upon poor Madge's silver brooch; a third, upon the gittern.

These various attacks roused up all the spirit and wrath of the old
woman: her cries of distress as she darted from one to the other,
striking to the right and left with her feeble arms, her form
trembling with passion, were at once ludicrous and piteous; and these
were responded to by the shrill exclamations of the fierce
tymbesteres, as they retorted scratch for scratch, and blow for blow.
The spectators grew animated by the sight of actual outrage and
resistance; the humpbacked tinker, whose unwholesome fancy one of the
aggrieved tymbesteres had mightily warmed, hastened to the relief of
his virago; and rendered furious by finding ten nails fastened
suddenly on his face, he struck down the poor creature by a blow that
stunned her, seized her in his arms,--for deformed and weakly as the
tinker was, the old woman, now sense and spirit were gone, was as
light as skin and bone could be,--and followed by half a score of his
comrades, whooping and laughing, bore her down the stairs. Tim's
father, who, whether from parental affection, or, as is more probable,
from the jealous hatred and prejudice of ignorant industry, was bent
upon Adam's destruction, hallooed on some of his fierce fellows into
the garden, tracked the footsteps of the fugitives by the trampled
grass, and bounded over the wall in fruitless chase. But on went the
more giddy of the mob, rather in sport than in cruelty, with a chorus
of drunken apprentices and riotous boys, to the spot where the
humpbacked tinker had dragged his passive burden. The foul green pond
near Master Sancroft's hostel reflected the glare of torches; six of
the tymbesteres, leaping and wheeling, with doggerel song and
discordant music, gave the signal for the ordeal of the witch,--

"Lake or river, dyke or ditch,