The object, according to him, is invariably to
bring the bewitcher on the spot, and he always comes; but I am not clear
what happens to him when he appears. My informant added, however, that
it was believed that, unless the bewitcher got possession of the heart
of the burning beast, he lost all his power of bewitching."[757]
[Magic sympathy between the witch and the bewitched animal.]
These statements shew that in the Isle of Man the sympathetic relation
between the witch and his or her animal victim is believed to be so
close that by burning the animal you compel the witch to appear. The
original idea may have been that, by virtue of a magic sympathy which
binds the two together, whatever harm you do to the animal is felt by
the witch as if it were done to herself. That notion would fully explain
why Manx people used also to burn bewitched animals alive; in doing so
they probably imagined that they were simultaneously burning the witch
who had cast the spell on their cattle.
[Parallel belief in magic sympathy between the animal shape of a
were-wolf and his or her ordinary human shape: by wounding the wolf you
simultaneously wound the man or woman.]
This explanation of the reason for burning a bewitched animal, dead or
alive, is confirmed by the parallel belief concerning were-wolves. It is
commonly supposed that certain men and women can transform themselves by
magic art into wolves or other animals, but that any wound inflicted on
such a transformed beast (a were-wolf or other were-animal) is
simultaneously inflicted on the human body of the witch or warlock who
had transformed herself or himself into the creature.
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