In the version quoted in Scottish Fairy and Folk Tales (1901), citing Henderson, Laird Harry Gilles of Littledean loved hunting. One day his dogs gave up chasing a hare, and enraged, he swore the animal must be one of the witches of Maxton. At once hares appeared all round him, springing over his saddle, though none of his hounds would chase them. He jumped down and killed the dogs in his anger, all but one black hound, which then ran down the largest hare and drove her towards him. He caught her forepaw and cut it off with his hunting knife, and all the hares vanished.
Next morning he heard that a woman in Maxton had lost her arm in some unaccountable way. He went to her house and took out the hare's foot from his pocket, where it had turned into a woman's hand and arm, and it fitted the stump. She confessed, and was drowned for witchcraft in the well that same day by the young men of Maxton.
It is a folk tale and not a trial record, and I have found no court case behind it. The killing of an accused woman is described as tradition, and the pin marks Maxton village, not any known well.
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