After the horrible sorceress had so blasphemed, she departed as quickly as possible from the church, muttering to herself. The congregation remained silent from fear and terror; and the poor priest, who seemed more dead than alive, prayed the s.e.xton to fetch him a cup of water, which he drank; and then being in some degree recovered, he stepped forth, and addressed the congregation thus:--

"Dear brethren and friends, after what ye have just heard, ye will not wonder if I am unable to receive confessions this day, or to administer the holy communion. Ye all know Dorothea Stettin, neither is my character unknown to you; therefore remember the words of St. Peter, 'The devil goeth about as a roaring lion, seeking whom he may devour.' But we will resist him, steadfast in the faith. Meet me, then, tomorrow here at the altar, and ye shall hear my justification. After which, I will shrive those who desire to be partakers of the holy sacrament."

And on the following morning, the holy minister of G.o.d preached from Matthew v. 11--"Blessed are ye when men shall revile you and persecute you, and say all manner of evil falsely against you, for My sake; be glad and comforted, for ye shall be well recompensed in heaven." And in this powerful sermon he drew a picture of Sidonia from her youth up; so that many trembled for him when they remembered her power, though they glorified G.o.d for the mighty zeal and courage that burned in his words. But when Sidonia heard of this sermon, she became almost frantic from rage.

CHAPTER VI.

_Dorothea Stettin falls sick, and how the doctor manages to bleed her--Item, how Sidonia chases the princely commissioners into the oak-forest._

Such a public humiliation the good virgin Dorothea Stettin found it impossible to bear. She fell sick, and repented with bitter tears of the trust and confidence she had reposed in Sidonia; finally, the abbess sent off a message to Stargard for the _medicus_, Dr. Schwalenberg.

This doctor was an excellent little man, rather past middle age though still unmarried, upright and honest, but rough as bean-straw. When he stood by Dorothea's bed and had heard all particulars of her illness, he bid her put out her hand, that he might feel her pulse. "No, no;" she answered, "that could she never do; never in her life had a male creature felt her pulse."

At this my doctor laughed right merrily, and all the nuns who stood round, and Sidonia's old maid, Wolde, laughed likewise; but at last he persuaded Dorothea to stretch out her hand.

"I must bleed her," said the doctor. "This is _febris putrida_; therefore was her thirst so great: she must strip her arm till he bleed her." But no one can persuade her to this--strip her arm! no, never could she do it; she would die first: if the doctor could do nothing else, he may go his ways.

Now the doctor grew angry. Such a cursed fool of a woman he had never come across in his life; if she did not strip her arm instantly, he would do it by force. But Dorothea is inflexible; say what he would, she would strip her arm for no man!

Even the abbess and the sisterhood tried to persuade her.

"Would she not do it for her health's sake; or, at least, for the sake of peace?"

They were all here standing round her, but all in vain. At last the doctor, half-laughing, half-cursing, said--

"He would bleed her in the foot. Would that do?"

"Yes, she would consent to that; but the doctor must leave the room while she was getting ready."

So my doctor went out, but on entering again found her sitting on the bed, dressed in her full convent robes, her head upon Anna Apenborg's shoulder, and her foot upon a stool. As the foot, however, was covered with a stocking, the doctor began to scold.

"What was the stocking for? Let him take off the stocking. Was she making a fool of him? He advised her not to try it."

"No," Dorothea answered, "never would she strip her foot for him.

Die she would if die she must, but that she could never do! If he could not bleed her through the stocking, he may go his ways."

_Summa_.--As neither prayers nor threatening were of any avail, the doctor, in truth, had to bleed her through the stocking; and scarcely had he finished, when Sidonia sent, saying.

"That she, too, was ill, and wished to be bled."

And there lay my hag alone, in bed, as the doctor entered. She was right friendly.

"And was it indeed true, that absurd fool Dorothea did not choose to be bled? Now he saw himself what a set of simpletons she had to deal with in the convent. No wonder that they all blackened her and belied her. She was sick from very disgust at such malice and absurdity. Ah, she regretted now not having married when she had the opportunity; it would have been better, and she had many offers. But she always feared she was too poor. However, her fortune was now excellent, for her sister had died without children, and left her everything--a very large inheritance, as she heard. But the dear doctor must taste her beer; she had tapped some of the best, and there was a fresh can of it on the table."

But my doctor was too cunning not to see what she was driving at; besides, he had heard of her beer-brewing, so he answered--

"He never drank beer; but what ailed her?"

"Ah, she didn't know herself, but she had a trembling in all her limbs. Would he not take a gla.s.s of mead, or even water? Her old servant should bring it to him."

"No. Let her just put out her hand for him to feel her pulse."

Instantly she stretched forth, not her hand alone, but her whole naked, dry, and yellow arm from the bed. Whereupon the doctor spoke--

"Eh? What should I bleed you for? The pulse is all right. In fact, old people never should be bled without serious cause; for at seventy or so, mind ye, every drop is worth a groschen."

"What!" exclaimed Sidonia, starting up; "what the devil, do ye think I am seventy? Why, I am hardly fifty yet."

"Seventy or fifty," answered the doctor, "it is all much the same with you women-folk."

"To the devil with you, rude churl!" screamed Sidonia. "If you will not bleed me, I'll find another who will. Seventy indeed! So rude a knave is not in the land!"

But my doctor goes away laughing; and as the ducal commissioners had arrived to try Sidonia's case, with the convent chaplain, he went down to meet them at Sheriff Sparling's, and these were the commissioners:--

1. Christian Ludeck, state prosecutor; a brother of the priest's.

2. Johann Wedel of Cremzow.

3. Eggert Sparling, sheriff of Marienfliess.

4. Jobst Bork, governor of Saatzig.

This Jobst was son to that upright Marcus whose wife, Clara von Dewitz, Sidonia had so miserably destroyed. For his good father's sake, long since dead, their Graces of Stettin had continued him in the government of Saatzig, for he walked in his father's steps, only he was slow of speech; but he had a lovely daughter, yet more praiseworthy than her grandmother, Clara of blessed memory, of whom we shall hear more anon.

_Summa_.--The doctor found all the commissioners a.s.sembled in the sheriff's parlour. _Item_, Anna Apenborg and the abbess as witnesses, who deposed to all the circ.u.mstances which I have heretofore related; also, the abbess set forth the prayer of the sick Dorothea Stettin, that she might be restored to the sub-prioret out of which the false Sidonia had wickedly talked her, and now for thanks gave her insolent contempt and mocking sneers.

Anna Apenborg further deposed, that, looking through the key-hole of the refectory door one day, she spied the wicked witch boring a hole in the wall; in this she placed a tun-dish, and immediately after, a rich stream of cow's milk flowed down into a basin which Sidonia held beneath, and that same day the best cow in the convent stopped giving milk, and had never given one drop since.

And because the dairymaid, Trina Pantels, said openly this was witchcraft, and accused Sidonia and the old hag Wolde of being evil witches--for she was not a girl to hold her tongue, not she--her knee swelled up to the size of a man's head, and day and night she screamed for agony, until another old witch that visited Sidonia, Lena of Uchtenhagen, for six pounds of wool, gave her a plaster of honey and meal to put on the knee, and what should be drawn out of the swelling, but quant.i.ties of pins and needles; and how could this have been, but by Sidonia's witchcraft? [Footnote: However improbable such accusations may seem, numbers of the like, some even still more extraordinary, may be found in the witch trials of that age, by any one who takes the trouble of referring to them.]

Many witnesses could prove this fact; for Tewes Barth, Dinnies Koch, and old Fritz were by, when the plaster was taken off.

Then Sheriff Sparling deposed, that having smothered his bees lately, he sent a pot of pure honey to each of the nuns, as was his custom; but Sidonia scolded, and said her pot was not large enough, and abused him in a cruel manner about his stinginess in not sending her more. So, some days after, as he was riding quietly home to his house, across the convent court, suddenly the whole ground before him became covered with the shadows of bee-hives, and little shadows like bees went in and out, and wheeled about just as real bees do. Whereupon, he looked in every direction for the hives, for no shadows can be without a body, but not a hive nor a bee was in the whole place round; but he heard a peal of mocking laughter, and, on looking up, there was the wicked witch looking out at him from a window, and she called out--

"Ho! sir sheriff, when you smother bees again, send me more honey.

A couple of pounds of the best--good weight!"

And this he did to have peace for the future.

Now the commissioners noted all this down diligently; but the state prosecutor shook his head, and asked the abbess--

"Wherefore she had not long ago brought this vile witch before the princely court?"

To which she answered, sighing--.

"What would that help? She had already tasted the vengeance of the wicked sorceress, and feared to taste it again. Well, night and day had she cried to G.o.d to free the convent from this she-devil, and often resolved to unfold the whole Satan's work to his Highness, though her own life would be perilled surely by so doing. But she was ready, as a faithful mother of the convent, to lay it down for her children, if, indeed, that could save them.

But how would her death help these poor young virgins? For a.s.suredly the moment Sidonia had brought her to a cruel end, she would make herself abbess by force, and this was such a dread to the sorrowing virgins, that they themselves entreated her to keep silence and be patient, waiting for the mercy of G.o.d to help them.