witness, if they were asked; whereas witches and warlocks always did evil
and no good to men, as our Lord Jesus taught (Matt. xii.), when the
Pharisees blasphemed him, saying that he cast out devils by Beelzebub the
prince of the devils; hence his worship might see whether she could in
truth be a witch.

_Q_. He would soon teach her to talk of blasphemies; he saw that her
tongue was well hung; but she must answer the questions he asked her, and
say nothing more. The question was not _what_ good she had done to the
poor, but _wherewithal_ she had done it; she must now show how she and her
father had of a sudden grown so rich that she could go pranking about in
silken raiment, whereas she used to be so very poor?

Hereupon she looked towards me, and said, "Father, shall I tell?"
Whereupon I answered, "Yes, my child, now thou must openly tell all, even
though we thereby become beggars." She accordingly told how, when our need
was sorest, she had found the amber, and how much we had gotten for it
from the Dutch merchants.

_Q_. What were the names of these merchants?

_R_. Dieterich von Pehnen and Jakob Kiekebusch; but, as we have heard from
a schipper, they since died of the plague at Stettin.

_Q_. Why had we said nothing of such a godsend?

_R_. Out of fear of our enemy the Sheriff, who, as it seemed, had
condemned us to die of hunger, inasmuch as he forbade the parishioners,
under pain of heavy displeasure, to supply us with anything, saying, that
he would send them a better parson.