the horrible abominations practised by witches, it is well known
that having received the sacred bread, they privately take the
same again from their mouth and feed their familiar therewith. And
one day when the convent was quite still, Anna Apenborg, having
crept down to peep through the key-hole of the refectory door, saw
enough to confirm this general belief.

No wonder then if the good priest stood long silent from horror;
then he spake--"Tell the prioress it is well;" but when Wolde was
gone, he threw himself upon his knees in his closet before God,
and wrestled long in prayer, with tears and wringing of hands,
that He would open to him what was his path of duty.

About noon he became more composed, through the great mercy of the
Lord; and bid his wife, Barbara, come to him, with whom he had
lived now a year and a half in perfect joy, though without
children. To her he disclosed the proposition of the horrible
sorceress, and afterwards spake thus:--

"And because, dear Barbara, after earnest prayer to God, I have
come to the resolution neither to shrive nor to give the Lord's
body to this daughter accursed of hell, do not be surprised if a
like death awaits me as happened to the porter, Matthias. When I
die, therefore, dear wife, take thee another spouse and bear
children. 'For the woman,' says the Scripture, 'shall be blessed
through childbearing, so as she continues in faith, and love, and
in holiness with sobriety' (I Tim. ii.). Thus thou wilt soon
forget me."

But the poor wife wept, and besought him to turn from his resolve,