He was not mistaken. The editor of the Mercurius had been given small news to print since the glorious victory of the Saints at Marston Moor. The fall of York was daily expected, indeed he had already set the story in type and waited only for the messengers, but in the meantime there was not much to inflame London’s passions. Then, into his dusty, crowded office, came Faithful Unto Death with his account of Dorcas Scammell. The editor liked it.

The story was printed at great length. It told of the devil appearing in London and burning down part of Thames Street. It described the murder of Captain Samuel Scammell, “a doughtie warrior of ye Lord,” and the editor commissioned a woodcut that showed Dorcas Scammell’s cat tearing the throat from an armed man whose sword was being restrained by a leering Satan. Campion, nails held out like claws, urged the cat on. The artist gave her black hair, a sharp nose, and missing teeth.

The story then paid tribute to Ebenezer Slythe who had “putte familie love aside, preferring the Love of Almightie God, and in Sorrow and Pain broughte His Sister from Lazen,” yet that brief acknowledgment of his patron was as nothing compared to the glory given to himself by the Reverend Faithful Unto Death Hervey. He had written his account in the third person, and it dwelt lovingly on his discovery of her witchcraft, of the Devil’s mark, and how he had pinioned her to the floor “strengthened by the strength of Him who is Mightier than the Devil.” In his account, the Reverend Faithful Unto Death described the subduing of the witch as a titanic battle, a mighty foretaste of the clash between good and evil at Armageddon, but one which, strengthened by the Lord, he had won. Then, with a stroke of genius, he condemned Campion properly.

The Reverend Faithful Unto Death Hervey had been puzzled when Ebenezer insisted on forgetting the presence of the crucifix in the jewel about Campion’s neck. He had asked Ebenezer and the young man had smiled. “Don’t you think there are enough plums in the pie, Brother Hervey?” Brother Hervey did not. Catholicism was the matter which scared Londoners. Witchcraft was not common in the capital, happening more in the country areas, but if Faithful Unto Death could give London a witch who was also a Roman Catholic then he knew he could arouse the interest and fanaticism of the mob. That groundswell of public hate and indignation would carry Faithful Unto Death to fame.

Mercurius Britanicus revealed that Dorcas Scammell was a Roman Catholic. She bore, about her neck, a crucifix. “Itt was a strange Crucificks, that emblem of the Devil, that the Witch wore. She was att pains to Conceal it, to which end it had beene cunningly hidden within a jewelled Scale so that noe man might Perceive its proper nature. Yet Almightie God in His goodnesse Revealed it to His Servant Faithful Unto Death Hervey and thus Defeated the Wiles of the Evil One as Wee praye He will continue so to doe.”