and a man of law. I must go on evidence, not hearsay about severed limbs.”

Slope persisted. “But you must believe in witches, Squire.”

“I know that they exist legally” was father’s answer.

“What of the Countess of Essex?” asked Biddie.

“Who is she?” asked Elizabeth.

“The one in the white mantilla,” said Biddie.

“She were a witch,” said Slope, rising out of his seat, which made the oxen go faster, causing the cart to bounce.

“She was?” Elizabeth asked bouncing in the air.

Her father sighed. “The Countess was accused of witchcraft when she was tried for poisoning her husband.”

“It was a love charm, I heard,” said Biddie.

“It was poison,” Richard said.

“I heard she used the Hand of Glory to control her husband,” said Slope.

“What is the Hand of Glory?” asked Elizabeth leaning over the dashboard.

“A hand cut from a corpse on the gallows, dipped in fat and lit like a candle. The smoke puts anyone asleep,” Slope told them.

Father reined his horse to stop the cart. “Mr. Slope, when I asked you to be my bailiff I thought you a man of probity and tact. I’ll not have my daughter exposed to such talk.”

“No sir,” Slope muttered, but later when his master rode on ahead whispered, “With her husband asleep she could slip away to meet her lovers.”

“What happened to her?” whispered Elizabeth.

“Oh, she came to a bad end,” said Biddie.

“In a coach and four?” asked Elizabeth.

“Over the golden spoons,” said Slope.

Elizabeth leaned closer. “Which spoons were these?”

Her father overhearing sighed. “One of her lovers was Sir Henry Neville,” he said. “She got him to steal gold spoons from his father-in-law, the Duke of Buckland. Now she is no longer welcome at Court.”

“Hadn’t she spoons of her own?” asked Elizabeth.

Biddie shrugged, so Slope spoke up. “Stealing and getting others to steal is part of a witch’s work. Story goes she wanted to melt them down.”

“But why?” asked Elizabeth.

“To form a ring of power,” answered Biddie, “with it her husband would be under her spell.”

“Then why did she poison him?”

“Because the ring of power did not work,” said father. “None of her spells have worked, daft woman.” He turned to Slope,” There may be witches all right, but they always prove to be incompetent.” He turned back to Elizabeth. “Nothing to worry about.”

Slope grumbled beneath his breath. “With a ring of power, one could do anything.”