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Title: Salem Witchcraft, Volumes I and II
       With an Account of Salem Village and a History of Opinions
       on Witchcraft and Kindred Subjects

Author: Charles Upham

Release Date: February 24, 2006 [EBook #17845]

Language: English

Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1

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AMERICAN CLASSICS

SALEM WITCHCRAFT

_With an Account of Salem Village
and
A History of Opinions on
Witchcraft and Kindred Subjects_


CHARLES W. UPHAM


[Illustration: [autograph] Charles W. Upham.]


_Volume I_


FREDERICK UNGAR PUBLISHING CO.

_New York_

[Transcriber's Note: Originally published 1867]

_Fourth Printing, 1969_

_Printed in the United States of America_

Library of Congress Catalog Card No. 59-10887

[Illustration: THE TOWNSEND BISHOP HOUSE.--VOL. I., 70, 96;
VOL. II., 294, 467.]




DEDICATED

TO

OLIVER WENDELL HOLMES,

PROFESSOR OF ANATOMY AND PHYSIOLOGY IN

HARVARD UNIVERSITY.




CONTENTS.


VOLUME I.

                                    PAGE

PREFACE                   vii to xiv

MAP AND ILLUSTRATIONS      xv to xvii

INDEX TO THE MAP           xix to xxvii

GENERAL INDEX             xxix to xl

INTRODUCTION                 1 to 12

PART FIRST.--SALEM VILLAGE  12 to 322

PART SECOND.--WITCHCRAFT   325 to 469


VOLUME II.

                                                PAGE

PART THIRD.--WITCHCRAFT AT SALEM VILLAGE  1 to 444

SUPPLEMENT                              447 to 522

APPENDIX                                525 to 553




PREFACE.


This work was originally constructed, and in previous editions
appeared, in the form of Lectures. The only vestiges of that form, in
its present shape, are certain modes of expression. The language
retains the character of an address by a speaker to his hearers; being
more familiar, direct, and personal than is ordinarily employed in the
relations of an author to a reader.

The former work was prepared under circumstances which prevented a
thorough investigation of the subject. Leisure and freedom from
professional duties have now enabled me to prosecute the researches
necessary to do justice to it.

The "Lectures on Witchcraft," published in 1831, have long been out of
print. Although frequently importuned to prepare a new edition, I was
unwilling to issue again what I had discovered to be an insufficient
presentation of the subject. In the mean time, it constantly became
more and more apparent, that much injury was resulting from the want
of a complete and correct view of a transaction so often referred to,
and universally misunderstood.

The first volume of this work contains what seems to me necessary to
prepare the reader for the second, in which the incidents and
circumstances connected with the witchcraft prosecutions in 1692, at
the village and in the town of Salem, are reduced to chronological
order, and exhibited in detail.

As showing how far the beliefs of the understanding, the perceptions
of the senses, and the delusions of the imagination, may be
confounded, the subject belongs not only to theology and moral and
political science, but to physiology, in its original and proper use,
as embracing our whole nature; and the facts presented may help to
conclusions relating to what is justly regarded as the great mystery
of our being,--the connection between the body and the mind.

It is unnecessary to mention the various well-known works of authority
and illustration, as they are referred to in the text. But I cannot
refrain from bearing my grateful testimony to the value of the
"Collections of the Massachusetts Historical Society" and the
"New-England Historical and Genealogical Register." The "Historical
Collections" and the "Proceedings" of the Essex Institute have
afforded me inestimable assistance. Such works as these are providing
the materials that will secure to our country a history such as no
other nation can have. Our first age will not be shrouded in darkness
and consigned to fable, but, in all its details, brought within the
realm of knowledge. Every person who desires to preserve the memory of
his ancestors, and appreciate the elements of our institutions and
civilization, ought to place these works, and others like them, on the
shelves of his library, in an unbroken and continuing series. A debt
of gratitude is due to the earnest, laborious, and disinterested
students who are contributing the results of their explorations to the
treasures of antiquarian and genealogical learning which accumulate in
these publications.

A source of investigation, especially indispensable in the preparation
of the present work, deserves to be particularly noticed. In 1647, the
General Court of Massachusetts provided by law for the taking of
testimony, in all cases, under certain regulations, in the form of
depositions, to be preserved _in perpetuam rei memoriam_. The evidence
of witnesses was prepared in writing, beforehand, to be used at the
trials; they to be present at the time, to meet further inquiry, if
living within ten miles, and not unavoidably prevented. In a capital
case, the presence of the witness, as well as his written testimony,
was absolutely required. These depositions were lodged in the files,
and constitute the most valuable materials of history. In our day,
the statements of witnesses ordinarily live only in the memory of
persons present at the trials, and are soon lost in oblivion. In cases
attracting unusual interest, stenographers are employed to furnish
them to the press. There were no newspaper reporters or "court
calendars" in the early colonial times; but these depositions more
than supply their place. Given in, as they were, in all sorts of
cases,--of wills, contracts, boundaries and encroachments, assault and
battery, slander, larceny, &c., they let us into the interior, the
very inmost recesses, of life and society in all their forms. The
extent to which, by the aid of WILLIAM P. UPHAM, Esq., of
Salem, I have drawn from this source is apparent at every page.

A word is necessary to be said relating to the originals of the
documents that belong to the witchcraft proceedings. They were
probably all deposited at the time in the clerk's office of Essex
County. A considerable number of them were, from some cause,
transferred to the State archives, and have been carefully preserved.
Of the residue, a very large proportion have been abstracted from time
to time by unauthorized hands, and many, it is feared, destroyed or
otherwise lost. Two very valuable parcels have found their way into
the libraries of the Massachusetts Historical Society and the Essex
Institute, where they are faithfully secured. A few others have come
to light among papers in the possession of individuals. It is to be
hoped, that, if any more should be found, they will be lodged in some
public institution; so that, if thought best, they may all be
collected, arranged, and placed beyond wear, tear, and loss, in the
perpetual custody of type.

The papers remaining in the office of the clerk of this county were
transcribed into a volume a few years since; the copyist supplying,
conjecturally, headings to the several documents. Although he executed
his work in an elegant manner, and succeeded in giving correctly many
documents hard to be deciphered, such errors, owing to the condition
of the papers, occurred in arranging them, transcribing their
contents, and framing their headings, that I have had to resort to the
originals throughout.

As the object of this work is to give to the reader of the present day
an intelligible view of a transaction of the past, and not to
illustrate any thing else than the said transaction, no attempt has
been made to preserve the orthography of that period. Most of the
original papers were written without any expectation that they would
ever be submitted to inspection in print; many of them by plain
country people, without skill in the structure of sentences, or regard
to spelling; which, in truth, was then quite unsettled. It is no
uncommon thing to find the same word spelled differently in the same
document. It is very questionable whether it is expedient or just to
perpetuate blemishes, often the result of haste or carelessness,
arising from mere inadvertence. In some instances, where the interest
of the passage seemed to require it, the antique style is preserved.
In no case is a word changed or the structure altered; but the now
received spelling is generally adopted, and the punctuation made to
express the original sense.

It is indeed necessary, in what claims to be an exact reprint of an
old work, to imitate its orthography precisely, even at the expense of
difficulty in apprehending at once the meaning, and of perpetuating
errors of carelessness and ignorance. Such modern reproductions are
valuable, and have an interest of their own. They deserve the favor of
all who desire to examine critically, and in the most authentic form,
publications of which the original copies are rare, and the earliest
editions exhausted. The enlightened and enterprising publishers who
are thus providing facsimiles of old books and important documents of
past ages ought to be encouraged and rewarded by a generous public.
But the present work does not belong to that class, or make any
pretensions of that kind.

My thanks are especially due to the Hon. ASAHEL HUNTINGTON, clerk of
the courts in Essex County, for his kindness in facilitating the use
of the materials in his office; to the Hon. OLIVER WARNER, secretary
of the Commonwealth, and the officers of his department; and to
STEPHEN N. GIFFORD, Esq., clerk of the Senate.

DAVID PULSIFER, Esq., in the office of the Secretary of
State, is well known for his pre-eminent skill and experience in
mastering the chirography of the primitive colonial times, and
elucidating its peculiarities. He has been unwearied in his labors,
and most earnest in his efforts, to serve me.

Mr. SAMUEL G. DRAKE, who has so largely illustrated our
history and explored its sources, has, by spontaneous and considerate
acts of courtesy rendered me important help. Similar expressions of
friendly interest by Mr. WILLIAM B. TOWNE, of Brookline,
Mass.; Hon. J. HAMMOND TRUMBULL, of Hartford, Conn.; and
GEORGE H. MOORE, Esq., of New-York City,--are gratefully
acknowledged.

SAMUEL P. FOWLER, Esq., of Danvers, generously placed at my
disposal his valuable stores of knowledge relating to the subject. The
officers in charge of the original papers, in the Historical Society
and the Essex Institute, have allowed me to examine and use them.

I cordially express my acknowledgments to the Hon. BENJAMIN F. BROWNE,
of Salem, who, retired from public life and the cares of business, is
giving the leisure of his venerable years to the collection,
preservation, and liberal contribution of an unequalled amount of
knowledge respecting our local antiquities.

CHARLES W. PALFRAY, Esq., while attending the General Court
as a Representative of Salem, in 1866, gave me the great benefit of
his explorations among the records and papers in the State House.

Mr. MOSES PRINCE, of Danvers Centre, is an embodiment of the
history, genealogy, and traditions of that locality, and has taken an
active and zealous interest in the preparation of this work.
ANDREW NICHOLS, Esq., of Danvers, and the family of the late
Colonel PERLEY PUTNAM, of Salem, also rendered me much aid.

I am indebted to CHARLES DAVIS, Esq., of Beverly, for the use
of the record-book of the church, composed of "the brethren and
sisters belonging to Bass River," gathered Sept. 20, 1667, now the
First Church of Beverly; and to JAMES HILL, Esq., town-clerk
of that place, for access to the records in his charge.

To GILBERT TAPLEY, Esq., chairman of the committee of the
parish, and AUGUSTUS MUDGE, Esq., its clerk, and to the Rev.
Mr. RICE, pastor of the church, at Danvers Centre, I cannot
adequately express my obligations. Without the free use of the
original parish and church record-books with which they intrusted me,
and having them constantly at hand, I could not have begun adequately
to tell the story of Salem Village or the Witchcraft Delusion.

C.W.U.




MAP AND ILLUSTRATIONS.


The map, based upon various local maps and the Coast-Survey chart, is
the result of much personal exploration and perambulation of the
ground. It may claim to be a very exact representation of many of the
original grants and farms. The locality of the houses, mills, and
bridges, in 1692, is given in some cases precisely, and in all with
near approximation. The task has been a difficult one. An original
plot of Governor Endicott's Ipswich River grant, No. III., is in the
State House, and one of the Swinnerton grant, No. XIX., in the Salem
town-books. Neither of them, however, affords elements by which to
establish its exact location. A plot of the Townsend Bishop grant, No.
XX., as its boundaries were finally determined, is in the State House,
and another of the same in the court-files of the county. This gives
one fixed and known point, Hadlock's Bridge, from which, following the
lines by points of compass and distances, as indicated on the plot and
described in the Colonial Records, all the sides of the grant are laid
out with accuracy, and its place on the map determined with absolute
certainty. A very perfect and scientifically executed plan of a part
of the boundary between Salem and Reading in 1666 is in the State
House; of which an exact tracing was kindly furnished by Mr. H.J.
COOLIDGE, of the Secretary of State's office. It gives two of the
sides of the Governor Bellingham grant, No. IV., in such a manner as
to afford the means of projecting it with entire certainty, and fixing
its locality. There are no other plots of original or early grants or
farms on this territory; but, starting from the Bishop and Bellingham
grants thus laid out in their respective places, by a collation of
deeds of conveyance and partition on record, with the aid of portions
of the primitive stone-walls still remaining, and measurements resting
on permanent objects, the entire region has been reduced to a
demarkation comprehending the whole area. The locations of
then-existing roads have been obtained from the returns of laying-out
committees, and other evidence in the records and files. The
construction of the map, in all its details, is the result of the
researches and labors of W.P. UPHAM.

The death-warrant is a photograph by E.R. PERKINS, of Salem.
The original, among the papers on file in the office of the clerk of
the courts of Essex County, having always been regarded as a great
curiosity, has been subjected to constant handling, and become much
obscured by dilapidation. The letters, and in some instances entire
words, at the end of the lines, are worn off. To preserve it, if
possible, from further injury, it has been pasted on cloth. Owing to
this circumstance, and the yellowish hue to which the paper has faded,
it does not take favorably by photograph; but the exactness of
imitation, which can only thus be obtained with absolute certainty, is
more important than any other consideration. Only so much as contains
the body of the warrant, the sheriff's return, and the seal, are
given. The tattered margins are avoided, as they reveal the cloth,
and impair the antique aspect of the document. The original is slowly
disintegrating and wasting away, notwithstanding the efforts to
preserve it; and its appearance, as seen to-day, can only be
perpetuated in photograph. The warrant is reduced about one-third, and
the return one-half.

The Townsend Bishop house and the outlines of Witch Hill are from
sketches by O.W.H. UPHAM. The English house is from a drawing
made on the spot by J.R. PENNIMAN of Boston, in 1822, a few
years before its demolition, for the use of which I am indebted to
JAMES KIMBALL, Esq., of Salem. The view of Salem Village and
of the Jacobs' house are reduced, by O.W.H. UPHAM, from
photographs by E.R. PERKINS.

The map and other engravings, including the autographs, were all
delineated by O.W.H. UPHAM.

[Illustration: [map]]




INDEX TO THE MAP.


DWELLINGS IN 1692.

     [The Map shows all the houses standing in 1692 within the
     bounds of Salem Village; some others in the vicinity are
     also given. The houses are numbered on the Map with Arabic
     numerals, 1, 2, 3, &c., beginning at the top, and proceeding
     from left to right. In the following list, against each
     number, is given the name of the occupant in 1692, and, in
     some cases, that of the recent occupant or owner of the
     locality is added in parenthesis.]


ABBREVIATIONS USED IN THIS LIST.

_s._ The same house believed to be still standing.

_s.m._ The same house standing within the memory of persons now
living.

_t.r._ Traces of the house remain.

_c._ The site given is conjectural.


1. John Willard. _c._

2. Isaac Easty.

3. Francis Peabody. _c._

4. Joseph Porter. (John Bradstreet.)

5. William Hobbs. _t.r._

6. John Robinson.

7. William Nichols. _t.r._

8. Bray Wilkins. _c._

9. Aaron Way. (A. Batchelder.)

10. Thomas Bailey.

11. Thomas Fuller, Sr. (Abijah Fuller.)

12. William Way.

13. Francis Elliot. _c._

14. Jonathan Knight. _c._

15. Thomas Cave. (Jonathan Berry.)

16. Philip Knight. (J.D. Andrews.)

17. Isaac Burton.

18. John Nichols, Jr. (Jonathan Perry and Aaron Jenkins.) _s._

19. Humphrey Case. _t.r._

20. Thomas Fuller, Jr. (J.A. Esty.) _s._

21. Jacob Fuller.

22. Benjamin Fuller.

23. Deacon Edward Putnam. _s.m._

24. Sergeant Thomas Putnam. (Moses Perkins.) _s._

25. Peter Prescot. (Daniel Towne.)

26. Ezekiel Cheever. (Chas. P. Preston.) _s.m._

27. Eleazer Putnam. (John Preston.) _s.m._

28. Henry Kenny.

29. John Martin. (Edward Wyatt.)

30. John Dale. (Philip H. Wentworth.)

31. Joseph Prince. (Philip H. Wentworth.)

32. Joseph Putnam. (S. Clark.) _s._

33. John Putnam 3d.

34. Benjamin Putnam.

35. Daniel Andrew. (Joel Wilkins.)

36. John Leach, Jr. _c._

37. John Putnam, Jr. (Charles Peabody.)

38. Joshua Rea. (Francis Dodge.) _s._

39. Mary, wid. of Thos. Putnam. (William R. Putnam.) _s._

     [Birthplace of Gen. Israel Putnam. Gen. Putnam also lived in
     a house, the cellar and well of which are still visible,
     about one hundred rods north of this, and just west of the
     present dwelling of Andrew Nichols.]

40. Alexander Osburn and James Prince. (Stephen Driver.) _s._

41. Jonathan Putnam. (Nath. Boardman.) _s._

42. George Jacobs, Jr.

43. Peter Cloyse. _t.r._

44. William Small. _s.m._

45. John Darling. (George Peabody.) _s.m._

46. James Putnam. (Wm. A. Lander.) _s.m._

47. Capt. John Putnam. (Wm. A. Lander.)

48. Daniel Rea. (Augustus Fowler.) _s._

49. Henry Brown.

50. John Hutchinson. (George Peabody.) _t.r._

51. Joseph Whipple. _s.m._

52. Benjamin Porter. (Joseph S. Cabot.)

53. Joseph Herrick. (R.P. Waters.)

54. John Phelps. _c._

55. George Flint. _c._

56. Ruth Sibley. _s.m._

57. John Buxton.

58. William Allin.

59. Samuel Brabrook. _c._

60. James Smith.

61. Samuel Sibley. _t.r._

62. Rev. James Bayley. (Benjamin Hutchinson.)

63. John Shepherd. (Rev. M.P. Braman.)

64. John Flint.

65. John Rea. _s.m._

66. Joshua Rea. (Adam Nesmith.) _s.m._

67. Jeremiah Watts.

68. Edward Bishop, the sawyer. (Josiah Trask.)

69. Edward Bishop, husbandman.

70. Capt. Thomas Rayment.

71. Joseph Hutchinson, Jr. (Job Hutchinson.)

72. William Buckley.

73. Joseph Houlton, Jr. _t.r._

74. Thomas Haines. (Elijah Pope.) _s._

75. John Houlton. (F.A. Wilkins.) _s._

76. Joseph Houlton, Sr. (Isaac Demsey.)

77. Joseph Hutchinson, Sr. _t.r._

78. John Hadlock. (Saml. P. Nourse.) _s.m._

79. Nathaniel Putnam. (Judge Putnam.) _t.r._

80. Israel Porter. _s.m._

81. James Kettle.

82. Royal Side Schoolhouse.

83. Dr. William Griggs.

84. John Trask. (I. Trask.) _s._

85. Cornelius Baker.

86. Exercise Conant. (Subsequently, Rev. John Chipman.)

87. Deacon Peter Woodberry. _t.r._

88. John Rayment, Sr. (Col. J.W. Raymond.)

89. Joseph Swinnerton. (Nathl. Pope.)

90. Benjamin Hutchinson. _s.m._

91. Job Swinnerton. (Amos Cross.)

92. Henry Houlton. (Artemas Wilson.)

93. Sarah, widow of Benjamin Houlton. (Judge Houlton.) _s._

94. Samuel Rea.

95. Francis Nurse. (Orin Putnam.) _s._

96. Samuel Nurse. (E.G. Hyde.) _s._

97. John Tarbell. _s._

98. Thomas Preston.

99. Jacob Barney.

100. Sergeant John Leach, Sr. (George Southwick.) _s.m._

101. Capt. John Dodge, Jr. (Charles Davis.) _t.r._

102. Henry Herrick. (Nathl. Porter.)

     [This had been the homestead of his father, Henry Herrick.]

103. Lot Conant.

     [This was the homestead of his father, Roger Conant.]

104. Benjamin Balch, Sr. (Azor Dodge.) _s._

     [This was the homestead of his father, John Balch.]

105. Thomas Gage. (Charles Davis.) _s._

106. Families of Trask, Grover, Haskell, and Elliott.

107. Rev. John Hale.

108. Dorcas, widow of William Hoar.

109. William and Samuel Upton. _c._

110. Abraham and John Smith. (J. Smith.) _s._

     [This had been the homestead of Robert Goodell.]

111. Isaac Goodell. (Perley Goodale.)

112. Abraham Walcot. (Jasper Pope.) _s.m._

113. Zachariah Goodell. (Jasper Pope.)

114. Samuel Abbey.

115. John Walcot.

116. Jasper Swinnerton. _s.m._

117. John Weldon. Captain Samuel Gardner's farm. (Asa Gardner.)

118. Gertrude, widow of Joseph Pope. (Rev. Willard Spaulding.) _s.m._

119. Capt. Thomas Flint. _s._

120. Joseph Flint. _s._

121. Isaac Needham. _c._

122. The widow Sheldon and her daughter Susannah.

123. Walter Phillips. (F. Peabody, Jr.)

124. Samuel Endicott. _s.m._

125. Families of Creasy, King, Batchelder, and Howard.

126. John Green. (J. Green) _s._

127. John Parker.

128. Giles Corey. _t.r._

129. Henry Crosby.

130. Anthony Needham, Jr. (E. and J.S. Needham.)

131. Anthony Needham, Sr.

132. Nathaniel Felton. (Nathaniel Felton.) _s._

133. James Houlton. (Thorndike Procter.)

134. John Felton.

135. Sarah Phillips.

136. Benjamin Scarlett. (District Schoolhouse No. 6.)

137. Benjamin Pope.

138. Robert Moulton. (T. Taylor.) _c._

139. John Procter.

140. Daniel Epps. _c._

141. Joseph Buxton. _c._

142. George Jacobs, Sr. (Allen Jacobs.) _s._

143. William Shaw.

144. Alice, widow of Michael Shaflin. (J. King.)

145. Families of Buffington, Stone, and Southwick.

146. William Osborne.

147. Families of Very, Gould, Follet, and Meacham.

+ Nathaniel Ingersoll.

¶ Rev. Samuel Parris. _t.r._

[Symbol: box] Captain Jonathan Walcot. _t.r._


TOWN OF SALEM.

     [For the sites of the following dwellings, &c., referred to
     in the book, see the small capitals in the lower right-hand
     corner of the Map.]

A. Jonathan Corwin.
B. Samuel Shattock, John Cook, Isaac Sterns, John Bly.
C. Bartholomew Gedney.
D. Stephen Sewall.
E. Court House.
F. Rev. Nicholas Noyes.
G. John Hathorne.
H. George Corwin, High-sheriff.
I. Bridget Bishop.
J. Meeting-house.
K. Gedney's "Ship Tavern."
L. The Prison.
M. Samuel Beadle.
N. Rev. John Higginson.
O. Ann Pudeator, John Best.
P. Capt. John Higginson.
Q. The Town Common.
R. John Robinson.
S. Christopher Babbage.
T. Thomas Beadle.
U. Philip English.
W. Place of execution, "Witch Hill."

       *       *       *       *       *

GRANTS.

     NOTE.--The grants are numbered on the Map with
     Roman numerals, the bounds being indicated by broken lines.
     They were all granted by the town of Salem, unless otherwise
     stated.

I. JOHN GOULD.

Sold by him to Capt. George Corwin, March 29, 1674; and by Capt.
Corwin's widow sold to Philip Knight, Thomas Wilkins, Sr., Henry
Wilkins, and John Willard, March 1, 1690.

II. ZACCHEUS GOULD.

Sold by him to Capt. John Putnam before 1662; owned in 1692 by Capt.
Putnam, Thomas Cave, Francis Elliot, John Nichols, Jr., Thomas
Nichols, and William Way.

The above, together, comprised land granted by the General Court to
Rowley, May 31, 1652, and laid out by Rowley to John and Zaccheus
Gould.

III. GOV. JOHN ENDICOTT.

Ipswich-river Farm, 550 acres, granted by the General Court, Nov. 5,
1639; owned in 1692 by his grandsons, Zerubabel, Benjamin, and
Joseph.

The General Court, Oct. 14, 1651, also granted to Gov. Endicott 300
acres on the southerly side of this farm, in "Blind Hole," on
condition that he would set up copper-works. As the land appears
afterwards to have been owned by John Porter, it is probable that the
copper-mine was soon abandoned; but traces of it are still to be seen
there.

IV. GOV. RICHARD BELLINGHAM.

Granted by the General Court, Nov. 5, 1639.

V. FARMER JOHN PORTER.

Owned in 1692 by his son, Benjamin Porter. This includes a grant to
Townsend Bishop, sold to John Porter in 1648; also 200 acres granted
to John Porter, Sept. 30, 1647. That part in Topsfield was released by
Topsfield to Benjamin Porter, May 2, 1687.

VI. CAPT. RICHARD DAVENPORT.

Granted Feb. 20, 1637, and Nov. 26, 1638; sold, with the Hathorne
farm, to John Putnam, John Hathorne, Richard Hutchinson, and Daniel
Rea, April 17, 1662.

VII. CAPT. WILLIAM HATHORNE.

Granted Feb. 17, 1637; sold with the above.

VIII. JOHN PUTNAM THE ELDER.

This comprises a grant of 100 acres to John Putnam, Jan. 20, 1641; 80
acres to Ralph Fogg, in 1636; 40 acres (formerly Richard Waterman's)
to Thomas Lothrop, Nov. 29, 1642; and 30 acres to Ann Scarlett, in
1636. The whole owned by James and Jonathan Putnam in 1692.

IX. DANIEL REA.

Granted to him in 1636; owned by his grandson, Daniel Rea, in 1692.

X. REV. HUGH PETERS.

Granted Nov. 12, 1638; laid out June 15, 1674, being then in the
possession of Capt. John Corwin; sold by Mrs. Margaret Corwin to Henry
Brown, May 22, 1693.

XI. CAPT. GEORGE CORWIN.

Granted Aug. 21, 1648; sold (including 30 acres formerly John
Bridgman's) to Job Swinnerton, Jr., and William Cantlebury, Jan. 18,
1661.

XII. RICHARD HUTCHINSON, JOHN THORNDIKE, AND MR. FREEMAN.

Granted in 1636 and 1637; owned in 1692 by Joseph, son of Richard
Hutchinson, and by Sarah, wife of Joseph Whipple, daughter of John,
and grand-daughter of Richard Hutchinson.

XIII. SAMUEL SHARPE.

Granted Jan. 23, 1637; sold to John Porter, May 10, 1643; owned by his
son, Israel Porter, in 1692.

XIV. JOHN HOLGRAVE.

Granted Nov. 26, 1638; sold to Jeffry Massey and Nicholas Woodberry,
April 2, 1652; and to Joshua Rea, Jan. 1, 1657.

XV. WILLIAM ALFORD.

Granted in 1636; sold to Henry Herrick before 1653.

XVI. FRANCIS WESTON.

Granted in 1636; sold by John Pease to Richard Ingersoll and William
Haynes, in 1644.

XVII. ELIAS STILEMAN.

Granted in 1636; sold to Richard Hutchinson, June 1, 1648.

XVIII. ROBERT GOODELL.

504 acres laid out to him, Feb. 13, 1652: comprising 40 acres granted
to him "long since," and other parcels bought by him of the original
grantees; viz., Joseph Grafton, John Sanders, Henry Herrick, William
Bound, Robert Pease and his brother, Robert Cotta, William Walcott,
Edmund Marshall, Thomas Antrum, Michael Shaflin, Thomas Venner, John
Barber, Philemon Dickenson, and William Goose.

XIX. JOB SWINNERTON.

300 acres laid out, Jan. 5, 1697, to Job Swinnerton, Jr.; having been
owned by his father, by grant and purchase, as early as 1650.

XX. TOWNSEND BISHOP.

Granted Jan. 11, 1636; sold to Francis Nurse, April 29, 1678.

XXI. REV. SAMUEL SKELTON.

Granted by the General Court, July 3, 1632; sold to John Porter, March
8, 1649; owned by the heirs of John Porter in 1692.

XXII. JOHN WINTHROP, JR.

Granted June 25, 1638; sold by his daughter to John Green, Aug. 9,
1683.

XXIII. REV. EDWARD NORRIS.

Granted Jan. 21, 1640: sold to Elleanor Trusler, Aug. 7, 1654; to
Joseph Pope, July 18, 1664.

XXIV. ROBERT COLE.

Granted Dec. 21, 1635; sold to Emanuel Downing before July 16th, 1638;
conveyed by him to John and Adam Winthrop, in trust for himself and
wife during their lives, and then for his son, George Downing, July
23, 1644; leased to John Procter in 1666; occupied by him and his son
Benjamin in 1692.

XXV. COL. THOMAS REED.

Granted Feb. 16, 1636; sold to Daniel Epps, June 28, 1701, by Wait
Winthrop, as attorney to Samuel Reed, only son and heir of Thomas
Reed.

XXVI. JOHN HUMPHREY.

Granted by the General Court, Nov. 7, 1632, May 6, 1635, and March 12,
1638, 1,500 acres, part in Salem and part in Lynn; sold, on execution,
to Robert Saltonstall, Dec. 6, 1642, and by him sold to Stephen
Winthrop, June 7, 1645, whose daughters--Margaret Willie and Judith
Hancock--owned it in 1692: that part within the bounds of Salem is
given in the Map according to the report of a committee, July 11,
1695.

ORCHARD FARM.

Granted by the General Court to Gov. Endicott; owned by his grandsons,
John and Samuel, in 1692.

THE GOVERNOR'S PLAIN.

Granted to Gov. Endicott, Jan. 27, 1637, Dec. 23, 1639, and Feb. 5,
1644; including land granted under the name of "small lots."

JOHNSON'S PLAIN.

Granted to Francis Johnson, Jan. 23, 1637.


FARMS.

     [The bounds of farms are indicated by dotted lines, except
     where they coincide with the bounds of grants. The following
     are those given on the Map.]

_1st_, Between grants No. XI. and VII., and extending north of the
Village bounds, and south as far as Andover Road,--about 500 acres;
bought by Thomas and Nathaniel Putnam of Philip Cromwell, Walter Price
and Thomas Cole, Jeffry Massey, John Reaves, Joseph and John Gardner,
and Giles Corey; owned, in 1692, by Edward Putnam, Thomas Putnam, and
John Putnam, Jr. This includes also 50 acres granted to Nathaniel
Putnam, Nov. 19, 1649.

_2d_, At the northerly end of Grant No. VII., and extending north of
the Village bounds,--100 acres, known as the "Ruck Farm;" granted to
Thomas Ruck, May 27, 1654, and sold to Philip Knight and Thomas Cave,
July 24, 1672.

_3d_, North of the "Ruck Farm,"--100 acres; sold by William Robinson
to Richard Richards and William Hobbs, Jan. 1, 1660, and owned, in
1692, by William Hobbs and John Robinson.

_4th_, Next east, bounded northeast by Nichols Brook, and extending
within the Village bounds,--200 acres; granted to Henry Bartholomew,
and sold by him to William Nichols before 1652.

_5th_, East of the "Ruck Farm," and extending across the Village
bounds,--about 150 acres; granted to John Putnam and Richard Graves.
Part of this was sold by John Putnam to Capt. Thomas Lothrop, June 2,
1669, and was owned by Ezekiel Cheever in 1692: the rest was owned by
John Putnam.

_6th_, East of the above, and south of the Nichols Farm,--60 acres,
owned by Henry Kenny; also 50 acres granted to Job Swinnerton, given
by him to his son, Dr. John Swinnerton, and sold to John Martin and
John Dale, March 20, 1693.

_7th_, South of the above, and east of Grant No. VII.,--150 acres;
granted to William Pester, July 16, 1638, and sold by Capt. William
Trask to Robert Prince, Dec. 20, 1655.

_8th_, East of Grant No. VI., and extending north to Smith's Hill and
south to Grant No. IX.,--about 400 acres; granted to Allen Kenniston,
John Porter, and Thomas Smith, and owned, in 1692, by Daniel Andrew
and Peter Cloyse.

_9th_, East and southeast of Smith's Hill,--500 acres; granted to
Emanuel Downing in 1638 and 1649, and sold by him to John Porter,
April 15, 1650. John Porter gave this farm to his son Joseph, upon his
marriage with Anna daughter of William Hathorne.

_10th_, East of Frost-fish River, including the northerly end of
Leach's Hill, and extending across Ipswich Road,--about 250 acres,
known as the "Barney Farm;" originally granted to Richard Ingersoll,
Jacob Barney, and Pascha Foote.

_11th_, South of the "Barney Farm,"--about 200 acres; granted to
Lawrence, Richard, and John Leach; owned, in 1692, by John Leach.

_12th_, North of the "Barney Farm," and between grants No. XIII. and
XIV.,--about 250 acres, known as "Gott's Corner;" granted to Charles
Gott, Jeffry Massey, Thomas Watson, John Pickard, and Jacob Barney,
and by them sold to John Porter. (Recently known as the "Burley
Farm.")

_13th_, Eastward of the "Barney Farm,"--40 acres; originally granted
to George Harris, and afterwards to Osmond Trask; owned, in 1692, by
his son, John Trask.

_14th_, Next east, and extending across Ipswich Road,--40 acres;
granted to Edward Bishop, Dec. 28, 1646; owned, in 1692, by his son,
Edward Bishop, "the sawyer."

_15th_, At the northwest end of Felton's Hill, and extending across
the Village line,--about 60 acres; owned by Nathaniel Putnam.

_16th_, Southeast of Grant No. XXIII.,--a farm of about 150 acres;
owned by Giles Corey, including 50 acres bought by him of Robert
Goodell, March 15, 1660, and 50 acres bought by him of Ezra and
Nathaniel Clapp, of Dorchester, heirs of John Alderman, July 4, 1663.

_17th_, Northeast of the above,--150 acres granted to Mrs. Anna
Higginson in 1636; sold by Rev. John Higginson to John Pickering,
March 23, 1652; and by him to John Woody and Thomas Flint, Oct. 18,
1654; owned in 1692 by Thomas and Joseph Flint.




GENERAL INDEX.


A.

Abbey, Thomas, 129.

Abbey, Samuel, ii. 200, 272.

Abbot, Joseph, 123.

Abbot, Nehemiah, ii. 128, 133, 208.

Aborn, Samuel, Jr., ii. 272.

Addington, Isaac, ii. 102, 474.

Afflicted children, ii. 112, 384, 465.

Age, reverence for, 217.

Agrippa, Henry Cornelius, 367.

Alford, William, 66.

Alden, John, ii. 208, 243-247, 255, 453.

Allen, James, 78-84; ii. 89, 309, 494, 550-553.

Allin, James, ii. 226.

America, the peopling of, 395.

Amsterdam, 460.

Andover, ii. 247.

Andrew, Daniel, 155, 214, 251, 270, 296, 319; ii. 59, 187, 272, 497,
550.

Andrews, Ann, ii. 170, 319.

Andrews, John, ii. 306.

Andrews, John, Jr., ii. 306.

Andrews, Joseph, ii. 306.

Andrews, William, ii. 306.

Andrews, Robert, 123.

Andros, Sir Edmund, ii. 99, 154.

Appleton, Samuel, 119; ii. 102, 250.

Apon, Peter, 342.

Arnold de Villa Nova, 342.

Arnold, Margaret, 356.


B.

Babbage, Christopher, ii. 184.

Bachelder, Mark, 123.

Bacheler, John, ii. 475.

Bacon, Francis, 383.

Bacon, Roger, 341.

Badger, John, 445.

Baker, Eben, 123.

Bailey, John, ii. 89, 310.

Balch, John, 129.

Balch, Joseph, 105.

Baptism: its subjects, 307.

Barbadoes, 287.

Barker, Abigail, ii. 349, 404.

Barnard, Thomas, ii. 477.

Barnes, Benjamin, ii. 499.

Barney, Jacob, 40, 140.

Barrett, Thomas, ii. 353.

Bartholomew, Henry, 206.

Bartholomew, William, 428.

Barton, Elizabeth, 343.

Bassett, William, ii. 207.

Batter, Edmund, 40, 46, 57.

Baxter, Richard, 352, 353, 355, 401, 459.

Bayley, James, 245-255, 278;
  autograph, 280; ii. 514.

Bayley, Joseph, ii. 417.

Bayley, Thomas, 105.

Beadle, Samuel, 132; ii. 164, 181.

Beadle, Thomas, ii. 164, 170, 172.

Beale, William, ii. 141.

Beard, Thomas, 360.

Bears, 210.

Becket, John, ii. 267.

Beers, Richard, 104.

Bekker, Balthasar, 371.

Belcher, Jonathan, ii. 481.

Bellingham, Richard, 144.

Bentley, Richard, 372.

Bentley, William, ii. 143, 365, 377.

Best, John, ii. 329.

Best, John, Jr., ii. 329.

Bibber, Sarah, ii. 5, 205, 287.

Billerica, 9.

Bishop, Bridget, 143, 191-197; ii. 114, 125-128, 253;
  trial and execution, 256-267;
  her house, 463.

Bishop, Edward, 142; ii. 272.

Bishop, Edward, 142, 191; ii. 253, 267, 466.

Bishop, Edward, 141, 143; ii. 128, 135, 383, 465, 478.

Bishop, Edward, 143.

Bishop, John, 8.

Bishop, Richard, 142.

Bishop, Sarah, ii. 128, 135.

Bishop, Thomas, 206.

Bishop, Townsend, 40, 66;
  his house, 69-74, 96, 97;
  autograph, 279; ii. 294, 467.

Black, Mary, ii. 128, 136.

Blackstone, Sir William, ii. 517.

Blazdell, Henry, 430.

Blazed trees, 43.

Bly, John, ii. 261, 266.

Bly, William, ii. 266.

Bloody Brook, 105.

Booth, Elizabeth, ii. 4, 465.

Bowden, Michael, ii. 467.

Bowditch, Nathaniel, 172.

Boyle, Robert, 359.

Boynton, Joseph, ii. 553.

Bradbury, Thomas, ii. 224, 450.

Bradbury, Mary, ii. 208, 224-238;
  trial and condemnation, 324, 480.

Bradford, William, 122.

Bradstreet, Dudley, ii. 248, 347.

Bradstreet, John, 428.

Bradstreet, John, ii. 248, 347.

Bradstreet, Simon, 124, 139, 147;
  autograph 279, 451, 454; ii. 99, 455, 456.

Braman, Milton P., ii. 516.

Brattle, William, ii. 450.

Braybrook, Samuel, ii. 30, 72, 202.

Bridges, Edmund, 186; ii. 94.

Bridges, Mary, ii. 349.

Bridges, Sarah, ii. 349.

Bridgham, Joseph, ii. 553.

Bridle-path, 43.

Britt, Mary, ii. 38.

Broom-making, 202.

Browne, Charles, 429.

Browne, Christopher, 438.

Browne, Henry, Jr., 55.

Browne, Sir Thomas, 357.

Browne, William, Jr., 226, 271.

Buckley, Sarah, ii. 187, 199, 349.

Buckley, Thomas, 105.

Buckley, William, ii. 199.

Burial of those executed, ii. 266, 293, 301, 312, 320.

Burnham, John, ii. 306.

Burnham, John, Jr., ii. 306.

Burroughs, Charles, ii. 478.

Burroughs, George, 255, 278;
  autograph, 280;
  arrest and examination, ii. 140-163;
  trial and execution, 296-304, 319, 480, 482, 514.

Burt, Goody, 437.

Burton, John, 151.

Burton, Isaac, 152, 241.

Burton, Warren, 152.

Butler, Samuel, 352, 367.

Butler, William, ii. 306.

Buxton, Elizabeth, ii 272.

Buxton, John, 154, 262.

Byfield, Nathaniel, ii. 455.


C.

Calamy, Edmund, 283, 352.

Calef, Robert, ii. 32, 461, 490.

Candy, ii. 208, 215, 349.

Canoes, 61.

Cantlebury, William, 154.

Cantlebury, Ruth, ii. 18.

Capen, Joseph, ii. 326, 478.

Capital punishment, 377.

Cary, Elizabeth, ii. 208, 238, 453, 456.

Cary, Jonathan, ii. 238.

Carr, Ann, 253; ii. 465.

Carr, George, ii. 229.

Carr, James, ii. 232.

Carr, John, ii. 234.

Carr, Mary, 253.

Carr, Richard, ii. 230.

Carr, Sir Robert, 220.

Carr, William, ii. 234, 465.

Carrier, Martha,
  arrest and examination, ii. 208-215;
  trial and execution, 296, 480.

Carrier, Sarah, ii. 209.

Carter, Bethiah, ii. 187.

Cartwright, George, 220.

Casco, 256.

Case, Humphrey, 154.

Castle Island, 102.

Cave, Thomas, 154.

Chapman, Simon, ii. 219.

Charter of Massachusetts, 15.

Checkley, Samuel, ii. 553.

Cheever, Ezekiel, 111.

Cheever, Ezekiel, Jr., 113, 117, 226, 299; ii. 15, 40, 550.

Cheever, Peter, 226.

Cheever, Samuel, 113; ii. 193, 478, 550.

Cheever, Thomas, 113.

Chickering, Henry, 74.

Chipman, John, 130.

Choate, John, ii. 306.

Choate, Thomas, ii. 306.

Church, Benjamin, 123.

Church-of-England Canon, 347.

Churchill, Sarah, ii. 4, 166, 169.

Clark, Peter, 171; ii. 513, 516.

Clark, Thomas, 425.

Clark, William, 40.

Cleaves, William, ii. 38, 336.

Clenton, Rachel, ii. 198.

Cloutman, William, ii. 267.

Cloyse, Peter, 269; ii. 9, 59, 94, 465, 485.

Cloyse, Sarah, ii. 60, 94, 101, 111, 326.

Cobbye, Goodman, 431.

Code, Roman, 374.

Cogswell, John, ii. 306.

Cogswell, John, Jr., ii. 306.

Cogswell, Jonathan, ii. 306.

Cogswell, William, ii. 306.

Cogswell, William, Jr., ii. 306.

Coldum, Clement, ii. 191.

Cole, Eunice, 437.

Colman, Benjamin, ii. 505.

Colson, Elizabeth, ii. 187.

Conant, Lot, 133.

Conant, Roger, 60, 63, 129.

Confessors, ii. 350, 397.

Constables, 21.

Cook, Elisha, ii. 497.

Cook, Elizabeth, ii. 272.

Cook, Henry, 57.

Cook, John, ii. 261.

Cook, Isaac, ii. 272.

Cook, Samuel, 230.

Copper mine, 45.

Corey, Giles, 181-191, 205; ii. 38, 44, 52, 114, 121, 128;
  pressed to death, 334-343;
  excommunicated, 343, 480, 483.

Corey, Martha, 190; ii. 38-42;
  examination, 43-55, 111;
  trial and execution, 324, 458, 507.

Corlet, Elijah, 111.

Corwin, George, 57, 98, 226.

Corwin, George, ii. 252, 470, 472.

Corwin, George, ii. 484.

Corwin, John, 55.

Corwin, Jonathan, 101; ii. 11, 13;
  autograph, (29, 50, 69, 314,) 89, 101, 116, 157, 165, 250, 345;
  letter to, 447, 485, 538.

Court House, ii. 253.

Court, Special, ii. 251, 254.

Court, Superior, of Judicature, ii. 349.

Cox, Mary, ii. 198.

Cox, Robert, 123.

Cradock, Matthew, 17.

Crane River Bridge, 194.

Cranmer, Archbishop, 343.

Creesy, John, 141.

Crosby, Henry, ii. 38, 45, 50, 124.

Cullender, Rose, 355.


D.

Daland, Benjamin, 230.

Dane, Francis, ii. 223, 330, 459, 478.

Dane, Deliverance, ii. 404.

Dane, John, ii. 475.

Dane, Nathaniel, ii. 460.

Danforth, Thomas, 461; ii. 101, 250, 349, 354, 455, 456.

Darby, Mrs., 260.

Darling, James, ii. 201.

Davenport, John, 385.

Davenport, Nathaniel, 121, 125-128.

Davenport, Richard, 100-103.

Davenport, True Cross, 101, 126.

Davis, Ephraim, 429.

Davis, James, 429.

De La Torre, 361.

Deane, Charles, 50.

Death-warrant, ii. 266.

Deland, Thorndike, ii. 267.

Demonology, 325, 327.

Dennison, Daniel, 147.

Derich, Mary, ii. 208.

Devil, 325, 338, 387.

Dexter, Henry M., 123.

Dodge, Granville M., 232.

Dodge, John, 129.

Dodge, Josiah, 105.

Dodge, William, 130.

Dodge, William, Jr., 129.

Dole, John, 444.

Dolliver, Ann, ii. 194.

Dolliver, William, ii. 194.

Douglas, Ann, ii. 179.

Dounton, William, ii. 274.

Downer, Robert, ii. 413.

Downing, Emanuel, 38-46;
  autograph, 279.

Downing, Lucy, 39;
  autograph, 279.

Downing, Sir George, 46.

Drake, Samuel G, ii. 26.

Dreams, ii. 411.

Druillettes, Gabriel, 37.

Dudley, Joseph, ii. 480.

Dudley, Thomas, 23.

Dugdale, Richard, 354.

Dummer, Jeremiah, ii. 553.

Dunny, Amey, 355.

Dunton, John, ii. 90, 471.

Dustin, Hannah, 9.

Dustin, Lydia, ii. 208.

Dustin, Sarah, ii. 208.

Dutch, Martha, ii. 179.


E.

Eames, Daniel, ii. 331.

Eames, Rebecca, ii. 324, 480.

Easty, Isaac, 241; ii. 56, 478.

Easty, John, 241.

Easty, Mary, ii. 60;
  arrest, 128;
  examination, 137;
  re-arrest, 200-205;
  trial and execution, 324-327, 480.

Education, 111, 213-216, 280, 284; ii. 221.

Eliot, Andrew, ii. 475.

Eliot, Daniel, ii. 191.

Eliot, Edmund, ii. 412.

Eliot, Elizabeth, 126.

Emerson, John, 444, 462.

Emory, George, 57.

Endicott, John, 16-20, 23, 32-38, 45, 50, 74-79, 95, 454.

Endicott, John, Jr., 74-78.

Endicott, Samuel, 32; ii. 231, 272, 307.

Endicott, Zerubabel, 32, 35, 58, 84-95.

Endicott, Zerubabel, ii. 230.

English, Mary, ii. 128, 136;
  autograph, 313.

English, Philip, ii. 128, 140, 255;
  autograph, 313, 470, 473, 478, 482.

Essex, Flower of, 104.

Eveleth, Joseph, ii. 306, 475.


F.

Fairfax, Edward, 347.

Fairfield, William, ii. 267.

Farmer, Hugh, 335, 390.

Farrar, Thomas, ii. 187.

Farrington, John, 123.

Faulkner, Abigail, ii. 330, 476, 480.

Fellows, John, ii. 306.

Felt, David, ii. 267.

Felton, Benjamin, 56.

Felton, John, 236; ii. 307.

Felton, Nathaniel, ii. 272, 307.

Felton, Nathaniel, Jr., ii. 307.

Filmer, Sir Robert, 373.

Fireplaces, 202.

First Church in Salem, 243, 246, 271; ii. 257, 290, 483.

Fisk, Thomas, ii. 284, 475.

Fisk, Thomas, Jr., ii. 475.

Fisk, William, ii. 475.

Fitch, Jabez, ii. 477.

Fletcher, Benjamin, ii. 242.

Flint, John, 141, 154.

Flint, Samuel, 229.

Flint, Thomas, 123, 188, 226, 270.

Flood, John, ii. 208, 331.

Fogg, Ralph, 57.

Forests, 7, 27.

Fosdick, Elizabeth, ii. 208.

Foster, Abraham, ii. 384.

Foster, Ann, ii. 351, 398, 480.

Foster, Isaac, ii. 306.

Foster, John, ii. 466.

Foster, Reginald, ii. 306.

Fowler, Joseph, ii. 206.

Fowler, Philip, ii. 206.

Fowler, Samuel P., ii. 206.

Fox, Rebecca, ii. 188.

Foxcroft, Francis, ii. 455.

Frayll, Samuel, ii. 307.

Fuller, Benjamin, ii. 177.

Fuller, Jacob, 227.

Fuller, John, ii. 280.

Fuller, Samuel, ii. 177.

Fuller, Thomas, 187, 227, 250, 288; ii. 25.

Fuller, Thomas, Jr., 288; ii. 173.


G.

Gallop, John, 122.

Game, pursuit of, 208.

Gammon, ----, ii. 354.

Gardiner, Sir Christopher, 68.

Gardner, Joseph, 45, 122, 123, 124.

Gardner, Samuel, 45.

Gardner, Thomas, 45, 117.

Gaskill, Edward, ii. 307.

Gaskill, Samuel, ii. 307.

Gaule, John, 363.

Gedney, Bartholomew, 271; ii. 89, 243, 244, 250, 251, 254, 496.

Gedney, John, 158, 258; ii. 254.

Gedney, John, Jr., ii. 254.

Gedney, Susannah, ii. 254, 264.

General Court responsible for the executions, ii. 268.

Gerbert (Sylvester II.), 339.

Gerrish, Joseph, ii. 478, 550.

Gidding, Samuel, ii. 306.

Gifford, Margaret, 437.

Gingle, John, 144.

Glover, Goody, 454.

Gloyd, John, 186, 189.

Godfrey, John, 428-436.

Good, Dorcas, examination of, ii. 71, 111.

Good, Sarah, ii. 11;
  examination of, 12-17;
  trial and execution, 268, 269, 480.

Good, William, ii. 12, 481.

Goodell, Abner C., 141.

Goodell, Robert, 141.

Goodhew, William, ii. 306.

Goodwin, Mr., 454.

Governors of Massachusetts, time of election by charter, 17.

Governor's Plain, 24.

Gould, Nathan, 432.

Gould, Thomas, 188.

Grants, policy of, 22.

Gray, William, 130.

Graves, Thomas, ii. 455.

Green, Joseph, 9, 146, 170; ii. 199, 477, 506, 516.

Greenslit, John, ii. 298.

Greenslit, Thomas, ii. 298.

Griggs, William, ii. 4, 6.

Griggs, Goody, ii. 111.

Grover, Edmund, 31.


H.

Hakins, Nicholas, 123.

Hale, John, 195-197, 299, 452; ii. 43, 70, 257, 345, 475, 478, 550.

Hale, Sir Matthew, 355; ii. 269.

Halliwell, Henry, 364.

Handwriting, 214, 277-281; ii. 55.

Harding, Edward, 123.

Hardy, George, 443.

Harris, Benjamin, ii. 90.

Harris, George, 63.

Harsnett, Samuel, 369.

Hart, Thomas, ii. 352.

Hart, Elizabeth, ii. 187.

Harwood, John, ii. 275.

Hathorne, John, 40, 99, 271; ii. 11, 13, 20, 28;
  autograph, (29, 50, 69, 314), 43, 60, 89, 101, 102, 116, 241, 250.

Hathorne, William, 46, 57, 99.

Haverhill, 9.

Hawkes, Mrs., ii. 216, 349.

Haynes, John, 139.

Haynes, Richard, 138, 140.

Haynes, Thomas, 139, 260, 431; ii. 132, 465.

Haynes, William, 40, 138.

Hazeldon, John, 429.

Herrick, George, ii. 49, 60, 71, 202, 252, 274, 471.

Herrick, Henry, 66, 153.

Herrick, Henry, ii. 475.

Herrick, Joseph, 129, 141, 269, 270; ii. 12, 28, 272.

Hibbert's Philosophy of Apparitions, ii. 518.

Hibbins, Ann, 420-427, 453.

Higginson, John, 271, 273; ii. 89, 193, 478, 550.

Highways, 43, 212.

Highways, surveyors of, 21.

Hill, Captain, ii. 244.

Hoar, Dorcas, ii. 140, 144, 384, 480.

Hobbs, Abigail, ii. 114, 128, 480, 481.

Hobbs, Deliverance, ii. 128, 161.

Hobbs, William, ii. 114, 128, 130.

Holgrave, John, 63.

Holyoke, Edward, 156.

Holyoke, Edward Augustus, 156; ii. 377.

Hopkins, Matthew, 351.

Horace, 366.

Horse Bridge, 234.

Houchins, Jeremiah, 74.

Houlton, Benjamin, ii. 275, 280, 281.

Houlton, James, ii. 307.

Houlton, Joseph, 86, 147, 243, 270; ii. 272, 496.

Houlton, Joseph, Jr., 123; ii. 272.

Houlton, Samuel, 148, 223.

Houlton, Sarah, ii. 281, 495, 506.

Houlton, town of, 151.

Houses, 184.

How, Elizabeth, ii. 208;
  examination of, 216-223;
  trial and execution, 268, 270, 480.

How, James, Sr., ii. 221.

How, John, 241.

Howard, John, ii. 198.

Howard, Nathaniel, 141.

Hubbard, Elizabeth, ii. 4, 191.

Hubbard, William, ii. 193, 477.

Hudson, William, 425.

Hungerford, Earl of, 343.

Hunniwell, Richard, ii. 298.

Hunt, Ephraim, ii. 553.

Huskings, 201.

Hutchinson, Benjamin, 172; ii. 151, 197, 201.

Hutchinson, Edward, 425.

Hutchinson, Elisha, ii. 150.

Hutchinson, Israel, 223, 228.

Hutchinson, Joseph, 243, 250, 270, 285, 319; ii. 11, 28, 33, 272, 393,
545, 550.

Hutchinson, Lydia, ii. 272.

Hutchinson, Richard, 27, 40, 86, 137.

Hutchinson, Thomas, History of Massachusetts, 415.


I.

Indians, 7, 25, 62, 286.

Ingersoll, Hannah, 166, 261; ii. 192.

Ingersoll, John, 40, 172; ii. 171.

Ingersoll, Joseph, ii. 129.

Ingersoll, Nathaniel, 35, 86, 165-179, 225, 244, 249, 251, 259, 261;
  autograph, 280, 288, 294, 301, 303;
  ordination as deacon, 305; ii. 11, 33, 42, 60, 73, 100, 112, 114,
  128, 132, 140, 499.

Ingersoll, Sarah, ii. 169.

Ingersoll, Richard, 36, 40, 138.

Ingersoll's Point, 138.

Inquest, jury of, ii. 178.

Ipswich road, 43.

Ireson, Benjamin, ii. 208.

Iron works, 147.

Izard, Ann, ii. 520.


J.

Jackson, John, ii. 198, 223.

Jackson, John, Jr., ii. 198, 223.

Jacobs, George, 198; ii. 4;
  arrest and examination, 164-172, 274;
  execution, 296, 312, 382, 480.

Jacobs, George, Jr., 198; ii. 187.

Jacobs, Margaret, ii. 164, 172, 315, 349, 353, 466.

Jacobs, Rebecca, ii. 187, 349.

Jacobs, Thomas, ii. 207.

James I., 368, 375, 410.

Jewell, John, 345.

Jewett, Nehemiah, ii. 553.

Joan of Arc, 343.

Jones, Hugh, 91.

Jones, Margaret, 415, 453.

John Indian, ii. 2, 95, 106, 241.

Johnson, Elizabeth, ii. 349.

Johnson, Elizabeth, Jr., ii. 349.

Johnson, Francis, 40.

Johnson, Isaac, 121, 122.

Johnson, Samuel, 357.

Johnson, Captain, 425.

Jovius Paulus, 367.

Judges, ii. 354.

Jury to examine the bodies of prisoners, ii. 274.

Jury of trials, ii. 284, 474.


K.

Kembal, John, ii. 412.

Kenny, Henry, 251; ii. 61.

Kepler, John, 345.

King, Daniel, ii. 181.

King, Joseph, 105.

King, Margaret, 196.

Kircher, Athanasius, 388.

Kitchen, John, 205.

Knight, Charles, 123.

Knight, John, 138.

Knight, Jonathan, ii. 177.

Knight, Philip, ii. 177.

Knight, Walter, 35.

Knowlton, Joseph, ii. 220.


L.

Lacy, Mary, ii. 400, 480.

Lacy, Mary, Jr., ii. 349, 401.

Lamb, Dr., 348.

Land, policy concerning, 16, 22;
  given up to towns, 20;
  clearing of, 26;
  disposition of, to children, 158;
  value of, 159.

Landlord, 218.

Laodicea, Council of, 375.

Law under which the trials took place, ii. 256, 268, 360.

Lawson, Deodat, 268-284;
  autograph, 280; ii. 7, 70, 73;
  his sermon, 76-92, 515, 525-537.

Lawson, Thomas, 283.

Law-suits, 232.

Layman, Paul, 361.

Leach, John, 141.

Leach, Lawrence, 141.

Leach, Robert, 129.

Leach, Sarah, ii. 272.

Lecture-day, 313, 450; ii. 76.

Lewis, Mercy, ii. 4, 287;
  autograph, 313.

Lewis, Rev. Mr., 353.

Lexington, 229.

Lightning, 72.

Locke, John, 372.

Locker, George, ii. 12, 307.

Lothrop, Ellen, 111.

Lothrop, Thomas, 100, 103-117.

Louder, John, ii. 264.

Lovkine, Thomas, ii. 306.

Low, Thomas, ii. 306.

Luther, Martin, 344.


M.

Mackenzie, Sir George, 350.

Magistrates, ii. 354.

Manning, Jacob, ii. 142.

Maple-sugar, 203.

Marblehead, ii. 519.

March, John, ii. 234.

Marriage, early, 160; ii. 236.

Marsh, Samuel, ii. 307.

Marsh, Zachariah, ii. 307.

Marshall, Benjamin, ii. 306.

Marshall, Samuel, 122.

Marston, Mary, ii. 349.

Martin, Susannah, 427;
  arrest and examination, ii. 145;
  trial and execution, 268.

Mascon, Devil of, 359.

Mason, Thomas, ii. 267.

Maverick, Samuel, 220.

Maverick, Samuel, Jr., ii. 228.

Mather, Cotton, 112, 384, 391, 454; ii. 89, 211, 250, 257, 299, 341,
366, 487, 494, 503, 553.

Mather, Increase, ii. 89, 299, 308, 345, 404, 494, 553.

Mechanical occupations, 224.

Mede, Joseph, 394.

Medical profession, ii. 361.

Meeting, intermission of, on the Lord's Day, 207.

Meeting-house of Salem Village, 243, 244, 285.

Meeting-house of Salem Village, scenes at, 263; ii. 34, 60, 94, 510.

Meeting-house of First Church in Salem, scenes at, ii. 111, 257, 290.

Melancthon, Philip, 344.

Middlecot, Richard, ii. 553.

Milton, John, 387, 467.

Ministers, ii. 267, 362.

Minot, Stephen, 125.

Mirage, 386.

Mitchel, Jonathan, 434, 437.

Moody, Lady Deborah, 57, 183.

Moody, Joshua, ii. 309.

Moore, Captain, 187.

Moore, Caleb, 188.

Moore, Jane, 188.

More, Henry, 400.

Morrel, Robert, ii. 153, 191.

Morrell, Sarah, ii. 140, 144.

Morse, Anthony, 447.

Morse, Elizabeth, 449-453.

Morse, William, 438.

Morton, Charles ii. 89.

Mosely, Samuel, 121.

Moulton, John, ii. 38, 336, 478.

Moulton, Robert, 40.

Moulton, Robert, Jr., 40.

Moxon, George, 419.


N.

Narragansett expedition, 118-135.

Narragansett townships, 133.

Nauscopy, 386.

Navigation, early New-England, 440.

Neal, Joseph, ii. 164, 274.

Needham, Anthony, 155, 184, 226, 236; ii. 48.

Newbury, 9.

New-Haven Phantom-ship, 384.

New-York Negro Plot, ii. 437.

Newman, Antipas, 58.

New Salem, 149.

Newton, Thomas, ii. 254;
  autograph, 314.

Nichols, Isaac, ii. 177.

Nichols, John, 241, ii. 133.

Nichols, Richard, 220.

Nichols, William, 154.

Norfolk, old county of, ii. 228.

Norris, Edward, 57, 237.

Norris, Edward, Jr., 205.

Norton, John, 423, 425; ii. 450.

Noyes, Nicholas, 117, 271, 299; ii. 43, 48, 55, 89, 170, 172, 184,
245, 253, 269, 290, 292, 365, 485, 550;
  autograph, 314.

Numa Pompilius, 330.

Nurse, Francis, 79, 84, 91, 214, 287, 319, 320; ii. 9, 467.

Nurse, Rebecca, 80;
  her arrest and examination, ii. 56-71, 111, 136;
  trial, 268, 270-289;
  excommunication, 290;
  execution, 292, 480, 483.

Nurse, Samuel, 80; ii. 57, 288, 479, 485, 497, 506, 545-553.

Nurse, Sarah, 80; ii. 287, 467.


O.

Obinson, Mrs., ii. 456.

Ocular fascination, 412; ii. 520.

Oliver, Christian, ii. 267.

Oliver, Mary, 420.

Oliver, Peter, 425.

Oliver, Thomas, 143, 191; ii. 253, 267.

Orchard Farm, 24, 87.

Orne, John, 57.

Osborne, Hannah, ii. 272.

Osborne, William, 152, 227; ii. 272.

Osburn, Alexander, ii. 18.

Osburn, John, ii. 19.

Osburn, Sarah, ii. 11, 17;
  examination, 20;
  death, 32.

Osgood, Mary, ii. 349, 404, 406.

Osgood, William, 432.


P.

Page, Abraham, 139.

Paine, Elizabeth, ii. 208.

Paine, Stephen, ii. 208.

Paine, Robert, 423; ii. 449.

Palfrey, Peter, 63, 129.

Palfrey, John G., 125.

Palisadoes, 31.

Parker, Alice, ii. 179-185;
  trial and execution, 324.

Parker, John, ii. 179, 181.

Parker, John, 189; ii. 38, 48, 124.

Parker, Mary, trial and execution, ii. 324, 325, 480.

Parris, Elizabeth, ii. 3.

Parris, Samuel, 170, 172, 278;
  autograph, 280, 286-320; ii. 1, 7, 9, 25, 31, 43, 49, 55, 92, 275,
  290, 485-503, 515, 545-553.

Parris, Thomas, 286; ii. 499.

Parsonage of Salem Village, 243, 386; ii. 74, 466, 493.

Parsons, Hugh, 419.

Parsons, Mary, 418.

Partridge, John, ii. 150.

Payson, Edward, ii. 218, 494, 553.

Peabody, John, ii. 475.

Peach, Barnard, ii. 414.

Pease, Robert, ii. 208.

Peele, William, ii. 267.

Peine forte et dure, ii. 338, 484.

Peirce, Joseph, 123.

Pendleton, Bryan, 256.

Penn, William, 414.

Perkins, Isaac, ii. 306.

Perkins, Nathaniel, ii. 306.

Perkins, Thomas, ii. 475.

Perkins, William, 362.

Perley, Samuel, ii. 216.

Perley, Thomas, ii. 475.

Peters, Elizabeth, 50-53, 57.

Peters, Hugh, 47, 50, 51-59.

Pettingell, Richard, 40.

Phelps, Henry, 237.

Phelps, John, 187.

Phips, Sir William, 131, 451; ii. 99, 250;
  autograph, 314, 345.

Phips, Spencer, ii. 482.

Phillips, Margaret, ii. 272.

Phillips, Samuel, 299; ii. 218, 494, 553.

Phillips, Tabitha, ii. 272.

Phillips, Walter, ii. 272.

Pickering, John, 46.

Pickering, Timothy, 46, 227.

Pierpont, James, 384.

Pike, John, ii. 226, 229.

Pike, Robert, ii. 226, 228, 250, 449, 538-544.

Pikeworth, 123; ii. 329.

Pitcher, Moll, ii. 521.

Pit-saw, 191.

Poindexter, ii. 185.

Poland, James, 188.

Pope, Gertrude, 236.

Pope, Joseph, 237, 238; ii. 65, 496.

Pope Innocent VIII., 342.

Porter, Benjamin, 141.

Porter, Elizabeth, ii. 272.

Porter, Israel, 141; ii. 59, 272, 550.

Porter, John, 40, 136.

Porter, John, Jr., 219.

Porter, John, ii. 207.

Porter, Joseph, 270, 296, 319.

Porter, Moses, 223, 230.

Post, Hannah, ii. 349.

Post, Mary, ii. 349, 480.

Powell, Caleb, 439.

Pratt, Francis, 428.

Prescott, Peter, 129, 316; ii. 153.

Preston, Thomas, 80, 91; ii. 11, 57, 496, 550.

Price, Walter, 226.

Prince, James, ii. 17.

Prince, Joseph, ii. 17.

Prince, Robert, ii. 17.

Prison, ii. 254.

Procter, Benjamin, ii. 207.

Procter, Elizabeth, arrest and examination, ii. 101-111;
  trial and condemnation, 296, 312, 466.

Procter, John, 179, 184, 227; ii. 4, 106, 111;
  trial and execution, 296, 304-312;
  autograph, 313, 458, 480.

Procter, Joseph, ii. 306.

Procter, Sarah, ii. 207.

Procter, William, ii. 208, 311.

Procter's Corner, 49.

Pronunciation, ii. 233.

Pudeator, Ann, ii. 179, 185, 300;
  trial and execution, 324, 329.

Pudeator, Jacob, ii. 185, 329.

Puppets, 408, ii. 12, 266.

Putnam, Ann, 253; ii. 5, 61, 69, 74, 177, 229, 236, 276, 282, 465,
495, 506.

Putnam, Ann, Jr., 214; ii. 3, 8, 40, 190;
  autograph, 313, 341, 511, 509-512.

Putnam, Archelaus, 164.

Putnam, Benjamin, 164; ii. 72, 272, 481.

Putnam, Daniel, 164.

Putnam, David, 227.

Putnam, Edward, 8, 161-164, 288, 302; ii. 11, 40, 44, 60, 71, 203,
288, 465.

Putnam, Eleazer, 132; ii. 152.

Putnam, Enoch, 229.

Putnam, Holyoke, 9.

Putnam, Israel, 160, 164, 227, 238.

Putnam, James, ii. 506.

Putnam, Jeremiah, 229.

Putnam, John, 34, 40, 155.

Putnam, John, 34, 155, 157, 241, 250, 251, 258, 267, 270, 284, 287,
316, 317; ii. 272, 359, 496, 550.

Putnam, John, Jr., 259; ii. 4, 172, 202, 506.

Putnam, John, 3d, ii. 506.

Putnam, Jonathan, 269; ii. 60, 71, 201, 272.

Putnam, Joseph, 160, 296, 319; ii. 9, 272, 457, 497.

Putnam, Lydia, ii. 272.

Putnam, Miriam, ii. 295.

Putnam, Nathaniel, 84, 86, 155, 157, 186, 198, 236, 250, 288, 296;
ii. 33, 128, 178, 271.

Putnam, Orin, ii. 295.

Putnam, Perley, 230.

Putnam, Phinehas, ii. 295.

Putnam, Rebecca, 267; ii. 272, 359.

Putnam, Rufus, 227.

Putnam, Samuel, 223.

Putnam, Sarah, ii. 272.

Putnam, Susannah, 143.

Putnam, Thomas, 155, 226, 250, 251, 259;
  autograph, 279.

Putnam, Thomas, 129, 225, 227, 236, 253;
  autograph, 279, 281, 316; ii. 3, 4, 11, 28, 55, 140, 232, 341, 464,
  465, 506.

Putnam, William Lowell, 232.


Q.

Queen Elizabeth, 345.

Quick, John, 283.


R.

Rabbits, 209.

Raising of a house, 201.

Rawson, Edward, 425, 450.

Raymond, John, 66.

Raymond, John, 129, 134; ii. 465.

Raymond, John W., 232.

Raymond, Richard, 141.

Raymond, Thomas, 129, 133, 141.

Raymond, William, 129, 132, 143.

Raymond, William, Jr., ii. 192.

Rea, Bethiah, 113, 116.

Rea, Daniel, 40, 113, 140.

Rea, Daniel, Jr., 288; ii. 272.

Rea, Hepzibah, ii. 272.

Rea, Joshua, 114, 140, 141, 287, 288; ii. 272, 545.

Rea, Sarah, ii. 272.

Read, Christopher, 123.

Read, Thomas, 49.

Records of Salem Village, 269, 272, 273-278.

Redemptioners, ii. 18.

Reed, Nicholas, 8.

Reed, Philip, 437.

Reed, Wilmot, arrest, ii. 208;
  trial and execution, 324, 325.

Reinolds, Alexius, 91.

Remigius, 344.

Rice, Charles B., ii. 513.

Rice, Sarah, ii. 208.

Richards, John, ii. 251, 349.

Richardson, Mr., 442.

Richardson, Mary, 448.

Ring, Jarvis, ii. 414.

Rist, Nicholas, ii. 352.

Roads, 43.

Robinson, John, ii. 181, 184.

Rogers, John, ii. 477.

Rogers, Thomas, 443.

Rolfe, Benjamin, 9; ii. 478.

Roots, Susannah, ii. 207.

Ropes, Nathaniel, 237.

Rose, Richard, ii. 171.

Royal Neck, 58.

Ruck, Thomas, 57.

Rule, Margaret, ii. 489.

Russell, James, ii. 102.

Russell, William, 80.


S.

Salem Farms, 136.

Salem Village, 199, 216, 223, 224, 233, 234, 242, 248, 269-278, 298,
312, 321, 322; ii. 485, 513.

Saltonstall, Nathaniel, ii. 251, 455.

Satan, 325, 338.

Sargent, Peter, ii. 251.

Savage, James, 50, 384.

Saw-pit, 191.

Sawyers, 191.

Sayer, Samuel, ii. 475.

Scarlett, Benjamin, 32.

Science, physical, 380.

Scott, Margaret, trial and execution, ii. 324, 325.

Scott, Reginald, 368, 410.

Scott, Sir Walter, 335.

Scottow, Joshua, 424, 425; ii. 298.

Scriptures, King James's Translation of, 375.

Scruggs, Margery, 66.

Scruggs, Rachel, 65.

Scruggs, Thomas, 64, 130.

Sears, Ann, ii. 208.

Seating the meeting-house, 217; ii. 506.

Seely, Robert, 122.

Settlers, provision of land for, 16.

Sewall, Mitchel, ii. 481.

Sewall, Samuel, ii. 102, 111, 157, 251, 441, 497.

Sewall, Samuel, ii. 481.

Sewall, Stephen, 57; ii. 3, 230, 384, 487, 497.

Shakespeare, William, 379, 467.

Sharp, Samuel, 46, 57, 388.

Shattuck, Samuel, 193; ii. 180, 259.

Shaw, Israel, ii. 465.

Sheldon, Godfrey, 8.

Sheldon, Susannah, ii. 4, 322.

Shepard, John, ii. 465.

Shepard, Rebecca, ii. 275, 280.

Sherringham, Robert, 356.

Shippen, Mr., 261.

Ship Tavern, ii. 254.

Shirley, William, ii. 482.

Shovel-board, 196, 204.

Sibley, John, 141, 154.

Sibley, John L., 141.

Sibley, Mary, ii. 95, 97.

Sibley, Samuel, 259, 262; ii. 97, 465.

Sibley, William, 262; ii. 18.

Silsbee, Nathaniel, ii. 267.

Sinclair, George, 350.

Singletary, Jonathan, 433.

Skelton, Samuel, 57, 85.

Skerry, Henry, 259.

Sleighs, 203.

Small, Thomas, 154; ii. 19.

Smith, George, ii. 307.

Smith, Thomas, 105.

Soames, Abigail, ii. 208.

Soames, Joseph, 123.

Spaulding, Willard, 237.

Spencer, John, 432.

Spenser, Edmund, 346, 365.

Sprenger, James, 361.

Stacy, William, ii. 263.

Stearns, Isaac, ii. 263.

Stileman, Elias, 40, 86.

Stone, Samuel, ii. 307.

Story, Joseph, ii. 440.

Story, William, ii. 306.

Stoughton, William, 125; ii. 157, 250, 301, 349, 355.

Sunday patrol, 40.

Surey Demoniac, 354.

Sweden, King of, 344.

Swinnerton, Esther, ii. 272.

Swinnerton, Job, 140, 270.

Swinnerton, Job, ii. 272.

Swinnerton, Ruth, ii. 495.

Switchell, Abraham, 123.

Syllogism, 381.

Symmes, Thomas, ii. 478.

Symmes, Zachariah, ii. 478.

Symonds, John, ii. 377.

Symonds, Samuel, 433.

Symonds, William, 433.


T.

Tanner, Adam, 361.

Tarbell, John, 80, 91, 288; ii. 57, 287, 486, 497, 506, 545-553.

Taylor, Benjamin, 182.

Taylor, Zachary, 124.

Tears, trial by, 409.

Thacher, Mrs., ii. 345, 448, 453.

Thomasius, Christian, 373.

Thompson, William, ii. 306.

Tibullus, Elegy, 337.

Titcomb, Elizabeth, 444.

Tituba, ii. 2, 11;
  examination and confession, 23, 32, 255.

Tookey, Job,
  arrest, ii. 208;
  examination, 223, 349.

Toothacre, Mrs., ii. 208.

Topsfield, controversy with, 238.

Torrey, Samuel, ii. 494, 553.

Torrey, William, 450; ii. 553.

Towne, Jacob, 241; ii. 56.

Towne, John, 241; ii. 56.

Towne, Joseph, 241; ii. 56.

Towne, William, ii. 466.

Towns, 20.

Train-band, 100, 224.

Training-field, 176, 178, 225.

Trask, Edward, 105.

Trask, William, 34, 64, 129.

Travel, modes of, 43, 61, 203.

Troopers, company of, 226.

Trusler, Eleanor, 237.

Tucker, John, 444.

Tucker, Mary, 448.

Tufts, James, 105.

Turner, Sharon, 375.

Twiss, William, 395.

Tycho Brahe, 345.

Tyler, Hannah, ii. 349, 404.

Tyler, Mary, ii. 349, 404.

Tyng, Edward, 125.


U.

Upham, Phinehas, 118, 122.

Upton family, 155.

Urbain Grandier, 348.

Usher, Hezekiah, ii. 453.


V.

Varney, Thomas, ii. 306.

Verrin, Hilliard, 40.

Verrin, Joshua, 40.

Verrin, Nathaniel, 156, 287.

Verrin, Philip, 40, 63.

Verrin, Philip, Jr., 40.

Vigilance Committee, ii. 286.

Villalpando, Don Francisco Torreblanca, 361.

Virgil, 336, 413.


W.

Wade, Thomas, ii. 337.

Wadsworth, Benjamin, ii. 505.

Wadsworth, Benjamin, ii. 516.

Wagstaff, John, 370.

Wainwright, Simon, 9.

Walcot, Abraham, 188.

Walcot, Jonathan, 155, 225, 270; ii. 3, 100, 140, 464, 466.

Walcot, Jonathan, Jr., ii. 125, 550.

Walcot, Mary, ii. 3, 465.

Walker, Richard, ii. 207.

Walley, John, ii. 553.

Ward, George A., 98.

Wardwell, Mary, ii. 349.

Wardwell, Samuel, trial and execution, ii. 324, 384, 480.

Wardwell, Sarah, ii. 349.

Warren, Mary, ii. 4, 114, 128.

Warren, Sarah, ii. 17.

Wassalbe, Bridget, 191.

Waterman, Richard, 60.

Watson's Annals of Philadelphia, 414.

Watts, Isaac, ii. 516.

Watts, Jeremiah, 179.

Way, Aaron, 145; ii. 68, 177.

Way, William, ii. 493.

Weld, Daniel, 57.

Wells, town of, 256.

Wesley, John, ii. 518.

Westgate, John, ii. 181.

Weston, Francis, 60.

Wheelwright, John, ii. 228.

Whitaker, Abraham, 429.

White, James, ii. 306.

White, John, 389.

Whittier, John G., ii. 444.

Whittredge, Mary, ii. 187, 197, 199.

Wierus, John, 368, 376.

Wilds, John, ii. 128, 135.

Wilds, Sarah, arrest and examination, ii. 135;
  trial and execution, 268, 480.

Wilds, William, 143; ii. 135.

Wilderness, opening of, 26.

Wilkins, Benjamin, 227; ii. 173, 550.

Wilkins, Bray, 143-146, 214, 309; ii. 173, 174.

Wilkins, Daniel, ii. 174, 179.

Wilkins, Hannah, 309.

Wilkins, Henry, ii. 174.

Wilkins, Samuel, ii. 173.

Wilkins, Thomas, 154, 227, 316; ii. 491-495, 506, 546-553.

Willard, John, arrest, ii. 172-179;
  trial and execution, 321, 480.

Willard, Margaret, ii. 466.

Willard, Samuel, ii. 89, 289, 309, 494, 550-553.

Willard, Simon, ii. 210.

Williams, Abigail, ii. 3, 7, 46, 393.

Williams, Nathaniel, ii. 553.

Williams, Roger, 50, 56, 68.

Wilson, Robert, 105.

Wilson, Sarah, ii. 404.

Wills, 65, 75, 78, 92, 137, 162, 175, 425; ii. 304, 312, 511.

Wills Hill, 26, 144.

Winslow, Josiah, 119.

Winthrop, Fitz John, 54.

Winthrop, John, 17, 23, 39, 95, 454.

Winthrop, John, Jr., 39, 50, 58.

Winthrop, Wait, 54; ii. 251, 349, 497.

Wise, John, ii. 304, 306;
  autograph, 314, 477, 494.

Witch, 402.

Witchcraft, 337;
  law relating to, ii. 256, 516.

Witch-imp, 406.

Witch-mark, 405.

Witch-puppets, 408.

Witch Hill, ii. 376-380.

Witch of Endor, 333.

Wood, Anthony, 370.

Woodbridge, John, 438.

Wooden Bridge, 234.

Woodbury, Humphrey, 141.

Woodbury, John, 129.

Woodbury, Nicholas, 98.

Woodbury, Peter, 105.

Woodbury, William, 141.

Wooleston River, 23.

Wolf-pits, 212.

Wolves, 211.


Y.

Young, William, 51.




INTRODUCTION.


It is one of the distinguishing characteristics of the human being,
that he loves to contemplate the scenes of the past, and desires to
have his own history borne down to the future. This, like all the
other propensities of our nature, is accompanied by faculties to
secure its gratification. The gift of speech, by which the parent can
convey information to the child--the old transmit intelligence to the
young--is an indication that it is the design of the Author of our
being that we should receive from those passing away the narrative of
their experience, and communicate the results of our own to the
generations that succeed us. All nations have, to a greater or less
degree, been faithful to their trust in using the gift to fulfil the
design of the Giver. It is impossible to name a people who do not
possess cherished traditions that have descended from their early
ancestors.

Although it is generally considered that the invention of a system of
arbitrary and external signs to communicate thought is one of the
greatest and most arduous achievements of human ingenuity, yet so
universal is the disposition to make future generations acquainted
with our condition and history,--a disposition the efficient cause of
which can only be found in a sense of the value of such
knowledge,--that you can scarcely find a people on the face of the
globe, who have not contrived, by some means or other, from the rude
monument of shapeless rock to the most perfect alphabetical language,
to communicate with posterity; thus declaring, as with the voice of
Nature herself, that it is desirable and proper that all men should
know as much as possible of the character, actions, and fortunes of
their predecessors on the stage of life.

It is not difficult to discern the end for which this disposition to
preserve for the future and contemplate the past was imparted to us.
If all that we knew were what is taught by our individual experience,
our minds would have but little, comparatively, to exercise and expand
them, and our characters would be the result of the limited influences
embraced within the narrow sphere of our particular and immediate
relations and circumstances. But, as our notice is extended in the
observation of those who have lived before us, our materials for
reflection and sources of instruction are multiplied. The virtues we
admire in our ancestors not only adorn and dignify their names, but
win us to their imitation. Their prosperity and happiness spread
abroad a diffusive light that reaches us, and brightens our condition.
The wisdom that guided their footsteps becomes, at the same time, a
lamp to our path. The observation of the errors of their course, and
of the consequent disappointments and sufferings that befell them,
enables us to pass in safety through rocks and ledges on which they
were shipwrecked; and, while we grieve to see them eating the bitter
fruits of their own ignorance and folly as well as vices and crimes,
we can seize the benefit of their experience without paying the price
at which they purchased it.

In the desire which every man feels to learn the history, and be
instructed by the example, of his predecessors, and in the
accompanying disposition, with the means of carrying it into effect,
to transmit a knowledge of himself and his own times to his
successors, we discover the wise and admirable arrangement of a
providence which removes the worn-out individual to a better country,
but leaves the acquisitions of his mind and the benefit of his
experience as an accumulating and common fund for the use of his
posterity; which has secured the continued renovation of the race,
without the loss of the wisdom of each generation.

These considerations suggest the true definition of history. It is the
instrument by which the results of the great experiment of human
action on this theatre of being are collected and transmitted from age
to age. Speaking through the records of history, the generations that
have gone warn and guide the generations that follow. History is the
Past, teaching Philosophy to the Present, for the Future.

Since this is the true and proper design of history, it assumes an
exalted station among the branches of human knowledge. Every community
that aspires to become intelligent and virtuous should cherish it.
Institutions for the promotion and diffusion of useful information
should have special reference to it. And all people should be induced
to look back to the days of their forefathers, to be warned by their
errors, instructed by their wisdom, and stimulated in the career of
improvement by the example of their virtues.

The historian would find a great amount and variety of materials in
the annals of this old town,--greater, perhaps, than in any other of
its grade in the country. But there is one chapter in our history of
pre-eminent interest and importance. The witchcraft delusion of 1692
has attracted universal attention since the date of its occurrence,
and will, in all coming ages, render the name of Salem notable
throughout the world. Wherever the place we live in is mentioned, this
memorable transaction will be found associated with it; and those who
know nothing else of our history or our character will be sure to
know, and tauntingly to inform us that they know, that we hanged the
witches.

It is surely incumbent upon us to possess ourselves of correct and
just views of a transaction thus indissolubly connected with the
reputation of our home, with the memory of our fathers, and, of
course, with the most precious part of the inheritance of our
children. I am apprehensive that the community is very superficially
acquainted with this transaction. All have heard of the Salem
witchcraft; hardly any are aware of the real character of that event.
Its mention creates a smile of astonishment, and perhaps a sneer of
contempt, or, it may be, a thrill of horror for the innocent who
suffered; but there is reason to fear, that it fails to suggest those
reflections, and impart that salutary instruction, without which the
design of Providence in permitting it to take place cannot be
accomplished. There are, indeed, few passages in the history of any
people to be compared with it in all that constitutes the pitiable and
tragical, the mysterious and awful. The student of human nature will
contemplate in its scenes one of the most remarkable developments
which that nature ever assumed; while the moralist, the statesman, and
the Christian philosopher will severally find that it opens widely
before them a field fruitful in instruction.

Our ancestors have been visited with unmeasured reproach for their
conduct on the occasion. Sad, indeed, was the delusion that came over
them, and shocking the extent to which their bewildered imaginations
and excited passions hurried and drove them on. Still, however, many
considerations deserve to be well weighed before sentence is passed
upon them. And while I hope to give evidence of a readiness to have
every thing appear in its own just light, and to expose to view the
very darkest features of the transaction, I am confident of being able
to bring forward such facts and reflections as will satisfy you that
no reproach ought to be attached to them, in consequence of this
affair, which does not belong, at least equally, to all other nations,
and to the greatest and best men of their times and of previous ages;
and, in short, that the final predominating sentiment their conduct
should awaken is not so much that of anger and indignation as of pity
and compassion.

Let us endeavor to carry ourselves back to the state of the colony of
Massachusetts one hundred and seventy years ago. The persecutions our
ancestors had undergone in their own country, and the privations,
altogether inconceivable by us, they suffered during the early years
of their residence here, acting upon their minds and characters, in
co-operation with the influences of the political and ecclesiastical
occurrences that marked the seventeenth century, had imparted a
gloomy, solemn, and romantic turn to their dispositions and
associations, which was transmitted without diminution to their
children, strengthened and aggravated by their peculiar circumstances.
It was the triumphant age of superstition. The imagination had been
expanded by credulity, until it had reached a wild and monstrous
growth. The Puritans were always prone to subject themselves to its
influence; and New England, at the time to which we are referring, was
a most fit and congenial theatre upon which to display its power.
Cultivation had made but a slight encroachment on the wilderness.
Wide, dark, unexplored forests covered the hills, hung over the
lonely roads, and frowned upon the scattered settlements. Persons
whose lives have been passed where the surface has long been opened,
and the land generally cleared, little know the power of a primitive
wilderness upon the mind. There is nothing more impressive than its
sombre shadows and gloomy recesses. The solitary wanderer is ever and
anon startled by the strange, mysterious sounds that issue from its
hidden depths. The distant fall of an ancient and decayed trunk, or
the tread of animals as they prowl over the mouldering branches with
which the ground is strown; the fluttering of unseen birds brushing
through the foliage, or the moaning of the wind sweeping over the
topmost boughs,--these all tend to excite the imagination and
solemnize the mind. But the stillness of a forest is more startling
and awe-inspiring than its sounds. Its silence is so deep as itself to
become audible to the inner soul. It is not surprising that wooded
countries have been the fruitful fountains and nurseries of
superstition.

    "In such a place as this, at such an hour,
    If ancestry can be in aught believed,
    Descending spirits have conversed with man,
    And told the secrets of the world unknown."

The forests which surrounded our ancestors were the abode of a
mysterious race of men of strange demeanor and unascertained origin.
The aspects they presented, the stories told of them, and every thing
connected with them, served to awaken fear, bewilder the imagination,
and aggravate the tendencies of the general condition of things to
fanatical enthusiasm.

It was the common belief, sanctioned, as will appear in the course of
this discussion, not by the clergy alone, but by the most learned
scholars of that and the preceding ages, that the American Indians
were the subjects and worshippers of the Devil, and their powwows,
wizards.

In consequence of this opinion, the entire want of confidence and
sympathy to which it gave rise, and the provocations naturally
incident to two races of men, of dissimilar habits, feelings, and
ideas, thrown into close proximity, a state of things was soon brought
about which led to conflicts and wars of the most distressing and
shocking character. A strongly rooted sentiment of hostility and
horror became associated in the minds of the colonists with the name
of Indian. There was scarcely a village where the marks of savage
violence and cruelty could not be pointed out, or an individual whose
family history did not contain some illustration of the stealth, the
malice or the vengeance of the savage foe. In 1689, John Bishop, and
Nicholas Reed a servant of Edward Putnam; and, in 1690, Godfrey
Sheldon, were killed by Indians in Salem. In the year 1691, about six
months previous to the commencement of the witchcraft delusion, the
county of Essex was ordered to keep twenty-four scouts constantly in
the field, to guard the frontiers against the savage enemy, and to
give notice of his approach, then looked for every hour with the
greatest alarm and apprehension.

Events soon justified the dread of Indian hostilities felt by the
people of this neighborhood. Within six years after the witchcraft
delusion, incursions of the savage foe took place at various points,
carrying terror to all hearts. In August, 1696, they killed or took
prisoners fifteen persons at Billerica, burning many houses. In
October of the same year, they came upon Newbury, and carried off and
tomahawked nine persons; all of whom perished, except a lad who
survived his wounds. In 1698, they made a murderous and destructive
assault upon Haverhill. The story of the capture, sufferings, and
heroic achievements of Hannah Dustin, belongs to the history of this
event. It stands by the side of the immortal deed of Judith, and has
no other parallel in all the annals of female daring and prowess. On
the 3d of July, 1706, a garrison was stormed at night in Dunstable;
and Holyoke, a son of Edward Putnam, with three other soldiers, was
killed. He was twenty-two years of age. In 1708, seven hundred
Algonquin and St. Francis Indians, under the command of French
officers, fell again upon Haverhill about break of day, on the 29th of
August; consigned the town to conflagration and plunder; destroyed a
large amount of property; massacred the minister Mr. Rolfe, the
commander of the post Captain Wainwright, together with nearly forty
others; and carried off many into captivity. On this occasion, a troop
of horse and a foot company from Salem Village rushed to the rescue;
the then minister of the parish, the Rev. Joseph Green, seized his gun
and went with them. They pursued the flying Indians for some
distance. So deeply were the people of Haverhill impressed by the
valor and conduct of Mr. Green and his people, that they sent a letter
of thanks, and desired him to come and preach to them. He complied
with the invitation, spent a Sunday there, and thus gave them an
opportunity to express personally their gratitude. On other occasions,
he accompanied his people on similar expeditions.

These occurrences show that the fears and anxieties of the colonists
in reference to Indian assaults were not without grounds at the period
of the witchcraft delusion. They were, at that very time, hanging like
a storm-cloud over their heads, soon to burst, and spread death and
destruction among them.

There was but little communication between the several villages and
settlements. To travel from Boston to Salem, for instance, which the
ordinary means of conveyance enable us to do at present in less than
an hour, was then the fatiguing, adventurous, and doubtful work of an
entire day.

It was the darkest and most desponding period in the civil history of
New England. The people, whose ruling passion then was, as it has ever
since been, a love for constitutional rights, had, a few years before,
been thrown into dismay by the loss of their charter, and, from that
time, kept in a feverish state of anxiety respecting their future
political destinies. In addition to all this, the whole sea-coast was
exposed to danger: ruthless pirates were continually prowling along
the shores. Commerce was nearly extinguished, and great losses had
been experienced by men in business. A recent expedition against
Canada had exposed the colonies to the vengeance of France.

The province was encumbered with oppressive taxes, and weighed down by
a heavy debt. The sum assessed upon Salem to defray the expenses of
the country at large, the year before the witchcraft prosecutions, was
£1,346. 1_s._ Besides this, there were the town taxes. The whole
amounted, no doubt, inclusive of the support of the ministry, to a
weight of taxation, considering the greater value of money at that
time, of which we have no experience, and can hardly form an adequate
conception. The burden pressed directly upon the whole community.
There were then no great private fortunes, no moneyed institutions, no
considerable foreign commerce, few, if any, articles of luxury, and no
large business-capitals to intercept and divert its pressure. It was
borne to its whole extent by the unaided industry of a population of
extremely moderate estates and very limited earnings, and almost
crushed it to the earth.

The people were dissatisfied with the new charter. They were becoming
the victims of political jealousies, discontent, and animosities. They
had been agitated by great revolutions. They were surrounded by
alarming indications of change, and their ears were constantly
assailed by rumors of war. Their minds were startled and confounded by
the prevalence of prophecies and forebodings of dark and dismal
events. At this most unfortunate moment, and, as it were, to crown the
whole and fill up the measure of their affliction and terror, it was
their universal and sober belief, that the Evil One himself was, in a
special manner, let loose, and permitted to descend upon them with
unexampled fury.

The people of Salem participated in their full share of the gloom and
despondency that pervaded the province, and, in addition to that, had
their own peculiar troubles and distresses. Within a short time, the
town had lost almost all its venerable fathers and leading citizens,
the men whose councils had governed and whose wisdom had guided them
from the first years of the settlement of the place. Only those who
are intimately acquainted with the condition of a community of simple
manners and primitive feelings, such as were the early New-England
settlements, can have an adequate conception of the degree to which
the people were attached to their patriarchs, the extent of their
dependence upon them, and the amount of the loss when they were
removed.

In the midst of this general distress and local gloom and depression,
the great and awful tragedy, whose incidents, scenes, and characters I
am to present, took place.




PART FIRST.




SALEM VILLAGE.

[Illustration]




PART FIRST.

SALEM VILLAGE.


It is necessary, before entering upon the subject of the witchcraft
delusion, to give a particular and extended account of the immediate
locality where it occurred, and of the community occupying it. This is
demanded by justice to the parties concerned, and indispensable to a
correct understanding of the transaction. No one, in truth, can
rightly appreciate the character of the rural population of the towns
first settled in Massachusetts, without tracing it to its origin, and
taking into view the policy that regulated the colonization of the
country at the start.

"The Governor and Company of the Massachusetts Bay in New England"
possessed, by its charter from James the First, dated Nov. 3, 1620,
and renewed by Charles the First, March 4, 1629, the entire
sovereignty over all the territory assigned to it. Some few conditions
and exceptions were incorporated in the grant, which, in the event,
proved to be merely nominal. The company, so far as the crown and
sovereignty of England were concerned, became absolute owner of the
whole territory within its limits, and exercised its powers
accordingly. It adopted wise and efficient measures to promote the
settlement of the country by emigrants of the best description. It
gave to every man who transported himself at his own charge fifty
acres of land, and lots, in distinction from farms, to those who
should choose to settle and build in towns. In 1628, Captain John
Endicott, one of the original patentees, was sent over to superintend
the management of affairs on the spot, and carry out the views of the
company. On the 30th of April, 1629, the company, by a full and free
election, chose said Endicott to be "Governor of the Plantation in the
Massachusetts Bay," to hold office for one year "from the time he
shall take the oath," and gave him instructions for his government. In
reference to the disposal of lands, they provided that persons "who
were adventurers," that is, subscribers to the common stock, to the
amount of fifty pounds, should have two hundred acres of land, and, at
that rate, more or less, "to the intent to build their houses, and to
improve their labors thereon." Adventurers who carried families with
them were to have fifty acres for each member of their respective
families. Other provisions were made, on the same principles, to meet
the case of servants taken over; for each of whom an additional number
of acres was to be allowed. If a person should choose "to build on
the plot of ground where the town is intended to be built," he was to
have half an acre for every fifty pounds subscribed by him to the
common stock. A general discretion was given to Endicott and his
council to make grants to particular persons, "according to their
charge and quality;" having reference always to the ability of the
grantee to improve his allotment. Energetic and intelligent men,
having able-bodied sons or servants, even if not adventurers, were to
be favorably regarded. Endicott carried out these instructions
faithfully and judiciously during his brief administration. In the
mean time, it had been determined to transfer the charter, and the
company bodily, to New England. Upon this being settled, John
Winthrop, with others, joined the company, and he was elected its
governor on the 29th of October, 1629. On the 12th of June, 1630, he
arrived in Salem, and held his first court at Charlestown on the 28th
of August.

There was some irregularity in these proceedings. The charter fixed a
certain time, "yearly, once in the year, for ever hereafter," for the
election of governor, deputy-governor, and assistants. Matthew Cradock
had been elected accordingly, on the 13th of May, 1629, governor of
the company "for the year following." He presided at the General Court
of the company when Winthrop was elected governor. There does not
appear to have been any formal resignation of his office by Cradock.
In point of fact, the charter made no provision for a resignation of
office, but only for cases where a vacancy might be occasioned by
death, or removal by an act of the company. It would have been more
regular for the company to have removed Cradock by a formal vote; but
the great and weighty matter in which they were engaged prevented
their thinking of a mere formality. Cradock had himself conceived the
project they had met to carry into effect, and labored to bring it
about. He vacated the chair to his successor, on the spot. Still
forgetting the provisions of the charter, they declared Winthrop
elected "for the ensuing year, to begin on this present day," the 20th
of October, 1629. By the language of the charter, he could only be
elected to fill the vacancy "in the room or place" of Cradock; that
is, for the residue of the official year established by the express
provision of that instrument, namely, until the "last Wednesday in
Easter term" ensuing. All usage is in favor of this construction. The
terms of the charter are explicit; and, if persons chosen to fill
vacancies during the course of a year could thus be commissioned to
hold an entire year from the date of their election, the provision
fixing a certain day "yearly" for the choice of officers would be
utterly nullified. Whether this subsequently occurred to Winthrop and
his associates is not known; but, if it did, it was impossible for
them to act in conformity to the view now given; for, in the ensuing
"last Wednesday of Easter term," he was at sea, in mid ocean, and the
several members of the company dispersed throughout his fleet. When he
arrived in Salem, he found Endicott--who, in the records of the
company before its transfer to New England, is styled "the Governor
beyond the seas"--with his year of office not yet expired. The company
had not chosen another in his place, and his commission still held
good. It was so evident that the vote extending the term of Winthrop's
tenure to a year from the day on which he was chosen, Oct. 20, 1629,
was illegal, that when that year expired, in October, 1630, no motion
was made to proceed to a new election. In the mean time, however,
Endicott's year had expired; and, for aught that appears, there was
not, for several months, any legal governor or government at all in
the colony. When the next "last Wednesday of Easter term" came round,
on the 18th of May, 1631, Winthrop was chosen governor, as the record
says, "according to the meaning of the patent;" and all went on
smoothly afterwards. If the difficulty into which they had got was
apprehended by Winthrop, Endicott, or any of their associates, they
were wise enough to see that nothing but mischief could arise from
taking notice of it; that no human ingenuity could disentangle the
snarl; and that all they could do was to wait for the lapse of time to
drift them through. The conduct of these two men on the occasion was
truly admirable. Endicott welcomed Winthrop with all the honors due to
his position as governor; opened his doors to receive him and his
family; and manifested the affectionate respect and veneration with
which, from his earliest manhood to his dying day, Winthrop ever
inspired all men in all circumstances. Winthrop performed the
ceremony at Endicott's marriage. They each went about his own
business, and said nothing of the embarrassments attached to their
official titles or powers. After a few months, Winthrop held his
courts, as though all was in good shape; and Endicott took his seat as
an assistant. They proved themselves sensible, high-minded men, of
true public spirit, and friends to each other and to the country,
which will for ever honor them both as founders and fathers. They
entered into no disputes--and their descendants never should--about
which was governor, or which first governor.

The disposal of lands, at the expiration of Endicott's delegated
administration, passed back into the hands of the company, and was
conducted by the General Court upon the policy established at its
meetings in London. On the 3d of March, 1635, the General Court
relinquished the control and disposal of lands, within the limits of
towns, to the towns themselves. After this, all grants of lands in
Salem were made by the people of the town or their own local courts.
The original land policy was faithfully adhered to here, as it
probably was in the other towns.

The following is a copy of the Act:--

     "Whereas particular towns have many things which concern
     only themselves, and the ordering of their own affairs, and
     disposing of businesses in their own towns, it is therefore
     ordered, that the freemen of any town, or the major part of
     them, shall only have power to dispose of their own lands
     and woods, with all the privileges and appurtenances of the
     said towns, to grant lots, and make such orders as may
     concern the well ordering of their own towns, not repugnant
     to the laws and orders here established by the General
     Court; as also to lay mulcts and penalties for the breach of
     these orders, and to levy and distress the same, not
     exceeding the sum of twenty shillings; also to choose their
     own particular officers, as constables, surveyors of the
     high-ways, and the like; and because much business is like
     to ensue to the constables of several towns, by reason they
     are to make distress, and gather fines, therefore that every
     town shall have two constables, where there is need, that so
     their office may not be a burthen unto them, and they may
     attend more carefully upon the discharge of their office,
     for which they shall be liable to give their accounts to
     this court, when they shall be called thereunto."

The reflecting student of political science will probably regard this
as the most important legislative act in our annals. Towns had existed
before, but were scarcely more than local designations, or convenient
divisions of the people and territories. This called them into being
as depositories and agents of political power in its mightiest
efficacy and most vital force. It remitted to the people their
original sovereignty. Before, that sovereignty had rested in the hands
of a remote central deputation; this returned it to them in their
primary capacity, and brought it back, in its most important elements,
to their immediate control. It gave them complete possession and
absolute power over their own lands, and provided the machinery for
managing their own neighborhoods and making and executing their own
laws in what is, after all, the greatest sphere of government,--that
which concerns ordinary, daily, immediate relations. It gave to the
people the power to do and determine all that the people can do and
determine, by themselves. It created the towns as the solid foundation
of the whole political structure of the State, trained the people as
in a perpetual school for self-government, and fitted them to be the
guardians of republican liberty and order.

Large tracts were granted to men who had the disposition and the means
for improving them by opening roads, building bridges, clearing
forests, and bringing the surface into a state for cultivation. Men of
property, education, and high social position, were thus made to lead
the way in developing the agricultural resources of the country, and
giving character to the farming interest and class. In cases where men
of energy, industry, and intelligence presented themselves, if not
adventurers in the common stock, with no other property than their
strong arms and resolute wills, particularly if they had able-bodied
sons, liberal grants were made. Every one who had received a town lot
of half an acre was allowed to relinquish it, receiving, in exchange,
a country lot of fifty acres or more. Under this system, a population
of a superior order was led out into the forest. Farms quickly spread
into the interior, seeking the meadows, occupying the arable land, and
especially following up the streams.

I propose to illustrate this by a very particular enumeration of
instances, and by details that will give us an insight of the
personal, domestic, and social elements that constituted the condition
of life in the earliest age of New England, particularly in that part
of the old township of Salem where the scene of our story is laid. I
shall give an account of the persons and families who first settled
the region included in, and immediately contiguous to, Salem Village,
and whose children and grandchildren were actors or sufferers in, or
witnesses of, the witchcraft delusion. I am able, by the map, to show
the boundaries, to some degree of precision, of their farms, and the
spots on or near which their houses stood.

The first grant of land made by the company, after it had got fairly
under way, was of six hundred acres to Governor Winthrop, on the 6th
of September, 1631, "near his house at Mystic." The next was to the
deputy-governor, Thomas Dudley, on the 5th of June, 1632, of two
hundred acres "on the west side of Charles River, over against the new
town," now Cambridge. The next, on the 3d of July, 1632, was three
hundred acres to John Endicott. It is described, in the record, as
"bounded on the south side with a river, commonly called the Cow House
River, on the north side with a river, commonly called the Duck River,
on the east with a river, leading up to the two former rivers, known
by the name of Wooleston River, and on the west with the main land."
The meaning of the Indian word applied to this territory was
"Birch-wood." At the period of the witchcraft delusion, and for some
time afterwards, "Cow House River" was called "Endicott River."
Subsequently it acquired the name of "Waters River."

This grant constituted what was called "the Governor's Orchard Farm."
In conformity with the policy on which grants were made, Endicott at
once proceeded to occupy and improve it, by clearing off the woods,
erecting buildings, making roads, and building bridges. His
dwelling-house embraced in its view the whole surrounding country,
with the arms of the sea. From the more elevated points of his farm,
the open sea was in sight. A road was opened by him, from the head of
tide water on Duck, now Crane, River, through the Orchard Farm, and
round the head of Cow House River, to the town of Salem, in one
direction, and to Lynn and Boston in another. A few years afterwards,
the town granted him two hundred acres more, contiguous to the western
line of the Orchard Farm. After this, and as a part of the
transaction, the present Ipswich road was made, and the old road
through the Orchard Farm discontinued. This illustrates the policy of
the land grants. They were made to persons who had the ability to lay
out roads. The present bridge over Crane River was probably built by
Endicott and the parties to whom what is now called the Plains, one of
the principal villages of Danvers, had been granted. The tract granted
by the town was popularly called the "Governor's Plain." By giving, in
this way, large tracts of land to men of means, the country was opened
and made accessible to settlers who had no pecuniary ability to incur
large outlays in the way of general improvements, but had the
requisite energy and industry to commence the work of subduing the
forest and making farms for themselves. To them, smaller grants were
made.

The character of the population, thus aided at the beginning in
settling the country, cannot be appreciated without giving some idea
of what it was to open the wilderness for occupancy and cultivation.
This is a subject which those who have always lived in other than
frontier towns do not perhaps understand.

How much of the land had been previously cleared by the aboriginal
tribes, it may be somewhat difficult to determine. They were but
slightly attached to the soil, had temporary and movable habitations,
and no bulky implements or articles of furniture. They were nomadic in
their habits. On the coast and its inlets, their light canoes gave
easy means of transportation, for their families and all that they
possessed, from point to point, and, further inland, over intervening
territory, from river to river. They probably seldom attempted, in
this part of the country, to clear the rugged and stony uplands. In
some instances, they removed the trees from the soft alluvial meadows,
although it is probable that in only a very few localities they would
have attempted such a persistent and laborious undertaking. There were
large salt marshes, and here and there meadows, free from timber.
There were spots where fires had swept over the land and the trees
disappeared. On such spots they probably planted their corn; the land
being made at once fertile and easily cultivable, by the effects of
the fires. Near large inland sheets of water, having no outlets
passable by their canoes, and well stocked with fish, they sometimes
had permanent plantations, as at Will's Hill. With such slight
exceptions, when the white settler came upon his grant, he found it
covered by the primeval wilderness, thickly set with old trees, whose
roots, as well as branches, were interlocked firmly with each other,
the surface obstructed with tangled and prickly underbrush; the soil
broken, and mixed with rocks and stones,--the entire face of the
country hilly, rugged, and intersected by swamps and winding streams.

Among all the achievements of human labor and perseverance recorded in
history, there is none more herculean than the opening of a
New-England forest to cultivation. The fables of antiquity are all
suggestive of instruction, and infold wisdom. The earliest inhabitants
of every wooded country, who subdued its wilderness, were truly a race
of giants.

Let any one try the experiment of felling and eradicating a single
tree, and he will begin to approach an estimate of what the first
English settler had before him, as he entered upon his work. It was
not only a work of the utmost difficulty, calling for the greatest
possible exercise of physical toil, strength, patience, and
perseverance, but it was a work of years and generations. The axe,
swung by muscular arms, could, one by one, fell the trees. There was
no machinery to aid in extracting the tough roots, equal, often, in
size and spread, to the branches. The practice was to level by the axe
a portion of the forest, managing so as to have the trees fall inward,
early in the season. After the summer had passed, and the fallen
timber become dried, fire would be set to the whole tract covered by
it. After it had smouldered out, there would be left charred trunks
and stumps. The trunks would then be drawn together, piled in heaps,
and burned again. Between the blackened stumps, barley or some other
grain, and probably corn, would be planted, and the lapse of years
waited for, before the roots would be sufficiently decayed to enable
oxen with chains to extract them. Then the rocks and stones would have
to be removed, before the plough could, to any considerable extent, be
applied. As late as 1637, the people of Salem voted twenty acres, to
be added within two years to his previous grant, to Richard
Hutchinson, upon the condition that he would, in the mean time, "set
up ploughing." The meadow to the eastward of the meeting-house, seen
in the head-piece of this Part, probably was the ground where
ploughing was thus first "set up." The plough had undoubtedly been
used before in town-lots, and by some of the old planters who had
secured favorable open locations along the coves and shores; but it
required all this length of time to bring the interior country into a
condition for its use.

The opening of a wilderness combined circumstances of interest which
are not, perhaps, equalled in any other occupation. It is impossible
to imagine a more exhilarating or invigorating employment. It
developed the muscular powers more equally and effectively than any
other. The handling of the axe brought into exercise every part of the
manly frame. It afforded room for experience and skill, as well as
strength; it was an athletic art of the highest kind, and awakened
energy, enterprise, and ambition; it was accompanied with sufficient
danger to invest it with interest, and demand the most careful
judgment and observation. He who best knew how to fell a tree was
justly looked upon as the most valuable and the leading man. To bring
a tall giant of the woods to the ground was a noble and perilous
achievement. As it slowly trembled and tottered to its fall, it was
all-important to give it the right direction, so that, as it came down
with a thundering crash, it might not be diverted from its expected
course by the surrounding trees and their multifarious branches, or
its trunk slide off or rebound in an unforeseen manner, scattering
fragments and throwing limbs upon the choppers below. Accidents often,
deaths sometimes, occurred. A skilful woodman, by a glance at the
surrounding trees and their branches, could tell where the tree on
which he was about to operate should fall, and bring it unerringly to
the ground in the right direction. There was, moreover, danger from
lurking savages; and, if the chopper was alone in the deep woods, from
the prowling solitary bear, or hungry wolves, which, going in packs,
were sometimes formidable. There were elements also, in the work, that
awakened the finer sentiments. The lonely and solemn woods are God's
first temples. They are full of mystic influences; they nourish the
poetic nature; they feed the imagination. The air is elastic, and
every sound reverberates in broken, strange, and inexplicable
intonations. The woods are impregnated with a health-giving and
delightful fragrance nowhere else experienced. All the arts of modern
luxury fail to produce an aroma like that which pervades a primitive
forest of pines and spruces. Indeed, all trees, in an original
wilderness, where they exist in every stage of growth and decay,
contribute to this peculiar charm of the woods. It was not only a
manly, but a most lively, occupation. When many were working near each
other, the echoes of their voices of cheer, of the sharp and ringing
tones of their axes, and of the heavy concussions of the falling
timber, produced a music that filled the old forests with life, and
made labor joyous and refreshing.

The length of time required to prepare a country covered by a
wilderness, on a New-England soil, for cultivation, may be estimated
by the facts I have stated. A long lapse of years must intervene,
after the woods have been felled and their dried trunks and branches
burned, before the stumps can be extracted, the land levelled, the
stones removed, the plough introduced, or the smooth green fields,
which give such beauty to agricultural scenes, be presented. An
immense amount of the most exhausting labor must be expended in the
process. The world looks with wonder on the dykes of Holland, the
wall of China, the pyramids of Egypt. I do not hesitate to say that
the results produced by the small, scattered population of the
American colonies, during their first century, in tearing up a
wilderness by its roots, transforming the rocks, with which the
surface was covered, into walls, opening roads, building bridges, and
making a rough and broken country smooth and level, converting a
sterile waste into fertile fields blossoming with verdure and grains
and fruitage, is a more wonderful monument of human industry and
perseverance than them all. It was a work, not of mere hired laborers,
still less of servile minions, but of freemen owning, or winning by
their voluntary and cheerful toil, the acres on which they labored,
and thus entitling themselves to be the sovereigns of the country they
were creating. A few thousands of such men, with such incentives,
wrought wonders greater than millions of slaves or serfs ever have
accomplished, or ever will.

It was not, therefore, from mere favoritism, or a blind subserviency
to men of wealth or station, that such liberal grants of land were
made to Winthrop, Dudley, Endicott, and others, but for various wise
and good reasons, having the welfare and happiness of the whole
people, especially the poorer classes, in view. In illustration of the
one now under consideration, a few facts may be presented. They will
show the amount of labor required to bring the "Orchard Farm" into
cultivation, and which must have been procured at a large outlay in
money by the proprietor. In the court-files are many curious papers,
in the shape of depositions given by witnesses in suits of various
kinds, arising from time to time, showing that large numbers of hired
men were kept constantly at work. Nov. 10, 1678, Edmund Grover,
seventy-eight years old, testified, "that, above forty-five years
since, I, this deponent, wrought much upon Governor Endicott's farm,
called Orchard, and did, about that time, help to cut and cleave about
seven thousand palisadoes, as I remember, and was the first that made
improvement thereof, by breaking up of ground and planting of
Indian-corn." The land was granted to Endicott in July, 1632; and the
work in which Grover, with others, was engaged, commenced undoubtedly
forthwith. Palisadoes were young trees, of about six inches in
diameter at the butt, cut into poles of about ten feet in length,
sharpened at the larger end, and driven into the ground; those that
were split or cloven were used as rails. In this way, lots were fenced
in. In some cases, the upright posts were placed close together, as
palisades in fortifications, to prevent the escape of domestic
animals, and as a safeguard against depredations upon the young
cattle, sheep, and poultry, by bears, wolves, foxes, the loup-cervier,
or wild-cat, with which the woods were infested. Grover seems to have
wrought on the Orchard Farm for a short time. We find, that, a few
years after the point to which his testimony goes back, he had a farm
of his own. Some wrought there for a longer time, and were permanent
retainers on the farm. In 1635, the widow Scarlett apprenticed her son
Benjamin, then eleven years of age, to Governor Endicott. The
following document, recorded in Essex Registry of Deeds, tells his
story:--

     "To all christian people to whom these presents shall come,
     I, Benjamin Scarlett of Salem, in New England, sendeth
     Greeting--Know ye, that I, the said Benjamin Scarlett, having
     lived as a servant with Mr. John Endicott, Esq., sometimes
     Governor in New England, and served him near upon thirty
     years, for, and in consideration whereof, the said Governor
     Endicott gave unto me, the said Benjamin Scarlett, a certain
     tract of land, in the year 1650, being about 10 acres, more
     or less, the which land hath ever since been possessed by me,
     the said Benjamin Scarlett, and it lyeth at the head of Cow
     House River, bounded on the north with the land of Mr.
     Endicott called Orchard Farm, on the South with the high way
     leading to the salt water, on the West with the road way
     leading to Salem, on the East with the salt water, which
     tract of land was given to me, as aforesaid, during my life,
     and in case I should leave no issue of my body, to give it to
     such of his posterity as I should see cause to bestow it
     upon; Know ye, therefore, that I, the said Benjamin Scarlett,
     for divers considerations me thereunto moving, have given,
     granted, and by these presents do give and grant, assign,
     sett over, and bestow the aforesaid tract of land, with all
     the improvements I have made thereon, both by building,
     fencing, or otherwise, unto Samuel Endicott, second son to
     Zerubabel Endicott deceased, and unto Hannah his wife, to
     have and to hold the said ten acres of land, more or less,
     with all the privileges and appurtenances thereunto
     belonging, unto the said Samuel Endicott and Hannah his
     wife, to his and her own proper use and behoof forever; and
     after their decease I give the said tract of land to their
     son Samuel Endicott. In case he should depart this life
     without issue, then to be given to the next heir of the said
     Samuel and Hannah.--In witness whereof I have hereunto set my
     hand and seal.--Dated the ninth of January one thousand six
     hundred and ninety one.--BENJAMIN SCARLETT, his mark."

It is to be observed, that Governor Endicott had died twenty-six
years, and his son Zerubabel seven years, before the date of the
foregoing deed. No writings had passed between them in reference to
the final disposition Scarlett was conditionally to make of the
estate. There were no living witnesses of the original understanding.
But the old man was true to the sentiments of honor and gratitude. The
master to whom he had been apprenticed in his boyhood had been kind
and generous to him, and he was faithful to the letter and spirit of
his engagement. He evidently made a point to have the language of the
deed as strong as it could be. He did not leave the matter to be
settled by a will, but determined to enjoy, while living, the
satisfaction of being true to his plighted faith. He was known, in his
later years, as "old Ben Scarlett." He did not feel ashamed to call
himself a servant. But humble and unpretending as he was, I feel a
pride in rescuing his name from oblivion. Old Ben Scarlett will for
ever hold his place among nature's nobles,--honest men.

The extent to which Endicott went in improving his lands is shown in
the particular department which gave the name to his original grant.
In 1648, he bought of Captain Trask two hundred and fifty acres of
land, in another locality, giving in exchange five hundred
apple-trees, of three years' growth. Such a number of fruit-trees of
that age, disposable at so early a period, could only be the result of
a great expenditure of labor and money. So many operations going on
under his direction and within his premises made his farm a school, in
which large numbers were trained to every variety of knowledge needed
by an original settler. The subduing of the wilderness; the breaking
of the ground; the building of bridges, stone-walls, "palisadoes,"
houses, and barns; the processes of planting; the introduction of all
suitable articles of culture; the methods best adapted to the
preparation of the rugged soil for production; the rearing of abundant
orchards and bountiful crops; the smoothing and levelling of lands,
and the laying-out of roads,--these were all going at once, and it was
quite desirable for young men to work on his farm, before going out
deeper into the wilderness to make farms for themselves. There were
many besides Grover who availed themselves of the advantage. John
Putnam was a large landholder, and an original grantee; but we find
his youngest son, John, attached to Endicott's establishment, and
working on his farm about the time of his maturity. In a deposition in
court, in a land case of disputed boundaries, August, 1705, "John
Putnam, Sr., of full age, testifieth and saith that--being a retainer
in Governor Endicott's family, about fifty years since, and being
intimately acquainted with the governor himself and with his son, Mr.
Zerubabel Endicott, late of Salem, deceased, who succeeded in his
father's right, and lived and died on the farm called Orchard Farm, in
Salem--the said Governor Endicott did oftentimes tell this deponent,"
&c. The same John Putnam, in a deposition dated 1678, says that he was
then fifty years old, and that, thirty-five years before, he was at
Mr. Endicott's farm, and went out to a certain place called "Vine
Cove," where he found Mr. Endicott; and he testifies to a conversation
that he heard between Mr. Endicott and one of his men, Walter Knight.
I mention these things to show that a lad of fifteen, a son of a
neighbor of large estate in lands, was an intimate visitor at the
Orchard Farm; and that, when he became of age, before entering upon
the work of clearing lands of his own, given by his father, he went as
"a retainer" to work on the governor's farm. He went as a voluntary
laborer, as to a school of agricultural training. This was done on
other farms, first occupied by men who had the means and the
enterprise to carry on large operations. It gave a high character, in
their particular employment, to the first settlers generally.

I cannot leave this subject of Endicott on his farm, without
presenting another picture, drawn from a wilderness scene. In 1678,
Nathaniel Ingersol, then forty-five years of age, in a deposition
sworn to in court, describes an incident that occurred on the eastern
end of the Townsend Bishop farm as laid out on the map, when he was
about eleven years of age. His father, Richard Ingersol, had leased
the farm. It was contiguous to Endicott's land, and controversies of
boundary arose, which subsequently contributed to aggravate the feuds
and passions that were let loose in the fury of the witchcraft
proceedings. Nathaniel Ingersol says,--

     "This deponent testifieth, that, when my father had fenced
     in a parcel of land where the wolf-pits now are, the said
     Governor Endicott came to my father where we were at plough,
     and said to my father he had fenced in some of the said
     Governor's land. My father replied, then he would remove the
     fence. No, said Governor Endicott, let it stand; and, when
     you set up a new fence, we will settle in the bounds."

This statement is worthy of being preserved, as it illustrates the
character of the two men, exhibiting them in a most honorable light.
The gentlemanly bearing of each is quite observable. Ingersol
manifests an instant willingness to repair a wrong, and set the matter
right; Endicott is considerate and obliging on a point where men are
most prone to be obstinate and unyielding,--a conflict of land rights:
both are courteous, and disposed to accommodate. Endicott was governor
of the colony, and a large conterminous landowner; Ingersol was a
husbandman, at work with his boys on land into which their labor had
incorporated value, and with which, for the time being, he was
identified. But Endicott showed no arrogance, and assumed no
authority; Ingersol manifested no resentment or irritation. If a
similar spirit had been everywhere exhibited, the good-will and
harmony of neighborhoods would never have been disturbed, and the
records of courts reduced to less than half their bulk.

To his dying day, John Endicott retained a lively interest in
promoting the welfare of his neighbors in the vicinity of the Orchard
Farm.

Father Gabriel Druillettes was sent by the Governor of Canada, in
1650, to Boston, in a diplomatic character, to treat with the
Government here. He kept a journal, during his visit, from which the
following is an extract: "I went to Salem to speak to the Sieur
Indicatt who speaks and understands French well, and is a good friend
of the nation, and very desirous to have his children entertain this
sentiment. Finding I had no money, he supplied me, and gave me an
invitation to the magistrates' table." Endicott had undoubtedly
received a good education. His natural force of character had been
brought under the influence of the knowledge prevalent in his day, and
invigorated by an experience and aptitude in practical affairs. There
is some evidence that he had, in early life, been a surgeon or
physician.

He was a captain in the military service before leaving England.
Although he was the earliest who bore the title of governor here,
having been deputed to exercise that office by the governor and
company in England, and subsequently elected to that station for a
greater length of time than any other person in our history, had been
colonel of the Essex militia, commandant of the expedition against the
Indians at Block Island, and, for several years, major-general, at the
head of the military forces of the colony, the title of captain was
attached to him, more or less, from beginning to end; and it is a
singular circumstance, that it has adhered to the name to this day.
His descendants early manifested a predilection for maritime life.
During the first half of the present century, many of them were
shipmasters. In our foreign, particularly our East-India, navigation,
the title has clung to the name; so much so, that the story is told,
that, half a century ago, when American ships arrived at Sumatra or
Java, the natives, on approaching or entering the vessels to ascertain
the name of the captain, were accustomed to inquire, "Who is the
Endicott?" The public station, rank, and influence of Governor
Endicott required that he should first be mentioned, in describing the
elements that went to form the character of the original agricultural
population of this region.

The map shows the farm of Emanuel Downing. The lines are substantially
correct, although precise accuracy cannot be claimed for them, as the
points mentioned in this and other cases were marked trees, heaps of
stones, or other perishable or removable objects, and no survey or
plot has come down to us. A collation of conterminous grants or
subsequent conveyances, with references in some of them to permanent
objects, enables us to approximate to a pretty certain conclusion.
This gentleman was one of the most distinguished of the early
New-England colonists. He was a lawyer of the Inner Temple. He
married, in the first instance, a daughter of Sir James Ware, a person
of great eminence in the learned lore of his times. His second wife
was Lucy, sister of Governor Winthrop of Massachusetts, who was born
July 9, 1601. They were married, April 10, 1622. There seems to have
been a very strong attachment between Emanuel Downing and his brother
Winthrop; and they went together, with their whole heart, into the
plan of building up the colony. They devoted to it their fortunes and
lives. Downing is supposed to have arrived at Boston in August, 1638,
with his family. On the 4th of November, he and his wife were admitted
to the Church at Salem. So great had been the value of his services in
behalf of the colony, in defending its interests and watching over its
welfare before leaving England, that he was welcomed with the utmost
cordiality to his new home. His nephew, John Winthrop, Jr., afterwards
Governor of Connecticut, was associated with John Endicott to
administer to him the freeman's oath. The General Court granted him
six hundred acres of land. He was immediately appointed a judge of the
local court in Salem, and, for many years, elected one of its two
deputies to the General Court. In anticipation of his arrival in the
country, the town of Salem, on the 16th of July, granted him five
hundred acres. He afterwards purchased the farm on which he seems to
have lived, for the most part, until he went to England in 1652. The
condition of public affairs, and his own connection with them,
detained him in the mother-country much of the latter part of his
life. While in this colony, he was indefatigable in his exertions to
secure its prosperity. His wealth and time and faculties were
liberally and constantly devoted to this end.

The active part taken by Mr. Downing in the affairs of the settlement
is illustrated in the following extract from the Salem town records:--

     "At a general Town meeting, held the 7th day of the 5th
     month, 1644--ordered that two be appointed every Lord's Day,
     to walk forth in the time of God's worship, to take notice
     of such as either lye about the meeting house, without
     attending to the word and ordinances, or that lye at home or
     in the fields without giving good account thereof, and to
     take the names of such persons, and to present them to the
     magistrates, whereby they may be accordingly proceeded
     against. The names of such as are ordered to this service
     are for the 1st day, Mr. Stileman and Philip Veren Jr.
     2d day, Philip Veren Sr. and Hilliard Veren. 3d day, Mr.
     Batter and Joshua Veren. 4th day, Mr. Johnson and Mr.
     Clark. 5th day, Mr. Downing and Robert Molton Sr. 6th
     day, Robert Molton Jr. and Richard Ingersol. 7th day, John
     Ingersol and Richard Pettingell. 8th day, William Haynes
     and Richard Hutchinson. 9th day, John Putnam and John
     Hathorne. 10th day, Townsend Bishop and Daniel Rea. 11th
     day, John Porter and Jacob Barney."

Each patrol, on concluding its day's service, was to notify the
succeeding one; and they were to start on their rounds, severally,
from "Goodman Porter's near the Meeting House."

The men appointed to this service were all leading characters,
reliable and energetic persons. It was a singular arrangement, and
gives a vivid idea of the state of things at the time. Its design was
probably, not merely that expressed in the vote of the town, but also
to prevent any disorderly conduct on the part of those not attending
public worship, and to give prompt alarm in case of fire or an Indian
assault. The population had not then spread out far into the country;
and the range of exploration did not much extend beyond the settlement
in the town. None but active men, however, could have performed the
duty thoroughly, and in all directions, so as to have kept the whole
community under strict inspection.

Mr. Downing probably expended liberally his fortune and time in
improving his farm, upon which there were, at least, four
dwelling-houses prior to 1661, and large numbers of men employed. He
was a ready contributor to all public objects. His education had been
superior and his attainments in knowledge extensive. He was of an
enlightened spirit, and strove to mitigate the severity of the
procedures against Antinomians and others. He seems to have had an
ingenious and enterprising mind. At a General Court held at Boston,
Sept. 6, 1638, it was voted that, "Whereas Emanuel Downing, Esq., hath
brought over, at his great charges, all things fitting for taking
wild fowl by way of duck-coy, this court, being desirous to encourage
him and others in such designs as tend to the public good," &c.,
orders that liberty shall be given him to set up his duck-coy within
the limits of Salem; and all persons are forbidden to molest him in
his experiments, by "shooting in any gun within half a mile of the
ponds," where, by the regulations of the town, he shall be allowed to
place the decoys. The court afterwards granted to other towns liberty
to set up duck-coys, with similar privileges. What was the particular
structure of the contrivance, and how far it succeeded in operation,
is not known; but the thing shows the spirit of the man. He at once
took hold of his farm with energy, and gathered workmen upon it.
Winthrop in his journal has this entry, Aug. 2, 1645:--

     "Mr. Downing having built a new house at his farm, he being
     gone to England, and his wife and family gone to the church
     meeting on the Lord's day, the chimney took fire and burned
     down the house, and bedding, apparel and household, to the
     value of 200 pounds."

This proves that his family resided on the farm; and it indicates,
that, when he first occupied it, he had only such a house as could
have been seasonably put up at the start, but that a more commodious
one had been erected at his leisure: the expression "having built a
new house" appears to carry this idea. On his return from England, he
undoubtedly built again, and had other houses for his workmen and
tenants; for we find that one of them, in 1648, was allowed to keep an
ordinary, "as Mr. Downing's farm, on the road between Lynn and
Ipswich, was a convenient place" for such an accommodation to
travellers. Public travel to and from those points goes over that same
road to-day. That it was so early laid out is probably owing to the
fact, that such men as Emanuel Downing were on its route, and John
Winthrop, Jr., at Ipswich. Downing called his farm "Groton," in dear
remembrance of his wife's ancestral home in "the old country."

Originally, travel was on a track more interior. The opening of roads
did not begin until after the more immediate and necessary operations
of erecting houses and bringing the land, on the most available spots
near them at the points first settled, under culture. Originally,
communication from farm to farm, through the woods, was by marking the
trees,--sometimes by burning and blackening spots on their sides, and
sometimes by cutting off a piece of the bark. The traveller found his
way step by step, following the trees thus marked, or "blazed," as it
was called whichever method had been adopted. When the branches and
brush were sufficiently cleared away, horses could be used. At places
rendered difficult by large roots, partly above ground, intercepting
the passage, or by rough stones, the rider would dismount, and lead
the horse. From this, it was called a "bridle-path." After the way had
become sufficiently opened for ox-carts or other vehicles to pass, it
would begin to receive the name of a road. On reaching a cleared and
fenced piece of land, the traveller would cross it, opening and
closing gates, or taking down and replacing bars, as the case might
be. There were arrangements among the settlers, and, before long, acts
of the General Court, regulating the matter. This was the origin of
what were called "press-roads," or "farm-roads," or "gate-roads." When
a proprietor concluded it to be for his interest to do so, he would
fence in the road on both sides where it crossed his land, and remove
the gates or bars from each end. Ultimately, the road, if convenient
for long travel, would be fenced in for a great distance, and become a
permanent "public highway." In all these stages of progress, it would
be called a "highway." The fee would remain with the several
proprietors through whose lands it passed; and, if travel should
forsake it for a more eligible route, it would be discontinued, and
the road-track, enclosed in the fields to which it originally
belonged, be obliterated by the plough. Many of the "highways," by
which the farmers passed over each other's lands to get to the
meeting-house or out to public roads, in 1692, have thus disappeared,
while some have hardened into permanent public roads used to this day.
When thus fully and finally established, it became a "town road," and
if leading some distance into the interior, and through other towns,
was called a "country road." The early name of "path" continued some
time in use long after it had got to be worthy of a more pretentious
title. The old "Boston Path," by which the country was originally
penetrated, long retained that name. It ran through the southern and
western part of Salem Village by the Gardners, Popes, Goodales,
Flints, Needhams, Swinnertons, Houltons, and so on towards Ipswich and
Newbury.

On the 30th of September, 1648, Governor Winthrop, writing to his son
John, says "they are well at Salem, and your uncle is now beginning to
distil. Mr. Endicott hath found a copper mine in his own ground. Mr.
Leader hath tried it. The furnace runs eight tons per week, and their
bar iron is as good as Spanish." Whatever may be thought by some of
the logic which infers that "all is well" in Salem, because they are
beginning "to distil;" and however little has, as yet, resulted here
from the discovery of copper-mines, or the manufacture of iron, the
foregoing extract shows the zeal and enthusiasm with which the
wealthier settlers were applying themselves to the development of the
capabilities of the country.

Mr. Downing seems to have resided permanently on his farm, and to have
been identified with the agricultural portion of the community. His
house-lot in the town bounded south on Essex Street, extending from
Newbury to St. Peter's Street. He may not, perhaps, have built upon it
for some time, as it long continued to be called "Downing's Field."
Two of his daughters married sons of Thomas Gardner: Mary married
Samuel; and Ann, Joseph. They came into possession of the "Downing
Field." Mary was the mother of John, the progenitor of a large branch
of the Gardner family. Mr. Downing had another large lot in the town,
which, on the 11th of February, 1641, was sold to John Pickering,
described in the deed as follows: "All that parcel of ground, lying
before the now dwelling-house of the said John Pickering, late in the
occupation of John Endicott, Esq., with all the appurtenances
thereunto belonging, abutting on the east and south on the river
commonly called the South River, and on the west on the land of
William Hathorne, and on the north on the Town Common." The deed is
signed by Lucy Downing, and by Edmund Batter, acting for her husband
in his absence. On the 10th of February, 1644, he indorsed the
transaction as follows: "I do freely agree to the sale of the said
Field in Salem, made by my wife to John Pickering: witness my hand,"
&c. The attesting witnesses were Samuel Sharpe and William Hathorne.
This land was then called "Broad Field." On his estate, thus enlarged,
Pickering, a few years afterwards, built a house, still standing. The
estate has remained, or rather so much of it as was attached to the
homestead, in that family to this day, and is now owned and occupied
by John Pickering, Esq., son of the eminent scholar and philologist of
that name, and grandson of Colonel Timothy Pickering, of Revolutionary
fame,--the trusted friend of Washington.

Emanuel Downing was the father of Sir George Downing, one of the first
class that graduated at Harvard College,--a man of extraordinary
talents and wonderful fortunes. After finishing his collegiate
course, in 1642, he studied divinity, probably under the direction of
Hugh Peters; went to the West Indies, acting as chaplain in the
vessel; preached and received calls to settle in several places; went
on to England; entered the parliamentary service as chaplain to a
regiment; was rapidly drawn into notice, and promoted from point to
point, until he became scoutmaster-general in Cromwell's army. This
office seems to have combined the functions of inspector and
commissary-general, and head of the reconnoitering department. In
1654, he was married to Frances, sister of Viscount Morpeth,
afterwards Earl of Carlisle; thus uniting himself with "the blood of
all the Howards," one of the noblest families in England. The nuptials
were celebrated with great pomp, an epithalamium in Latin, &c. All
this, within eleven years after he took his degree at Harvard, is
surely an extraordinary instance of rising in the world. He was a
member of Parliament for Scotland. Cromwell sent him to France on
diplomatic business, and his correspondence in Latin from that court
was the beginning of a career of great services in that line. He was
soon commissioned ambassador to the Hague, then the great court in
Europe. Thurlow's state papers show with what marvellous vigilance,
activity, and efficiency he conducted, from that centre, the
diplomatic affairs of the commonwealth. At the restoration of the
monarchy, he made the quickest and the loftiest somersault in all
political history. It was done between two days. He saw Charles the
Second at the Hague, on his way to England to resume his crown: and
the man who, up to that moment, had been one of the most zealous
supporters of the commonwealth, came out next morning as an equally
zealous supporter of the king. He accompanied this wonderful exploit
by an act of treachery to three of his old associates,--including
Colonel Oakey, in whose regiment he had served as chaplain,--which
cost them their lives. He was forthwith knighted, and his commission
as ambassador renewed. After a while, he returned to England; went
into Parliament from Morpeth, and ever after the exchequer was in his
hands. By his knowledge, skill, and ability, he enlarged the financial
resources of the country, multiplied its manufactures, and extended
its power and wealth. He was probably the original contriver of the
policy enforced in the celebrated Navigation Act, having suggested it
in Cromwell's time. By that single short act of Parliament, England
became the great naval power of the world; her colonial possessions,
however widely dispersed, were consolidated into one vast fountain of
wealth to the imperial realm; the empire of the seas was fixed on an
immovable basis, and the proud Hollander compelled to take down the
besom from the mast-head of his high-admiral.

Sir George Downing did one thing in favor of the power of the people,
in the British system of government, which may mitigate the resentment
of mankind for his execrable seizure and delivery to the royal
vengeance of Oakey, Corbett, and Barkstead. He introduced into
Parliament and established the principle of Specific Appropriations.
The House of Commons has, ever since, not only held the keys of the
treasury, but the power of controlling expenditures. The fortune of
Sir George, on the failure of issue in the third generation, went to
the foundation of Downing College, in Cambridge, England. It amounted
to one hundred and fifty thousand pounds sterling. It is not
improbable, that Downing Street, in London, owes its name to the great
diplomatist.

This remarkable man spent his later youth and opening manhood on Salem
Farms. In his college vacations and intervals of study, he partook,
perhaps, in the labors of the plantation, mingled with the rural
population, and shared in their sports. The crack of his fowling-piece
re-echoed through the wild woods beyond Procter's Corner; he tended
his father's duck-coys at Humphries' Pond, and angled along the clear
brooks. It is an observable circumstance, as illustrating the
transmission of family traits, that the same ingenious activity and
versatility of mind, which led Emanuel Downing, while carrying on the
multifarious operations of opening a large farm in the forest,
presiding in the local court at Salem, and serving year after year in
the General Court as a deputy, to contrive complicated machinery for
taking wild fowl and getting up distilleries, re-appeared in his son,
on the broader field of the manufactures, finances, and foreign
relations of a great nation.

A tract of three hundred acres, next eastward of the Downing farm, was
granted to Thomas Read. He became a freeman in 1634, was a member of
the Salem Church in 1636, received his grant the same year, and was
acknowledged as an inhabitant, May 2, 1637. The farm is now occupied
and owned by the Hon. Richard S. Rogers. It is a beautiful and
commanding situation, and attests the taste of its original
proprietor. Mr. Read seems to have had a passion for military affairs.
In 1636, he was ensign in a regiment composed of men from Saugus,
Ipswich, Newbury, and Salem, of which John Endicott was colonel, and
John Winthrop, Jr., lieutenant-colonel. In 1647, he commanded a
company. During the civil wars in England, he was attracted back to
his native country. He commanded a regiment in 1660, and held his
place after the Restoration. He died about 1663.

Our antiquarians were long at a loss to understand a sentence in one
of Roger Williams's letters to John Winthrop, Jr., in which he says,
"Sir, you were not long since the son of two noble fathers, Mr. John
Winthrop and Mr. Hugh Peters." How John Winthrop, Jr., could be a son
of Hugh Peters was the puzzle. Peters was not the father of either of
Winthrop's two wives; and there was nothing in any family records or
memorials to justify the notion. On the contrary, they absolutely
precluded it. By the labors and acumen of the Hon. James Savage and
Mr. Charles Deane, of Cambridge, who have no superiors in grappling
with such a difficulty, its solution seems, at last, to be reached.
"After long fruitless search," Mr. Savage has expressed a conviction
that Mr. Deane has "acquired the probable explication." The clue was
thus obtained: Mr. Savage says, "This approach to explanation is
gained from 'the Life and Death of Hugh Peters, by William Yonge, Dr.
Med. London. 1663,' a very curious and more scarce tract." The facts
discovered are that Peters taught a free school at Maldon, in Essex;
and that a widow lady with children and an estate of two or three
hundred pounds a year befriended him. She was known as "Mistress
Read." Peters married her. The second wife of John Winthrop, Jr., was
Elizabeth, daughter of Colonel Read, of Essex. By marrying Mrs. Read,
Peters became the step-father of the younger Winthrop's wife; and, by
the usage of that day, he would be called Winthrop's father.

A few additional particulars, in reference to Peters and our Salem
Read, may shed further light on the subject. While a prisoner in the
Tower of London, awaiting the trial which, in a few short days,
consigned him to his fate, Peters wrote "A Dying Father's Last Legacy
to an only Child," and delivered it to his daughter just before his
execution. This is one of the most admirable productions of genius,
wisdom, and affection, anywhere to be found. In it he gives a
condensed history of his life, which enables us to settle some
questions, which have given rise to conflicting statements, and kept
some points in his biography in obscurity. In the first place, the
title proves that he had, at the time of his death, no other child. In
the course of it, he tells his daughter, that, when he was fourteen
years of age, his mother, then a widow, removed with him to Cambridge,
and connected him with the University there. His elder brother had
been sent to Oxford for his education. After residing eight years in
Cambridge, he took his Master's degree, and then went up to London,
where he was "struck with the sense of his sinful estate by a sermon
he heard under Paul's, which was about forty years since, which text
was the _burden of Dumah or Idumea_, and stuck fast. This made me to
go into Essex; and after being quieted by another sermon in that
country, and the love and labors of Mr. Thomas Hooker, I there
preached, there married with a good gentlewoman, till I went to London
to ripen my studies, not intending to preach at all." He then relates
the circumstances which subsequently led him again to engage in
preaching. He is stated to have been born in 1599: his death was in
1660. Putting together these dates and facts, it becomes evident that
he could not have been more than twenty-two years of age when he
married "Mistress Read." The "Last Legacy" shows, not merely in the
manner in which he speaks of her,--"a good gentlewoman,"--but, in its
express terms, that she was not the mother of the "only child" to whom
it was addressed. "Besides your mother," he states that he had had "a
godly wife before." There is no indication that there were children by
the earlier marriage. If there were, they died young. He married, for
his second wife, Deliverance Sheffield, at Boston, in March, 1639.

His first wife, the time of whose death is unknown, had left the
children by her former husband in his hands and under his care. He
evidently cherished the memory of the "good gentlewoman of Essex" with
the tenderest and most sacred affection. She had not only been the
dear wife of his youth, but her property placed him above want. No
wonder that the strongest attachment existed between him and her
children. John Winthrop, Jr., and his wife, called him father, not
merely in conformity with custom, being their step-father in point of
fact, but with the fondness and devotion of actual children. It was on
account of this intimate and endeared connection, and in consideration
of the pecuniary benefit he had derived from his marriage to the
mother of the younger Winthrop's wife, that he made arrangements, in
case he should not return to America, that his Salem property should
go to her and her husband. Having married a second wife, and there
being issue of said marriage, he would not have alienated so
considerable a part of his property from the legal heir without some
good and sufficient reason. The foregoing view of the case explains
the whole. The solution of the mystery which had enveloped Roger
Williams's language is complete. Elizabeth, the daughter of the second
marriage, to whom the "Last Legacy" was addressed, was baptized in the
First Church at Salem, on the 8th of March, 1640. It does not appear,
that, during her subsequent life, there was any intimacy, or even
acquaintance, between her and the Winthrops, as there was no ground
for it, she being in no way connected with them.

May not Thomas Read, of Salem, have been a son of Colonel Read, of
Maldon in Essex, and a brother of the wife of the younger Winthrop?
Peters says, in the "Last Legacy," "Many of my acquaintances, going
for New England, had engaged me to come to them when they sent, which
accordingly I did." Thomas Read came over some time before him; so did
John Winthrop, Jr., and wife. They were the same as children to him.
They sent for him, and he came. After it was ascertained and
determined that Peters should settle in Salem, Read joined the church
here, and became a full inhabitant. Peters located his grant of land
in sight of Read's residence, on the next then unappropriated
territory, at a distance of about two and a half miles. When Read
returned to England, he left his property here in the care of the
Winthrops. Wait Winthrop, as the agent and attorney of his heirs, sold
it to Daniel Eppes. If, as I conjecture, Thomas Read was a son of
Colonel Read, of Essex, his coming here with Peters, and his
connection with the Winthrops, are accounted for. His strong
predilection for military affairs was natural in a son of a colonel of
the English army. It led him back to the mother-country, on the first
sound of the great civil war reaching these shores, and raised him to
the rank he finally attained. The conjecture that he was a brother of
the wife of the younger Winthrop is favored by the fact, that her son,
Fitz John Winthrop, was a captain in Read's regiment, at the time of
the restoration of the Stuarts.

During the short period of the residence of Hugh Peters in America,
professional duties, and the extent to which his great talents were
called upon in ecclesiastical and political affairs, in all parts of
the colony, left him but little opportunity to attend to his
two-hundred-acre grant. It was to the north of the present village of
Danvers Plains, on the eastern side and adjoining to Frost-Fish Brook.
The history of this grant confirms the supposition of his particular
connection with the family of the younger Winthrop. It seems that it
had not been formally laid out by metes and bounds while Peters was
here. Owing to this circumstance, perhaps, it escaped confiscation at
the time of his condemnation and execution. Some years afterwards,
June 4, 1674, a committee of the town laid out the grant "to Mr.
Peters." The record of this transaction says, "The land is in the
possession of John Corwin." Captain John Corwin had married, in May,
1665, Margaret, daughter of John Winthrop, Jr. She survived her
husband, and sold the same land, May 22, 1693, to "Henry Brown, Jr.,
of Salisbury, yeoman." These facts show that this portion of Mr.
Peters's lands did go, according to the agreement when he left
America, to the family of John Winthrop, Jr.

Whether he had erected a house on this grant is not known. From his
characteristic energy, activity, and promptitude, it is probable that
he had begun to clear it. In agriculture, as in every thing else, he
gave a decisive impulse. It is stated that he had a particular design
to attempt the culture of hemp. He introduced many implements of
labor, and started new methods of improvement. He disclosed to the
producer of agricultural growths the idea of raising what the land was
most capable of yielding in abundance, in greater quantities than were
needed for local consumption, and finding for the surplus an outside
market. He is allowed to have introduced the coasting and foreign
trade on an intelligent and organized basis, and to have promoted
ship-building and the export of the products of the forests and the
fields generally to the Southern plantations, the West Indies, and
even more distant points. If he had remained longer in the country,
the farming interests, and the settlers in what was afterwards called
Salem Village, within which his tract was situated, would have felt
his great influence. As it was, he undoubtedly did much to inspire a
zeal for improvement. His town residence was on the south-western
corner of Essex and Washington Street, then known as "Salem Corner,"
where the office of the Horse-railroad Company now is. The lot was a
quarter of an acre. Roger Williams probably had resided there, and
sold to Peters, who was his successor in the ministry of the First
Church, and whose attorney sold it to Benjamin Felton, in 1659. The
range of ground included within what are now Washington, Essex,
Summer, and Chestnut Streets, and extending to the South River, as it
was before any dam or mills had been erected over or across it, was a
beautiful swell of land, with sloping surfaces, intersected by a creek
from near the foot of Chestnut Street to its junction with the South
River under the present grade of Mill Street. To the south of the
corner, occupied successively by Roger Williams and Hugh Peters, Ralph
Fogg, the Lady Deborah Moody, George Corwin, Dr. George Emory, Thomas
Ruck, Samuel Skelton, Endicott, Pickering, Downing, and Hathorne, each
had lots, extending in order to the foot of what is now Phelps Street.
Most, if not all of them, had houses on their lots. Elder Sharp had
what was called "Sharp's Field," bordering on the north side of Essex
Street, extending from Washington to North Streets. His house was at
the north corner of Lynde and Washington Streets. Edmund Batter, Henry
Cook, Dr. Daniel Weld, Stephen Sewall, and Edward Norris, were
afterwards on his land. Hugh Peters also owned the lot, consisting of
a quarter of an acre, on the north-eastern corner of Essex and
Washington Streets, now occupied by what is known as Stearns's
Building, and was preparing to erect a house upon it when he was sent
to England. His attorney sold it, in 1652, to John Orne, the founder
of the family of that name.

The daughter of Mr. Peters came over to America shortly after his
death, bringing with her her mother, who, for many years, had been
subject to derangement. They were kindly received; and some of his
property, particularly a valuable farm in the vicinity of Marblehead,
which the daughter sold to the American ancestor of the Devereux
family, was recovered from the effect of his attainder. She probably
soon went back to England, where she spent her days. Papers on file in
the county court show that Elizabeth Barker, widow, "daughter of Mr.
Hugh Peters," was living, in March, 1702, in good health, at Deptford,
Kent, in the immediate vicinity of London, and had been living there
for about forty years.

In consequence, perhaps, of the intimate connection between Mr. Peters
and the family of John Winthrop, Jr., the name of the latter is to be
added to the cluster of eminent men who, at that time, were drawn to
reside in Salem. He was here, it is quite certain, from 1638 to 1641,
if not for a longer period. There are indications of his presence as
early as March of the former year, when he was appointed with Endicott
to administer the freeman's oath to his uncle Downing. On the 25th of
the next June, he had liberty to set up a salt-house at Royal Neck, on
the east side of Wooleston River. There he erected a dwelling-house
and other buildings, as appears by the depositions of sundry persons
in a land suit about thirty years afterwards, who state that they
worked for him, and were conversant with him there for several years.
His first experiments and enterprises in the salt-manufacture, which
he subsequently conducted on a very extensive scale in Connecticut,
were performed at Royal Neck. His daughter, the widow successively of
Antipas Newman and Zerubabel Endicott, in the suit just mentioned,
recovered possession of that property, comprising forty acres, with
the buildings and improvements. In 1646, John Winthrop, Jr.,
accompanied by a brother of Hugh Peters, Rev. Thomas Peters from
Cornwall in England, began a plantation at Pequot River; and Trumbull,
in his "History of Connecticut," says that "Mr. Thomas Peters was the
first minister of Saybrook." The fortunes and families of Hugh Peters
and John Winthrop, Jr., seem all along to have been linked together.

Downing, Read, and Peters, three of the original planters of Salem
Farms, were drawn back to England and kept there by the engrossing
interest which the wonderful revolution then breaking out in that
kingdom could not but awaken in such minds as theirs. Here and
everywhere, a great check was given to the early progress of the
country by the turn of the tide which carried such men back to
England, and prevented others from coming over. If the Parliament had
not attempted to arrest the usurpations of the crown at that time, and
the Stuarts been suffered to establish an absolute monarchy, the eyes
and hearts of all free spirits would have remained fixed on America,
and a perpetual stream of emigration brought over, for generations and
for ever, thousands upon thousands of such men as came at the
beginning. The effects that would have been thus produced in America
and in England, in accelerating the progress of society here, and
sinking it into debasement there; and thereby upon the fortunes of
mankind the world over, is a subject on which a meditative and
philosophical mind may well be exercised.

But, although these men were lost, others are worthy of being
enumerated, in forming an estimate of the elements that went to make
the character of the people, a chapter in whose history, of awful
import, we are preparing ourselves to explore.

Francis Weston was a leading man at the very beginning. In 1634, with
Roger Conant and John Holgrave, he represented Salem in the first
House of Deputies ever assembled. His land grant was some little
distance to the west of the meeting-house of the village. He must have
been a person of more than ordinary liberality of spirit; for he
discountenanced the intolerance of his age, and kept his mind open to
receive truth and light. He did not conceal his sympathy with those
who suffered for entertaining Antinomian sentiments. He was ordered to
quit the colony in 1638. For the same offence, his wife, who probably
had refused to go, was placed in the stocks "two hours at Boston and
two at Salem, on a lecture day." Weston, having ventured back, five
years afterwards, was put in irons, and imprisoned to hard labor. But,
as he stood to his principles, and there was danger to be apprehended
from his influence, he was again driven out of the colony.

Richard Waterman came over from England in 1629, recommended to
Governor Endicott by the governor and deputy in London. He was a noted
hunter. "His chief employment," says the letter introducing him to
Endicott, "will be to get you good venison." A land grant was assigned
him near Davenport's Hill. But he, too, had a spirit that resisted the
severe and arbitrary policy of the times. He became a dissenter from
the prevalent creed, and sympathized with those who suffered
oppression. In 1664, he was brought before the court, condemned to
imprisonment, and finally banished. Weston and Waterman subsequently
were conspicuous in Rhode-Island affairs. While residing in the
village, the latter probably devoted himself to the opening of his
land, and the pursuit of game through the forests. I find but one
notice of him as connected with public affairs.

For some years, the settlements were necessarily confined to the
shores of bays or coves, and the banks of rivers. There were no
wheel-carriages of any kind, for transportation or travel, until
something like roads could be made; and that was the work of time. A
few horses had been imported; but it was long before they could be
raised to meet the general wants, or come much into use. Every thing
had to be water-borne. The only vehicles were boats or canoes, mostly
the latter. There were two kinds of canoes. Large white-pine logs were
scooped or hollowed out, and wrought into suitable shape, about two
and a half feet in breadth and twenty in length. These were often
quite convenient and serviceable, but not to be compared with the
Indian canoes, which were made of the bark of trees, wrought with
great skill into a beautiful shape. The birch canoe was an admirable
structure, combining elements and principles which modern naval
architecture may well study to imitate. In lightness, rapidity,
freedom and ease of motion, it has not been, and cannot be, surpassed.
Its draft, even when bearing a considerable burden, was so slight,
that it would glide over the shallowest bars. It was strong, durable,
and easily kept in repair. Although dangerous to the highest degree
under an inexperienced and unskilful hand, no vessel has ever been
safer when managed by persons trained to its use. The cool and
quick-sighted Indian could guide it, with his exquisitely moulded
paddle, in perfect security, through whirling rapids and over heavy
seas, around headlands and across bays. The settlers early supplied
themselves with canoes, by which to thread the interior streams, and
cross from shore to shore in the harbors. One great advantage of the
light canoe, before roads were opened through the woods, was, that it
could be unloaded, and borne on the shoulders across the land, at any
point, to another stream or lake, thus cutting off long curves, and
getting from river to river. The lading would be transported in
convenient parcels, the canoe launched, loaded, and again be floated
on its way. Canoes soon came into universal use, particularly in this
neighborhood. Wood, in his "New-England's Prospect," speaking of
Salem, says, "There be more canowes in this town than in all the whole
Patent, every household having a water horse or two." It was so
important for the public safety to have them kept in good condition,
that the town took the matter in hand. The quarterly court records
have the following entry under the date of June 27, 1636:--

     "It was ordered and agreed, that all the canoes of the north
     side of the town shall be brought the next second day, being
     the 4th day of the 5th month, about 9 o'clock,
     A.M., unto the cove of the common landing place of
     the North River, by George Harris his house--And that all
     the canoes of the south side are to be brought before the
     port-house in the South River, at the same time, then and
     there to be viewed by J. Holgrave, P. Palfrey, R. Waterman,
     R. Conant, P. Veren, or the greater number of them. And that
     there shall be no canoe used (upon penalty, of forty
     shillings, to the owner thereof) than such as the said
     surveyors shall allow of and set their mark upon; and if any
     shall refuse or neglect to bring their canoes to the said
     places at the time appointed, they shall pay for said fault
     10 shillings."

The names of the men associated with Waterman prove that he was ranked
among the chief citizens of the town. The austere manners of the age,
among communities like that established here; the exclusion, at that
time, by inexorable laws, of many forms of amusement; and the general
sombre aspect of society, kept down the natural exhilaration of life
to such a degree, that, when the pressure was occasionally removed,
the whole people bounded into the liveliest outbursts of glad
excitement. It was no doubt a gala day. Ceremony, sport, and
festivity, in all their forms, took full effect. The surveyors
performed their functions with the utmost display of authority,
examined the canoes with the gravest scrutiny, and affixed their
marks with all due formality. A light, graceful, and most picturesque
fleet swarmed, from all directions, to the appointed rendezvous. The
harbor glittered with the flashing paddles, and was the scene of swift
races and rival feats of skill, displaying manly strength and agility.
It must have been an aquatic spectacle of rare gayety and beauty, not
surpassed nor equalled in some respects, when, more than a century
afterwards, the "Grand Turk" or the "Essex" frigate was launched, or
when Commodore Forbes, still later, swept into our peaceful waters
with his boat flotilla. It was the first Fourth of July ever
celebrated in America.

Thomas Scruggs was an early inhabitant of Salem; often represented the
town as deputy in the General Court; was one of the judges of the
local court, and always recognized among the rulers of the town. In
January, 1636, he received a grant of three hundred acres on the
south-west limits of its territory. The next month, an exchange took
place, which is thus recorded in the town-book of grants: "It was
ordered, that, whereas Mr. Scruggs had a farm of three hundred acres
beyond Forest River, and that Captain Trask had one of two hundred
acres beyond Bass River, and Captain Trask freely relinquishing his
farm of two hundred acres, it was granted unto Mr. Thomas Scruggs, and
he thereupon freely relinquished his farm of three hundred acres."
This brought Scruggs upon the Salem Farms, between Bass River and the
great pond, Wenham Lake. The real object in making this arrangement
was to advance a project which the leading people of Salem at that
time had much at heart. They were very desirous to have the college
established on the tract relinquished by Scruggs. What would have been
the effect of placing it there, in the immediate neighborhood of the
sea-shore, in full view of the spacious bay, its promontories,
islands, and navigation, is a question on which we may speculate at
our leisure. The effort failed: Captain Trask and Mr. Scruggs had done
all they could to accomplish it, and gave their energies to the
welfare of the community in other directions. From the little that is
recorded of Scruggs, it is quite evident that he was an intelligent
and valuable citizen. The event that brought his career as a public
man to a close proves that his mind was enlightened, liberal, and
independent; that he was in advance of the times in which he lived.
When the bitter and violent persecution of the celebrated Anne
Hutchinson, on account of her Antinomian sentiments, took place, Mr.
Scruggs disapproved and denounced it. He gave his whole influence,
earnestly and openly, against such attempts to suppress freedom of
inquiry and the rights of conscience. He, with others in Salem, was
proscribed, disarmed, and deprived of his public functions. He appears
to have been suffered to remain unmolested on his estate, and died
there in 1654. He had but one child, Rachel; and the name, as derived
from him, became extinct. The inventory of his property is dated on
the 24th of June of that year. The items mentioned in it amount to
£244. 10_s._ 2_d._ Considering the rates of value at that time, it
was a large property. At the same date, an agreement is recorded by
which his widow, Margery, conveys to her son-in-law, John Raymond, all
her real estate, upon these conditions: She to have the use of her
house during her life, the bedding, and other "household stuff;" and
he to pay her five pounds "in hand," twenty pounds per annum, and five
pounds "at the hour of her death." This was an ample provision, in
those times, for her comfort while she lived, and for her funeral
charges. I do not remember to have found this last point arranged for,
in such a form of expression, in any other instance.

William Alford was an early settler. He was a member of the numerous
and wealthy society, or guild, of Skinners, in the city of London, and
probably came here with the view of establishing an extensive trade in
furs. He received accordingly, in 1636, a grant of two hundred acres,
including what was for some time called Alford's Hill, afterwards Long
Hill, now known as Cherry Hill. It is owned and occupied by R.P.
Waters, Esq. Alford sympathized in religious views with his neighbor
Scruggs, and with him was subjected to censure, and disarmed by order
of the General Court. He sold his lands to Henry Herrick, and left the
jurisdiction.

One of the most enlightened, and perhaps most accomplished, men among
the first inhabitants of Salem Village, was Townsend Bishop. He was
admitted a freeman in 1635. The next year, he appears on the list of
members of the Salem Church. He was one of the judges of the local
court, and, almost without intermission from his first coming here, a
deputy to the General Court. In 1645, as his attention had been led to
the subject, he conceived doubts in reference to infant baptism; and
it was noticed that he did not bring forward a child, recently born,
to the rite. Although himself on the bench, and ever before the object
of popular favor and public honors, he was at once brought up, and
handed over for discipline. The next year, he sold his estates, and
probably removed elsewhere. He appears no more in our annals. Where he
went, I have not been able to learn. It is to be hoped that he found
somewhere a more congenial and tolerant abode. It is evident that he
could not breathe in an atmosphere of bigotry; and it was difficult to
find one free from the miasma in those days.

Five of the most valuable of the first settlers of the
village--Weston, Waterman, Scruggs, Alford, and Bishop--were thus
early driven into exile, or subdued to silence, by the stern policy on
which the colony was founded. It is an error to characterize this as
religious bigotry. It was not so much a theological as a political
persecution. Its apparent form was in reference to tenets of faith,
but the policy was deeper than this. Any attempt to make opposition to
the existing administration was treated with equal severity, whatever
might be the subject on which it ventured to display itself.

The men who sought this far-off "nook and corner of the world,"
crossing a tempestuous and dangerous ocean, and landing on the shores
of a wilderness, leaving every thing, however dear and valuable,
behind, came to have a country and a social system for themselves and
of themselves alone. Their resolve was inexorable not to allow the
mother-country, or the whole outside world combined, to interfere with
them. And it was equally inexorable not to suffer dissent or any
discordant element to get foothold among them. Sir Christopher
Gardner's rank and title could not save him: he was not of the sort
they wanted, and they shipped him back. Roger Williams's virtues,
learning, apostolic piety, could not save him; and they drove him into
a wintry wilderness, hunting him beyond their borders. It was not so
much a question whether Baptists, Antinomians, or Quakers were right
or wrong, as a preformed determination not to have any dissentients of
any description among them. They had sacrificed all to find and to
make a country for themselves, and they meant to keep it to
themselves. They had gone out of everybody else's way, and they did
not mean to let anybody else come into their way. They did not
understand the great truth which Hugh Peters preached to Parliament,
"Why," said he, "cannot Christians differ, and yet be friends? All
children should be fed, though they have different faces and shapes:
unity, not uniformity, is the Christian word." They admitted no such
notion as this. They thought uniformity the only basis of unity. They
meant to make and to keep this a country after their own pattern, a
Congregational, Puritan, Cambridge-Platform-man's country. The time
has not yet come when we can lift up clean hands against them. Two
successive chief-magistrates of the United States have opened the door
and signified to one-eighth part of our whole people, that it will be
best for them to walk out. So long as the doctrine is maintained that
this is the white man's country, or any man's, or any class or kind of
men's country, it becomes us to close our lips against denunciation of
the Fathers of New England because they tried to keep the country to
themselves. The sentiment or notion on which they acted, in whatever
form it appears, however high the station from which it emanates, or
however long it lasts in the world, is equally false and detestable in
all its shapes. It is a defiant rebellion against that law which
declares that "all nature's difference is all nature's peace;" that
there can be no harmony without variety of sound, no social unity
without unlimited freedom, and no true liberty where any are deprived
of equal rights; that differences ought to bring men together, rather
than keep them apart; and that the only government that can stand
against the shocks of time, and grow stronger and dearer to all its
people, is one that recognizes no differences of whatever kind among
them. The only consistent or solid foundation on which a republic or a
church can be built, is an absolute level, with no enclosures and no
exclusion.

Townsend Bishop's grant of three hundred acres was made on the 16th of
January, 1636. When he sold it, Oct. 18, 1641, it appears by the deed,
that there were on it edifices, gardens, yards, enclosures, and
meadows. A large force must have been put and kept upon it, from the
first, to have produced such results in so short a time. Orchards had
been planted. The manner in which the grounds were laid out is still
indicated by embankments, with artificial slopes and roadways, which
exhibit the fine taste of the proprietor, and must have required a
large expenditure of money and labor. Although the estate has always
been in the hands of owners competent to take care of it and keep it
in good preservation, none but the original proprietor would have been
likely to have made the outlay apparent on its face, on the plan
adopted. The mansion in which he resided stands to-day. Its front,
facing the south, has apparently been widened, at some remote
intermediate date since its original erection, by a slight extension
on the western end, beyond the porch. It has been otherwise, perhaps,
somewhat altered in the course of time by repairs; but its general
aspect, as exhibited in the frontispiece of this volume, and its
original strongly compacted and imperishable frame, remain. No saw was
used in shaping its timbers; they were all hewn, by the broad-axe, of
the most durable oak: they are massive, and rendered by time as hard
to penetrate almost as iron. The walls and stairway of the cellar, the
entrance to which is seen by the side of the porch, constructed of
such stones as could be gathered on the surface of a new country, bear
the marks of great antiquity. A long, low kitchen, with a stud of
scarcely six feet, extended originally the whole length of the
lean-to, on the north side of the house. The rooms of the main house
were of considerably higher stud. The old roadway, the outlines of
which still remain, approached the house from the east, came up to its
north-east corner, wound round its front, and continued from its
north-west corner, on a track still visible, over a brook and through
the apple-orchard planted by Bishop, to the point where the
burial-ground of the village now is; and so on towards the lands then
occupied by Richard Hutchinson, also to the lands afterwards owned by
Nathaniel Ingersol, towards Beaver Dam, and the first settlements in
that direction and to the westward. In general it may be said, that
the structural proportions and internal arrangements of the house,
taken in its relations to the vestiges and indications on the face of
the grounds, show that it is coeval with the first occupancy of the
farm. But we do not depend, in this case, upon conjectural
considerations, or on mere tradition, which, on such a point, is not
always reliable. It happens to be demonstrated, that this is the
veritable house built and occupied by Townsend Bishop, in 1636, by a
singular and irrefragable chain of specific proof. A protracted land
suit, hereafter to be described, gave rise to a great mass of papers,
which are preserved in the files of the county courts and the State
Department; among them are several plots made by surveyors, and
adduced in evidence by the parties. Not only the locality but a
diagram of the house, as then standing, are given. The spot on which
it stood is shown. Further, it appears, that in the deeds of
transference of the estate, the homestead is specially described as
the house in which Townsend Bishop lived, called "Bishop's Mansion."
This continues to a period subsequent to the style of its
architecture, and within recent tradition and the memory of the
living. In the old Salem Commoner's records, it is called "Bishop's
Cottage," which was the name generally given to dwelling-houses in
those early times. Having, as occasion required, been seasonably
repaired, it is as strong and good a house to-day as can be found. Its
original timbers, if kept dry and well aired, are beyond decay; and it
may stand, a useful, eligible, and comely residence, through a future
as long as the past. It may be doubted whether any dwelling-house now
in use in this country can be carried back, by any thing like a
similar strength of evidence, to an equal antiquity. Its site, in
reference to the surrounding landscape, was well chosen. Here its
hospitable and distinguished first proprietor lived, in the interims
of his public and official service, in peace and tranquillity, until
ferreted out by the intrusive spirit of an intolerant age. Here he
welcomed his neighbors,--Endicott, Downing, Peters, John Winthrop,
Jr., Read, and other kindred spirits.[A]

[Footnote A: Not only the storms of two hundred and thirty years, but
the bolts of heaven, have beat in vain upon this mansion. The view
given of it in the frontispiece is from a sketch taken in winter. The
leafless branches of a tall elm at its western end are represented. At
noon on Saturday, July 28, 1866, during a violent thunder-storm, the
electric fluid seems to have passed down the tree, rending and tearing
some of its branches, and leaving its traces on the trunk. It flashed
into the house. It tore the roof, knocking away one corner, displacing
in patches the mortar that coated the old chimney top and sides,
hacking the edges of the brick-work, splitting off the side of an
extension to the building at the western end, entering a chamber at
that point, where two children were sitting at a window, and throwing
upon the floor, within two or three feet of them, a considerable
portion of the plastered ceiling. It then scattered all through the
apartments. What looked like perforations, as if made by shot or
pistol-balls, were found in many places; but there were no
corresponding marks on the opposite sides of the walls or partitions.
Portions of the paper-hangings were stripped off, and small slivers
ripped up from the floors. It struck the frames of looking-glasses,
cracking off small pieces of the wood, but only in one instance
breaking the mirror. It cut a velvet band by which one was hung; and
it was found on the floor, the mirror downward and unbroken, as if it
had been carefully laid there. In the attic, fragments of the old
gnarled and knotted rafters, of different lengths,--from four or five
feet to mere chips,--were scattered in quantities upon the floor, and
grooves made lengthwise along posts and implements of household use.
Large cracks were left in the wooden casings of some of the doors and
windows. A family of eight persons were seated around the
dinner-table. All were more or less affected. They were deprived for
the time of the use of their feet and ancles; were stunned, paralyzed,
and rendered insensible for a few moments by the shock; and felt the
effects, some of them, for a day or two in their lower limbs. In front
of each person at the table was a tall goblet, which had just been
filled with water. As soon as they were able to notice, they found the
water dripping on all sides to the floor, the whole table-cloth wet,
seven of the goblets entirely empty, the eighth half emptied, and not
one of them thrown over, or in the slightest manner displaced. The
whole house was filled with what seemed, to the sight and smell, to be
smoke; but no combustion, scorch, discoloration, or the least
indication of heat, could be found on any of the objects struck. The
building, in its thirteen rooms, from the garret to the ground-floor,
had been flooded with lightning; but, with all its inmates, escaped
without considerable or permanent injury.]

In the course of a mysterious providence, this venerable mansion was
destined to be rendered memorable by its connection with the darkest
scene in our annals. As that scene cannot otherwise be comprehended in
all the elements that led to it, it is necessary to give the
intermediate history of the Townsend Bishop farm and mansion. In 1641,
Bishop sold it to Henry Chickering, who seems to have been residing
for some time in Salem, and to whom, in January, 1640, a grant of land
had been made by the town. He continued to own it until the 4th of
October, 1648; although he does not appear to have resided on the farm
long, as he soon removed to Dedham, from which place he was deputy to
the General Court in 1642, and several years afterwards. He sold the
farm at the above-mentioned date to Governor Endicott for one hundred
and sixty pounds. In 1653, John Endicott, Jr., the eldest son of the
Governor, married Elizabeth, daughter of Jeremiah Houchins, an eminent
citizen of Boston, who had before resided in Hingham, which place he
represented as deputy for six years. The name was pronounced
"Houkins," and so perhaps was finally spelled "Hawkins." By agreement,
or "articles of marriage contract," Endicott bestowed the farm upon
his son. "Present possession" was given. How long, or how much of the
time, the young couple lived on the estate, is not known. Their
principal residence was in Boston. The General Court, in 1660, granted
John Endicott, Jr., four hundred acres of land on the eastern side of
the upper part of Merrimac River. After the purchase of the farm from
Chickering, the Endicott property covered nearly a thousand acres in
one tract, extending from the arms of the sea to the centre of the
present village of Tapleyville. On the 10th of May, 1662, the Governor
executed a deed, carrying out the engagements of the marriage
contract, giving to his son John, his heirs, and assigns for ever, the
Bishop farm. Governor Endicott died in 1665. A will was found signed
and sealed by him, dated May 2, 1659, in which, referring to the
marriage gift to John, he bequeathes the aforesaid farm to "him and
his heirs," but does not add, "and assigns." Another item of the will
is, "The land I have bequeathed to my two sons, in one place or
another, my will is that the longest liver of them shall enjoy the
whole, except the Lord send them children to inherit it after them."
Unfortunately, there were no witnesses to the will. It was not allowed
in Probate. The matter was carried up to the General Court; and it was
decided Aug. 1, 1665, that the court "do not approve of the instrument
produced in court to be the last will and testament of the late John
Endicott, Esq., governor." In October of the same year, John Endicott,
Jr., petitioned the General Court to act on the settlement of his
father's estate; and the court directs administration to be granted to
"Mrs. Elizabeth Endicott and her two sons, John and Zerubabel," and
that they bring in an inventory to the next county court at Boston,
and to dispose of the same as the law directs. Upon this, the widow
of the Governor, and his son Zerubabel, again appeal to the General
Court; and on the 23d of May, 1666, "after a full hearing of all
parties concerned in the said estate, i.e., the said Mrs. Elizabeth
Endicott and her two sons, Mr. John and Mr. Zerubabel Endicott, Mr.
Jeremiah Houchin being also present in court, and respectively
presenting their pleas and evidences in the case," it was finally
decided and ordered by the court, that the provisions of the document
purporting to be the will of Governor Endicott should be carried into
effect, with these exceptions: that the Bishop or Chickering farm
shall go to his son John "to him, his heirs and assigns for ever;" and
that Elizabeth, the wife of said son John, if she should survive her
husband, shall enjoy during her life all the estate of her husband in
all the other houses and lands mentioned in the instrument purporting
to be his father's will. The court adjudge that this must have been
"the real intent of the aforesaid John Endicott, Esq., deceased, who
had during his life special favor and respect for her." They give the
widow of the Governor "the goods and chattels" of the said John
Endicott, Esq., her late husband, provided that, if "she shall die
seized to the value of more than eighty pounds sterling" thereof, the
surplus shall be divided between her two sons: John to have a double
portion thereof. Finally, they appoint the widow sole administratrix,
and require her to bring in a true inventory to the next court for the
county of Suffolk, and to pay all debts.

John and his father-in-law had it all their own way. The decision of
the court was perhaps correct, according to legal principles; although
it is not so certain that it was, in all respects, in conformity with
the intent of Governor Endicott. Undoubtedly, as the language of the
deed shows, he had made up his mind to give to his son John and "his
assigns" absolute, full, and final possession of the Bishop farm. But
it seems equally certain, that he meant to have the rest of his landed
estate, including the Orchard Farm and the Ipswich-river farm, go
directly and wholly to the survivor, if either of his sons died
without issue. The facts and dates are as follows: His son John was
married in 1653. The Governor's will was made in 1659. It had then
become quite probable that John might not have issue. The will gives
him and his heirs, but not his assigns, the Bishop farm. In the event
of his death without issue, his widow would have her dower and legal
life right in it, but the final heir would be Zerubabel. In 1662, the
Governor, who had, some years before, removed to Boston, where he
resided the remainder of his life, executed a deed, giving to his son
John, "his heirs and assigns," a full and permanent title to the
Bishop farm. This was a variation of the plan for the disposition of
his estate as shown in his will. He probably designed to make a new
will, securing to his natural heirs, so far as his other landed
property was concerned, what he had thus permitted to pass away from
them in the Bishop farm; that is, the full and immediate possession
by the survivor, if either of the sons died without issue. It was a
favorite idea, almost a sacred principle, in those days, to have lands
go in the natural descent. The sentiment is quite apparent in the
tenor of the Governor's will. When he deprived, by his deed to John in
1662, Zerubabel's family of the right to the final possession of the
Bishop farm, it can hardly be doubted that he relied upon the
provisions of his will to secure to them the immediate, complete
possession of all his other lands, without the incumbrance of any
claim of dower or otherwise of John's widow. But the pressure of
public duties prevented his duly executing his will, and putting it
into a new shape, in conformity with the circumstances of the case.
The troubles that followed teach the necessity of the utmost caution
and carefulness in that most difficult and most irremediable of all
business transactions,--the attempt to continue the control of
property, after death, by written instruments.

John Endicott, Jr., died in February, 1668, without issue; leaving his
whole estate to his widow, "her heirs and assigns for ever." His will
is dated Jan. 27, 1668, and was offered to Probate on the 29th of
February, 1668. His widow married, Aug. 31, 1668, the Rev. James
Allen, one of the ministers of the First Church in Boston, whose
previous wife, Hannah Dummer, by whom he received five hundred acres
of land, had died in March, 1668. His Endicott wife died April 5,
1673, leaving the Townsend-Bishop farm and all her other property to
him; and on the 11th of September, of the same year, he married Sarah
Hawlins. By his two preceding wives he received twelve hundred acres
of land. How much he got by the last-mentioned, we have no
information. Besides these matrimonial accumulations, the accounts
seem to indicate that he was rich before.

It may well be imagined, that it could not have been very agreeable to
the family at the Orchard Farm to see this choice and extensive
portion of their estate, which was within full view from their
windows, swept into the hands of utter strangers in so rapid and
extraordinary a manner, by a series of circumstances most distasteful
and provoking. But this was but the beginning of their trouble.

On the 29th of April, 1678, Allen sold the Bishop farm to Francis
Nurse, of the town of Salem, for four hundred pounds. Nurse was an
early settler, and, before this purchase, had lived, for some forty
years, "near Skerry's," on the North River, between the main part of
the settlement in the town of Salem and the ferry to Beverly. He is
described as a "tray-maker." The making of these articles, and similar
objects of domestic use, was an important employment in a new country
remote from foreign supply. He appears to have been a very respectable
person, of great stability and energy of character, whose judgment was
much relied on by his neighbors. No one is mentioned more frequently
as umpire to settle disputes, or arbitrator to adjust conflicting
claims. He was often on committees to determine boundaries or
estimate valuations, or on local juries to lay out highways and
assess damages. The fact that he was willing to encounter the
difficulties connected with such a heavy transaction as the purchase
of the Bishop farm at such a price at his time of life proves that he
had a spirit equal to a bold undertaking. He was then fifty-eight
years of age. His wife Rebecca was fifty-seven years of age. We shall
meet her again.

They had four sons,--Samuel, John, Francis, and Benjamin; and four
daughters,--Rebecca, married to Thomas Preston, Mary to John Tarbell,
Elizabeth to William Russell, and Sarah, who remained unmarried until
after the death of her mother. With this strong force of stalwart sons
and sons-in-law, and their industrious wives, Francis Nurse took hold
of the farm. The terms of the purchase were so judicious and
ingenious, that they are worthy of being related, and show in what
manner energetic and able-bodied men, even if not possessed of
capital, particularly if they could command an effective co-operation
in the labor of their families, obtained possession of valuable landed
estates. The purchase-money was not required to be paid until the
expiration of twenty-one years. In the mean time, a moderate annual
rent was fixed upon; seven pounds for each of the first twelve years,
and ten pounds for each of the remaining nine years. If, at the end of
the time, the amount stipulated had not been paid, or Nurse should
abandon the undertaking, the property was to relapse to Allen.
Disinterested and suitable men, whose appointment was provided for,
were then to estimate the value added to the estate by Nurse during
his occupancy, by the clearing of meadows or erection of buildings or
other permanent improvements, and all of that value over and above one
hundred and fifty pounds was to be paid to him. If any part of the
principal sum should be paid prior to the expiration of twenty-one
years, a proportionate part of the farm was to be relieved of all
obligation to Allen, vest absolutely in Nurse, and be disposable by
him. By these terms, Allen felt authorized to fix a very high price
for the farm, it not being payable until the lapse of a long period of
time. If not paid at all, the property would come back to him, with
one hundred and fifty pounds of value added to it. It was not a bad
bargain for him,--a man of independent means derived from other
sources, and so situated as not to be able to carry on the farm
himself. It was a good investment ahead. To Nurse the terms were most
favorable. He did not have to pay down a dollar at the start. The low
rent required enabled him to apply almost the entire income from the
farm to improvements that would make it more and more productive.
Before half the time had elapsed, a value was created competent to
discharge the whole sum due to Allen. His children severally had good
farms within the bounds of the estate, were able to assume with ease
their respective shares of the obligations of the purchase; and the
property was thus fully secured within the allotted time. Allen gave,
at the beginning, a full deed, in the ordinary form, which was
recorded in this county. Nurse gave a duly executed bond, in which the
foregoing conditions are carefully and clearly defined. That was
recorded in Suffolk County; and nothing, perhaps, was known in the
neighborhood, at the time or ever after, of the terms of the
transaction. When the success of the enterprise was fully secured,
Nurse conveyed to his children the larger half of the farm, reserving
the homestead and a convenient amount of land in his own possession.
The plan of this division shows great fairness and judgment, and was
entirely satisfactory to them all. They were required, by the deeds he
gave them, to maintain a roadway by which they could communicate with
each other and with the old parental home.

Here the venerable couple were living in truly patriarchal style,
occupying the "mansion" of Townsend Bishop, when the witchcraft
delusion occurred. They and their children were all clustered within
the limits of the three-hundred-acre farm. They were one family. The
territory was their own, secured by their united action, and made
commodious, productive, valuable, and beautiful to behold, by their
harmonious, patient, and persevering labor. Each family had a
homestead, and fields and gardens; and children were growing up in
every household. The elder sons and sons-in-law had become men of
influence in the affairs of the church and village. It was a scene of
domestic happiness and prosperity rarely surpassed. The work of life
having been successfully done, it seemed that a peaceful and serene
descent into the vale of years was secured to Francis and Rebecca
Nurse. But far otherwise was the allotment of a dark and inscrutable
providence.

There is some reason to suspect that the prosperity of the Nurses had
awakened envy and jealousy among the neighbors. The very fact that
they were a community of themselves and by themselves, may have
operated prejudicially. To have a man, who, for forty years, had been
known, in the immediate vicinity, as a farmer and mechanic on a small
scale, without any pecuniary means, get possession of such a property,
and spread out his family to such an extent, was inexplicable to all,
and not relished perhaps by some. There seems to have been a
disposition to persist in withholding from him the dignity of a
landholder; and, long after he had distributed his estate among his
descendants, it is mentioned in deeds made by parties that bounded
upon it, as "the farm which Mr. Allen, of Boston, lets to the Nurses."
Not knowing probably any thing about it, they call it, even after
Nurse's death, "Mr. Allen's farm." This, however, was a slight matter.
When Allen sold the farm to Nurse, he bound himself to defend the
title; and he was true to his bond. What was required to be done in
this direction may, perhaps, have exposed the Nurses to animosities
which afterwards took terrible effect against them.

In granting lands originally, neither the General Court nor the town
exercised sufficient care to define boundaries. There does not appear
to have been any well-arranged system, based upon elaborate,
accurate, scientific surveys. Of the dimensions of the area of a
rough, thickly wooded, unfrequented country, the best estimates of the
most practised eyes, and measurements resting on mere exploration or
perambulation, are very unreliable. The consequence was, that, in many
cases, grants were found to overlap each other. This was the case with
the Bishop farm; and soon after Nurse came into possession, and had
begun to operate upon it, a conflict commenced; trespasses were
complained of; suits were instituted; and one of the most memorable
and obstinately contested land-controversies known to our courts took
place. In that controversy Nurse was not formally a principal. The
case was between James Allen and Zerubabel Endicott, or between Allen
and Nathaniel Putnam.

An inspection of the map, at this point, will enable us to understand
the grounds on which the suit was contested. The Orchard Farm was
granted to Endicott, as has been stated, July 3, 1632, by the General
Court. The grant states the bounds on the south and on the north to be
two rivers; on the east, another river, into which they both flow;
and, on the west, the mainland. Where this western line was to strike
the rivers on the north and south is not specified; but the natural
interpretation would seem to be, in the absence of any thing to the
contrary, that it was to strike them at their respective heads. The
evidence of all persons who were conversant with the premises during
the life of the Governor as connected with the farm was unanimous and
conclusive to this point; that is, that he and they always supposed
that the west line was, as drawn on the map, from the head of one
river to the head of the other; that the farm embraced all between
them as far up as the tide set. It was objected, on the other side,
that this made the farm much more than three hundred acres; but as an
offset to that was the fact, that a considerable part of the area was
swamp or marsh, not usually taken into the account in reckoning the
extent of a grant, and the additional fact, that the language of the
General Court in reference to quantity was not precise,--"about" three
hundred acres. At the same date with the grant to Endicott, the
General Court granted two hundred acres to Mr. Skelton, which tract is
given on the map.

As has been stated, the General Court conferred upon the towns the
exclusive right to dispose of the lands within their limits, March 3,
1635. On the 10th of December of that year, the town of Salem granted
to Robert Cole the tract of three hundred acres subsequently purchased
by Emanuel Downing, which is indicated on the map. On the 11th of
January, 1636, the grant of three hundred acres was made to Townsend
Bishop. Its language is unfortunately obscure in some expressions; but
it is clear, that the tract was to be four hundred rods in length, one
hundred and twenty-four rods in width at the western end, and one
hundred and sixteen rods at the eastern. At the north-east corner it
was to meet the water or brook that separated it from the grant to
Skelton; and it was also to "but" upon, or touch, at the eastern end,
the land granted to Endicott by the General Court. After the grant to
Bishop, the town, from time to time, made grants to Stileman of land
north of the Bishop grant. Stileman's grants adjoined Skelton's at the
north-eastern corner of the Bishop farm. That part of Stileman's land
had come into possession of Nathaniel Putnam, and the residue
westwardly, together with the grant to Weston, into the possession of
Hutchinson, Houlton, and Ingersol. Still further west, the town had
made grants to Swinnerton. Their respective locations are given in the
map. The point of difficulty which gave rise to litigation was this:
The Bishop farm was required, by the terms of the grant, to be one
hundred and sixteen rods wide at its eastern end. But there was no
room for it. The requisite width could not be got without encroaching
upon either Putnam or Endicott, or both. As Endicott stood upon an
earlier title than that of Bishop, and from a higher authority, and
Putnam upon a later title from an inferior authority, the court of
trials might have disposed of the matter, at the opening, on that
ground, and Putnam been left to suffer the encroachment. But it did
not so decide; and the case went on. The struggle was between Endicott
to push it north, and thereby save his Orchard Farm, and the land
between it and the Bishop grant, given by the town to his father,
called the Governor's Plain, and Nathaniel Putnam to push it south,
and thereby save the land he had received from his wife's father,
Richard Hutchinson, who had purchased from Stileman. Allen stood on
the defensive against both of them. The Nurses had nothing to do but
to attend to their own business, carrying on their farming operations
up to the limits of their deed, looking to Allen for redress, if, in
the end, the dimensions of their estate should be curtailed. But,
being the occupants, and, until finally ousted, the owners of the
land, if there was any intrusion to be repelled, or violence to be
met, or fighting to be done, they were the ones to do it. They were
equal to the situation.

After various trials in the courts of law in all possible shapes, the
whole subject was carried up to the General Court, where it was
decided, in conformity with the report of a special commission in May,
1679, substantially in favor of Putnam and Allen. Endicott petitioned
for a new hearing. Another commission was appointed; and their report
was accepted in May, 1682. It was more unfavorable to Endicott than
the previous one. He protested against the judgment of the court in
earnest but respectful language, and petitioned for still another
hearing. They again complied with his request, and appointed a day for
once more examining the case; but, when the day came, Nov. 24, 1683,
he was sick in bed, and the case was settled irrevocably against him.

The map gives the lines of the Bishop farm as finally settled by the
General Court. It will be noticed, that it is laid directly across the
Governor's Plain, and runs far into the Orchard Farm "up to the rocks
near Endicott's dwelling-house," or, as it is otherwise stated,
"within a few rods of Guppy's ditch, near to" the said house. It may
be said to have been a necessity, as the original three hundred acres
of the grant to Townsend Bishop had to be made up. It could not go
north; for Houlton and Ingersol stood upon the Weston grant, and
Hutchinson and Nathaniel Putnam stood upon Stileman's grants, to push
it back. It could not go west or south-west, for there Swinnerton
stood to fend off upon his grants; and there, too, was Nathaniel
Putnam, upon his own grant, and lands he had purchased of another
original grantee. It could not be swung round to the south without
jamming up the lands of Felton and others, or pushing them over the
grants, made to Robert Cole--under which Downing had purchased--and to
Thomas Read. All these parties were combined to force it
south-eastwardly over the grounds of Endicott. Nathaniel Putnam was
his most fatal antagonist. He was a man of remarkable energy, of
consummate adroitness, and untiring resources in such a transaction;
and he so managed to press in the bounds of the Bishop farm, at the
north-east, as to gain a valuable strip for himself. With this strong
man against him, acting in combination with the rich and influential
James Allen, minister of the great metropolitan First Church, and
licenser of the press, who brought the whole power of his clerical and
social connections in Boston and throughout the colony to bear upon
the General Court, Zerubabel Endicott had no chance for justice, and
no redress for wrong. In vain he invoked the memory of his father, or
of Winthrop, the grandfather of his wife. His father and both the
Winthrops had long before left the scene: a new generation had risen,
and there was none to help him.

One would have supposed, that the General Court, which had granted the
Orchard Farm to Governor Endicott, would have felt bound, in
self-respect and in honor, to have protected it against any
overlapping grants subsequently made by an inferior authority. Under
the circumstances of the case, it was its duty to have held the
Orchard Farm intact, and made it up to the satisfaction of Allen and
Nurse by a grant elsewhere, or an equitable compensation in money. It
owed so much to the son of Endicott and the grand-daughter of
Winthrop, the first noble Fathers of the colony. Perhaps the court
found its justification in the phraseology of the deed of conveyance
of the Bishop farm from Governor Endicott to his son John. After
reciting or referring to the original town grant to Bishop, and the
deeds from Bishop to Chickering, and from Chickering to himself, the
Governor conveys to his son John all the houses, &c., and every part
and parcel of the land "to the utmost extent thereof, according as is
expressed or included in either of the forecited deeds, or town
grant." It was maintained, and justly, by Allen, that he held all that
was conveyed to John Endicott, Jr. But the Court had no right to
encroach upon the Orchard Farm, which had been granted to the
Governor by them prior to all deeds and to the town grant to Bishop.

Never did that deep and sagacious observation on the mysteries of
human nature, "Men's judgments are a parcel of their fortunes,"
receive a more striking or melancholy illustration than in the case of
Zerubabel Endicott. With his falling fortunes, his judgment and
discretion fell also; his mind, maddened by a sense of wrong, seemed
bent upon exposing itself to new wrongs. Having been broken down by
lawsuits, that had wasted his estate, he seemed to have acquired a
blind passion for them. Having destroyed his peace and embarrassed his
affairs in attempts to resist the adjudications of the Court, he
persisted in struggling against them. He had tried to push the Bishop
grant west, over the land of Nathaniel Putnam in that quarter. The
highest tribunal had settled it against him. But he appeared to be
incapable of realizing the fact. He sent his hired men to cut timber
on that land. They worked there some days, felled a large number of
trees, and hewed them into beams and joists for the frame of a house.
One morning, returning to their work, there was no timber to be found;
logs, framework, and all, were gone. They were carefully piled up a
mile away, by the side of Putnam's dwelling-house, who had sent two
teams, one of four oxen, the other of two oxen and a horse, with an
adequate force of men, and in two loadings had cleaned out the whole.
Endicott of course sued him, and of course was cast.

When the General Court had consented to give him a rehearing of the
case of the Bishop farm, they expressly forbade his making any "strip"
of the land in the mean while. But with the infatuation which seemed
to possess him, and not heeding how fatally it would prejudice his
cause at the impending hearing to violate the order of the Court, he
again sent a gang of men to cut wood on the land in controversy. The
following shows the result:--

     "Hugh Jones, aged 46 years, and Alexius Reinolds, aged 25
     years, testify and say, that we, these deponents, being
     desired by Mr. Zerubabel Endicott to cut up some wood, for
     his winter firewood, accordingly went with our teams, which
     had four oxen and a horse; and there we met with several
     other teams of our neighbors, which were upon the same
     account, that is to say, to help carry up Mr. Endicott some
     wood for his winter firewood, and when we had loaded our
     sleds, Thomas Preston and John Tarbell came in a violent
     manner, and hauled the wood out of our sleds; and Francis
     Nurse, being present, demanded whose men we were. Mr.
     Endicott, being present, answered, they were his men."

These witnesses testify that this "battle of the wilderness" lasted
two days,--Endicott's men cutting the wood and loading the teams, and
Nurse's men pitching it off. The altercations and conflicts that took
place between the parties during those two days may easily be
imagined. Whether there was a final, decisive pitched battle, we are
not informed. Perhaps there was. The woods rang with rough echoes, we
may be well assured. A lawsuit followed; the result could not be in
doubt. Endicott had no right there; he was there in direct violation
of the order of Court. Nurse was in possession, had a right, and was
bound, to keep the land from being stripped.

Shortly after this, Endicott broke down, under the difficulties that
had accumulated around him. On the 24th of November, 1683, as we have
seen, he was "sick in bed." Two days before,--that is, on the 22d of
November,--he had made his will, which was presented in court on the
27th of March, 1684. He was game to the last; for this is an item of
the will:--

     "Whereas my late father, by his last will, bequeathed to me
     his farm called Bishop's or Chickering's farm, I do give the
     said farm to my five sons, to be equally divided among
     them."

The will of his father had been declared invalid on that point, and
others. The whole thing had been conclusively settled for years; but
he never would recognize the fact. It is a singular instance of an
obstinacy of will completely superseding and suppressing the reason
and the judgment. He lost the perception of the actual and real, in
clinging to what he felt to be the right.

Every association and sentiment of his soul had been shocked by the
wrongs he had suffered. He could not walk over his fields, or look
from his windows, without feeling that a property which his father had
given to his brother had, in a manner that he knew would have been as
odious to that father as it was to him, passed into the hands of
strangers, and been used as a wedge on which everybody had conspired
to deal blows, driving it into the centre of his patrimonial acres,
splitting and rending them through and through. He brooded over the
thought, until, whenever his mind was turned to it, his reason was
dethroned, his heart broken, and under its weight he fell into his
grave.

An argument addressed by him to the court and jury, in one of the
innumerable trials of the Bishop-farm case, is among the papers on
file. It appears to be a verbatim report of the speech as it was
delivered at the time, and proves him to have been a man of talents.
It is courteous, gentlemanly, and, I might say, scholarly in its
diction and style, skilful in its statements, and forcible in its
arguments.

In all the earlier trials, the juries uniformly gave verdicts in favor
of Endicott; but Allen carried the cases up to the General Court,
which exercised a final and unrestrained jurisdiction in all matters
referred to it. It usually appointed committees or commissioners to
examine such questions, accepted their reports, and made them binding.
Lands were thus disposed of without the agency, and against the
decisions, of juries. In his arguments addressed to the General Court,
Zerubabel Endicott protested against this jurisdiction, by which his
lands were taken from him "by a committee, in an arbitrary way, being
neither bound nor sworn by law or evidence." He boldly denounced it.

     "To be disseized of my inheritance; to be judged by three or
     four committee-men, who are neither bound to law nor
     evidence,--who are, or may be, mutable in their
     apprehensions, doing one thing to-day, and soon again
     undoing what they did,--I conceive, to be judged in such an
     arbitrary way is repugnant to the fundamental law of England
     contained in Magna Charta, chap. 29, which says no freeman
     shall be disseized of his freehold but by the lawful
     judgment of his peers,--that is to say, by due process of
     law; which was also confirmed by the Petition of Right, by
     Act of Parliament, _tertio Caroli I_. And also such
     arbitrary jurisdiction was exploded in putting down the
     Star-Chamber Court; and the excessive fines imposed upon all
     such actings. See 'English Liberties,' as also the fourth
     and sixth articles against the Earl of Strafford in Baker's
     'Chronicle,' folio 518."

He closes one of his remonstrances thus:--

     "The humble request of your petitioner to the Hon. Gen.
     Court, that, as an Englishman,--as a freeman of this
     jurisdiction; as descended from him who, in his time, sought
     the welfare of this commonwealth,--I may have the benefit
     and protection of the wholesome laws established in this
     jurisdiction: that, in my extreme wrong, I may have liberty
     to seek relief in a way of law, and may not, contrary to
     Magna Charta, be disseized of my freehold by the arbitrary
     act of two or three committee-men; the fundamental law of
     England knowing no such constitution, abhorring such
     administrations: and that the Hon. Court would release your
     petitioner from the injurious effects of the said
     committee's act, and explode so pernicious a precedent."

Zerubabel Endicott was an imprudent and obstinate man, but had the
traits of a generous, ardent, and noble character. He was a physician
by profession. His second wife--the widow, as has been stated, of Rev.
Antipas Newman, of Wenham, and daughter of John Winthrop, Jr.,
governor of Connecticut--survived him. Although he left five sons, the
name, at one time, was borne by a single descendant only, a lad of
seven years of age,--Samuel, a grandson of Zerubabel. On him it hung
suspended, but he saved it. From that boy, those who bear the name in
New England have been derived. We rejoice to believe that they will
preserve it, and keep its honor bright.

Winthrop was recognized as the great leader in the early history of
the Colony. He had a combination of qualities that marked him as a
wise and good man, and gave him precedence. The eminent dignity of his
character was admired and revered by all. No one was more ready to
admit this than Endicott. Never were men placed towards each other in
relations more severely testing their magnanimity, and none ever bore
the test more perfectly. But Endicott was, after all, the most
complete representative man of that generation. He was thoroughly
identified with the people, participating in their virtues and in
their defects. He was a strict religionist, a sturdy Puritan, a firm
administrator of the law; at the same time, there are indications that
he was of a genial spirit. He was personally brave, and officially
intrepid. His administration of the government required nerve, and he
had it. Sometimes the ardor of his temperament put him for a moment
off his guard; but he was quick to acknowledge his error. He was true
to the people, who never faltered in their fidelity to him. The author
of "Wonder-working Providence" described him as "a fit instrument to
begin the wilderness worke, of courage bold undaunted, yet sociable
and of a cheerful spirit." I have presented some instances of his kind
and pleasant relations with his workmen and neighbors. His name will
ever be held in honored remembrance in this vicinity, where his useful
enterprise was appreciated; and his descendants in our day, and to the
present time, have contributed to the prosperity and the adornment of
the community.

It is not unlikely, that hostile feelings towards the Nurses, which
contributed afterwards to serious results, may have been engendered in
this long-continued land quarrel. There is evidence that no such
feeling existed on the part of the Endicotts: but there were many
others interested; for, by testimony at the trials and in outside
discussions, the whole community had become more or less implicated in
the strife. The Nurses, as holding the ground and having to bear the
brunt of defending it in all cases of intrusion, had a difficult
position, and may have made some enemies. At any rate, this
controversy was one of the means of stirring up animosities in the
neighborhood; and an account of it has been deemed necessary, as
contributing to indicate the elements of the awful convulsions which
soon afterwards desolated Salem Village.

When we reach the story, for which this account of the farms of the
village and the population that grew up on them is a preparative, we
shall come back to the Townsend-Bishop grant, and to the house, still
standing, that he built and dwelt in, upon it. It may be well to
pause, and view its interesting history prior to 1692. While occupied
by its original owner, the "mansion," or "cottage," was the scene of
social intercourse among the choicest spirits of the earliest age of
New England. Here Bishop, and, after him, Chickering, entertained
their friends. Here the fine family of Richard Ingersoll was brought
up. Here Governor Endicott projected plans for opening the country;
and the road that passes its entrance-gate was laid out by him. To
this same house, young John Endicott brought his youthful Boston
bride. Here she came again, fifteen years afterwards, as the bride of
the learned and distinguished James Allen, to show him the farm which,
received as a "marriage gift" from her former husband, she had brought
as a "marriage gift" to him. Here the same Allen, in less than six
years afterwards, brought still another bride. In all these various,
and some of them rather rapid, changes, it was, no doubt, often the
resort of distinguished guests, and the place of meeting of many
pleasant companies. During the protracted years of litigation for its
possession, frequent consultations were held within it; and now, for
twelve years, it had been the home of a happy, harmonious, and
prosperous family, exemplifying the industry, energy, and enterprise
of a New England household. A new chapter was destined, as we shall
see, to be opened in its singular and diversified history. But we must
return to the enumeration of the original landholders of the village.

George Corwin came to Salem in 1638. He had large tracts of land in
various places. He lived, a part of his time, on his farm in the
village; is found to have taken an active part in the proceedings of
the people, particularly in military affairs; and was captain of a
company of cavalry. His great mercantile transactions probably led him
to have his residence mostly in the town, first on a lot on Washington
Street, near the corner of Norman Street, where his grandson the
sheriff lived in 1692. In 1660, he bought of Ann, the relict of
Nicholas Woodbury, a lot on Essex Street, next east of the Browne
Block, with a front of about one hundred and fifty feet. Here he built
a fine mansion, in which he lived the remainder of his days. He died
Jan. 6, 1685, leaving an estate inventoried at £5,964. 10_s._
7_d._,--a large fortune for those times. His portrait is preserved by
his descendants, one of whom, the late George A. Ward, describes his
dress as represented in the picture: "A wrought flowing neckcloth, a
sash covered with lace, a coat with short cuffs and reaching half-way
between the wrist and elbow; the skirts in plaits below; an octagon
ring and cane." The last two articles are still preserved. His
inventory mentions "a silver-laced cloth coat, a velvet ditto, a satin
waistcoat embroidered with gold, a trooping scarf and silver hat-band,
golden-topped and embroidered, and a silver-headed cane." His farms in
the vicinity contained fifteen hundred acres. His connections were
distinguished, and his descendants have included many eminent persons.
The name, by male descent, disappeared for a time in this part of the
country; but in the last generation it was restored in the female
descent by an act of the Legislature, and is honorably borne by one of
our most respectable families, who inherit his blood, and cherish the
memorials which time has spared of their first American ancestor.

William Hathorne appears on the church records as early as 1636. He
died in June, 1681, seventy-four years of age. No one in our annals
fills a larger space. As soldier commanding important and difficult
expeditions, as counsel in cases before the courts, as judge on the
bench, and in innumerable other positions requiring talent and
intelligence, he was constantly called to serve the public. He was
distinguished as a public speaker, and is the only person, I believe,
of that period, whose reputation as an orator has come down to us. He
was an Assistant, that is, in the upper branch of the Legislature,
seventeen years. He was a deputy twenty years. When the deputies, who
before sat with the assistants, were separated into a distinct body,
and the House of Representatives thus came into existence, in 1644,
Hathorne was their first Speaker. He occupied the chair, with
intermediate services on the floor from time to time, until raised to
the other House. He was an inhabitant of Salem Village, having his
farm there, and a dwelling-house, in which he resided when his
legislative, military, and other official duties permitted. His son
John, who succeeded him in all his public honors, also lived on his
own farm in the village a great part of the time. The name is
indelibly stamped on the hills and meadows of the region, as it was in
the civil history of that age, and has been in the elegant literature
of the present.

William Trask was one of what are called the "First Planters." He came
over before Endicott, had his residence on Salem Farms, was a most
energetic, enterprising, and useful citizen, and filled a great
variety of public stations. He brought large tracts of land under
culture, planted orchards, and established mills at the head of
tide-water on the North River. He was the military leader of the first
age of the plantations in this neighborhood, was captain of the
train-band from the beginning, and, by his gallantry and energy in
action, commanded the applause of his contemporaries. For his services
in the Pequot Expedition, the General Court gave him and his
associates large grants of land. His obsequies were celebrated, on the
16th of May, 1666, with great military parade; and the people of the
town and the whole surrounding country followed his honored remains to
the grave.

Richard Davenport came to Salem in 1631. His first residence was in
the town; but soon he was led to the Farms. In 1636, he received a
grant of eighty acres; in 1638, of two hundred and twenty acres; and,
in 1642, eighty acres more, to be divided between him and Captain
Lothrop. Besides these, he received several smaller grants of meadow
and salt marsh. Such grants were made only with the view of having
them duly improved; and it cannot be doubted that he was zealously
engaged in agricultural operations. His town residence was on a lot
reaching from Essex Street to the North River. Its front extended from
the grounds now the site of the North Church to North Street. His
house stood at some distance back from Essex Street. This estate was
sold by his administrators, in 1674, to Jonathan Corwin, whose family
occupied it until a very recent period. He left the town in 1643, and
subsequently lived in what was afterwards Salem Village, until the
public service called him away. He sold some of his estates, but
retained others, on the Farms and in the town, to the time of his
death. He continued the superintendence of his country estate, which
seems to have been his family home, to the last. His military career
gave him early distinction, and closed only with his life. In 1634,
the General Court chose him "Ensign to Capt. Trask." He was concerned
with Endicott in cutting out the cross from the king's colors. The
following is from the record of a meeting of the court, Nov. 7, 1634:
"It is ordered that Ensign Davenport shall be sent for by warrant,
with command to bring his colors with him to the next court, as also
any other that hath defaced the said colors." Davenport did not seem
anxious to cover up his agency in this matter; for, when he offered
his next child to baptism, he signified to the assembly that he was
determined to commemorate and perpetuate the memory of the
transaction, by having her christened "True Cross." It was necessary
to make a show of punishing Endicott and Davenport on this occasion,
to prevent trouble from the home government. Soon after, we find the
General Court heaping honors upon Davenport, and finally, in 1639,
making him a grant of one hundred and fifty acres of land, specially
noticing his services in the Pequot War, which appear to have elicited
general applause. In some desperate encounters with the savages,
seventeen arrows were shot "into his coat of mail," and he was wounded
in unprotected parts of his person. He was twice deputy to the General
Court. In 1644, the General Court organized an elaborate system of
external defence, the whole based upon Castle Island, now Fort
Independence, in Boston Harbor. From that point, hostile invasion by a
naval force was to be repelled. Every vessel, on entering, was to
report to the castle, be examined and subject to the orders of the
commandant. It became the military headquarters of the colony, the
protection and oversight of whose commerce were intrusted to the
officer in command. This was the highest military station and trust in
the gift of the Government. It was assigned to Richard Davenport; and
he held it for twenty-one years, to the moment of his death. The
country reposed in confidence upon his watchful fidelity. He put and
kept the castle in an efficient condition. In 1659, as evidence of
their satisfaction and approval of his official conduct, the General
Court made him a grant of five hundred acres of land laid out in
Lancaster. On the 15th of July, 1665, he was killed by lightning, at
his post. The records of the General Court speak of "the solemn stroke
of thunder that took away Captain Davenport." The whole country
mourned the loss of the veteran soldier; and the Court granted his
family an additional tract of one hundred acres of land on the
Merrimac River. He was in his sixtieth year at the time of his death.
Of the company required to be raised in Salem for the Block-Island
Expedition, in 1636, the three commissioned officers were furnished
from the Farms,--Trask, Davenport, and Read. They were soldiers by
nature and instinct, and to the end. The volleys of devoted, faithful,
and mourning comrades were fired over their graves, with no great
interval of time. United in early service, separated by the course of
their lives, they were united again in death.

Thomas Lothrop originally lived in the town, between Collins Cove and
the North River. He became a member of the First Church in Salem, and
was admitted a freeman in 1634. He soon removed to the Farms; and his
name appears among the rate-payers at the formation of the village
parish. For many years he was deputy from Salem to the General Court;
and after Beverly was set off, as his residence at the time was on
that side of the line, he was always in the General Court, as deputy
from the new town, when his other public employments permitted. No man
was ever more identified with the history of the Salem Farms. He
contributed to form the structure of its society, and the character of
its population, by all that a wise and good man could do. During his
whole life in America, he was more or less engaged in the military
service, in arduous, difficult, and dangerous positions and
operations; acting sometimes against Indians, and sometimes against
the French, or, as was usually the case, against them both combined.
He was occasionally sent to distant posts; commanding expeditions to
the eastward as far as Acadia. He was at one time in charge of a force
at Port Royal, now Annapolis, Nova Scotia. Increase Mather calls him a
"godly and courageous commander." When the last decisive struggle with
King Philip was approaching, and aid was needed from the eastern part
of the colony to rescue the settlements on the Connecticut River from
utter destruction, the "Flower of Essex" was summoned to the field. It
was a choice body of efficient men, "all culled out of the towns
belonging to this county," numbering about one hundred men. Lothrop,
of course, was their captain. In August, 1675, they were on the ground
at Hadley, the place of rendezvous. On the 26th of that month, Captain
Lothrop, with his company, and Captain Beers, of Watertown, with his,
after a vigorous pursuit, attacked the Indians in a swamp, about ten
miles from Hatfield, at the foot of Sugar-Loaf Hill. Ten were killed
on the side of the English, and twenty-six on the side of the Indians,
who were driven from the swamp, and scattered in their flight; to
fall, as was their custom, upon detached settlements; and continuing
to waste and destroy, by fire and sword, with hatchet,
scalping-knife, torch, and gun. On the 18th of September, Lothrop,
with his company, started from Deerfield, to convoy a train of
eighteen wagons, loaded with grain, and furniture of the inhabitants
seeking refuge from danger, with teamsters and others. Moseley, with
his men, remained behind, to scout the woods, and give notice of the
approach of Indians; but the stealthy savages succeeded in effecting a
complete surprise, and fell upon Lothrop as his wagons were crossing a
stream. They poured in a destructive fire from the woods, in all
directions. They were seven to one. A perfect carnage ensued. Lothrop
fell early in the unequal fight, and only seven or eight of his whole
party were left to tell the story of the fatal scene. The locality of
this disastrous and sanguinary tragedy has ever since been known as
"Bloody Brook." In the list of those who perished by bullet, tomahawk,
or arrow, on that fearful morning, we read the names of many village
neighbors of the brave and lamented commander,--Thomas Bayley, Edward
Trask, Josiah Dodge, Peter Woodbury, Joseph Balch, Thomas Buckley,
Joseph King, Robert Wilson, and James Tufts. One of Lothrop's
sergeants, who was among the slain, Thomas Smith, then of Newbury,
originated in the village. His family had grants of land, including
the hill called by their name.

Captain Lothrop was as remarkable for the benevolence of his spirit
and the tenderness of his nature as for his wisdom in council, energy
in command, or gallantry in battle. Indeed, his character in private
life was so beautiful and lovable, that I cannot refrain from leading
you into the recesses of his domestic circle. It presents a picture of
rare attractiveness. He had no children. His wife was a kind and
amiable person. They longed for objects upon which to gratify the
yearnings of their affectionate hearts. He had a large estate. His
character became known to the neighbors and the country people around.
If there was an occurrence calling for commiseration anywhere in the
vicinity, it was managed to bring it to his notice. Orphan children
were received into his household, and brought up with parental care
and tenderness. Many were, in this way, the objects of his charity and
affections. Persons especially, who were in any degree connected with
his wife's family, naturally conceived the desire to have him adopt
their children. This was the case particularly with those who were in
straitened circumstances. Others, knowing his disposition, would bring
tales of distress and destitution to his ears. Some, perhaps, turned
out to be unworthy of his goodness. In one instance, at least, where
he had taken a child into his family in its infancy, touched by
appeals made to his compassion by the parents, brought it up
carefully, watched over its education, and become attached to it, when
it had reached an age to be serviceable, the parents claimed and
insisted on their right to it, and took it away, much against his
will. But the good man's benevolence was not impaired, nor the stream
of his affectionate charities checked, by the misconduct or
ingratitude of his wards or of their friends. His plan was to do all
the good in his power to the children thus brought into his family, to
prepare them for usefulness, and start them favorably in life. In the
case of boys, he would get them apprenticed to worthy people in useful
callings. At the time of his death, there were two grown-up members of
his family, who appear to have been foisted upon his care in their
earliest childhood. But there was no blame to be attached to them in
the premises; and they were regarded by him with much affection. There
were no relations of his own in this country in need of charitable aid
or without adequate parental protection; and it was not strange that
several of his wife's connections should have availed themselves of
the benefit of his generous disposition. She herself gives a very
interesting account of an instance of this sort, in a deposition found
wrapped up among some old papers in the county court-house. The object
of the statement was to explain how a connection of hers became
domesticated in the family.

     "When the child's mother was dead, my husband being with me
     at my cousin's burial, and seeing our friends in so sad a
     condition, the poor babe having lost its mother, and the
     woman that nursed it being fallen sick, I then did say to
     some of my friends, that, if my husband would give me leave,
     I could be very willing to take my cousin's little one for a
     while, till he could better dispose of it; whereupon the
     child's father did move it to my husband. My dear husband,
     considering my weakness, and the incumbrance I had in the
     family, was pleased to return this answer,--that he did not
     see how it was possible for his wife to undergo such a
     burden. The next day there came a friend to our house, a
     woman which gave suck, and she understanding how the poor
     babe was left, being intreated, was willing to take it to
     nurse, and forthwith it was brought to her: but it had not
     been with her three weeks before it pleased the Lord to
     visit that nurse with sickness also; and the nurse's mother
     came to me desiring I would take the child from her
     daughter, and then my dear husband, observing the providence
     of God, was freely willing to receive her into his house."

At the time when this addition was made to his family, there was
certainly already in it another of his wife's connections, who had
been brought there when an infant in a manner perhaps equally
singular, and who had grown up to maturity. The particular
"incumbrance," however, spoken of by her, related to another matter.
She was an only daughter. Her father had died many years before, at
quite an advanced age. Her mother, who was sickly and infirm as well
as aged, was taken immediately into her family, and remained under her
roof until her death. In her weak and helpless condition, much care
and exertion were thrown upon her daughter. The only objection the
captain seemed to have to increasing the burden of the household, by
receiving into it this additional child with its nurse, resulted from
conjugal tenderness and considerateness. It must be confessed that
there are some indications of well-arranged management in the
foregoing account. The friend who happened to call at the house the
"next day," and who was able to supply what the "poor babe" needed,
certainly came very opportunely; and there was altogether a remarkable
concurrence and sequence of circumstances. But all that he saw was a
case of suffering, helpless innocence, and an opportunity for
benevolence and charity; and in these, with a true theology, he read
"a providence of God." That child continued, to the hour when he took
his last farewell of his family, beneath his roof, and was an object
of affectionate care, and in her amiable qualities a source of
happiness to him and his good wife. It is stated that the children,
thus from time to time domesticated in the family, called him father,
and that he addressed them as his children. While they were infants,
he was "a tender nursing father" to them. When fondling them in his
arms, in the presence of his wife, he would solemnly take notice of
the providence of God that had "disposed of them from one place to
another" until they had been brought to him; and "would present them
in his desires to God, and implore a blessing upon them."

The picture presented in the foregoing details is worth rescuing from
oblivion. Such instances of actual life, exhibited in the most private
spheres, constitute a branch of history more valuable, in some
respects, than the public acts of official dignitaries. History has
been too exclusively confined, in its materials, to the movements of
states and of armies. It ought to paint the portraits of individual
men and women in their common lives; it ought to lead us into the
interior of society, and introduce us to the family circles and home
experiences of the past. It cannot but do us good to know Thomas
Lothrop, not only as an early counsellor among the legislators of the
colony, and as having immortalized by his blood a memorable field of
battle and slaughter, but as the centre of a happy and virtuous
household on a New England farm. He made that home happy by his
benignant virtue. Although denied the blessing of children of his own,
his fireside was enlivened with the prattle and gayeties of the young.
Joy and hope and growth were within his walls. He was not a parent;
but his heart was kept warm with parental affections. He had a home
where dear ones waited for him, and rushed out to meet and cling round
him with loving arms, and welcome him with merry voices, when he
returned from the sessions of the General Court, or from campaigns
against the French and Indians.

Besides these offices of beneficence in the domestic sphere, we find
traces, in the local records, of constant usefulness and kindness
among his rural neighbors. He was called, on all occasions, to advise
and assist. As a judicious friend, he was relied upon and sought at
the bedside of the sick and dying, and in families bereaved of their
head. His name appears as a witness to wills, appraiser of estates,
trustee and guardian of the young. He was the friend of all. I know
not where to find a more perfect union of the hero and the Christian;
of all that is manly and chivalrous with all that is tender,
benevolent, and devout.

Somewhere about the year 1650, after he had been married a
considerable time, he revisited his native country. A sister, Ellen,
had, in the mean while, grown up from early childhood; and he found
her all that a fond brother could have hoped for. With much
persuasion, he besought his mother to allow her to return with him to
America. He stated that he had no children; that he would be a father
to her, and watch over and care for her as for his own child. At
length the mother yielded, and committed her daughter to his custody,
not without great reluctance, trusting to his fraternal affection and
plighted promise. He brought her over with him to his American home.
She was worthy of his love, and he was true to his sacred and precious
trust.

Ellen Lothrop became the wife of Ezekiel Cheever, the great
schoolmaster; and I should consider myself false to all good learning,
if I allowed the name of this famous old man to slip by, without
pausing to pay homage to it. His record, as a teacher of a Latin
Grammar School, is unrivalled. Twelve years at New Haven, eleven at
Ipswich, nine at Charlestown, and more than thirty-eight at
Boston,--more than seventy in all,--may it not be safely said that he
was one of the very greatest benefactors of America? With Elijah
Corlett, who taught a similar school at Cambridge for more than forty
years, he bridged over the wide chasm between the education brought
with them by the fathers from the old country, and the education that
was reared in the new. They fed and kept alive the lamp of learning
through the dark age of our history. All the scholars raised here were
trained by them. One of Cotton Mather's most characteristic
productions is the tribute to his venerated master. It flows from a
heart warm with gratitude. "Although he had usefully spent his life
among children, yet he was not become twice a child," but held his
faculties to the last. "In this great work of bringing our sons to be
men, he was my master seven and thirty years ago, was master to my
betters no less than seventy years ago; so long ago, that I must even
mention my father's tutor for one of them. He was a Christian of the
old fashion,--an old New England Christian; and I may tell you, that
was as venerable a sight, as the world, since the days of primitive
Christianity, has ever looked upon. He lived, as a master, the term
which has been, for above three thousand years, assigned for the life
of a man." Mather celebrated his praises in a poetical effusion:--

    "He lived, and to vast age no illness knew,
    Till Time's scythe, waiting for him, rusty grew.
    He lived and wrought; his labors were immense,
    But ne'er declined to preterperfect tense.

           *       *      *       *       *

    'Tis Corlett's pains, and Cheever's, we must own,
    That thou, New England, art not Scythia grown."

To our early schoolmasters, as Mather says, and the later too, I may
add, it is owing, that the whole country did not become another
Scythia.

Ezekiel Cheever was in this country as early as 1637. He was then in
New Haven, sharing in the work of the first settlement of that colony,
teaching school as his ordinary employment, but sometimes preaching,
and in other ways helping to lay the foundations of church and
commonwealth. While there, he had a family of several children. The
first-born, Samuel, became the minister of Marblehead. In 1650, he was
keeping a school at Ipswich. About this time, he lost his wife. On the
18th of November, 1652, he married Ellen, the sister whom Captain
Lothrop had brought with him from England. They had several children;
one of them, Thomas, was ordained first at Malden, and afterwards at
Chelsea. The old schoolmaster died on the 21st of August, 1708, aged
ninety-three years and seven months. His son Thomas reached the same
age. Samuel, the minister at Marblehead, was eighty-five years old at
his death. The name of Ezekiel, jr., appears on the rate-list of the
village parish as late as 1731, so that he must have reached the age
of at least seventy-seven years.

The antiquarians have been sorely perplexed in determining the
relationship of the Cheevers and Reas, as they appear to be connected
together as heirs of the Lothrop property, in an order of the General
Court of the 11th of June, 1681.

The facts are these: Captain Lothrop married Bethia, daughter of
Daniel Rea. He died without issue, and had made no will. As he was
killed in battle, his widow undertook to set up a nuncupative will. A
snow-storm, on the day appointed to act upon the matter, so blocked up
the roads, that neither Ezekiel Cheever nor his son Thomas, who had
charge of his mother's rights, could get to Salem; and the court
granted administration to the widow. The Cheevers demanded a
rehearing: it was granted; and quite an interesting and pertinacious
law-suit arose, which was finally carried up to the General Court, who
decided it in 1681. The widow does not appear to have been actuated by
merely selfish motives, but sought to divert a portion of the landed
estate from the only legal heir, Ellen, the wife of Ezekiel Cheever,
to other parties, in favor of whom her feelings were much enlisted.
There is no indication of any unfriendliness between her and her
"sister Cheever."

Lothrop's wife had become much attached to one of her connections, who
had been brought into the family. Her husband, having been fond of
children, had often expressed great affection for those of her
brother, Joshua Rea. He had also sometimes, in expressing his interest
in the Beverly Church, evinced a disposition to leave to it "his ten
acre lot and his house upon the same," as a parsonage. Perhaps, if he
had not been suddenly called away, he might have done something,
particularly for the latter object. It appeared in evidence, from her
statements and from others, that he had been importuned to make a
will, and that it was much on his mind, particularly when recovering
from a long and dangerous sickness the winter before his death; but he
never could be brought to do it. There was no evidence that he had
ever absolutely determined on any thing positively or specifically.
His widow, who seems to have been a perfectly honest and truthful
woman, testified to a conversation that passed between them on the
subject, as they were riding "together towards Wenham, the last
spring, in the week before the Court of election." In passing by
particular pieces of property owned by him, he indulged in some
speculations as to what disposal he should make of this or that
pasture or plain or woodland. But she did not represent that his
expressions were absolute and determinate, but rather indicative of
the then inclination of his mind. In another part of her statement,
she said, "I did desire him to make his will, which, when he was sick,
I did more than once or twice; and his answer to me was, that he did
look upon it as that which was very requisite and fit should be done.
But, dear wife, thou hast no cause to be troubled; if I should die and
not make a will, it would be never the worse for thee; thyself would
have the more." It is not difficult to understand the case as it
probably stood in the mind of Captain Lothrop. Whenever the subject of
making a will, and doing kind things for the Beverly parish, and the
individuals in whose behalf his wife was so anxious, was brought up,
he felt the force, as he expressed it, "of the duty which God required
of a master of a family to set his house in order;" and he was no
doubt strongly moved, and sometimes almost resolved, to gratify her
wishes: but he remembered the solemn promise he had made to his
mother, as he parted from her for ever, and received his sister from
her hands, and every sentiment of honor, and of filial and fraternal
love, restrained him; and his mind settled into a conviction that it
was his duty to allow his sister the benefit of the final inheritance
of his property. As the particular persons to whom his wife wished him
to make bequests were her relatives, and the law would give her an
ample allowance in the use, for life, of his large landed property,
she would be able to provide for them after his death, as he had been
in the habit of doing.

The General Court took a just view of the case, and decided that she
should have the whole movable estate for her own "use and dispose,"
and the "use and benefit" for life of the houses and lands, "making no
strip nor waste;" after her death, the same to go to Ellen, the wife
of Ezekiel Cheever. The widow was to pay all debts due from the
estate, and also twenty pounds to the children of her brother, Joshua
Rea. The Court seemed to think, that, if any expectations had been
excited in that quarter, she was fully as responsible for it as her
late husband; and, as the Cheevers were to get nothing, while she
lived, out of the estate, the Court required her to pay the sum just
named to her nephews and nieces. They ordered Ezekiel Cheever to pay
five pounds as costs for their hearing the case, which he did on the
spot.

It may be mentioned, by the way, that the widow of Captain Lothrop was
married again within eight months of his death; but that was quite
usual in those days. She and her new husband concluded that it would
be troublesome to take care of Captain Lothrop's several farms. They
preferred to live in the town. She was probably over sixty years of
age. The conclusion of the whole matter was, that, in consideration of
sixty pounds paid down, they surrendered all claim whatever to the
"houseing and lands" left by Captain Lothrop, to Cheever and his wife.
They conveyed them "free and clear of and from all debts owing from
the estate of said Lothrop, and gifts or bequests pretended to be made
by him, or by any ways or means to be had, claimed, or challenged
therefrom by any person or persons whomsoever." The relict of Captain
Lothrop died in 1688.

Ezekiel Cheever and his wife, having thus become possessed of all her
brother's real estate, conveyed the lands belonging to it in Salem
Village to their son, Ezekiel Cheever, Jr. He had, for some years,
been living in the town of Salem, carrying on the business of a
tailor. He was a member of the First Church, and appears to have been
a respectable person. His dwelling-house stood on the lot in
Washington Street occupied by the late Robert Brookhouse. He sold it
to the Rev. Nicholas Noyes, on the 14th of April, 1684, removed to the
village, took possession of the Lothrop farm, and was there in time to
bear a share in the witchcraft delusion.

In 1636, a grant of land was made to Thomas Gardner of one hundred
acres. He came to this country as early as 1624, and resided at Cape
Ann. Subsequently he removed to Salem, and, with his wife, was
admitted to the church. He was deputy to the General Court in 1637.
His grant was in the western part of the township, and embraced land
included within the limits of Salem Village. The name still remains on
the same territory. His sons became proprietors of several additional
tracts in the neighborhood. One of them, Joseph, is connected, in the
most conspicuous and interesting manner, with our military history.

The destruction of Captain Lothrop and his company, on the 18th of
September, filled the country with grief and consternation; and, as
the year 1675 drew towards a close, the conviction became general,
that the crisis of the fate of the colonies was near at hand. The
Indians were carrying all before them. Philip was spreading
conflagration, devastation, and slaughter around the borders, and
striking sudden and deadly blows into the heart of the country. It was
evident that he was consolidating the Indian power into irresistible
strength. Among papers on file in the State House is a letter
addressed to the governor and council, dated at Mendon, Oct. 1, 1675,
from Lieutenant Phinehas Upham, of Malden. In command of a company,
acting under Captain Gorham of Barnstable, who had also a company of
his own, he had been on a scout for Indians beyond Mendon, which was a
frontier town. Their route had been over a sweep of territory then an
almost unbroken wilderness, embracing the present sites of Grafton,
Worcester, Oxford, and Dudley. The result of the exploration is thus
given: "Now, seeing that in all our marches we find no Indians, we
verily think that they are drawn together into great bodies far remote
from these parts." From other scouting parties, it became evident that
this opinion was correct, and that the Indians were collecting stores
and assembling their warriors somewhere, to fall upon the colonies at
the first opening of spring. Further information made it certain, that
their place of gathering was in the Narragansett country, in the
south-westerly part of the colony of Rhode Island. There was no
alternative but, as a last effort, to strike the enemy at that point,
with the utmost available force. A thousand men were raised, 527 by
Massachusetts, 315 by Connecticut, and 158 by Plymouth. Massachusetts
organized a company of cavalry and six companies of foot soldiers,
Connecticut five and Plymouth two companies of foot. All were placed
under the command of Governor Winslow, of Plymouth. The winter had set
in earlier than usual; much snow had fallen, and the weather was
extremely cold. The seven companies of Massachusetts, under the
command of Major Samuel Appleton of Ipswich, started on their march,
Dec. 10. On the evening of the 12th, having effected a junction with
the Plymouth companies, they reached the rendezvous, on the north side
of Wickford Hill, in North Kingston, R.I. On the 13th, Winslow
commenced his move upon the enemy. On the 18th, the Connecticut
troops joined him. His army was complete; the enemy was known to be
near, and all haste made to reach him. The snow was deep. The
Narragansetts were intrenched on a somewhat elevated piece of ground
of five or six acres in area, surrounded by a swamp, within the limits
of the present town of South Kingston. The Indian camp was strongly
fortified by a double row of palisades, about a rod apart, and also by
a thick hedge. There was but a single entrance known to our troops,
which could only be reached, one at a time, over a slanting log or
felled tree, slippery from frost and falling snow, about six feet
above a ditch. There were other passages, known only to the Indians,
by which they could steal out, a few at a time, and get a shot at our
people in the flank and rear. Many of our men were cut off in this
way. The allied forces had expected to pass the night, previous to
reaching the hostile camp, at a garrison about fifteen miles distant
from that point; but the Indians had destroyed the buildings, and
slaughtered the occupants, seventeen in number, two days before. Here
the troops passed the night, unsheltered from the bitter weather. The
next day, Dec. 19, was Sunday; but their provisions were exhausted,
and the supply they had expected to find had been destroyed with the
garrison-house. There could be no delay. They recommenced their march,
at half-past five o'clock in the morning, through the deep snow, which
continued falling all day, and reached the borders of what was
described, by a writer well acquainted with it, as "a hideous swamp."
Fortunately, the early and long-continued extreme cold weather of that
winter had rendered it more passable than it otherwise would have
been. But the ground was rough, and very difficult to traverse. They
were chilled and worn by their long march, following winding paths
through thick woods, across gullies, and over hills and fields. It was
between one and two o'clock in the afternoon, and the short winter day
was wearing away. Winslow saw the position at a glance, and, by the
promptness of his decision, proved himself a great captain. He ordered
an instant assault. The Massachusetts troops were in the van; the
Plymouth, with the commander-in-chief, in the centre; the Connecticut,
in the rear. The Indians had erected a block-house near the entrance,
filled with sharp-shooters, who also lined the palisades. The men
rushed on, although it was into the jaws of death, under an unerring
fire. The block-house told them where the entrance was. The companies
of Moseley and Davenport led the way. Moseley succeeded in passing
through. Davenport fell beneath three fatal shots, just within the
entrance. Isaac Johnson, captain of the Roxbury company, was killed
while on the log. But death had no terrors to that army. The centre
and rear divisions pressed up to support the front and fill the gaps;
and all equally shared the glory of the hour. Enough survived the
terrible passage to bring the Indians to a hand-to-hand fight within
the fort. After a desperate struggle of nearly three hours, the
savages were driven from their stronghold; and, with the setting of
that sun, their power was broken. Philip's fortunes had received a
decided overthrow, and the colonies were saved. In all military
history, there is not a more daring exploit. Never, on any field, has
more heroic prowess been displayed. By the best computations, the
Indian loss was at least one thousand, including the large numbers who
perished from cold, as they scattered in their flight without shelter,
food, or place of refuge. Of the colonial force, over eighty were
killed, and one hundred and fifty wounded. Three of the Massachusetts
captains--Johnson, Gardner, and Davenport--were killed on the spot.
Three of the Connecticut captains--John Gallop, Samuel Marshall, and
Robert Seely--also fell in the fight. Captain William Bradford, of
Plymouth, was wounded by a musket-ball, which he carried in his body
to his grave. Captain John Gorham, also of the Plymouth colony, was
shortly after carried off by a fever, occasioned by the
over-exhaustion of the march and the battle. Lieutenant Phinehas
Upham, of Johnson's company, was mortally wounded. Great value appears
to have been attached to the services of this officer. In the hurried
preparation for the campaign, Captain Johnson had nominated his
brother as his lieutenant. The General Court overruled the
appointment. Johnson cheerfully acquiesced, and, in a paper addressed
to the Court, assured them that he "most readily submitted to their
choice of Lieutenant Upham." This single passage is an imperishable
eulogium upon the characters of the two brave men who gave their
lives to the country on that fatal but glorious day.

Captain Gardner's company was raised in this neighborhood. Joseph
Peirce and Samuel Pikeworth of Salem, and Mark Bachelder of Wenham,
were killed before entering the fort. Abraham Switchell of Marblehead,
Joseph Soames of Cape Ann, and Robert Andrews of Topsfield, were
killed at the fort. Charles Knight, Thomas Flint, and Joseph Houlton,
Jr., of Salem Village; Nicholas Hakins and John Farrington, of Lynn;
Robert Cox, of Marblehead; Eben Baker and Joseph Abbot, of Andover;
Edward Harding, of Cape Ann; and Christopher Read, of Beverly,--were
wounded. An account of the death of Captain Gardner, in detail, has
been preserved. The famous warrior, and final conqueror of King
Philip, Benjamin Church, was in the fight as a volunteer, rendered
efficient service, and was wounded. His "History of King Philip's War"
is reprinted, by John Kimball Wiggin, as one of his series of elegant
editions of rare and valuable early colonial publications entitled
"Library of New England History." In the second number, Part I. of
Church's history is edited by Henry Martyn Dexter. Church's account of
what came within his observation in this fight, with the notes of the
learned editor, is the most valuable source of information we have in
reference to it. He says, that, in the heat of the battle, he came
across Gardner, "amidst the wigwams in the east end of the fort,
making towards him; but, on a sudden, while they were looking each
other in the face, Captain Gardner settled down." He instantly went to
him. The blood was running over his cheek. Church lifted up his cap,
calling him by name. "Gardner looked up in his face, but spoke not a
word, being mortally shot through the head." The widow of Captain
Gardner (Ann, sister of Sir George Downing) became the successor of
Ann Dudley, the celebrated poetess of her day, by marrying Governor
Bradstreet, in 1680. She died in 1713.

There is a curious parallelism between the first and the last great
victory over the Indian power in the history of America. An interval
of one hundred and sixty one years separates them. On the 19th of
December, 1836,--the anniversary of the day when Winslow stormed the
Narragansett fort,--Colonel Taylor received his orders to pursue the
Florida Indians. It was a last attempt to subdue them. They had long
baffled and defied the whole power of the United States. Every general
in the army had laid down his laurels in inglorious and utter failure.
He started on the 20th, with an army of about one thousand men. On the
25th, he found himself on the edge of a swamp, impassable by artillery
or horses. On the opposite side were the Indian warriors, ready to
deal destruction, if he should attempt to cross the swamp. He had the
same question to decide which Winslow had; and he decided it in the
same way, with equal promptness. The struggle lasted about the same
time; and the loss, in proportion to the numbers engaged, was about
the same. The results were alike permanently decisive. Okee-cho-bee
stands by the side of Narragansett, and the names of Josiah Winslow
and Zachary Taylor are imperishably inscribed together on the tablets
of military glory.

Dr. Palfrey says that Captain Nathaniel Davenport was a son of
"Davenport of the Pequot War." He was born in Salem, and brought up in
the village. His name, with those of his brave father, and his
associate in youth and in death Joseph Gardner, belongs to our local
annals. They were both the idols of their men. Davenport was dressed,
when he fell, in a "full buff suit," and was probably thought by the
Indians to be the commander-in-chief. On receiving his triple wound,
he called his lieutenant, Edward Tyng, to him, gave him his gun in
charge, delivered over to him the command of his company, and died.

There has been some uncertainty on the point whether Nathaniel
Davenport was a son of Richard, the commandant at the castle. The fact
that he was associated with William Stoughton, and Stephen Minot whose
wife was a daughter of Richard Davenport, as an administrator of the
estate of the latter, has been regarded as rendering it probable. Dr.
Palfrey's unhesitating statement to that effect is, of itself, enough
to settle the question. There is, moreover, a document on file which
proves that he is correct. Nathaniel's widow had some difficulty in
settling his estate, and applied to the General Court for its
interposition. Quite a mass of papers belong to the case. Among them
is a bill of expenses incurred by her in connection with his funeral
charges, such as, "twenty-one rings to relatives," and to those "who
took care to bring him off slain, eight pounds;" and "for mourning for
my mother Davenport, sisters Minot and Elliot, and myself, sixteen
pounds." This latter item is decisive, as we know that two of Richard
Davenport's daughters married persons of those names. It is a
circumstance of singular interest, as showing by how slight an
accident--for it is a mere accident--important questions of history
are sometimes determinable. This item, so far as I have been able to
find, is the only absolute evidence we have to the point that Richard
was the father of Nathaniel Davenport; and it would not have been in
existence, had not questions arisen in the settlement of the estate of
the latter requiring the action of the General Court. The record of
baptisms in the First Church at Salem, prior to 1636, is lost. The
names of Richard Davenport's children, baptized subsequent to that
date, are in the records of the Salem or Boston churches. As Nathaniel
is understood to have been one of the earliest born, the record of his
baptism was probably in the lost part of the Salem book.

It may be thought surprising, that so little appears to have been
known concerning an officer of his rank and parentage, and whose death
has rendered his name so memorable. To account for it, I must recur to
the history of the Narragansett expedition. No military organization
was ever more rapidly effected, or more thoroughly and promptly
executed its work. The commissioners of the three united colonies were
satisfied that the Indian rendezvous at Narragansett, where their
forces and stores were being collected and their resources
concentrated, must be struck at without a moment's delay; that the
blow must be swift and decisive; that it must be struck then, in the
depth of winter; that, if deferred to the spring, all would be lost;
that, if the Indian power was allowed to remain and to gather strength
until the next season, nothing could save the settlements from
destruction. Early in November, they formed their plan, and put the
machinery for summoning all their utmost resources into instant
action. On the 30th of November, the officers appointed for the
purpose made return, that they had impressed the required number in
the several counties and towns, fitted them out with arms, ammunition,
clothes, and all necessary equipments; that the men were on the
ground, ready to go forward. There was no time for recruiting, or
raising bounties, or substitute brokerage; no time for electioneering
to get commissions. The rank and file were ready: they had been
brought in by a process that gave no time for canvassing for offices.
A summons had been left at the house of every drafted man, to report
himself the next morning. If any one failed to appear, some other
member of the family, brother or father, had to take his place. The
organizing and officering of this force must be done instanter. All
depended upon suitable officers being selected. A company was waiting
at Boston for a captain, and a captain must be found. Some one in
authority happened to think of Nathaniel Davenport. His childhood and
youth had been passed at Salem Village and on Castle Island: on
reaching maturity, he had removed to New York, and been there for
years in commercial pursuits. A short time before, he had returned to
Boston, and engaged in business there. His father had been dead since
1665, and not many persons knew him,--only, perhaps, a few of his
early associates, and the old friends of his father: but they knew,
that, from his birth to his manhood, he had breathed a military
atmosphere,--was a soldier, by inheritance, of the school of Lothrop,
Read, and Trask; and it was determined at once to hunt him up. He was
serving at Court; taken out of the jury-box in a pending trial; and
placed at the head of the company. The accurate historian of Boston,
Samuel G. Drake, says, "Captain Davenport's men were extremely grieved
at the death of their leader; he having, by his courteous carriage,
much attached them to himself, although he was a stranger to most of
them when he was appointed their captain. On which occasion he made 'a
very civil speech,' and allowed them to choose their sergeants
themselves." He had no time to settle his accounts, arrange his
affairs, or confer with any one, but led his company at once to the
rendezvous. These circumstances, perhaps, partially explain why so
little seems to have been known of him in Boston, or to local
writers.

Besides Captains Gardner and Davenport and the men whose names have
been mentioned as killed or wounded, there were in the Narragansett
fight the following from Salem Village and its farming neighborhood:
John Dodge, William Dodge, William Raymond, Thomas Raymond, John
Raymond, Joseph Herrick, Thomas Putnam, Jr., Thomas Abbey, Robert
Leach, and Peter Prescott. There may have been others: no full roll is
on record. The foregoing are gathered from partial returns
miscellaneously collected in the files at the State House. The Dodges
(sometimes the name is written Dodds, which appears, I think, to have
been its original form), and the Raymonds (sometimes written Rayment),
were, from the first, conspicuous in military affairs. A few words
explanatory of their relation to the village may be here properly
given.

On the 25th of January, 1635, the town of Salem voted to William
Trask, John Woodbury, Roger Conant, Peter Palfrey, and John Balch, a
tract of land, as follows: "Two hundred acres apiece together lying,
being at the head of Bass River, one hundred and twenty-four poles in
breadth, and so running northerly to the river by the great pond side,
and so in breadth, making up the full quantity of a thousand acres."
These men were original settlers, having been in the country for some
time before Endicott's arrival. This circumstance gave to them and
others the distinguishing title of "old planters." The grant of a
thousand acres, comprising the five farms above mentioned, was always
known as "the Old Planters' Farms." The first proprietors of them,
and their immediate successors, appear to have arranged and managed
them in concert,--to have had homesteads near together between the
head of Bass River and the neighborhood of the "horse bridge," where
the meeting-house of the Second Congregational Society of Beverly, or
of the "Precinct of Salem and Beverly" now stands. Their woodlands and
pasture lands were further to the north and east. An inspection of the
map will give an idea of the general locality of the "Old Planters'
Farms" in the aggregate--above the head of Bass River, extending
northerly towards "the river," as the Ipswich River was called, and
easterly to the "great pond," that is, Wenham Lake. Conant, Woodbury,
and Balch occupied their lands at once. I have stated how Trask's
portion of the grant went into the hands of Scruggs, and then of John
Raymond. Palfrey is thought never to have occupied his portion. He
sold it to William Dodge, the founder of the family of that name,
known by way of eminence as "Farmer Dodge," whose wife was a daughter
of Conant. A portion of the grant assigned to Conant was sold by one
of his descendants to John Chipman, who, on the 28th of December,
1715, was ordained as the first minister of the "Second Beverly
Society." He was the grandfather of Ward Chipman, Judge of the Supreme
Court, and for some time President, of the Province of New Brunswick,
and whose son of the same name was chief-justice of that court. He was
also grandfather of the wife of the great merchant, William Gray,
whose family has contributed such invaluable service to the
literature, legislation, judicial learning, and general welfare of the
country. The Rev. Mr. Chipman was the ancestor of many other
distinguished persons. The house in which he lived is still standing,
near the site of the church in which he preached. It is occupied by
his descendants, bearing his name, and, although much time-worn, has
the marks of having been a structure of a very superior order for that
day. The venerable mansion stands back from the road, on a smooth and
beautiful lawn, bordered by a solid stone wall of even lines and
surfaces. In these respects it well compares with any country
residence upon which taste, skill, and wealth have, in more recent
times, been bestowed.

The dividing line between Beverly and Salem Village, as seen on the
map, finally agreed upon in 1703, ran through the "Old Planters'
Farms," particularly the portions belonging to the Dodges, Raymonds,
and Woodbury. It went through "Captain John Dodge's dwelling-house,
six foot to the eastward of his brick chimney as it now stands." At
the time of the witchcraft delusion, the Raymonds and Dodges mostly
belonged to the Salem Village parish and church. They continued on the
rate-list, and connected with the proceedings entered on the
record-books, until the meeting-house at the "horse bridge" was opened
for worship, in 1715, when they transferred their relations to the
"Precinct of Salem and Beverly."

When Sir William Phipps got up his expedition against Quebec, in
1690, William Raymond raised a company from the neighborhood; and so
deep was the impression made upon the public mind by his ability and
courage, and so long did it remain in vivid remembrance, that, in
1735, the General Court granted a township of land, six miles square,
"to Captain William Raymond, and the officers and soldiers" under his
command, and "to their heirs," for their distinguished services in the
"Canada Expedition." The grant was laid out on the Merrimack, but,
being found within the bounds of New Hampshire, a tract of equivalent
value was substituted for it on the Saco River. Among the men who
served in this expedition was Eleazer, a son of Captain John Putnam,
who afterwards, for many years, was one of the deacons of the Salem
Village Church.

The short, rapid, sharp, and sanguinary campaign against the
Narragansetts seems to have tried to the utmost, not only the courage
and spirit of the men, but the powers of human endurance. The
constitutions of many were permanently impaired. As much fatigue and
suffering were crowded into that short month as the physical forces of
strong men could bear. We find such entries as this in the
town-books:--"Salem, 1683. Samuel Beadle, who lost his health in the
Narragansett Expedition, is allowed to take the place of Mr. Stephens
as an innkeeper." A petition, dated in 1685, is among the papers in
the State House, signed by men from Lynn, the Village, Beverly,
Reading, and Hingham, praying for a grant of land, for their services
and sufferings in that expedition. The petition was granted. The
following extract from it tells the story: "We think we have reason to
fear our days may be much shortened by our hard service in the war,
from the pains and aches of our bodies, that we feel in our bones and
sinews, and lameness thereby taking hold of us much, especially in the
spring and fall."

While there is "reason to fear" that the days of many were shortened,
there were some so tough as to survive the strain, and bid defiance to
aches and pains, and almost to time itself. In a list of fourteen who
went from Beverly, six, including Thomas Raymond and Lott, a
descendant of Roger Conant, were alive in 1735!

The grants of land made to these gallant men and their heirs amounted
in all, and ultimately, to seven distinct tracts, called "Narragansett
Townships." They were made in fulfilment of an express public promise
to that effect. It is stated in an official document, that
"proclamation was made to them, when mustered on Dedham Plain" on the
9th of December, just as they took up their march, "that, if they
played the man, took the fort, and drove the enemy out of the
Narragansett country, which was their great seat, they should have a
gratuity in land, besides their wages." The same document, which is in
the form of a message from the House of Representatives to the Council
of the Province of Massachusetts, dated Jan. 10, 1732, goes on to say,
"And as the condition has been performed, certainly the promise, in
all equity and justice, ought to be fulfilled. And if we consider the
difficulties these brave men went through in storming the fort in the
depth of winter, and the pinching wants they afterwards underwent in
pursuing the Indians that escaped, through a hideous wilderness, known
throughout New England to this day by the name of the _hungry march_;
and if we further consider, that, until this brave though small army
thus played the man, the whole country was filled with distress and
fear, and we trembled in this capital, Boston itself; and that to the
goodness of God to this army we owe our fathers' and our own safety
and estates,"--therefore they urge the full discharge of the
obligations of public justice and gratitude. They did not urge in
vain. The grants were made on a scale, that finally was liberal and
honorable to the government.

I have dwelt at this great length on the Narragansett campaign and
fight, partly because the details have not been kept as familiar to
the memory of the people as they deserve, but chiefly because they
demonstrate the military genius of the community with whose character
our subject requires us to be fully acquainted. The enthusiasm of the
troops, when Winslow gave the order for the assault, was so great,
that they rushed over the swamp with an eagerness that could not be
restrained, struggling as in a race to see who could first reach the
log that led into the fiery mouth of the fort. A Salem villager, John
Raymond, was the winner. He passed through, survived the ordeal, and
came unharmed out of the terrible fight. He was twenty-seven years of
age. He signed his name to a petition to the General Court, in 1685,
as having gone in the expedition from Salem Village, and as then
living there. Some years afterwards, he removed to Middleborough,
joined the church in that place in 1722, and died in 1725. The fact
that his last years were spent there has led to the supposition that
he went from Middleborough to the Narragansett fight; but no men were
drafted into that army from Middleborough. It was not a town at the
time, but was organized some years afterwards. It had no inhabitants
then. Philip had destroyed what few houses had been there, and
slaughtered or dispersed their occupants.

Thus far our attention has been directed to that portion of the
population of Salem Village drawn there by the original policy of the
company in London to attract persons of superior social position,
wealth, and education to take up tracts of land, and lead the way into
the interior. It operated to give a high character to the early
agriculture of the country, and facilitate the settling of the lands.
Without taking into view the means they had to make the necessary
outlays in constructing bridges and roads, and introducing costly
implements of husbandry and tasteful improvements, but looking solely
at the social, intellectual, and moral influence they exerted, it must
be acknowledged that the benefit derived from them was incalculable.
They gave a powerful impulse to the farming interest, and introduced a
high tone to the spirit of the community. They were early on the
ground, and remained more or less through the period of the first
generation. Their impress was long seen in the manners and character
of the people. There was surely a goodly proportion of such men among
the first settlers of this neighborhood.

I come now to another class drawn along with and after the
preceding,--the permanent, substantial yeomanry with no capital but
their sturdy industry, doing hard work with their strong arms, and
striking the roots of the settlement down deep into the soil by mixing
their own labor with it. A glance at the map will be useful, at this
point, showing the general direction by which the farming population
advanced to the interior. All between the North and Cow House Rivers
was, as now, called North Fields, and is still for the most part a
farming territory. All north of Cow House River, westwardly to Reading
and eastwardly to the sea, was originally known as the "Farms" or
"Salem Farms." When the First Beverly Parish was set off in 1667, it
took from the "Farms" all east of Bass River. As Topsfield and other
townships were established, they were more or less encroached upon.
The "Farmers" as they were called, although unorganized, regarded
themselves as one community, having a common interest. The tide of
settlement flowed up the rivers and brooks, sought out the meadows,
and was drawn into the valleys among the hills.

John Porter, called "Farmer Porter," came with his sons from Hingham,
and bought up lands to the north of Duck or Crane River. His family
before long held among them more land, it is probable, than any other.
He served many years as deputy in the General Court, first from
Hingham and then from Salem. He is spoken of in the colonial records
of Massachusetts as "of good repute for piety, integrity, and estate."
The Barneys, Leaches, and others went eastwardly towards Bass River.
The Putnams followed up Beaver Brook to Beaver Dam, and spread out
towards the north and west; while Richard Hutchinson turned southerly
to the interval between Whipple and Hathorne Hills, bought the
Stileman grant, and cleared the beautiful meadows where the old
village meeting-house afterwards stood. He was a vigorous and
intelligent agriculturist, and a man of character. He died in 1681, at
eighty years of age, leaving a large and well-improved estate. His
will has this item: I give "five acres of land to Black Peter, my
servant." He had given fine farms to his children severally, many
years before his death. His second wife, who survived him, had no
children. He had come by her into possession of a valuable addition to
his estate. After distributing his property, and providing legacies
for children and grandchildren, his will left it to the option of his
widow to spend the residue of her days either in the family of his son
Joseph, or elsewhere; if she should prefer to live elsewhere, then she
should receive back, in her own right, all the property she had
originally owned; if she continued to live to her death in Joseph's
family, then her property was to go to him and his heirs. This, I
think, shows that he was as sagacious as he was just.

Richard Ingersoll came from Bedfordshire in England in 1629, bringing
letters of recommendation from Matthew Cradock to Governor Endicott.
After living awhile in town, a tract of land of eighty acres was
granted to him, on the east side of Wooleston River, opposite the site
of Danversport, at a place called, after him, Ingersoll's Point. He
there proceeded to clear and break ground, plant corn, fence in his
land, and make other improvements. He also carried on a fishery.
Subsequently he leased the Townsend Bishop farm, where he lived
several years. He died in 1644. Not long before his death, he
purchased, jointly with his son-in-law Haynes, the Weston grant. His
half of it he bequeathed to his son Nathaniel. He was evidently a man
of real dignity and worth, enjoying the friendship of the best men of
his day. Governor Endicott and Townsend Bishop were with him in his
last sickness, and witnesses to his will. His widow married John
Knight of Newbury. In a legal instrument filed among the papers
connected with a case of land title, dated twenty-seven years after
her first husband's death, she expresses in very striking language the
tender affection and respect with which she still cherished his
memory.

William Haynes married Sarah, daughter of Richard Ingersoll, and
occupied his half of the Weston grant. In company with his brother,
Richard Haynes, he had before bought of Townsend Bishop five hundred
and forty acres, covering a considerable part of the northern end of
the village territory. They sold one-third part of it to Abraham Page.
Page sold to Simon Bradstreet, and John Porter bought all the three
parts from the Hayneses and Bradstreet. It long constituted a portion
of the great landed property of the Porter family. These facts show
that William Haynes was a person of means; and the manner in which he
is uniformly spoken of proves that he was regarded with singular
respect and esteem. He died about 1650, and his son Thomas became
subsequently a leading man in the village.

There has been uncertainty where William Haynes came from, or to what
family of the name he belonged. Among the papers of the Ingersoll
family, it has recently been found that he is mentioned as "brother to
Lieutenant-Governor Haynes." There seems to be no other person to whom
this language can refer than John Haynes, who, after being Governor of
Massachusetts, removed to Connecticut where he was governor and
deputy-governor, in alternate years, to the day of his death. John
Haynes, as Winthrop informs us, was a gentleman of "great estate." His
property in England is stated to have yielded a thousand pounds per
annum. Dr. Palfrey says he was "a man of family as well as fortune;
and the dignified and courteous manners, which testified to the care
bestowed on his early nurture, won popularity by their graciousness,
at the same time that they diffused a refining influence by their
example." If William of the village was brother to John of
Connecticut, the fact that he and his brother Richard could make such
large purchases of lands, and the remarkable respect manifested
towards him, are well accounted for. The Ingersoll family traditions
and entries would seem to be the highest authority on such a point.

Job Swinnerton was a brother of John who for many years was the
principal physician in the town of Salem. He had several grants of
land, and was a worthy, peaceable, unobtrusive citizen. He seems to
have kept out of the heat of the various contentions that occurred in
the village; and, although his influence was sometimes decisively put
forth, he evidently did nothing to aggravate them. He died April 11,
1689, over eighty-eight years of age. He had a large family, and his
descendants continue the name in the village to this day. Daniel Rea
came originally to Plymouth, and in 1630 bought a dwelling-house,
garden, and "all the privileges thereunto belonging," in that town. In
1632 he removed to Salem, and at once became a leading man in the
management of town affairs. He had a grant of one hundred and sixty
acres, which he occupied and cultivated till his death in 1662. He had
but two children: one, the wife of Captain Lothrop; the other, Joshua
Rea, became the founder of a large family who acted conspicuously in
the affairs of the village for several generations. Jacob Barney was
an original grantee, and for several years a deputy. His son of the
same name became a large landholder, and, on the 5th of April, 1692,
at the very moment when the witchcraft delusion was at its height,
gave two acres conveniently situated for the erection of a
schoolhouse. He conveyed it to inhabitants of the neighborhood to be
used for that purpose, mentioning them severally by name. I give the
list, as it shows who were the principal people thereabouts at the
time: "Mr. Israel Porter; Sergeant John Leach; Cornet Nathaniel
Howard, Sr.; Corporal Joseph Herrick, Sr.; Benjamin Porter; Joshua
Rea, Sr.; Thomas Raymond, Sr.; Edward Bishop, _secundus_; John Trask,
Jr.; John Creesy; Joshua Rea, Jr.; John Rea; John Flint, Sr." Lawrence
Leach received a grant of one hundred acres; and others of the same
name and family had similar evidence that they were regarded as
valuable accessions to the population. William Dodge and Richard
Raymond had grants of sixty acres each; Humphrey and William Woodbury
had forty each. The families of Leach, Raymond, Dodge, and Woodbury,
still remain in the community of which their ancestors were the
founders. John Sibley had a grant of fifty acres. Robert Goodell was a
grantee, and became a large landholder.

The descendants of the two last-named persons are very numerous, and
have maintained the respectability of their family names. They are
each, at this day, represented by gentlemen whose enthusiastic
interest in our antiquities is proved by their invaluable labors and
acquisitions in the interesting departments of genealogy and local
history,--John L. Sibley, Librarian of Harvard University; and Abner
C. Goodell, Register of Probate for the County of Essex.

Besides Townsend Bishop, there were two other persons of that name
among the original inhabitants of Salem. They do not appear to have
been related to him or to each other. Richard Bishop, whose wife
Dulcibell had died Aug. 6, 1658, married the widow Galt, July 22,
1660. He died Dec. 30, 1674.

Edward Bishop was in Salem in 1639, and became a member of the church
in 1645. In 1660 he was one of the constables of Salem, an original
member of the Beverly Church in 1667, and died in January, 1695. He
was an early settler on the Farms; his lands were on both sides of
Bass River, the parcels on the west side being above and below the
Ipswich road. His own residence was on the Beverly side; and he was
not usually connected with the concerns of the village. His name
appears but once in the witchcraft proceedings, and then in favor of
an accused person.

Edward Bishop, commonly called "the sawyer," from the tenor of
conveyances of land, dates, and other evidences, appears to have been
a son of the preceding. In his earlier life, he was somewhat notable
for irregularities and aberrations of conduct. With his wife Hannah,
he was fined by the local court, in 1653, for depredating upon the
premises of his neighbors. During the subsequent period of his
history, he bore the character of an industrious and reputable
person. At some time previous to 1680, he married Bridget, widow of
Thomas Oliver. On the 9th of March, 1693, he married Elizabeth Cash.
He lived originally in Beverly; afterwards, at different times, on the
land belonging to his father in Salem Village,--the estate he occupied
being on both sides of the Ipswich road. His last years were passed in
the town of Salem. He died in 1705. His daughter Hannah, born in 1646,
became the wife of Captain William Raymond, one of the founders of the
numerous family of that name.

Edward Bishop, son of the preceding, called, for distinction,
"husbandman," was born in 1648. He married Sarah, daughter of William
Wilds, of Ipswich. He was a respectable person, and lived in the
village on an estate also occupied by "the sawyer." His house was west
of the avenue leading to Cherry Hill. In 1703 he removed to Rehoboth.

Edward Bishop, the eldest of his sons, married Susanna, daughter of
John Putnam, and in 1713 removed to that part of Ipswich now Hamilton.
Prior to 1695, these four Edward Bishops were all living; and the
youngest had a wife and children. All will be found connected with our
story, the second and third prominently. The fourth owed his safety,
perhaps, to the influential connections of his wife.

The first notice we have of Bray Wilkins is in the Massachusetts
colonial records, Sept. 6, 1638, when he was authorized to set up a
house and keep a ferry at Neponset River, and have "a penny a person."
On the 5th of November, 1639, the General Court accepted a report
made by William Hathorne and Richard Davenport, commissioners
appointed for the purpose, and, in accordance therewith, laid out a
farm for Richard Bellingham, who had been deputy-governor, was then an
assistant, and afterwards governor, "on the head of Salem, to the
north-west of the town; there being in it a hill, and an Indian
plantation, and a pond." This nice little farm included seven hundred
acres, and "about one hundred or one hundred and fifty acres of
meadow" beside. The next thing we hear about the matter is a petition
to the General Court, May 22, 1661, of "Bray Wilkins and John Gingle,
humbly desiring that the farm called by the name of Will's Hill, which
this Court granted to the worshipful Richard Bellingham, Esq., and
they purchased of him, may be laid to, and appointed to belong to,
Salem; being nigh its lands, and the petitioners of its society." The
Court granted the request. It seems that, about a year before, on the
9th of March, "Bray Wilkins, husbandman, and John Gingle, tailor, both
of Lynn," had bought the Bellingham farm for two hundred and fifty
pounds, of which they paid at the time twenty-five pounds, and
mortgaged it back for the residue. The twenty-five pounds was paid as
follows: twenty-four pounds in a ton of bar-iron, and one pound in
money. Wilkins had, some time before, removed from Neponset, and
perhaps had been working in one of the iron-manufactories then in
operation at Lynn. When the balance of his wages over his expenses
enabled him, with the aid of Gingle, to raise a ton of iron and scrape
together twenty shillings, they entered upon their bold undertaking.
He had not a dollar in his pocket; but he had what was better than
dollars,--industrious habits, a resolute will, a strong constitution,
an iron frame, and six stout sons. After a while, he took into the
work, in addition to his own effective family force, two trusty
kinsmen, Aaron Way and William Ireland, conveying to them good farms
out of his seven hundred acres. He enlarged his farm, from time to
time, by new purchases, so as to more than make up for what he sold to
Way and Ireland. In 1676 the mortgage was fully discharged. He and his
sons bought out the heirs of Gingle, and the work was done. They held,
free from debt, in one tract, a territory about two miles in length on
the Reading line. Each member of the family had a house, barns,
orchards, gardens, meadows, upland, and woodland; and the homestead of
the old patriarch was in the midst of them, the enterprise of his
laborious life crowned with complete success. The innumerable family
of the name, scattered all over the country, has largely, if not
wholly, been derived from this source. Bray Wilkins, and the members
of his household in all its branches, were always on hand at parish
meetings in Salem Village. Over a distance, as their route must have
been, of five miles, they came, in all seasons and all weathers, by
the roughest roads, and, in the earlier period, where there were no
roads at all, through the woods, fording streams, to meeting on the
Lord's Day. He continued vigorous, hale, and active to the last; and
died, as he truly characterizes himself in his will, "an ancient,"
Jan. 1, 1702, at the age of ninety-two.

This was the way in which the large grants made to wealthy and eminent
persons, governors, deputy-governors, and assistants, came into the
possession and under the productive labor of a yeomanry who made good
their title to the soil by the force of their characters and the
strength of their muscles. One of the terms of Wilkins's purchase was,
that, if he found and wrought minerals on the land, he was to pay to
Bellingham or his heirs a royalty of ten pounds per annum. Believing
that the best mine to be found in land is the crops that can be raised
from it, he never tried to find any other.

Bray Wilkins will appear to have shared in the witchcraft delusion,
and been very unhappily connected with it; but he lived to behold its
termination, and to participate in the restoration of reason. The
minister of the parish at the time of his death, the Rev. Joseph
Green, kept a diary which has been preserved. He thus speaks of the
old man: "He lived to a good old age, and saw his children's children,
and their children, and peace upon our little Israel."

It is rather curious to notice such indications as the mineral clause
in Wilkins's deed affords of the prevalent expectation, at the
beginning of settlements in this region, that valuable minerals would
be found in it. What makes it worthy of particular inquiry is, that
they were found and wrought for some time, but that no one thinks of
looking after them now. Simon Bradstreet, Daniel Dennison, and John
Putnam put up and carried on together, upon a large scale, iron-works,
in 1674, at Rowley Village, now Boxford. Samuel and Nathan Leonard
were employed to construct them, and carried them on by contract.
These iron-works were long regarded as a promising enterprise and
valuable investment. The Leonards were probably of the same family
that, at Raynham and the neighborhood, engaged in this business to a
great extent, and for a long period, making it a source of wealth and
the foundation of eminent families. We know that the business was
carried on extensively in Lynn, and that Governor Endicott was quite
sure that he had found copper on his Orchard Farm. Who knows but that
modern science and more searching methods of detection may yet
discover the hidden treasures of which the fathers caught a glimpse,
and their enterprises be revived and conducted with permanent energy
and success?

In 1669, Joseph Houlton testified, that, when he was about twenty
years of age, in 1641, he was "a servant to Richard Ingersoll," and
worked on his land at Ingersoll's Point. About the year 1652, he
married Sarah, daughter of Richard Ingersoll, and widow of William
Haynes. By her he had five sons and two daughters, who lived to
maturity. He gave to each of them a farm; and their houses were in his
near neighborhood. The sons were respectable and substantial
citizens, and persons of just views and amiable sentiments. The father
was one of the honored heads of the village, and lived to a good old
age. He died May 30, 1705. From him, it is probable, all of the name
in this country have sprung. It will be for ever preserved in the
public annals and on the geographical face of the country. Samuel
Houlton, great-grandson of the original Joseph, was a representative
of Massachusetts for ten years in the old Congress of the
Confederation, for a time presiding over its deliberations. He was
also a member of the first Congress under the Constitution, and
subsequently, for a very long period, Judge of Probate for the county
of Essex. He was a true patriot and wise legislator; enjoyed to an
extraordinary degree the confidence and love of the people; had a
commanding person and a noble and venerable aspect; and was always
conspicuous by the dignity and courtesy of his manners. He was a
physician by profession; but his whole life was spent in the public
service. He was in both branches of the Legislature of the State, also
in the Executive Council. He was major of the Essex regiment at the
opening of the Revolution; was a member of the Committee of Safety,
and of every convention for the framing of the Government; and, for
more than thirty years, a judge of the Court of Common Pleas. He died,
where he was born and had his home for the greater part of his life,
in Salem Village, Jan. 2, 1816, in the seventy-eighth year of his age.

In 1724 a petition was presented to the Legislature, commencing as
follows: "Whereas Salem is a most ancient town of Massachusetts
Province, and very much straitened for land," the petitioners pray for
a grant in the western part of the province. The petition was allowed
on condition that one lot be reserved for the first settled minister,
one for the ministry, and one for a school. Each grantee was required
to give a bond of twenty-five pounds to be on the spot; have a house
of seven feet stud and eighteen square at least, seven acres of
English hay ready to be mowed, and help to build a meeting-house and
settle a minister, within five years. A grandson of Joseph Houlton, of
the same name, led the company that emigrated to the assigned
location. The first result was the town of New Salem, in Franklin
County, incorporated in 1753; named in honor of the old town from
which their leading founder had come. But the people were not
satisfied with having merely a school. They must have an academy. They
went to work with a will, and an academy was established and
incorporated in 1795. This was the second result. The academy did not
flourish to an extent to suit their views, and they beset the
Legislature to grant them a township of land in the woods of Maine to
enable them to endow it. They carried their point, and in 1797
obtained the grant. The effort had been great, and great was the
rejoicing at its successful issue. But, as bad luck would have it,
just at that time land could not be sold at any price. The grant
became worthless; and deep and bitter was the disappointment of the
people of New Salem. The doom of the academy seemed to be settled,
and its days numbered and finished. But there were men in New Salem
who were determined that the academy should be saved. They met in
consultation, and, under the lead of still another Joseph Houlton, of
the same descent, fixed their purpose. They sold or mortgaged their
farms, which more than half a century of labor had rendered
productive, and which every association and every sentiment rendered
dear to them. With the money thus raised they bought the granted
tract, paying a good price for it. The preservation and endowment of
the academy were thus secured; but all benefit from it to themselves
or their descendants was wholly relinquished. It was the only way in
which the academy could be saved. Some must make the sacrifice, and
they made it. They packed up bag and baggage; sold off all they could
not carry; gathered their families together; bid farewell to the
scenes of their birth and childhood, the homes of their life, and the
fruits of their labor; and started in wagons and carts on the journey
to Boston. Their location was hundreds of miles distant, far down in
the eastern wilderness, and inaccessible from the extremes of
settlement at that time on the Penobscot. As the only alternative,
they embarked in a coasting-vessel; went down the Bay of Fundy to St.
John, N.B.; took a river-sloop up to Fredericton,--a hundred miles;
got up the river as they could, in barges or canoes, eighty miles
further to Woodstock; and there, turning to the left, struck into the
forest, until they reached their location. The third result of this
emigration, in successive generations and stages, from Salem Farms, is
to be seen to-day in a handsome and flourishing village, interspersed
and surrounded with well-cultivated fields,--the shire town of the
county of Aroostook, in the State of Maine; which bears the name of
the leader of this disinterested, self-sacrificing, and noble company.
Three times was it the lot of this one family to encounter and conquer
the difficulties, endure and triumph over the privations, and carry
through the herculean labors, of subduing a rugged wilderness, and
bringing it into the domain of civilization,--at Salem Village, New
Salem, and Houlton. It would be difficult to find, in all our history,
a story that more strikingly than this illustrates the elements of the
glory and strength of New England,--zeal for education,--enterprise
invigorated by difficulties,--and prowess equal to all emergencies.

John Burton came early to Salem by way of Barbadoes. He combined the
pursuits of a farmer and a tanner. He was a sturdy old Englishman,
who, while probably holding the theological sentiments that prevailed
in his day, abhorred the spirit of persecution, and was unwilling to
live where it was allowed to bear sway. He does not appear to have
been a Quaker, but sympathized with all who suffered wrong. In 1658,
he went off in their company to Rhode Island, sharing their
banishment. But his conscience would not let him rest in voluntary
flight. He came back in 1661, to bear his testimony against
oppression. He was brought before the Court, as an abettor and
shelterer of Quakers. He told the justices that they were robbers and
destroyers of the widows and fatherless, that their priests divined
for money, and that their worship was not the worship of God. They
commanded him to keep silent. He commanded them to keep silent. They
thought it best to bring the colloquy to a close by ordering him to
the stocks. They finally concluded, upon the whole, to let him alone;
and he remained here the rest of his life. His descendants are through
a daughter (who married William Osborne) and his son Isaac. They are
numerous, under both names. Isaac was an active and respectable
citizen of the village, and a farmer of enterprise and energy. He
carried on, under a lease, Governor Endicott's farm of over five
hundred acres on Ipswich River, and had lands of his own. In
subsequent generations, this family branched off in various directions
to Connecticut, Vermont, and elsewhere. One detachment of them went to
Wilton, N.H., where the family still remains on the original
homestead. The late Warren Burton, who was born in Wilton,--a graduate
of Harvard College in the class of 1821, and well known for his
invaluable services in the cause of education, philanthropy, and
letters,--was a direct descendant of John Burton, and as true to the
rights of conscience as the old tanner, who bearded the lion of
persecution in the day of his utmost wrath, and in his very den.

Henry Herrick, who, as has been stated, purchased the Cherry-Hill farm
of Alford, was the fifth son of Sir William Herrick, of Beau Manor
Park, in the parish of Loughborough, in the county of Leicester,
England. He came first to Virginia, and then to Salem. He was
accompanied to America by another emigrant from Loughborough, named
Cleaveland. Herrick became a member of the First Church at Salem in
1629, and his wife Edith about the same time. Their fifth son, Joseph,
baptized Aug. 6, 1645, owned and occupied Cherry Hill in 1692. He
married Sarah, daughter of Richard Leach, Feb. 7, 1667. He was a man
of great firmness and dignity of character, and, in addition to the
care and management of his large farm, was engaged in foreign
commerce. As he bore the title of Governor, he had probably been at
some time in command of a military post or district, or perhaps of a
West-India colony. His descendants are numerous, and have occupied
distinguished stations, often exhibiting a transmitted military stamp.
Joseph Herrick was in the Narragansett fight. It illustrates the state
of things at that time, that this eminent citizen, a large landholder,
engaged in prosperous mercantile affairs, and who had been abroad,
was, in 1692, when forty-seven years of age, a corporal in the village
company. He was the acting constable of the place, and, as such,
concerned in the early proceedings connected with the witchcraft
prosecutions. For a while he was under the influence of the delusion;
but his strong and enlightened mind soon led him out of it. He was one
of the petitioners in behalf of an accused person, when intercession,
by any for any, was highly dangerous; and he was a leader in the party
that rose against the fanaticism, and vindicated the characters of its
victims. He inherited a repugnance to oppression, and sympathy for the
persecuted. His father and mother appear, by a record of Court, to
have been fined "for aiding and comforting an excommunicated person,
contrary to order."

William Nichols, in 1651, bought two hundred acres, which had been
granted to Henry Bartholomew, partly in the village, but mostly beyond
the "six-mile extent," and consequently set off to Topsfield. He had
several other lots of land. He distributed nearly all his real estate,
during his lifetime, to his son John; his adopted son, Isaac Burton;
his daughters, the wives of Thomas Wilkins and Thomas Cave; and his
grand-daughter, the wife of Humphrey Case. His only son John had
several sons, and from them the name has been widely dispersed. In a
deposition dated May 14, 1694, William Nichols declares himself "aged
upwards of one hundred years." As his will was offered for Probate
Feb. 24, 1696, he must have been one hundred and two years of age at
his death.

William Cantlebury was a large landholder, having purchased
three-quarters of the Corwin grant. He died June 1, 1663. His name
died with him, as he had no male issue. His property went to his
daughters, who were represented, in 1692, under the names of Small,
Sibley, and Buxton. The Flints, Popes, Uptons, Princes, Phillipses,
Needhams, and Walcotts, had valuable farms, and appear, from the
records and documents, to have been respectable, energetic, and
intelligent people. Daniel Andrew was one of the strong men of the
village; had been a deputy to the General Court, and acted a prominent
part before and after the witchcraft convulsion. But the great family
of the village--greater in numbers and in aggregate wealth than any
other, and eminently conspicuous on both sides in the witchcraft
proceedings--remains to be mentioned.

John Putnam had a grant of one hundred acres, Jan. 20, 1641. With his
wife Priscilla, he came from Buckinghamshire, England, and was
probably about fifty years of age on his arrival in this country. He
was a man of great energy and industry, and acquired a large estate.
He died in 1662, leaving three sons,--Thomas, born in 1616; Nathaniel,
in 1620; and John, in 1628. For a more convenient classification, I
shall, in speaking of this family, refer, not to the original John at
all, but to the sons as its three heads.

Thomas, the eldest, inherited a double share of his father's lands. He
was of age when he came to America, and had received a good education.
He appears to have settled, in the first instance, in Lynn, where for
several years he acted as a magistrate, holding local courts, by
appointment of the General Court. Upon removing to Salem, he was
chosen, as the town-records show, to the office of constable. This was
considered at that time as quite a distinguished position, carrying
with it a high authority, covering the whole executive local
administration. Thomas Putnam was the first clerk of Salem Village,
and acted prominently in military, ecclesiastical, and municipal
affairs. He seems to have been a person of a quieter temperament than
his younger brothers, and led a somewhat less stirring life.
Possessing a large property by inheritance, he was not quite so active
in increasing it; but, enjoying the society and friendship of the
leading men, lived a more retired life. At the same time, he was
always ready to serve the community if called for, as he often was,
when occasion arose for the aid of his superior intelligence and
personal influence. He married first, while in Lynn, Ann, daughter of
Edward Holyoke, great-grandfather of the President of Harvard College
of that name whose son, the venerable centenarian, Dr. Edward Augustus
Holyoke, is remembered as a true Christian philosopher by the
generation still lingering on the stage. Having lost his wife on the
1st of September, 1665, he married, on the 14th of November, 1666,
Mary, widow of Nathaniel Veren; coming, through her, into possession
of property in Jamaica and Barbadoes, in which places Veren had
resided, more or less, in the prosecution of commercial business. His
homestead, as shown on the map, was occupied by his widow in 1692,
and, after her death, by her son Joseph, the father of General Israel
Putnam. He had also a town residence on the north side of Essex
Street, extending back to the North River. Its front on Essex Street
embraced the western part of the grounds now occupied by the North
Church, and extended to a point beyond the head of Cambridge Street.
He left the eastern half of this property to his son Thomas, and the
western half to his son Joseph. To his son Edward he left another
estate in the town, on the western side of St. Peter's Street, to the
north of Federal Street.

Thomas Putnam died on the 5th of May, 1686. He left large estates in
the village to each of his children, and a valuable piece of meadow
land, of fifteen acres, to a faithful servant.

Nathaniel Putnam married Elizabeth, daughter of Richard Hutchinson,
and, besides what he received from his father, came, through his wife,
into possession of seventy-five acres. On that tract he built his
house and passed his life. The property has remained uninterruptedly
in his family. One of them, the late Judge Samuel Putnam, of the
Supreme Court of Massachusetts, enjoyed it as a country residence, and
it is still held by his children. Nathaniel Putnam was a deputy to the
General Court, and constantly connected with all the interests of the
community. He had great business activity and ability, and was a
person of extraordinary powers of mind, of great energy and skill in
the management of affairs, and of singular sagacity, acumen, and
quickness of perception. He died July 23, 1700, leaving a numerous
family and a large estate.

John Putnam had the same indefatigable activity as Nathaniel. He was
often deputy to the General Court, and accumulated a very great landed
property. He married Rebecca Prince, step-daughter of John Gedney, and
died on the 7th of April, 1710. He was buried with military honors. He
left a large family of sons and daughters. We shall often meet him in
our narrative, and gather the materials, as we go along, to form an
opinion of his character. The earliest rate-list in the parish record
book is for 1681. At that time the three brothers were all living; the
aggregate sum assessed upon ninety-four names was two hundred pounds.
The rate of Thomas was £10. 6_s._ 3_d._; that of Nathaniel, £9.
10_s._; that of John, £8. No other person paid as much as either of
them.

These brothers, as well as many others of the large landholders in the
village, adopted the practice of giving to their sons and sons-in-law,
outright, by deed, good farms, as soon as they became heads of
families; so that, as the fathers advanced in life, their own estates
were gradually diminished; and, when unable any longer to take an
active part in managing their lands, they divided up their whole
remaining real estate, making careful contracts with their children
for an adequate maintenance, to the extent of their personal wants and
comfort. Joseph Houlton did this: so did the widow Margery Scruggs,
old William Nichols, Francis Nurse, and many others. In his last
years, John Putnam was on the rate-list for five shillings only, while
all his sons and daughters were assessed severally in large sums. In
this way they had the satisfaction of making their children
independent, and of seeing them take their places among the heads of
the community.

Where this practice was followed, there were few quarrels in families
over the graves of parents, and controversies seldom arose about the
provisions of wills. In some cases no wills were needed to be made. It
is apparent, that, in many respects, this was a wise and good
practice. It was, moreover, a strictly just one. As the sons were
growing to an adult age, they added, by their labors, to the value of
lands,--inserted a property into them that was truly their own; and
their title was duly recognized. In a new country, land has but little
value in itself; the value is imparted by the labor that clears it and
prepares it to yield its products. In 1686, Nathaniel Putnam testified
that for more than forty years he had lived in the village, and that
in the early part of that time unimproved land brought only a shilling
an acre, while a cow was worth five pounds. In 1672, the rate of
taxation on unimproved land was a half penny per acre, and, for land
on which labor had been expended, a penny per acre. In 1685 it was
taxed at the rates of three shillings for a hundred acres of wild
land, and one penny an acre for "land within fence." The relative
value of improved land constantly increased with the length of time it
had been under culture. It may be said that labor added two-thirds to
the value of land, and that he who by the sweat of his brow added
those two-thirds, to that extent owned the land. An industrious young
man went out into his father's woods, cut down the trees, cleared the
ground, fenced it in, and prepared it for cultivation. All that was
thus added to its value was his creation, and he its rightful owner.
The right was recognized, and full possession given him, by deed, as
soon as he had opened a farm, and built a house, and brought a wife
into it.

The effect of this was to anchor a family, from generation to
generation, fast to its ancestral acres. It strengthened the ties that
bound them to their native fields. Its moral effect was beyond
calculation. When a young man was thus enabled to start in life on an
independent footing, it made a man of him while he was young. It
invested him with the dignity of a citizen by making him feel his
share of responsibility for the security and welfare of society. It
gave scope for enterprise, and inspiration to industry, at home. It
led to early marriages, under circumstances that justified them.
Joseph Putnam, the youngest son of Thomas, at the age of twenty years
and seven months, took as his bride Elizabeth, daughter of Israel
Porter, and grand-daughter of William Hathorne, when she was sixteen
years and six months old. We shall see what a valuable citizen he
became; and she was worthy of him. A large and noble family of
children grew up to honor them, one of the youngest of whom was Israel
Putnam, of illustrious Revolutionary fame.

Though there were descendants of this family in every company of
emigrants that went forth from Salem Village, in all directions, in
every generation, to Yarmouth, Nova Scotia, New Brunswick, Maine, and
all parts of the New England, Middle, Western, and Pacific States,
there is about as large a proportionate representation of the name
within the precincts of Salem Village to-day, as there ever was. Fifty
Putnams are at present voters in Danvers, on a list of eight hundred
names,--one-sixteenth of the whole number. The rate-schedule of 1712
shows almost precisely the same proportion.

Edward Putnam, whom we shall meet again, was baptized July 4, 1654.
After serving as deacon of the church from its organization, a period
of forty years, he resigned on account of advancing age; and in 1733,
as he was entering on his eightieth year, gave this account of his
family: "From the three brothers proceeded twelve males; from these
twelve males, forty males; and from these forty males, eighty-two
males: there were none of the name of Putnam in New England but those
from this family." With respect to their situation in life, he
remarks: "I can say with the Psalmist, I have been young, and now am
old; yet I have not seen the righteous forsaken, nor their seed
begging bread except of God, who provides for all. For God hath given
to the generation of my fathers a generous portion, neither poverty
nor riches." When the infirmities of age prevented his longer
partaking in the worship of the Lord's Day, this good old man
relinquished his residence near the church, and removed to his
original homestead, in the neighborhood of his children, which had
then been included in the new town of Middleton. His will is dated
March 11, 1731. It was offered in Probate, April 11, 1748. After
making every reasonable deduction, in view of his share of
responsibility for the earlier proceedings in the witchcraft
prosecutions, we may participate in the affection and veneration with
which this amiable and gentle-hearted man was regarded by his
contemporaries.

The provisions of his will contain items which so strikingly
illustrate his character, and give us such an insight of the domestic
life of the times, that a few of them will be presented. According to
the prevalent custom, he had given good farms to his several children
when they became heads of families. In his will, he distributes the
residue of his real estate among them with carefulness and an equal
hand, describing the metes and bounds of the various tracts with great
minuteness, so as to prevent all questions of controversy among them.
He gives legacies in money to his daughters, ten pounds each; and, to
his grand-daughters, five pounds each. To one of his five sons, he
gives his "cross-cut saw." This was used to saw large logs crosswise,
having two handles worked by two persons, and distinguished from the
"pit saw," which was used to saw logs lengthwise. All his other tools
were to be divided among his sons, to one of whom he also gives his
cane; to another, his "Great Bible;" to another, "Mr. Jeremiah
Burroughs's Works;" to another, "Mr. Flavel's Works;" and, to the
other, his "girdle and sword." To one of them he gives his desk, and
"that box wherein are so many writings;" to another, his "share in the
iron-works;" and to another, his share "in the great timber chain."
This, with other evidence, shows that there was a boom, and
arrangements on a large scale for the lumbering business, at that
time, on Ipswich River. The provisions for his wife were very
considerate, exact, and minute, so as to prevent all possibility of
there being any difficulty in reference to her rights, or of her ever
suffering want or neglect. He gives to her, absolutely and for her own
disposal, the residue of his books and all his "movable estate" in the
house and out of it, including all "cattle, sheep, swine," the whole
stock of the homestead farm, agricultural implements, and carriages.
He makes it the duty of one of his sons to furnish her with all the
"firewood" she may want, with ten bushels of corn-meal, two bushels of
English meal, four bushels of ground malt, four barrels of good
cider,--he to find the barrels--as many apples "as she shall see
cause," and nine or ten score weight of good pork, annually: he was to
"keep for her two cows, winter and summer," and generally to provide
all "things needful." The will specifies, apartment by apartment, from
cellar to garret, one-half of the house, to be for her accommodation,
use, and exclusive control, and half of the garden. The sons were to
pay, in specified proportions, all his funeral charges. One of the
sons was to pay her forthwith four pounds in money; and they were
severally to deliver to her annually, in proportions expressly
stated, ten pounds for pocket money. When the relative value of money
at that time is considered, and the other particulars above named
taken into account, it will be allowed that he was faithful and wise
in caring for the wife of his youth and the companion of his long
life. There is no better criterion of the good sense and good feeling
of a person than his last will and testament. The result of a quite
extensive examination is a conviction that the application of this
test to the early inhabitants of Salem Village is most creditable to
them, particularly in the tender but judicious and effectual manner in
which the rights, comfort, independence, and security of their wives
were provided for.

In the third generation, the three Putnam families began to give their
sons to the general service of the country in conspicuous public
stations, and in the professional walks of life. Their names appear on
the page of history and in the catalogues of colleges. Major-General
Israel Putnam was a grandson of the first Thomas. On the 14th of May,
1718, Archelaus, a grandson of John, and son of James, died at
Cambridge, while an undergraduate. Benjamin, a son of Nathaniel, in
his will, presented for Probate, April 25, 1715, says, "I give my son
Daniel one hundred and fifty pounds for his learning." Daniel lived
and died in the ministry, at North Reading. His name heads the list of
more than thirty--all, it is probable, of this family--in the last
Triennial Catalogue of Harvard University.

The brightest name in the annals of Salem Village, though frequently
referred to, has not yet been presented for your contemplation. I
shall hold it up and keep it in your view by a somewhat detailed
description, not only because it is necessary to a full understanding
of our subject, but because it is good to gaze upon a life of virtue;
to pause while beholding a portrait beaming with beneficence, and
radiant with all excellent, beautiful, and attractive affections.

Nathaniel Ingersoll was about eleven years old at the death of his
father. His mother married John Knights, of Newbury, who became the
head of her household, and continued to carry on the Townsend Bishop
farm for several years. Governor Endicott, the friend and neighbor of
Richard Ingersoll, took Nathaniel, while still a lad, into his family.
In a deposition made in Court, June 24, 1701, Nathaniel Ingersoll
says, "I went to live with Governor Endicott as his servant four
years, on the Orchard Farm." At that time, the term "servant" had no
derogatory sense connected with it. It merely implied the relations
between an employer and the employed, without the least tint of the
feeling which we associate with the condition of servility. Here was a
youth, who, by his father's will, was the owner of a valuable estate
of seventy-five acres in the immediate neighborhood, voluntarily
seeking the privilege of entering the service of his father's friend,
because he thereby would be better qualified, when old enough, to
enter upon his own estate. Governor Endicott's political duties were
not then regarded as requiring him to live in Boston; and his usual
residence was at the Orchard Farm, where he was making improvements
and conducting agricultural operations upon so large a scale that it
was the best school of instruction anywhere to be found for a young
person intending to make that his pursuit in life. Young John Putnam,
as has been stated, was there for the same purpose, under similar
circumstances.

Having built a house and barn, and provided the necessary stock and
materials, Nathaniel Ingersoll went upon his farm when about nineteen
years of age. Soon after, probably, he married Hannah Collins of Lynn,
who, during their long lives, proved a worthy helpmeet. His house was
on a larger scale than was usual at that time. One of its rooms is
spoken of as very large; and the uses to which his establishment was
put, from time to time, prove that it must have had capacious
apartments. Its site is shown on the map. The road from Salem to
Andover passed it, not at an angle as now, but by a curve. The present
parsonage of Danvers Centre stands on the lot. But Ingersoll's house
was a little in the rear of the site occupied by the present
parsonage. It faced south. In front was an open space, or lawn, called
Ingersoll's Common. Here he lived nearly seventy years. During that
long period, his doors were ever open to hospitality and benevolence.
His house was the centre of good neighborhood and of all movements for
the public welfare. His latch-string was always out for friend or
stranger. In a military sense, and every other sense, it was the
head-quarters of the village. On his land, a few rods to the
north-east, stood the block-house where watch was kept against Indian
attacks. There a sentinel was posted day and night, under his
supervision. The spot was central to the several farming settlements;
and all meetings of every kind took place there. To accommodate the
public, he was licensed to keep a victualling-house; also to sell beer
and cider by the quart "on the Lord's Day." This last provision was
for the benefit of those who came great distances to meeting, and had
to find refreshment somewhere between the services. To meet the
occasions arising out of this business, he probably had a separate
building. Indeed, the evidence, in the language used in reference to
it, is quite decisive that there was an "ordinary," distinct from the
dwelling-house. The location was thought to render such an
establishment necessary, and his character secured its orderly
maintenance.

Travellers through the country stopped at "Nathaniel Ingersoll's
corner." The earliest path or roadway to and from the eastern
settlements went by it. Here Increase and Cotton Mather, and all
magistrates and ministers, were entertained. Here the wants of the
poor and unfortunate were made known, and all men came for counsel and
advice. From the first, even when he had not reached the age of
maturity, he commanded to a singular extent the confidence and respect
of all men. The influence of his bearing and character, thus early
established, was never lost or abated, or disturbed for a moment
during his long life. He was the umpire to settle all differences, but
never made an enemy by his decisions. Although of moderate estate,
compared with some of his neighbors, they all treated him with a
deference greater than they sometimes paid to each other. It was his
lot to be mixed up with innumerable controversies, to be in the very
centre of the most vehement and frightful social convulsions, and to
act decisively in some of them; but it is most marvellous to witness
how uniform and universal was the consideration in which he was held.
These statements are justified abundantly by evidence in records and
documents.

When village business was to be transacted, or consultation of any
kind had, the house of Deacon Ingersoll was designated, as a matter of
course, for the place of meeting. Whether it was an ecclesiastical or
a military gathering, a prayer-meeting or a train-band drill, it was
there. Before they had a meeting-house, it cannot be doubted, they met
for worship in his large room. We find it recorded, that, after the
meeting-house was built, if from the bitterness of the weather, or any
other cause, it was too uncomfortable to remain in, they would adjourn
to Deacon Ingersoll's. Such a free use of a particular person's
premises sometimes engenders a familiarity that runs into license, and
is apt to breed contempt. Not so at all in his case. There was a
native-born dignity, an honest manliness and pervading integrity
about him, that were appreciated by all persons at all times. When
wrong was meditated, his admonition was received with respectful
consideration; when it had been committed, his rebuke awakened no
resentment. The fact, that he was acknowledged and felt by all to be a
perfectly just man, is apparent through the whole course of his action
in all the affairs of life. His uprightness, freedom from unworthy
prejudice, and clear and transparent conscientiousness, appear in all
documents, depositions, and records that proceeded from him. He was
often called to give evidence in land causes and other trials at law;
and his testimony is always straightforward, fair, and lucid. You can
tell from the style, temper, or tone of other witnesses, which side of
the controversy they espoused, but not from his. In the great and
protracted conflict in the courts, relating to the Townsend Bishop
farm, he and all his most intimate connections and relatives were
parties of adverse interest; but Zerubabel Endicott paid homage, and
left it on record, to the truthfulness and uprightness of the
testimony and the fairness of the course of Nathaniel Ingersoll. We
shall meet other illustrations to the same effect in the course of our
narrative.

Although it is anticipating the course of events, it may be well to
trace the outlines of the life of this man to its distant close.
Partaking of the general views of his age, he participated in the
proceedings that led to the witchcraft prosecutions. He believed in
what was regarded as decisive evidence against the accused, and acted
accordingly. But no one ever felt that there was any vindictiveness in
his course.

He lived to see the storm that desolated his beloved village pass
away, and to enjoy the restoration of reason, peace, and good-will
among a people who had so long been torn by strife, and subjected to
untold horrors,--horrors that have never yet been fully described, and
which I despair of being able adequately to depict. He did all that a
good and true man could do to eradicate the causes of the mischief. He
participated in the exercises of a day of Thanksgiving, set apart for
the purpose, in 1700, to express the devout and contrite gratitude of
the people to a merciful God for deliverance from the errors and
passions that had overwhelmed them with such awful judgments. The
removal of Mr. Parris having been effected, Joseph Green was settled
near the close of the year 1697. He was a wise and prudent man. By
kind, cautious, and well-timed measures, he gradually succeeded in
extracting every root of bitterness, healing all the breaches, and
restoring harmony to a long-distracted people. In this work, Deacon
Ingersoll and his good associate, Edward Putnam, aided him to the
utmost. When, by their united counsels and labors, the difficult work
was about accomplished, Mr. Green was taken to his reward, in 1715.
Greatly was he lamented; but Nathaniel Ingersoll had realized all his
best wishes at last. The prayers he had poured forth for fifty years
had been answered. He had seen the completed service of a pastor who
had fulfilled his highest estimate of what a Christian minister
should be. He lived to witness and share in the warm and unanimous
welcome of Peter Clark to a useful, honored, happy ministry which
lasted more than half a century. The ordination of Mr. Clark, which
took place on the 8th of June, 1717, was made the occasion of
demonstrating the complete re-establishment of social harmony and
Christian love throughout that entire community. The storms of strife
had commenced with the settlement of the first minister, more than
forty years before: they had increased in violence, until, at the
witchcraft delusion, they swept in a tornado every thing to ruin. The
clouds had been slowly dispersed, and the angry waves smoothed down,
by Mr. Green's benignant ministry. The long, and yet unbroken, "era of
good feeling" was fully inaugurated. It was a day of great rejoicing.
Old men and matrons, young men and maidens, met together in happy
union. Tradition says that they carried their grateful festivities to
the highest point allowable by the proprieties of that period. Having
witnessed this scene, and beheld the church and village of his
affections start on a new and sure career of peace and prosperity, the
Good Parishioner folded his mantle and departed from sight. He died in
1719, in his eighty-fifth year. He was truly the "Man of Ross." The
celebrated portrait, which poetry has drawn under this name, was from
an actual example in real life, not more shining than his. He left no
issue; but his brothers were the founders of a family widely
diffused, many members of which have, in every subsequent age,
contributed to the honor of the name. Innumerable branches have spread
out from the same stock under other names. The children of the late
Dr. Nathaniel Bowditch, through both father and mother, have descended
from a brother of Nathaniel Ingersoll.

Citations and extracts from documents on file will justify all I have
said of this man.

His wife was a spirit kindred to his own. Their only child, a
daughter, died when quite young. Their hearts demanded an object on
which to exercise parental affection, and to give opportunity for
benevolent care, within their own household; and they induced their
neighbor, Joseph Hutchinson, who had several sons, to give one of them
to be theirs by adoption. When this child had grown to manhood, a deed
was recorded in the Essex Registry, Oct. 2, 1691, of which this is the
purport:--

     "Benjamin Hutchinson, being an infant when he was given to
     us by his parents, we have brought him up as our own child;
     and he, the said Benjamin, living with us as an obedient
     son, until he came of one and twenty years of age, he then
     marrying from us, I, the said Nathaniel Ingersoll, and
     Hannah, my wife, on these considerations, do, upon the
     marriage of our adopted son, Benjamin Hutchinson, give and
     bequeath to him, his heirs and assigns for ever, this deed
     of gift of ten acres of upland, and also three acres of
     meadow," &c.

When Mr. Parris was settled, it occurred to Deacon Ingersoll, that it
would be very convenient for him to have a certain piece of ground
between the parsonage land and the Andover road; and he gave him a
deed, from which the following is an extract. It is dated Jan. 2,
1689.

     "To all Christian people to whom this present writing shall
     come, Nathaniel Ingersoll, of Salem Village, in the county
     of Essex, sendeth greeting. Know ye, that the said Nathaniel
     Ingersoll, husbandman, and Hannah, his wife, for and in
     consideration of the love, respect, and honor which they
     justly bear unto the public worship of the true and only
     God, and therefore for the encouragement of their
     well-beloved pastor, the Rev. Samuel Parris, who hath lately
     taken that office amongst them, and also for and in
     consideration of a very small sum of money to them in hand
     paid, with which they do acknowledge themselves fully
     contented and satisfied, do grant to said Samuel Parris and
     Elizabeth, his wife, for life, and then to the children of
     said Samuel and Elizabeth Parris, four and a half acres of
     land, adjoining upon the home field of the said Nathaniel
     Ingersoll; the three acres on the south alienated by gift,
     and the remainder by sale."

There was a fine young orchard on the land.

Joseph Houlton had conveyed to the parish a lot for the use of the
ministry, attached to the parsonage house. A question having arisen in
consequence of a lost deed, or some other imagined defect in the
Houlton title, whether the land originally belonged to him or to
Nathaniel Ingersoll, the latter disposed of it at once by an
instrument recorded in the Essex Registry, of which the following is
the substance:--

     "Nathaniel Ingersoll to the Trustees of Salem Village
     Ministry land, for divers good causes and considerations me
     thereunto moving, but more especially for the true love and
     desire I have to the peace and welfare of Salem Village
     wherein I dwell, I hereby release, &c., all my right and
     title to five acres described in my brother Houlton's deed
     of sale," &c.

In the same Registry, the following extract is found, in a deed dated
Jan. 28, 1708:--

     "For the desire I have that children may be educated in
     Salem Village, I freely give four poles square of land to
     Rev. Joseph Green, to have and to hold the same, not for his
     own particular use, but for the setting a schoolhouse upon,
     and the encouragement of a school in this place."

The Essex Registry has a deed dated Jan. 6, 1714, of which the
following is the substance:--

     "For the good affection that I bear unto Deacon Edward
     Putnam, and the desire that I have of his comfortable
     attendance upon the public worship of God, I have freely
     given unto him, the said Deacon Edward Putnam, of Salem
     aforesaid, for him and his heirs for ever, a piece of land,
     bounded northerly upon the land of Joseph Green, next to his
     orchard gate, westerly on the highway, and southerly and
     easterly on my land."

Deacon Putnam was, at this time, sixty years of age. His homestead was
at some distance; and it was often difficult for him to get to
meeting. Ingersoll had always enjoyed the convenience of having only a
few rods to go to the place of worship; and he desired to have his
beloved colleague enjoy the same privilege. Besides, he longed to have
him near. The proffer was probably accepted. We find that
church-meetings were held at the house of Deacon Putnam, which would
not probably so often have been the case, had he remained on his farm;
and we know that there were two dwelling-houses, some time afterwards,
on the Ingersoll lot. It was a pleasant arrangement: the two deacons
and the minister being thus brought close together, and reaching each
other through Ingersoll's garden and the minister's orchard. Of the
personal friendship, attachment, and genial affection between the two
good old deacons, the foregoing extract is a pleasing illustration.

Nathaniel Ingersoll's property was never very large; and, as he had
enjoyed the luxury, all his life long, of benevolence and beneficence,
there was no great amount to be left after suitably providing for his
wife. But there was enough to enable him to express the family
affection to which he was always true, and to give a parting assurance
of his devotion to the church and people of the village. By his will,
certain legacies were required to be paid by the residuary legatee and
final heir within a reasonable time specified in the document. It
bears date July 8, 1709, and was offered for Probate, Feb. 17, 1719.
It begins thus:--

     "In the name of God, Amen. I, Nathaniel Ingersoll, of Salem,
     in the county of Essex, in the Province of Massachutetts
     [Transcriber's note: so in original] Bay, in New England,
     being through God's mercy in good health of body and of
     perfect memory, but not knowing how soon my great change
     may come, do make this my last will, in manner and form
     following: First, I give up my soul to God, in and through
     Jesus Christ my Redeemer, when he shall please to call for
     it, hoping for a glorious resurrection, in and through his
     merits; and my body to decent burial, at the discretion of
     my executors; and, as for the worldly estate God hath been
     pleased to give me, I dispose of it in the manner
     following," &c.

He gives a small sum of money, varying from thirty shillings to four
pounds, to each and every nephew and niece then living, twenty-two in
number. He provides for an annuity of twenty shillings a year for a
sister, the only remaining member of his own immediate family, to be
paid into the hands of the daughter who took care of her. Not being
able to leave a large amount to any, he preferred to express his love
for all. There were two items in the will which may be specially
preserved from oblivion.

     "I give to the church in Salem Village the sum of fifty
     shillings in money, for the more adorning the Lord's Table,
     to be laid out in some silver cup, at the discretion of the
     Pastor, Deacons, and my overseers."--"After my wife's
     decease, I give to Benjamin (my adopted son) who was very
     dutiful to me, while he lived with me, and helpful to me
     since he has gone from me, all the remaining part of my
     whole estate, both real and personal,--excepting a small
     parcel of land of about two acres, that lyeth between Mrs.
     Walcots and George Wyotts by the highway, which I give to
     the inhabitants of Salem Village, for a training place for
     ever."

The bonds required of the executors by the Probate Court were to the
amount of two hundred pounds only, showing that his movable or
personal estate was a very moderate one. There is a feature in the
will, which is, I think, worthy of being mentioned, as evincing the
excellent judgment and practical wisdom of this man.

     "I give to Hannah, my well-beloved wife, the use and
     improvement of my whole estate during her natural life: and
     my will is, that, if my wife should marry again, he that she
     so marrieth, before she marry, shall give sufficient
     security to my overseers not to make strip or waste upon any
     of my estate; and, if he do not become so bound, I give
     one-half of my whole estate to Benjamin Hutchinson, at the
     time of my wife's marriage."

He did not cut her off entirely, as is sometimes attempted to be done,
in the event of a second marriage, but secured her and the estate
against suffering in case she took that step. He adopted an effectual
method to prevent any one from seeking to marry her for the purpose of
getting the benefit of her whole income and a comfortable
establishment upon his property without providing for its
preservation; and, if she should be so improvident as to marry again
without having his conditions complied with, he took care that she
should not thereby expose to injury or loss more than one-half of his
estate. Ingenuity is much exercised in making wills, particularly in
reference to the rights, interests, and security of wives. It is
worthy of consideration, whether, all things considered, Nathaniel
Ingersoll's plan is not about as skilful and just as any that has been
devised.

We shall meet this man again in the course of our story. I trust to
your good feeling in vindication of the space I have given to his
biography; being strongly impressed with a conviction, that you will
agree with me,--taking into view the influence he constantly exerted,
his steadfast integrity and honor, his personal dignity and public
spirit,--that the life of this citizen of a retired rural community,
this plain "husbandman," is itself a monument to his memory more truly
glorious than many which have been reared to perpetuate the names of
men whom the world has called great. The "training place" has been
carefully preserved. Occupying a central point, by the side of the
principal street, this pretty lawn is a fitting memorial of the Father
of the village. In its proper character, as a training-field, it is
invested with an interest not elsewhere surpassed, if equalled. Within
its enclosure the elements of the military art have been imparted to a
greater number of persons distinguished in their day, and who have
left an imperishable glory behind them as the defenders of the
country, a brave yeomanry in arms, than on any other spot. It was
probably used as a training field at the first settlement of the
village. From the slaughter of Bloody Brook, the storming of the
Narragansett Fort, and all the early Indian wars; from the Heights of
Abraham, Lake George, Lexington, Bunker Hill, Brandywine, Pea Ridge,
and a hundred other battle-fields, a lustre is reflected back upon
this village parade-ground. It is associated with all the military
traditions of the country, down to the late Rebellion. Lothrop,
Davenport, Gardners, Dodges, Raymonds, Putnams, Porters, Hutchinsons,
Herricks, Flints, and others, who here taught or learned the manual
and drill, are names inscribed on the rolls of history for deeds of
heroism and prowess.

There was the usual diversity and variety of character among the
people of the village. John Procter originally lived in Ipswich, where
he, as well as his father before him, had a farm of considerable
value. In 1666, or about that time, he removed to Salem, and carried
on the Downing farm, which had before been leased to the Flints. After
a while, Procter purchased a part of it. If a conclusion can be drawn
from the prevalent type of his posterity of our day, he was a man of
herculean frame. There is, I think, a tradition to this effect. At any
rate, his character was of that stamp. He had great native force and
energy. He was bold in his spirit and in his language,--an upright
man, no doubt, as the whole tone of the memorials of him indicate, but
free and imprudent in speech, impulsive in feeling, and sometimes rash
in action. He was liable from this cause, as we shall see, to get into
contention and give offence. There was Jeremiah Watts, a
representative of a class of men existing in every community where the
intellect is stimulated and idiosyncrasies allowed to develop
themselves. By occupation he was a dish-turner, but by temperament an
enthusiast, a zealot, and an agitator. He was not satisfied with
things as they were, nor willing to give time an opportunity to
improve them. He took hold of the horns of the altar with daring
hands. He denounced the Church and the world,--undertook to overturn
every thing, and to put all on a new foundation. He entered on a
crusade against what he called "pulpit preaching," whereby particular
persons, called ministers, "may deliver what they please, and none
must object; and this we must pay largely for; our bread must be taken
out of our mouths, to maintain the beast's mark; and be wholly
deprived of our Christian privileges. This is the time of Antichrist's
reign, and he must reign this time: now are the witnesses slain, and
the leaders in churches are these slayers. But I see plainly that it
is a vain thing to debate about these things with our fellow-brethren;
for they are all for lording it, and trampling under foot." This man
imagined that he "was singled out alone to give his testimony for
Christ, discovering Antichrist's marks." "If any," he cried out, "will
be faithful for Christ, they must witness against Antichrist, which is
self-love, and lovers of pleasure more than lovers of God. The
witnesses are now slain, but shortly they will rise again," &c. He
tried to get up "private Christian meetings," to run an opposition to
"pulpit preaching." After going about from house to house, declaiming
in this style, denouncing all who would not fall in with his notions
and act with him, and not succeeding in overthrowing things in
general, he hit upon a new expedient. As his neighbors had wit enough
to let him alone, and did not suffer themselves to be tempted to
resort to the civil power to make him keep quiet, he did it himself.
He instituted proceedings against the ministers and churches, on the
charge, that, by taking the rule into their own hands, they were
supplanting the magistrates and usurping the civil power. This was not
in itself a bad move; but the Court wisely declined to engage in the
proceedings. They neither prosecuted the case nor him, but let the
whole go by. They adhered severely to the do-nothing policy. What a
world of mischief would have been avoided, if all courts, everywhere,
at all times, had shown an equal wisdom! Watts was allowed to vex the
village, torment the minister, and perplex those who listened to him
by the ingenuity and ability with which he urged his views. He
continued his brawling declamations until he was tired; but, not being
noticed by ministers or magistrates, no great harm was done, and he
probably subsided into a quiet and respectable citizen.

The prominent place Giles Corey is to occupy in the scene before us
renders an account of him particularly necessary. It is not easy to
describe him. He was a very singular person. His manner of life and
general bearing and conversation were so disregardful, in many
particulars, of the conventional proprieties of his day, that it is
not safe to receive implicitly the statements made by his
contemporaries. By his peculiarities of some sort, he got a bad name.
In the Book of Records of the First Church in Salem, where his public
profession of religion is recorded, he is spoken of as a man of eighty
years of age, and of a "scandalous life," but who made a confession of
his sins satisfactory to that body. It cannot be denied that he was
regarded in this light by some; but there is no reason to believe,
that, in referring to the sinfulness of his past life, the old man
meant more than was usually understood by such language on such
occasions. He was often charged with criminal acts; but in every
instance the charge was proved to be either wholly unfounded or
greatly exaggerated. He had a good many contentions and rough
passages; but they were the natural consequences, when a bold and
strong man was put upon the defensive, or drawn to the offensive, by
the habit of inconsiderate aspersion into which some of his neighbors
had been led, and the bad repute put upon him by scandal-mongers. He
was evidently an industrious, hard-working man. He was a person of
some means, a holder of considerable property in lands and other
forms. Deeds are often found on record from and to him. He owned
meadows near Ipswich River. His homestead, during the last thirty
years of his life, was a farm of more than a hundred acres of very
valuable land, which has been in the possession of the family, now
owning it, for a hundred years. The present proprietor, Mr. Benjamin
Taylor, some twenty years ago, ploughed up the site of Corey's
dwelling-house; the vestiges of the cellar being then quite visible.
It was near the crossing of the Salem and Lowell, and Georgetown and
Boston Railroads, about three hundred feet to the west of the
crossing, and close to the track of the former road, on its south
side. The spot is surrounded by beautiful fields; and their aspect
shows that it must have been, in all respects, an eligible estate.
What is now known as "the Curtis Field" is a part of Corey's farm.

Giles Corey lived previously, for some time, in the town of Salem. He
sold his house there in 1659. The contract with a carpenter for
building his farmhouse is preserved. It was stipulated to be erected
"where he shall appoint." While the carpenter was getting out the
materials, he selected and bought the farm, on which he lived ever
afterwards. The house was to be "twenty feet in length, fifteen in
breadth, and eight feet stud." Nothing strikes us more, as strange and
unaccountable, than the small size of houses in those days. One would
have thought, that, where wood was so plenty and near at hand, and
land of no account, they would have built larger houses. In a letter,
dated Nov. 16, 1646, from Governor Winthrop to his son John, of
Connecticut, he gives an account "of a tempest (than which I never
observed a greater);" and mentions that the roof of "Lady Moody's
house, at Salem," with all of the chimney above it, was blown off in
two parts, and "carried six or eight rods. Ten persons lay under it,
and knew not of it till they arose in the morning." The house had a
flat roof, was of one story, and nine feet in height! Lady Deborah
Moody was a person of high position, a connection of Sir Henry Vane,
and a woman of property. She bought Mr. Humphreys' great plantation.
But, like Townsend Bishop, she was dealt with, and compelled to quit
the colony, on account of her doubts about infant baptism. Winthrop
calls her a "wise and anciently religious woman." She went to Long
Island, where her influence was so important, that Governor Stuyvesant
consulted her in his administration, and conceded to her the
nomination of magistrates. It seems very strange that such a lady
should have had a house only nine feet high. The early houses were
built either as temporary structures or with a view to enlargement.
Perhaps Lady Moody intended to add a story to hers. They were
low-studded for warmth. The farm-houses generally were designed to be
increased in length, when convenience required. The chimney was very
large, placed at one end, and so constructed, that, on the extension
of the building, fire-places could be opened into it on the new end. A
building of twenty feet was prepared to become one of forty feet in
width or length, as the case might be; and then the chimney would be
in the middle of it.

As has been intimated, Corey was in bad repute. Either he was a
lawless man, or much misunderstood. I am inclined to the latter
opinion. He belonged to that class of persons, instances of which we
occasionally meet, who care little about the opinions or the talk of
others. On one occasion, he was going into town with a cartload of
wood. He met Anthony Needham, in company with John Procter whose
house he had just passed. Procter accosted him thus: "How now, Giles,
wilt thou never leave thy old trade? Thou hast got some of my wood
here upon thy cart." Corey answered, "True, I did take two or three
sticks to lay behind the cart to ease the oxen, because they bore too
hard." This shows the free way in which Procter bantered with Corey,
and the slight account the latter made of it. But the thing before
long got to be too serious to be trifled with. It became the fashion
to charge all sorts of offences against Corey; and, whatever any one
lost or mislaid, he was considered as having abstracted it. The gossip
against him was quite unrestrained, and created a bitter and angry
feeling in the neighborhood. In the winter of 1676, a man named
Goodell, who had been working on Corey's farm, was carried home to his
friends by Corey's wife, in a feeble state of health, and died soon
after. It was whispered about, and before long openly asserted, that
he had come to his death in consequence of having been violently
beaten by Corey, who was accordingly arrested and brought to trial for
killing the man. There was a great excitement against him. He probably
had punished the man severely for some alleged misconduct; and it was
charged that the castigation had been so unmerciful and excessive as
to have broken down his constitution and caused his death. There was
conflicting evidence going to show that the man had been beaten, for
some misconduct, after he had returned to his family. It was a
circumstance in favor of Corey, that his wife had taken the invalid
to his home; and there was no evidence of any ill feeling between her
and the sick man during a stop they made at Procter's house on their
way. The death, too, it was supposed by some, might have resulted from
ordinary disease, and not from whipping, either at Corey's or at home.
The result was, that, notwithstanding the prejudice against Corey, he
was discharged on paying a fine; showing that the Court did not
consider it a very serious offence. We shall hear of this affair
again.

In the year 1678, there was a suit at law between Corey and a man
named John Gloyd, a laborer on his farm, on a question of wages. The
case was, by agreement of the parties, passed out of court into the
hands of arbitrators mutually chosen. John Procter was one of the
arbitrators, and, as it would seem, chosen as the friend of Gloyd:
Nathaniel Putnam and Edmund Bridges were the others; one of them
chosen by Corey, and the other mutually agreed upon. They brought in
their award. Its precise character is not stated; but the
circumstances indicate that it was favorable to Gloyd. The conduct of
Corey on this occasion shows, that, though a rough man perhaps, and
liable, from his peculiar ways, to be harshly spoken of, he had, after
all, a generous, forgiving, and genial nature. Nathaniel Putnam and
Edmund Bridges state, that, when they brought in their award, "it was
greatly to the satisfaction of the parties concerned; and Giles Corey
did manifest as much satisfaction, and gave as many thanks to every
one of us, as ever we heard; and Goodman Corey did manifest, to our
observation, as much satisfaction to John Procter as he did to the
rest of the arbitrators." Captain Moore, being by when the award was
brought in, says, "I did see and take notice of the abundance of love
manifested from Corey to Procter, and from Procter to Corey: for they
drank wine together; and Procter paid for part, and Corey for part."

This remarkable overflow of affection between these two men is
rendered interesting, not merely by the collisions into which, before
and after, their impulsive and imprudent natures brought them, but by
the part they were destined to enact in an impending tragedy, which
was to bring them to a fearful end in a manner and on a scene that
will arrest the notice of all ages, and attest to their strong
characters and heroic spirit. The passage has a unique interest, and
is worthy of a painter.

It happened unfortunately, that, a few days after the loving embraces
of these hardy men, Procter's house took fire. According to their
habit, some of the neighbors at once started the idea, that Corey had
set fire to it because of the award of the arbitrators, of whom
Procter was one. Under the excitement of the conflagration, with his
usual rashness, and forgetting the pledges of reconciliation that had
just passed between them, Procter fell in with the accusation, and
Corey was brought to trial. It appeared, in evidence, that John Phelps
and Thomas Fuller, who lived on the western borders of the village,
near Ipswich River, coming along the road towards Procter's Corner
about two hours before daylight, on the way probably to Salem market,
saw his roof on fire, gave the alarm, and stopped to help put it out.
Thomas Gould and Thomas Flint thought it must be the work of an
incendiary, or of "an evil hand," as they expressed it, from the place
where it took and the hour when it occurred. On the other hand, it was
testified by James Poland and Caleb and Jane Moore, that they heard
John Procter say that his boy carried a lamp and set the fire by
accident. This was said by him, probably before the idea of Corey's
agency in the matter had been put into his head. The prisoner proved
an _alibi_ by the most conclusive evidence, which is so curious, as
giving an insight of a farmer's life at that time, and of Corey's
domestic condition, that it may well be inserted.

Abraham Walcot testifies, that, "Tuesday night last was a week, I
lodged at Giles Corey's house, which night John Procter's house was
damaged by fire; and Giles Corey went to bed before nine o'clock, and
rose about sunrise again, and could not have gone out of the house but
I should have heard him; and it must have been impossible that he
should have gone to Procter's house that night; for he cannot in a
long time go afoot, and, for his horse-kind, they were all in the
woods. And further testifieth, that said Corey came home very weary
from work, and went to bed the rather." His wife testified that he was
in bed from nine o'clock until sunrise.

John Parker, one of Corey's four sons-in-law, testified as follows: "I
being at work with my father, Goodman Corey, the day Goodman Procter's
house was on fire. I going home with my father the night before, he
complained that he was very weary, and said he would go to bed. I did,
on our way going, ask him whether or no he would eat his supper: my
father answered me again, no, he could not eat any thing that night;
and so went to bed, and so I left him abed. And, the next morning, my
father came to me about sun-rising, and asked me to go with Abraham
Walcot to fetch a load of hay; and my father said he would try whether
or not he could cart up a load of peas. I do also testify that he had
no horse-kind near at home at that time."

John Gloyd, the hired man, with whom he had the lawsuit that had been
settled a day or two before by arbitrators, testified, in
corroboration of Parker, and to show that the latter could not have
had any thing to do with the fire, that he slept in the same room with
said Parker that night, and that he came to bed between nine and ten
o'clock in the evening, and never rose until the break of day. Gloyd's
wife testified to the same effect. There turned out to be no evidence
against Corey whatever, but abundant proof of his innocence. The
hard-working, "weary" old man was triumphantly acquitted. He thought,
however, from this high-handed and utterly groundless attempt to wrong
and ruin him, and from calumnious general statements that had been
made against him in the course of the trial, that it was time to put
a stop to the malignant and mischievous slanders which had been
current in the neighborhood. He instituted prosecutions of Procter and
others for defamation, and recovered against them all. After this, we
hear no more of him until he experienced religion and was received
into the First Church. Whether he and Procter became reconciled again
is not known. Probably they did; for they seem to have had points of
attraction, and each of them traits of kind-heartedness and
generosity, under a rather rough exterior. The manner in which they
bore themselves in their last hours is a matter of history, and stamps
them both with true manliness.

The incidents which have now been related, and the peculiar traits of
this man, are perhaps sufficient to account for the fact, that he was
spoken of as a person of "a scandalous" life. He had afforded food for
scandal; and it is not surprising, that, in a rural community, where
but few topics for talk occur beyond the village boundaries, all
should have participated, more or less, in criticising his ways, and
that the various difficulties into which he had been drawn, and the
charges against him, should have made him the object of much
prejudice. His wife Martha was also a noticeable character. She was a
professor of religion, a member of the village church, and found her
chief happiness in attendance upon public worship and in private
devotions. Much of her time--indeed, all that she could rescue from
the labors of the household--was spent in prayer. She was a woman of
spirit and pluck, as we shall see.

Another notability of the village was Bridget Bishop. In 1666--then
the widow Wasselbe--she was married to Thomas Oliver. After his death,
she became the wife of Edward Bishop, who is spoken of as a "sawyer."
This term did not describe the same occupation then to which it is
almost wholly applied now. Firewood, in those days, was not, as a
general thing, sawed, but chopped. The sawyer got out boards and
joists, beams, and timber of all kinds, from logs; and before mills
were constructed, or where they were not conveniently accessible, it
was an indispensable employment, and held a high rank among the
departments of useful industry. It was in constant requisition in
shipyards. It was a manly form of labor, requiring a considerable
outlay of apparatus, and developing finely the whole muscular
organization. The implement employed, beside the ordinary tools, such
as wedges, beetles, the broad-axe, chains, and crowbar, was a strong
steel cutting-plate, of great breadth, with large teeth, highly
polished and thoroughly wrought, some eight or ten feet in length,
with a double handle, crossing the plate at each end at a right angle.
It was worked by two men, and called a "pit-saw," because sometimes
the man at the lower handle stood in a deep pit, dug for the purpose,
and called a "saw-pit." But, among the early settlers, the usual
method was to make a frame of strong timbers. The log to be sawed was
raised by slings, or slid up an inclined plane, and placed upon
cross-beams. Above it, a scaffolding was made on which one man stood;
the other stood on the ground below. They each held the saw by both
hands, and worked in unison. The log was pushed along by handspikes as
they reached the cross-timbers, and wedges were used to keep the cleft
open, that the saw might work free. So important was this business
considered, that, from time to time, the General Court regulated by
law the rates of pay to the sawyer. If a farmer had suitable
woodlands, he provided in many cases a saw-frame or saw-pit of his
own, got out his logs, and worked them into boards or square timber
for sale. This was a profitable business.

Edward Bishop had resided, for some seven years previous to the
witchcraft delusion, within the limits of Salem, near the Beverly
line. His wife Bridget was a singular character, not easily described.
She kept a house of refreshment for travellers, and a shovel-board for
the entertainment of her guests, and generally seems to have
countenanced amusements and gayeties to an extent that exposed her to
some scandal. She is described as wearing "a black cap and a black
hat, and a red paragon bodice," bordered and looped with different
colors. This would appear to have been rather a showy costume for the
times. Her freedom from the austerity of Puritan manners, and
disregard of conventional decorum in her conversation and conduct,
brought her into disrepute; and the tongue of gossip was generally
loosened against her. She was charged with witchcraft, and actually
brought to trial on the charge, in 1680, but was acquitted; the
popular mind not being quite ripe for such proceedings as took place
twelve years afterwards. She still continued to brave public
sentiment, lived on in the same free and easy style, paying no regard
to the scowls of the sanctimonious or the foolish tittle-tattle of the
superstitious. She kept her house of entertainment, shovel-board, and
other appurtenances. Sometimes, however, she resented the calumnies
circulated about her being a witch, in a manner that made it to be
felt that it was best to let her alone. A man called one day at the
house of Samuel Shattuck, where there was a sick child. He was a
stranger to the inmates of the family, and evidently had come to the
place to make trouble for Bridget Bishop. He pretended great pity for
the child, and said, among other things, in an oracular way, "We are
all born, some to one thing, and some to another." The mother asked
him what he thought her poor, suffering child was born to. He replied,
"He is born to be bewitched, and is bewitched: you have a neighbor,
that lives not far off, who is a witch." The good woman does not
appear to have entertained any suspicion of the kind; but the man
insisted on the truth of what he had affirmed. He succeeded in
exciting her feelings on the subject, and, by vague insinuations and
general descriptions of the witch, led her mind to fix upon Bridget
Bishop. He said he should go and see her, and that he could bring her
out as the afflicter of her child. She consented to let another of
her boys go with him, and show the way. They proceeded to the house,
and knocked at the door. Bridget opened it, and asked what he would
have: he said a pot of cider. There was something in the manner of the
man which satisfied her that he had come with mischievous intent. She
ordered him off, seized a spade that happened to be near, drove him
out of her porch, and chased him from her premises. When he and the
boy got back, they bore marks of the bad luck of the adventure. Such
things had perhaps happened before, and it was found that whoever
provoked her resentment was very likely to come off second best from
the encounter; yet Bridget was a member of Mr. Hale's Church in
Beverly, and retained her standing in full fellowship there. It must
have been thought, by the pastor and members of that church, that no
charge seriously affecting her moral or Christian character was justly
imputable to her.

The traveller of to-day, in passing over Crane-river Bridge,
approaching the present village of "The Plains," near the eastern end
of the Townsend Bishop or Nurse farm, will notice a roadway by the
side of the bridge descending through the brook and going up to rejoin
the main road on the other side. Such turnouts are frequent by the
side of bridges over small streams. They are refreshing and useful,
cooling the feet and cleansing the fetlocks of horses, and washing the
wheels of carriages. One afternoon, Edward Bishop, with his wife
behind him on a pillion, was riding home from Salem. Two women,
mounted in the same way, joined them; and they chatted together
pleasantly as their horses ambled along. When they came to the bridge,
Bishop, probably merely for the fun of the thing, dashed down into the
brook, instead of going over the bridge, to the great consternation
and against the vehement remonstrances of his wife, who berated him
soundly for his reckless disregard of her safety. They got through
without accident; and the four jogged on together until the Bishops
turned up to their house, and the other two kept on to their home in
Beverly. But all the way from the bridge, until they parted company,
Bishop was finding great fault with his wife, saying that he should
not have been sorry if any mishap had occurred. She did not say much
after her first fright and resentment were over; but he kept on
talking very freely about her, and using some pretty hard language.
This affair, which perhaps is not without a parallel in the occasional
experiences of married life, was, with other things of an equally
trivial and irrelevant character, brought to bear fatally against her
at her trial on the charge of witchcraft, between seven and eight
years afterward.

I can find no evidence against the moral character of this woman. One
person, at least, who participated largely in getting up accusations
against her, acknowledged, in a death-bed repentance, the wrong she
had done. Mr. Hale, the minister of the Beverly congregation, states,
in a deposition, that a certain woman, "being in full communion in our
church, came to me to desire that Goodwife Bishop, her neighbor, wife
of Edward Bishop, Jr., might not be permitted to receive the Lord's
Supper in our church till she had given her satisfaction for some
offences that were against her; namely, because the said Bishop did
entertain people in her house at unseasonable hours in the night, to
keep drinking and playing at shovel-board, whereby discord did arise
in other families, and young people were in danger to be corrupted;
that she knew these things, and had once gone into the house, and,
finding some at shovel-board, had taken the pieces they played with
and thrown them into the fire, and had reproved the said Bishop for
promoting such disorders, but received no satisfaction from her about
it." According to Mr. Hale's statement, the night after this complaint
was brought to him, the woman was found to be distracted. "She
continuing some time distracted, we sought the Lord by fasting and
prayer." After a while, the woman recovered her senses, and, as Mr.
Hale says he understood, expressed a suspicion "that she had been
bewitched by Bishop's wife." He declares that he did not, at the time,
countenance the idea, "hoping better of Goody Bishop." He says
further, that he "inquired of Margaret King, who kept at or near the
house," what she had observed concerning the woman who had been
distracted. "She told me that she was much given to reading and
searching the prophecies of Scripture." At length the woman appeared
to have entirely recovered, went to Goody Bishop, gave satisfaction
for what she had said and done against her, and they became friends
again. Mr. Hale goes on to say, "I was oft praying with and
counselling of her before her death." She earnestly desired that
"Edward Bishop might be sent for, that she might make friends with
him. I asked her if she had wronged Edward Bishop. She said, not that
she knew of, unless it were in taking his shovel-board pieces, when
people were at play with them, and throwing them into the fire; and,
if she did evil in it, she was very sorry for it, and desired he would
be friends with her, or forgive her. This was the very day before she
died." That night her distemper returned, and, in a paroxysm of
insanity, she destroyed herself.

It is evident, from his own account, that Mr. Hale did not then fall
in with, or countenance at all, any unfavorable impressions against
Bridget Bishop; and that the poor diseased woman, when entirely free
from her malady, repented bitterly of what she had done and said of
Goodman Bishop and his wife, and heartily desired their forgiveness.
So far as the facts stated by Mr. Hale of his own knowledge go, they
prove that Bridget Bishop was the victim of gross misrepresentation.
Five years afterwards, as we shall see, Mr. Hale gave a very different
version of the affair, and one which it is extremely difficult to
reconcile with his own former deliberate convictions at the time when
the circumstances occurred.

As it is my object to bring before you every thing that may help to
explain the particular occurrences embraced in the account I am to
give of the witchcraft prosecutions, two other persons must be
mentioned before concluding this branch of my subject,--George Jacobs,
Sr., and his son George Jacobs, Jr. They each had given offence to
some persons, and suffered that sort of notoriety which led to the
selection of victims, although both were persons of respectability.
The father owned and had lived for about a half-century on a farm in
North Fields, on the banks of Endicott River, a little to the eastward
of the bridge at the iron-foundery. He was a person of good estate and
an estimable man; but it was his misfortune to have an impulsive
nature and quick passions. In June, 1677, he was prosecuted and fined
for striking a man who had incensed him. George Jacobs, Jr., his only
son, at a court held Nov. 7, 1674, was prosecuted, "found blamable,
and ordered to pay costs of court." His offence and defence are
embraced in his deposition on the occasion.

     "GEORGE JACOBS'S ANSWER TO NATHANIEL PUTNAM'S
     COMPLAINT.--That I did follow some horses in our enclosure on
     the Royal Side, where they were trespassing upon us; that the
     end of my following them was to take them; but, rather than
     they would be taken, they took the water, and I did follow
     them no further; but straightway they turned ashore, and I
     did run to take them as they came out of the water, but could
     not: and I can truly take my oath that since that time I did
     never follow any horses or mares; and I hope my own oath will
     clear me."

The result of his attempt to drive off the horses was, that several
valuable animals were drowned. Their owner, Nathaniel Putnam, brought
an action; but he could not recover damages. The horses were evidently
trespassing, and the Court did not seem to regard Jacobs's conduct as
a heinous matter. It is not to be supposed, that Nathaniel Putnam
harbored sentiments of revenge or resentment for eighteen years, or
had any hand in prosecuting Jacobs in 1692. There is every indication
that he did not sympathize in the violent passions which raged on that
occasion, although he was much under the power of the delusion. But
the affair of drowning the horses was probably for a long time a topic
of gossip, and may have given to the author of the catastrophe a
notoriety which nearly cost him his life.

The account that has been given of the elements of the population of
the Salem Farms or Village, shows that, while there were the usual
varieties entering into the composition of all communities, it is
wholly inadmissible to suppose that the witchcraft delusion took place
there because it was the scene of greater ignorance or stupidity or
barbarism than prevailed elsewhere. This will be made more apparent
still by some general views of the state of society and manners. The
people of a remote age are in general only regarded as they are seen
through prominent occurrences and public movements. These constitute
the ordinary materials of history. Dynasties, reigns of kings, armies,
legislative proceedings, large ecclesiastical synods, dogmatic creeds,
and the like, are, as a general thing, about all we know of the past.
Portraits of individuals appear here and there; but, separated from
the ordinary life of the times, they cannot be fairly or fully
appreciated. The public life of the past is but the outline, or, more
strictly speaking, the mere skeleton, of humanity. To fill up the
outline, to clothe the skeleton with elastic nerves and warm flesh,
and quicken it with a vital circulation, we must get at the domestic,
social, familiar, and ordinary experience of individuals and private
persons; we must obtain a view of the popular customs and the daily
routine of life. In this way only can history fulfil its office in
making the past present.

The people of the early colonial settlements had a private and
interior life, as much as we have now, and the people of all ages and
countries have had. It is common to regard them in no other light than
as a severe, sombre, and pleasure-abhorring generation. It was not so
with them altogether. They had the same nature that we have. It was
not all gloom and severity. They had their recreations, amusements,
gayeties, and frolics. Youth was as buoyant with hope and gladness,
love as warm and tender, mirth as natural to innocence, wit as
sprightly, then as now. There was as much poetry and romance: the
merry laugh enlivened the newly opened fields, and rang through the
bordering woods as loud, jocund, and unrestrained as in these older
and more crowded settlements. It is true that their theology was
austere, and their polity, in Church and State, stern; but, in their
modes of life, there were some features which gave peculiar
opportunity to exercise and gratify a love of social excitement of a
pleasurable kind. Let me mention some of the customs having a tendency
in this direction, that prevailed in the early settlements of New
England.

Whenever a young man had made his clearing in the forest, got out the
frame of his house, and selected a helpmeet to dwell with him in it,
there was "a raising." On an appointed day, the neighbors far and near
assembled; all together put their shoulders to the work; and, before
the shadows of night enveloped the scene, the house was up, and
covered from sill to ridgepole. The same was done if the house of a
neighbor had been destroyed by fire. In this case, often the timbers,
joists, and boards were contributed as well as the labor. These were
made the occasions of general merriment, in which all ages and both
sexes participated. Then there were the "huskings." After the barns
were filled with hay and grain, and the corn was ripe, at "harvest
home," gatherings would be seen on the bright autumnal afternoons of
successive days, in the neighborhood of the different farmhouses. The
sheaves would be taken from the shocks and brought up from the fields,
the golden leaves and milky tassels stripped from the full ear, and
the crib filled to the brim. These were scenes of unalloyed enjoyment
and unrestrained gayety.

At that time were prevalent, in rural neighborhoods, other recreations
promotive of social hilarity to the highest degree. As a wintry
evening drew on, the wide, deep fireplace--equalling in width nearly
the whole of one side of the room, and so deep that benches were
permanently attached to the jambs, on which two or more could
comfortably sit--was duly prepared. A huge log, of a diameter equal to
that of "the mast of some great admiral," six feet perhaps in length,
was worked in by handspikes to its place as the "back-log;" a smaller
one, as "back-stick," placed over it; the great andirons duly
adjusted, and the wood piled on artistically--for there was an art in
building a wood-fire. The kindlings were placed on top of the whole;
never by an experienced hand below. More than the light of day, from
dazzling chandeliers or the magic tongues of flaming gas-burners,
blazes through the halls of modern luxury and splendor; but the lights
and shadows from a glowing, old-fashioned, New-England country
fireplace created a scene as enlivening, exhilarating, and genial as
has ever been witnessed, and cannot be surpassed. Assembled neighbors
in a single evening accomplished what would have been the work of a
family for months. The corn and the nuts were all shelled; the young
birch was stripped down in thin strands, and brooms enough made for a
year's service in house and barn; and various other useful offices
rendered. The sound of busy hands and nimble fingers was lost in
commingling happy voices. Fun and jest, joy and love, ruled the hour.
The whole affair was followed by "Blind-man's Buff" or some other
sport. After the "old folks" had considerately retired, who knows but
that the sons and daughters of Puritans sometimes wound up with a
dance? There were sleigh-rides, and the woods rang with the happy
laugh and jingling bells. The vehicles used on these occasions were,
prior to 1700, more properly called "sleds." Our modern "sleigh" had
not then been introduced. As the spring came on, logs would be
hollowed or scooped out and placed near the feet of sugar maples, a
slanting incision made a foot or two above them in the trunks of the
trees, a slip of shingle inserted, and the delicious sap would trickle
down into the troughs. When the proper time came, tents or booths made
of evergreen boughs would be erected in the woods, great kettles hung
over blazing fires, and a whole neighborhood camp out for several days
and nights, until the work was accomplished, and the flavory syrup or
solid cakes of sugar brought out.

These were some of the recreations of the country people in the early
settlements of New England; continuing, perhaps, in frontier towns to
this day. They constituted forms of enjoyment which cannot exist in
cities or older communities; and possessed a charm, in the memory of
all who ever participated in them, greater, far greater, than society
in any later stage can possess.

The principal method of travelling in those days was on horseback. It
afforded many special opportunities for social enjoyment. Women as
well as men were trained to it. The people of the village were all at
home in the saddle. The daughters of Joseph Putnam, sisters of Israel,
were celebrated as equestrians. Tradition relates adventurous feats of
theirs in this line, equal to that which constitutes a part of the
history of their famous brother. There were, perhaps, several games of
skill or chance practised more or less, even in those days, in this
neighborhood. The only one that seems to have been openly allowed, of
which we have any evidence, was shovel-board. This game, now supposed
to be out of use, is referred to by Shakespeare, and was quite common
in England as well as in this country. A board about two and a half
feet wide and twenty feet long was placed three feet above the floor,
somewhat like a billiard-table, though not with so wide a surface,
precisely level and perfectly smooth, covered with a sprinkling of
fine sand. It was provided with weights or balls, called "pieces,"
flattened on one end. The game consisted in shoving them as far as
possible, without going over the end. A trough surrounded the table to
catch the pieces if they fell. Richard Grant White, from whom this
account of the game has been derived, says that "it required great
accuracy of eye, and steadiness of hand, much more than ten-pins." He
states that, when a boy, he saw it played by "brawny" men, in
Brooklyn, N.Y., and that the pieces then used were of brass. It is
probable that the "pieces" used on Bridget Bishop's shovel-board were
made of some heavy wood, as they were thrown into the fire for the
purpose of destroying them. The fact that a game like this was
suffered to be openly played in Salem Village is quite remarkable,
and shows that some license was left for such amusements.

The records and files of the local courts show, that, notwithstanding
the austere gravity and strictness of manners and morals usually
ascribed to our New-England ancestors, occasional irregularities
occurred in the early settlements, which would be considered high
misdemeanors in our day. The following deposition was given "on oath
before the Court," Feb. 26, 1651. Edward Norris was the son of the
minister of the First Church; had been for more than ten years, and
continued to be for twenty years after, schoolmaster of the town; and,
by his character as well as office, commanded the highest respect.
John Kitchen, in 1655, was chosen "searcher and sealer of leather."
Giles Corey had not yet purchased his farm, but lived on his town-lot,
extending from Essex Street, near its western extremity, to the North
River. They were severally persons of good estate.

     "THE TESTIMONY OF GILES COREY.--Mr. Edward Norris
     and I were going towards the brickkiln: John Kitchen, going
     with us, fell a nipping and pinching of us. And, when we
     came back again, John Kitchen struck up Mr. Edward Norris
     his heels and mine, and fell upon me, and catched me by the
     throat, and held me so long till he had almost stopped my
     breath. And I said unto John Kitchen, 'This is not good
     jesting.' And John Kitchen replied, 'This is nothing: I do
     owe you more than this of old: this is not half of that
     which you shall have afterwards.' After this, he went into
     his house, and he took stinking water and threw upon us, and
     took me and thrust me out of doors, and I went my ways. And
     John Kitchen followed me half-way up the lane, or
     thereabouts. Perceiving him to follow me, I went to go over
     the rails. He took me again, and threw me down off the
     rails, and fell a beating of me until I was all bloody. And,
     Thomas Bishop being present, I desired him to bear witness
     of what he saw. Upon my words, he let me rise. As soon as I
     was up, he fell a beating of me again.

     "Testified on oath before the Court, 26th Feb., 1651.

     "HENRY BARTHOLOMEW, _Clerk_."

This was indeed an extraordinary outburst of lawless violence, and
gives a singular insight of the state of society. Such an occurrence
in our day would create astonishment. The organized power of the
community to suppress vicious and rude passions was probably never
brought to bear with greater rigidness than in our Puritan villages;
but it did not fully accomplish its end. Behind and beneath the solemn
and formal exterior, there was, after all, perhaps as much
irregularity of life as now. The nature of man had not been subdued.
The people had their quarrels and fights, and their frolics and
merriments, in defiance of the restraints of authority. Violations of
local and general laws were not infrequent; and flowed, as ever since,
from intemperance, in as large a measure. Kitchen, in this instance,
acted as if under the influence of liquor. His behavior, in tripping
up the heels and throwing dirty water upon the person of the
schoolmaster of the town, the dignity of whose social position is
indicated by the title of "Mr.;" and in giving to Corey such a
persistent and gratuitous pommelling,--bears the aspect of a drunken
delirium. The latter seems not to have supposed, for some time, that
he was in earnest, but to have looked upon his conduct as rough play,
which was carried rather too far. Poor Corey was often getting before
the town Court as accused or accuser. He was, to the end, the victim
of ill-usage, either given or taken. Though not a bad-natured man, he
was almost always in trouble. The tenor of his long life was as
eccentric and unruly as the manner of his death was strange and
horrible.

There was what may be called an institution in the rural parishes of
the early times, still existing to some extent perhaps in country
places, which must not be omitted in an enumeration of controlling
influences. The people lived on farms, at some distance from each
other, and almost all at great distances from the meeting-house. Local
and parental authority, church discipline, public opinion, enforced
attendance upon the regular religious services. Fashion, habit, and
choice concurred in bringing all to meeting on the Lord's Day. It was
impossible for many to return home during the intermission between the
services of the forenoon and afternoon. The effect was, that the whole
community were thrown and kept together every week for several hours,
during which they could not avoid social intercourse. It was a more
effective institution than the town-meeting; for it occurred oftener,
and included women and children. In pleasant weather, they would
perhaps gather together in knots at eligible places, or stroll off in
companies to the shades of the neighboring woods. In bad weather, they
would remain in the meeting-house, or congregate at Deacon Ingersoll's
ordinary, or in the great rooms of his dwelling-house. As a whole,
this practice must have produced important results upon the character
of the people. In the absence of newspapers, or of much intercourse
with remote places, the day was made the occasion for hearing and
telling all the news. It provided for the circulation of ideas, good
and bad. It widened the sphere of influence of the wiser and better
sort, and gave opportunity for mischievous people to do much harm. It
was a sort of central bazaar, open every week, where all the varieties
of local gossip could be interchanged and circulated far and wide. Of
the aggregate character of the effects thus produced, I do not propose
to strike the balance. It was undoubtedly an effective instrumentality
in moulding the population of the country, developing the elements of
society, quickening and rendering more vigorous the action of the
people in masses, and elucidating the phenomena of their history. It
answers my purpose, at present, to suggest, that, if any popular
delusion or fanaticism arose, the means of giving it a rapid
diffusion, and of intensifying its power, were in this way provided.

In the early settlement of the country, the pursuit of game in the
forests, rivers, and lakes, was necessary as a means of subsistence,
and has always been important in that view. A war against beasts and
birds of prey was also required to be incessantly kept up. The methods
adopted for these ends were various and ingenious, often requiring
courage and skill, and in most instances conducted in companies. Deer
and moose were sometimes caged by surrounding them, or trapped; but
the gun was chiefly relied upon in their pursuit. There were various
methods for catching the smaller animals. One of the sports of boyhood
was to spring the rabbits or hares. A sapling, or young tree, was bent
down and fastened to a stick slid into notches cut in trees, on each
side of the path of the animal. The rabbit is wont to race through the
woods at great speed, and along established tracks, which,
particularly after snow has fallen, are clearly traceable. To the
cross-stick, thus placed above the path, one end of a strong
horse-hair was tied. The other end was in a slip-knot, with a noose
just large enough, and hanging at the height, to receive the head of
the rabbit. Not seeing the noose, and rushing along the path, the
rabbit would jerk the cross-stick out of the notches. The tree would
bound back to its original upright direction, and the rabbit remain
swinging aloft, until, at the break of day, the boys would rejoice in
the success of their stratagem. Pigeons in clouds frequented the
country in their seasons, and acres upon acres of the forests bowed
beneath their weight. They were taken by nets, dozens at a time, or
brought down in great numbers by shot-guns. The marshalled hosts of
wild geese made their noisy flights over the land in the spring and
fall, traversing a space spanning the continent north and south. They
were brought down by the gun, on the wing, or surprised while resting
in their long route or stopped by storms, around secluded ponds or
swamps. Ducks and other aquatic birds were abundant on the rivers and
marshes, and pursued in canoes along the bays and seashores.
Salt-water fish were within reach in the neighboring ocean; while an
unfailing supply of fresh-water fish was yielded by Wenham Lake,
Wilkins's Pond, and the running streams.

The bear was a formidable prowler around the settlements, killing
young cattle, making havoc in the sheepfold, and depredating upon the
barn and farm yard. He was a dangerous antagonist, of immense strength
in his arms and claws. Sometimes he was reached effectually by the
gun, but the trap was mainly relied upon to secure him. His skin made
him a valuable prize, and he supplied other beneficial uses. The
earliest and rudest method of trapping a bear was as follows: A place
was selected in the woods, where two large fallen and mouldering trees
were side by side within two or three feet of each other. The space
between them would be roofed over by throwing branches and boughs
across them, and closed up at one end. The other end would be left
open. A gun was placed inside, heavily loaded, the muzzle towards the
open end; to the trigger a cord was fastened running along by the
barrel of the gun, passing over a cross-bar, and hanging down directly
before the muzzle, baited with a piece of fresh meat. The bear,
ranging in the woods at night, would be attracted by the smell of
meat, and come snuffing around. At the open end, he would see the
bait, rush in, seize it between his jaws, pull the cord, discharge the
gun, and his head and breast be torn to pieces. The men engaged in the
enterprise would remain awake in some neighboring house, waiting and
listening, with the extremest interest, for the report of the gun to
announce their success. At the break of day, they would gather to the
spot, and participate in the profit of the capture. After a while,
iron or steel traps were introduced. They would be skilfully baited
and set, and fastened to a tree by a chain. The whole was covered over
with light soil and leaves. The bear would make for the bait. The
weight of his paw would spring the trap. The iron-teeth would hold him
fast till the morning. In his suffering and exasperation, it would
require considerable effort to despatch him. In catching bears, as
well as foxes, much skill and art were needed. They were each very
wary and cautious; and, where iron was used in the traps, some scent
was necessary to disguise the smell of the metal. All appearance of
having been disturbed had to be removed from the ground. Trapping
became quite a science, and was a pursuit of much importance.

Wolves were perhaps the most destructive of the beasts of prey.
Although not so large or strong as bears, they were far more fierce
and rapacious. Bears could be tamed, but wolves not. Bears were not
dangerous, unless provoked, or suffering from hunger, or alarmed for
the safety of their young. It was thought that kind treatment would
awaken strong attachment in them, but wolves were always snarling and
ferocious. They roamed mostly in packs, and would kill sheep, lambs,
and poultry long after hunger was appeased. The farmers regarded them
as their great enemy. A long and deep trench would be dug, lined with
slippery logs, from which the bark had been taken, standing upright,
and touching each other. The trench was covered by a slight framework,
upon which leaves and dirt were scattered, to make the surface appear
like the surrounding territory. Some savory bait would be placed over
it. The wolves, rushing on, would break through. Not being able to
ascend the sides, they would be found alive, the next morning, at the
bottom. These were called "wolf-pits." It was no easy matter to
dispose of or despatch the furious animals, and the wolf-pits were
often the scenes of much excitement. There was another class of
animals,--divided into different species, mostly according to their
size,--smaller but fiercer than wolves, of extraordinary strength and
activity, called wild-cats, catamounts, or loup-cerviers, pronounced
by the farmers lucifees. These were only taken by the gun. It was
considered a useful public service, and no inconsiderable feat, to
kill them.

Some of the laborious employments, at that time, were especially
promotive of social influence; for instance, the making and mending
highways. This was secured by a tax, annually levied in town-meeting.
The work was placed under the care and direction of surveyors,
annually chosen. A small part of this tax, however, was paid in money.
Most of it was "worked out." At convenient seasons, when there was a
respite from the ordinary farm work, the men of a neighborhood would
come together, in greater or less numbers, at a designated time and
place, with their oxen and implements. Working in unison, they would
work merrily and with energy; and, as the tough roots and deeply
bedded rocks gave way to the pickaxe, crowbar, and chain, and rough
places became smooth, the wilderness would echo back their voices of
gratulation, and a spirit of animating rivalry stimulate their toils.
Many other operations were carried on, such as getting up hay from the
salt-marshes and building stone-walls, by neighbors working in
companies.

Particular circumstances in the history of the population of Salem
Village contributed to keep up a condition of general intelligence,
which served, to some degree, as a substitute for an organized system
of education. Indeed, any thing like regular schools was rendered
impossible by the then-existing circumstances. Clearings had made a
very inconsiderable encroachment on the wilderness. There were here
and there farmhouses, with deep forests between. It was long before
easily traversable roads could be made. A schoolhouse placed
permanently on any particular spot would be within the reach of but
very few. Farmers most competent to the work, who had enjoyed the
advantages of some degree of education, and could manage to set apart
any time for the purpose, were, in some instances, prevailed upon to
receive such children as were within reaching distance as pupils in
their own houses, to be instructed by them at stated times and for a
limited period. Daniel Andrew rendered this service occasionally. At
one period, we find them practising the plan of a movable school and
schoolmaster. He would be stationed in the houses of particular
persons, with whom the arrangement could be made, a month at a time,
in the different quarters of the village, from Will's Hill to Bass
River. Of course, there was a great lack of elementary education. For
a considerable time, it was reduced to a very low point; and there
were heads of families,--men who had good farms, and possessed the
confidence and respect of their neighbors,--who appear not to have
been able to write.

It is difficult, however, to come to a definite estimate on this
subject, as the singular fact is discovered, that some persons, who
could write, occasionally preferred to "make their mark." Ann Putnam,
in executing her will, made her mark; but her confession, with her own
proper written signature, is spread out in the Church-book. Francis
Nurse very frequently used his peculiar mark, representing, perhaps,
some implement of his original mechanical trade; but, on other
occasions, he wrote out his name in a good, round hand. The same was
the case with Bray Wilkins. We can hardly reach any decisive
conclusions as to the intelligence or education of the people of that
day from their handwriting, or construction of sentences, much less
from their spelling. Their forms of speech were very different from
ours in many respects. What, at first view, we might be apt to call
errors of ignorance, were perhaps conformity to good usage at the
time. Their use of verbs is different from ours, particularly in the
subjunctive mood, and in conjugation generally. They did not follow
our rule in reference to number. When the nominative was a plural
noun, or several nouns, they often employ the connected verb in the
singular number, and _vice versâ_. They were inclined to make
construction conform to the sense, rather than to the letter. It is
not certain that their usage, in this particular, is wholly
indefensible. Cicero, in his fifth oration against Verres, couples
_rem_ with _futurum_. This was looked upon by some editors as an
error, and they altered the text accordingly; but Aulus Gelius, in his
"Attic Nights," maintains that it is the true reading, and, in view of
the sense of the passage, a legitimate and elegant use of language. He
cites instances, in Latin and Greek authors of the highest standard,
of a similar usage.

Nothing, or scarcely any thing, can be inferred from spelling. It was
wholly unsettled among the best-educated men, and in the practice of
the same person. In Winthrop's "Journal," he spells the name of his
distinguished friend--the governor of both Massachusetts and
Connecticut--sometimes Haynes, and sometimes Haines. The _r_ is
generally dropped from his own signature, or, if not intentionally
dropped, is quite lost in one or the other of the contiguous letters.
It is a curious circumstance, that the name "Winthrop" is spelled
differently by our governor, his wife, and his son, the governor of
Connecticut; each varying from either of the other two. George
Burroughs, a graduate of Harvard College, wrote his own name sometimes
with, and sometimes without, the _s_. In our General-court records,
the name of the first Captain Davenport is spelled in at least four
different ways. The Putnams sometimes wrote their name Putman. The
name of the Nurses was often written Nourse, and sometimes Nurs.

Unable to come to any reliable conclusions in reference to the general
intelligence of the people of Salem Village from their orthography,
etymology, syntax, or chirography, compared with their contemporaries,
I can only say, that, in examining the records and papers which have
come down to us, the wonder to me is that they expressed themselves so
well. I do not hesitate to say, that, in the various controversies in
which they were involved, prior to and immediately after the
witchcraft delusion, there is a pervading appearance of uncommon
appreciation of the questions at issue, and substantial evidence that
there was a solid substratum of good sense among them.

Their manners appear to have been remarkably courteous and respectful,
showing the effect still remaining upon their style of intercourse and
personal bearing, of the society and example of the great number of
eminent, enlightened, and accomplished men and families that had
resided or mingled with them during all the early period of their
history. In their deportment to each other, there was that sort of
decorum which indicates good breeding. They paid honor to gray hairs,
and assigned to age the first rank in seating the congregation,--a
matter to which, before the introduction of pews as a particular
property, they gave the greatest consideration. The "seating" was to
continue for a year; and a committee of persons who would command the
greatest confidence was regularly appointed to report on the delicate
and difficult subject. Their report, signed by them severally, was
entered in full in the parish record-book. The invariable rule was,
first, age; then, office; last, rates. The chief seats were given to
old men and women of respectable characters, without regard to their
circumstances in life or position in society. Then came the families
of the minister and deacons, the parish committee and clerk, the
constable of the village, magistrates, and military officers. These
were preferred, because all offices were then honorable, and held, if
they were called to them, by the principal people. Last came
rates,--that is, property. The richest man in the parish, if not
holding office, or old enough to be counted among the aged, would take
his place with the residue of the congregation. The manner in which
parents were spoken of on all occasions is quite observable, not only
in written documents, but ordinary conversation,--always with tender
respectfulness. In almost all cases, the expressions used are "my
honored father" or "my honored mother," and this by persons in the
humblest and most inferior positions in life. The terms "Goodman" and
"Goodwife" were applied to the heads of families. The latter word was
abbreviated to "Goody," but not at all, as our dictionaries have it,
as a "low term of civility." It was applied to the most honored
matrons, such as the wife of Deacon Ingersoll. It was a term of
respect; conveying, perhaps, an affectionate sentiment, but not in the
slightest degree disrespectful, derogatory, or belittling. Surely no
better terms were ever used to characterize a worthy person. "Goodman"
comprehends all that can be ascribed to a citizen of mature years in
the way of commendation; and the whole catalogue of pretentious titles
ever given by flatterers or courtiers to a married lady cannot, all
combined, convey a higher encomium than the term "Goodwife." How much
more expressive, courteous to the persons to whom they are applied,
and consistent with the self-respect of the person using them, than
"Mr." and "Mrs."! A more than questionable taste and a foolish pride
have led us to adopt these terms because they were originally
applicable to the gentry or to magistrates, and to abandon the good
old words which had a meaning truly polite to others, and not
degrading to ourselves!

A patriarchal authority and dignity was recognized in families. The
oldest member was often called, by way of distinction, "Landlord,"
merely on account of his seniority, without reference particularly to
the extent of his domain or the value of his acres. After the death
of Thomas Putnam, in 1686, his brother Nathaniel had the title; after
him, the surviving brother, Captain John; after him, it fell to the
next generation, and Benjamin, a son of Nathaniel, became "Landlord
Putnam." It was so with other families.

The liberal and judicious policy, before described, of giving estates
to children on their marriage, with the maintenance of parental
authority in the household, produced the desired effect upon the
character of the people. It was almost a matter of course, that, on
reaching mature years, young men and women would own the covenant, and
become members of the church. The general tone of society was
undoubtedly favorable to the moral and religious welfare of the
younger portion of the community. Some exceptions occurred, but few in
number. One case, however, in which there was a flagrant violation of
filial duty, may not be omitted in this connection; for it belongs to
the public history of the country.

John Porter, Jr., the eldest son of the founder of that most
respectable family, about thirty years of age, appears to have been a
very wicked and incorrigible person. His abusive treatment of his
parents reached a point where it became necessary, in the last resort,
to appeal to the protection of the law. After various proceedings, he
was finally sentenced to stand on the ladder of the gallows with a
rope around his neck for an hour; to be severely whipped; committed to
the House of Correction; kept closely at work on prison diet, not to
be released until so ordered by the Court of Assistants or the General
Court; and to pay "a fine to the country of two hundred pounds." It is
stated, that, if the mother of the culprit "had not been overmoved by
her tender affections to forbear appearing against him, the Court must
necessarily have proceeded with him as a capital offender, according
to our law being grounded upon and expressed in the Word of God, in
Deut. xxi. 18 to 21. See Capital Laws, p. 9, § 14." Some time
afterward, the General Court, upon his petition, granted him a release
from imprisonment, on condition of his immediate departure from this
jurisdiction; first giving a bond of two hundred pounds not to return
without leave of the General Court or Court of Assistants.

In 1664, four commissioners, Colonel Richard Nichols, Sir Robert Carr,
George Cartwright, and Samuel Maverick, Esqs., were sent over by
Charles II. "to hear and determine complaints and appeals in all
causes, as well military as criminal and civil." There had always been
a powerful influence at work in the English Court adverse to New
England. It had been thus far successfully baffled by the admirable
diplomacy of the colonial government and agents. All conflicts of
authority had been prevented from coming to a head by a skilful policy
of "protracting and avoiding." But the restoration of the Stuarts
boded no good to the liberties of the colonies; and the arrival of
these commissioners with their sweeping authority was regarded as
designed to deal the long-deferred fatal blow at chartered rights.
They began with a high hand. The General Court did not quail before
them, but stood ready to take advantage of the first false step of the
commissioners; and they did not have long to wait.

Porter had taken refuge in Rhode Island. When the commissioners
visited that colony, he appealed to them for redress against the
Massachusetts General Court. They were inconsiderate enough to espouse
his cause, and issued a proclamation giving him protection to return
to Boston to have his case tried before them. The General Court at
once took issue with them, and changed their attitude from the
defensive to the offensive; denounced their proceedings; spread upon
the official records a full account, in the plainest language, of
Porter's outrages upon his parents, exhibiting it in details that
could not but shock every sentiment of humanity and decency; holding
up the commissioners as the abettors and protectors of criminality of
the deepest dye; and planting themselves fair and square against them
on the merits of Porter's case. The commissioners tried to explain and
extricate themselves; but they could not escape from the toils in
which, through rashness, they had become entangled. The General Court
made a public declaration charging the commissioners with "obstructing
the sentence of justice passed against that notorious offender," and
with sheltering and countenancing "his rebellion against his natural
parents;" with violating a court of justice, discharging a whole
country "from their oaths whereby they had sworn obedience to His
Majesty's authority according to the Constitution of his Royal
Charter;" and with attempting to overthrow the rights of the colony
under the charter by bringing in a military force to overawe and
suppress the civil authorities. They denounced them as guilty of a
perversion of their trust, and as having committed a breach upon the
dignity of the crown, by pursuing a course "derogatory to His
Majesty's authority here established," and "repugnant to His Majesty's
princely and gracious intention in betrusting them with such a
commission." The Court held the vantage-ground, and the commissioners
were unable to dislodge them. The end of the matter was, that the
power of the commissioners was completely broken down. They
ingloriously gave up the contest, and went home to England.

The instance of John Porter, Jr., to which such extraordinary
publicity and prominence were given by the circumstances now related,
does not bear against what I have said of the general prevalence, in
the rural community of Salem Village, of parental authority and filial
duty, as he was early withdrawn from it to pursuits that led him into
totally different spheres of life. He had been engaged in trade, and
exposed to vicious influences in foreign ports. In voyages to
"Barbadoes, and so for England, he had prodigally wasted and riotously
expended about four hundred pounds." Besides this, he had run himself,
by his vicious courses, into debts which his father had to pay in
order to release him from prison abroad. He came back the desperate
character described by the General Court. His punishment was severe,
but absolutely necessary, in the judgment of the whole community, for
the safety of his parents and the preservation of domestic and public
order.

Although living in humble dwellings on plain fare, working with their
hands for daily bread, clad in rude garments, and practising a frugal
economy, there was a certain style of things about the people I am
describing unlike what is ordinarily associated with our ideas of
them. The men wore swords or rapiers as a part of their daily apparel.
Their wives had domestic servants. Every farmer had his hired
laborers, and many of them had slaves. The relation of servitude,
however, differed from that on Southern plantations in many respects.
The slaves, without any formal manumission, easily obtained their
freedom, and often became landholders. The courteous decorum acquired
from the example of the eminent men among the first planters long
continued to mark the manners of this people; and its vestiges remain
to the present day. It strikingly appeared in the latter half of the
last and the earlier period of this century in the persons of Judge
Samuel Houlton, Colonel Israel Hutchinson, General Moses Porter, and
the late Judge Samuel Putnam.

The wise forethought of the company in London, at the outset of its
operations, in providing for all that was needful to the establishment
and welfare of the colony, has already been described. It was most
strikingly illustrated in the careful selection of the first
emigrants. Men were sought out who were experienced and skilful in the
various mechanic arts. In the early population of Salem Farms, every
species of handicraft was represented. When the number was less than a
hundred householders, there were weavers, spinners, potters, joiners,
housewrights, wheelwrights, brickmakers and masons, blacksmiths,
coopers, painters, tailors, cordwainers, glovers, tanners, millers,
maltsters, skinners, sawyers, tray-makers, and dish-turners. Every
absolute want was provided for. These trades and callings were carried
on in connection with agricultural employments, and their continuance
kept carefully in view by the heads of the principal families. John
Putnam not only gave large farms to each of his sons, but he trained
them severally to some mechanical art. One was a weaver, another a
bricklayer, &c. The farmer was also a mechanic, and every description
of useful labor held in equal honor.

Another marked feature of this people was their military spirit. They
were kept in a state of universal and thorough organization to protect
themselves from Indian hostilities, or to respond, on any occasion, at
a moment's warning, to the call of the country. The sentinel at the
watch-house was ever on the alert. Authority was early obtained from
the General Court to form a foot company. All adults of every
description, including men much beyond middle life,--every one, in
fact, who could carry a musket, belonged to it. Its officers were the
fathers of the village. Every title of rank, from corporal to captain,
once obtained, was worn ever after through life. Jonathan Walcot, a
citizen of the highest respectability, who had married as a second
wife Deliverance a daughter of Thomas Putnam, and was one of the
deacons of the parish, was its captain. Nathaniel Ingersoll, the other
deacon, is spoken of from time to time as corporal, then sergeant, and
finally lieutenant. He served with that commission till late in life,
and was always, after attaining that rank, known as either Lieutenant
or Deacon Ingersoll. The eldest son of Thomas Putnam, a leading member
of the church, a man of large property, and the clerk of the parish,
was one of the sergeants, always known as such. In our narrative, with
which he will be found in most unfortunate connection, I shall speak
of him by that title. It will distinguish him from his father. This
"company" had frequent drills, probably from the first, in the field
left by will afterwards for that purpose by Nathaniel Ingersoll.
Often, no doubt, it paraded on the open grounds around the
meeting-house, or in the fields of Joseph Hutchinson after the harvest
had been gathered. It marched and countermarched along the neighboring
roads. It was almost as much thought of as the "church," officered by
the same persons, and composed of the same men. It was a common
practice, at the close of a parade, before "breaking line," for the
captain to give notices of prayer, church, or parish meetings. Such
men as Richard Leach, Thomas Fuller, and Nathaniel Putnam, esteemed it
an honor to bear titles in this company; and held them ever after
through life with pride, whether corporal, sergeant, lieutenant, or
captain.

A company of troopers was early formed, made up from the village and
neighboring settlements. In the colonial records, under date of Oct.
8, 1662, we find the following: "Mr. George Corwin for captain, Mr.
Thomas Putnam for lieutenant, Mr. Walter Price for cornet, being
presented to this Court as so chosen by the troopers of Salem, Lynn,
&c., the Court allows and approves thereof." The inventory of Captain
Corwin, before cited, indicates the stylish uniform he wore as captain
of the troopers. Each of the officers was a wealthy man; and it cannot
be doubted that a parade of the company was a dashing affair. The
lapse of time having thinned their ranks and removed their officers, a
vigorous and successful attempt was made in October, 1678, to revive
the company. Thirty-six men, belonging, as they say, "to the reserve
of Salem old troop," and very desirous "of being serviceable to God
and the country," petition the General Court to re-organize them as a
troop of horse, and to issue the necessary commissions. They request
the appointment of William Brown, Jr., as captain, and Corporal John
Putnam as lieutenant. The petition was granted, and the commissions
issued. Among the signers of this petition are Anthony Needham, Peter
and Ezekiel Cheever, Thomas Flint, Thomas and Benjamin Wilkins,
Thomas and Jacob Fuller, John Procter, William Osborne, Thomas Putnam,
Jr., and others of the Farms. The officers named were men of property
and energy; and the company of troopers was kept up ever afterwards,
until all danger from Indians or other foes had passed away.

It is very observable how the military spirit with which this rural
community was so early imbued has descended through all generations.
Israel Putnam, the famous Revolutionary hero, a son of Joseph who was
a younger brother of Sergeant Thomas and Deacon Edward Putnam, was
born in the village. His brother David, much older than himself, who
flourished in the period anterior to the Revolution, was a celebrated
cavalry officer. Colonel Timothy Pickering used to mention, among the
recollections of his boyhood, that David Putnam "rode the best horse
in the province." General Rufus Putnam, a grandson of Deacon Edward,
was a distinguished brigadier in the army of the Revolution. There are
few officers of that army whose names are more honored than his by
encomiums from the pen of Washington: and praise from him was praise
indeed, for it was, like all his other judgments, the result of
careful and discriminating observation. In a letter to the President
of Congress, dated "At camp above Trenton Falls, Dec. 20, 1776," he
speaks of the fact, that, owing to a neglect on the part of the
Government to place the Engineer Department upon a proper footing,
"Colonel Putnam, who was at the head of it, has quitted, and taken a
regiment in the State of Massachusetts." He expresses the opinion,
that Putnam's qualifications as a military engineer were superior to
those of any other man within his knowledge, far superior to those of
the foreign officers whom he had seen. In a letter to the same, dated
"Pompton Plains," July 12, 1777, speaking of General Schuyler's army,
he says, "Colonel Putnam, I imagine, will be with him before this, as
his regiment is a part of Nixon's Brigade, who will answer every
purpose he can possibly have for an engineer at this crisis." The high
opinion of Washington took effect in his promotion as
brigadier-general. At the end of the war, he returned to civil life,
but was soon called back and re-commissioned as brigadier-general.
Washington felt the need of him. In a letter to General Knox,
Secretary of War, dated Aug. 13, 1792, he says, "General Putnam merits
thanks, in my opinion, for his plan, and the sentiments he has
delivered on what he conceives to be a proper mode of carrying on the
war against the hostile nations of Indians; and I wish he would
continue to furnish them without reserve in future." During
Washington's administration of the government under the Constitution,
Rufus Putnam held the office of Surveyor-General of the United States.
In addition to his military reputation, he will be for ever memorable
as the first settler of Marietta, and founder of the State of Ohio.

Israel Hutchinson was born in 1727. In 1757 he was one of a
scouting-party under the command of his neighbor, Captain Israel
Herrick, that penetrated through the wilderness in Maine in perilous
Indian warfare. He fought at Ticonderoga and Lake George, and was with
Wolfe when he scaled the Heights of Abraham. On the morning of the
19th of April, 1775, he led a company of minute-men, who met and
fought the British in their bloody retreat from Lexington. He was
prominently concerned during the siege of Boston; and, on its
evacuation, took command at Fort Hill. He was afterwards in command at
Forts Lee and Washington. Throughout the war, he, like both the
Putnams, had the confidence of his commander-in-chief. For twenty-one
years, he was elected to one or the other branch of the Legislature,
or to the Council. He was distinguished for the courtesy of his
manners and the dignity of his address. Colonel Enoch Putnam was also
at the battle of Lexington, and served with honor through the
Revolutionary War, as did also Captain Jeremiah Putnam, both of them
descendants of John. Captain Samuel Flint was among the bravest of the
brave at Lexington, exciting universal admiration by his intrepidity;
and fell at the head of his company at Stillwater, Oct. 7, 1777.

Intelligence of the marching of the British towards Lexington, on the
19th of April, 1775, reached the lower part of Danvers about nine
o'clock that morning. With a rapidity that is perfectly marvellous,
when we consider the distances from each other over which the
inhabitants were scattered, five companies, fully organized and
equipped,--each of them containing men of the village,--rushed to the
field in time to meet the retreating enemy at West Cambridge. It was a
rally and a march without precedent, and never yet surpassed. The day
was extremely sultry for the season; and the distance traversed by
many of the men from the village, before they got into that fight,
could not have been less than twenty miles. Seven belonging to Danvers
companies were killed, and others wounded. A larger offering was made
that day at the baptismal sacrifice to American liberty by Danvers
than by any other town except Lexington; and no town represented in
the scene was more remote. Of the men who fell on this occasion, the
following appear to have been of the village: Samuel Cook, Benjamin
Daland, and Perley Putnam,--the last a descendant of John. Their
bodies were brought home, and buried with appropriate honors; two
companies from Salem, and military detachments from Newburyport,
Amesbury, and Salisbury participating in the ceremonies, and giving
the soldier's tribute to their glory, by volleys over their closing
graves.

Moses Porter, when eighteen years of age, attracted attention by his
heroic courage and indomitable pluck at Bunker Hill. He was in an
artillery company, and would not quit his gun when almost every other
man had fallen. His country never allowed him to quit it afterwards.
From that day, he bore a commission in the army of the United States.
He was retained on every peace establishment, always in the
artillery, and at the head of that arm of the service for a great
length of time, and until the day of his death. He was in the battle
of Brandywine, and wounded in a subsequent fight on the banks of the
Delaware. He was with Wayne in his campaign against the Western
Indians, and won his share of the glory that crowned it in the final
bloody and decisive conflict. He was at the head of the artillery when
the war of 1812 took place, in active service on the Niagara frontier,
and on the 10th of September, 1813, brevetted "for distinguished
services." He commanded at Norfolk, in Virginia, in 1814, and received
great credit for the ability and vigilance with which he held that
most vital point of the coast defence. At successive periods after the
war, he was at the head of each of the geographical military divisions
of the country. He died at Cambridge, Mass., in 1822, while in command
of the Eastern Department, near the scene of his youthful glory,
forty-seven years before. No man who fought at Bunker Hill remained so
long a soldier of the United States. No man had so extended a record,
and it was bright with honor from the beginning to the end. His
pre-eminent reputation, as a disciplinarian and artillerist of the
highest class, was uniformly maintained. He added to the sterner
qualities required by professional duty a polished urbanity of
manners, and a dignified and commanding aspect and bearing. His ashes
rest beneath the sod of his ancestral acres in Salem Village.

When the great war for the suppression of the Southern Rebellion came
on, and the life of the Union was at stake, the same old spirit was
found unabated. A descendant of the family of Raymonds, emulating the
example of his ancestors, rallied his company to the front. At the end
of the war, Lieutenant-Colonel John W. Raymond brought back, in
command, the remnant of his veteran regiment, with its tattered
banners; two of his predecessors in that commission having fallen in
battle. The youthful patriot, William Lowell Putnam, who fell at
Ball's Bluff on the 21st of October, 1861, was a direct descendant of
Nathaniel Putnam. It is an interesting circumstance, that the names of
men who trained in the foot company and with the troopers on the
fields and roads about the village meeting-house two hundred years ago
have re-appeared in the persons of their descendants, in the highest
lines of service and with unsurpassed distinction, in the three great
wars of America,--Major-General Israel, and Brigadier-General Rufus,
Putnam, in the War of the Revolution; Brigadier-General Moses Porter,
in the War of 1812; and Major-General Granville M. Dodge, in the War
of the Rebellion. The last-named is a descendant of a hero of the
Narragansett fight, and was born and educated in Salem Village.

Several lawsuits, particularly in land cases, have been referred to.
They indicate, perhaps, to some extent the ingredients that aggravated
the terrible scenes we are preparing to contemplate. They served to
keep up the general intelligence of the community through a period
necessarily destitute of such means of information as we enjoy.
Attendance upon courts of law, serving on juries, having to give
testimony at trials, are indeed in themselves no unimportant part in
the education of a people. Principles and questions of great moment
are forced upon general attention, and become topics of discussion in
places of gathering and at private firesides. Of this material of
intelligence, the people of the village had their full share. It was
their fate to have their minds, and more or less their passions,
stirred up by special local controversies thrust upon them. As a
religious society, they had difficult points of disagreement with the
mother-church, and the town of Salem. While they were supporting a
minister and trying to build a meeting-house for themselves, attempts
were made to tax them to support the minister and build a new
meeting-house in the town. There was a natural reluctance to part with
them, and it was long before an arrangement could be made. The great
distance of many of the farmers from the town prevented their
exercising what they deemed their rightful influence in municipal
affairs. They felt, that, in many respects, their interests were not
identical, and in some absolutely at variance. These topics were much
discussed, and with considerable feeling at times on both sides. The
papers which remain relating to the subject show that the farmers
understood it in all its bearings, and maintained their cause with
clearness of perception and forcibleness of argument and expression.
At one time, they were very desirous to be set off as a distinct
town, but this could not be allowed; and, finally, a sort of
compromise was effected. A partial separation--a
semi-municipality--was agreed upon. Salem Village was the result.

In 1670, a petition, with twenty signers, was presented to the town to
be set off as a parish, and be allowed to provide a minister for
themselves. In March, 1672, the town granted the request; and, in
October following, the General Court approved of the project, and gave
it legal effect. The line agreed upon by the town and the village is
substantially defined by the vote of the former, which was as follows:
"All farmers that now are, or hereafter shall be, willing to join
together for providing a minister among themselves, whose habitations
are above Ipswich Highway, from the horse bridge to the wooden bridge,
at the hither end of Mr. Endicott's Plain, and from thence on a west
line, shall have liberty to have a minister by themselves; and when
they shall provide and pay him in a maintenance, that then they shall
be discharged from their part of Salem ministers' maintenance," &c.
The "horse bridge" was across Bass River. The "wooden bridge" was at
the head of Cow-House or Endicott River. Ipswich highway runs along
from one of these points to the other. The south line, beyond the
wooden bridge, is seen on the map. All to the north of this line, and
of Ipswich highway between the bridges, to the bounds of Beverly and
Wenham on the east; Topsfield, Rowley Village,--since Boxford, and
Andover on the north; and Reading and Lynn on the west,--was the
Village. Middleton, incorporated afterwards, absorbed a large part of
its western portion; but, at the time of the witchcraft delusion, the
Village was bounded as above described, and as in the map. There was a
specific arrangement fixing the point of time when the farmers were to
become exempt from all charges in aid of the mother-church; that is,
as soon as they had provided for the support of a minister and the
erection of a meeting-house of their own. It was further stipulated,
that the villagers should not form a church until a minister was
ordained; and that they should not settle a minister permanently
without the approval of the old church, and its consent to proceed to
an ordination. This latter restriction was perhaps the cause of all
the subsequent troubles.

Owing, as has been stated in another connection, to erroneous notions
about the topography of the country; the incompetency perhaps, in some
cases, of surveyors; and the want of due care in the General Court and
the towns to have boundaries clearly defined,--uncertainties and
conflicting claims arose in various portions of the colony, but
nowhere to a greater extent than here. The village became involved in
controversies about boundaries with each one of its neighbors;
producing, at times, much exasperation. The documents drawn forth on
these questions, as they appear in the record-book of the village, are
written with ability, and show that there were men among them who knew
how to express and enforce their views. The plain, lucid,
well-considered style of Nathaniel Ingersoll's depositions on the
court-files, in numerous cases, render it not improbable that his pen
was put in requisition. Sergeant Thomas Putnam, the parish recorder,
as he was sometimes entitled, was a good writer. His chirography,
although not handsome, is singularly uniform, full, open, and clear,
so easily legible that it is a refreshment to meet with it; and his
sentences are well-constructed, simple, condensed, and to the purpose.
His words do their office in conveying his meaning. No public body
ever had a better clerk. Somehow or other, he and others, brought up
in the woods, had contrived to acquire considerable efficiency in the
use of the pen. Perhaps, a few who, like him, had parents able to
afford it, had been sent to Ipswich or Charlestown to enjoy the
privilege of what Cotton Mather calls "the Cheverian education."

The southern boundary of the village was intended to run due west from
the Ipswich road to Lynn, and was accordingly spoken of as "on a west
line." As originally established, it was defined by an enumeration of
a variety of objects such as trees of different kinds and sizes, as
running through the lands of John Felton, Nathaniel Putnam, and
Anthony Needham, to "a dry stump standing at the corner of Widow
Pope's cow-pen, leaving her house and the saw-mill within the farmer's
range," and so on to "the top of the hill by the highway side near
Berry Pond." From the changeable conditions of some of the objects,
and a diversity of methods adopted by surveyors,--many of them being
unacquainted with, or making no allowance for, the variation of the
compass,--controversies arose with the mother-town: and some
proprietors, like the Gardners, were left in doubt how the line
affected them; and there was, in consequence, much disquietude. The
line was not accurately run until 1700.

It is observable, that the "saw-mill" is still in operation on the
same spot. The "cow-pen," then on the south side of the mill, was,
more than a century ago, removed to the north side, where it has
remained ever since. This estate has interesting reminiscences. It was
an original grant in January, 1640, to Edward Norris, at the time of
his settlement as pastor of the First Church in Salem. He sold to
Eleanor Trussler in 1654. It then went into the possession of Henry
Phelps, who sold to Joseph Pope in 1664. His widow, Gertrude, owned it
in 1672. In 1793, Eleazer Pope sold to Nathaniel Ropes, son of Judge
Ropes, of Salem. His heirs sold it back to the Phelpses; and it is now
in the possession of the Rev. Willard Spaulding, of Salem. Originally
given as an ordination present to a minister of the old town, it has,
after the lapse of two hundred and twenty-six years, come round into
the hands of another. The house in which the Popes lived one hundred
and twenty-nine years, and the families that succeeded them for above
half a century more,--a venerable and picturesque specimen of the
rural architecture, in its best form, of the earliest times,--has,
within the last ten years, given place to a new one on the same spot.
In that old house, besides unnumbered and unknown instances of the
same sort, Israel Putnam conducted his courtship; and there, on the
19th of July, 1739, he was married to Hannah, daughter of Joseph Pope.

Contests for what they deemed their rights with the old church and the
border towns and their own town, as in the case just mentioned,
undoubtedly produced a bad effect upon the temper of the people, by
occasional expenses that consumed their substance, and incidents that
sowed the seeds of personal animosities; preparing the way for that
dreadful convulsion which was near at hand. At the very time when the
witchcraft frenzy broke out, they were in the crisis of an
exasperating conflict with Topsfield, occasioned by a wrong done them
by the General Court. This requires to be explained, as it can be, by
a collation of facts of record.

On the 3d of March, 1636, the General Court passed an order that the
bounds of Salem, Ipswich, and Newbury, should extend six miles into
the country. It was afterwards defined to mean that "the six-mile
extent," as it was called, should be measured from the meeting-houses
of the respective towns. On the 5th of November, 1639, the General
Court passed an order in these words: "Whereas the inhabitants of
Salem have agreed to plant a village near the river that runs to
Ipswich, it is ordered that all the land near their bounds between
Salem and the said river, not belonging to any other town or person by
any former grant, shall belong to the said village." On the strength
of this order, the farmers in that part of Salem pushed settlements
out beyond the "six-mile extent," over the ground thus pledged to
them; cleared off the forests, built houses, brought the land under
culture, erected bridges, made roads, and fulfilled their part of the
contract by preparing to establish their village. Four years after the
General Court had thus pledged to "inhabitants of Salem" the
privileges of a village organization on the lands between "Salem and
the said river," they authorized some inhabitants of Ipswich, who had
gone there, to establish the village on the territory, independent of
the Salem men. This was an unjustifiable and flagrant violation of the
stipulated agreement on the part of the General Court; because it
appears by their own records, that Salem farmers had promptly
fulfilled the condition on their part by going directly upon the
ground, and getting farms under way there before 1643. This careless
and indefensible procedure by the General Court was the cause of
interminable trouble and strife on the tract between Salem bounds and
the river, introduced the elements of discord, and gave a color of
legal justification to a conflict of authority between Salem and
Ipswich men. It sowed the seeds of animosities which aggravated the
scenes that occurred in Salem Village in 1692. In 1658, the General
Court passed an order creating the town of Topsfield, including the
larger part of these lands within its limits. No heed was paid to the
remonstrances, against these proceedings, of the Salem farmers, who
found themselves, without their consent, permanently bereft of the
benefit that had been promised them, cut off from all connection with
the town of Salem, to which they originally belonged, and put in the
outskirts of another town. It was a clear case of wrong, and ought to
have been rectified. But public bodies are more reluctant even than
individuals to acknowledge themselves in fault. The people of Salem
Village joined in earnest protests against the acts of the General
Court. The old town of Salem declared by a public vote, that they had
always regarded the lands in controversy as belonging to the village
which, under the plighted faith of the General Court, their
inhabitants had been forming. But it was all in vain. Neither remedy
nor reparation could be obtained. The struggle against this injustice
lasted until some time after the witchcraft occurrences had
terminated, and was finally brought to a close by an order of the
Court, that the people on the territory might maintain parish
relations with Salem Village or with Topsfield, at their individual
option. Entire satisfaction was never realized until, in 1728, they
were incorporated, in accordance with their petition, into a township,
under the name of Middleton, with parts of Topsfield, Boxford, and
Andover added. During a period of half a century, this grievance
remained unadjusted. The proceedings on the part of the village in its
public action, as shown in the records, were conducted with skill,
ability, and firmness. But the collisions that occurred between
particular parties were violent and bitter. Salem settlers were called
to pay parish and town rates to Topsfield, but refused to do it.
Constables and tax-collectors were defied. Topsfield went so far as to
claim not only unoccupied lands, but lands within fence, with houses
on them, and families within them, and orchards and growing fields
around them, as part of its "commons;" and it disputed the titles
given by Salem. Of course, the question went, in various forms, into
the county courts; but sometimes, there is reason to believe, it came
to a rougher arbitrament, in the depths of the woods, between man and
man.

John Putnam had gone out and settled lands between the "six-mile
extent" of Salem and Ipswich River. Some of his sons had gone with
him. They had two dwelling-houses, cultivated meadows, orchards, &c.
Isaac Burton says, that, one day, when near John Nichols's house, he
heard a tree fall in the woods; and that he went to see who was
chopping there. It seems that Jacob Towne and John How, Topsfield men,
had come in defiance of John Putnam, and cut down a tree before his
face. As they were two to one, Putnam had to swallow the insult; but
he was not the man to let it rest so. He went out shortly after,
accompanied by an adequate force of sons and nephews, and proceeded to
fell the trees. The sound of the axes reached the ears of the
Topsfield men; and Isaac Easty, Sr., John Easty, John Towne, and
Joseph Towne, Jr., undertook to put a stop to the operation. On
reaching the spot, they warned Putnam against cutting timber. He
replied, "The timber now and here cut down has been felled by me and
my orders;" and he proceeded to say, "I will keep cutting and carrying
away from this land until next March." They asked him, "What, by
violence?" He answered, "Aye, by violence. You may sue me: you know
where I dwell;" and, turning to his company, he said, "Fall on." The
Putnams were evidently the stronger party; and the Topsfield men,
counting forces, concluded, in their turn, that discretion, at that
time, was the better part of valor. Such scenes occurred on the
disputed ground for a whole generation. It is not wonderful that all
sorts of animosities were kindled. The fact will be borne in mind,
that Isaac Easty and son, with John Towne and son, constituted the
Topsfield force on this occasion.

It cannot be doubted, that these controversies with the surrounding
towns, the mother-church, and the General Court itself, gradually
engendered a very bad state of feeling. The people were deeply
impressed with a conviction that they had been wronged all around and
all the way through. They felt that the whole world was against them;
and when, by a train of mischievous influences, hell itself seemed to
be let loose upon them, it is not strange that they were driven to
distraction.

We come, at last, to that chapter in the history of Salem Village
which will lead us directly to the witchcraft delusion. Its religious
organization was somewhat peculiar; and, although instituted by a
particular arrangement made by the General Court, was, in one or two
features, a complete departure from the ecclesiastical polity
elsewhere rigidly enforced. It was a congregation forbidden, for the
time being, to have a church. It was a society for religious worship,
administered, not by professors of religion or by persons regarded at
all in a religious light, but by householders. The people of the
village liked it, perhaps, all the better for this; and they took hold
of it with a will. Joseph Houlton gave to the parish five and a half
acres of land, in the centre of the village, for the use of the
minister. A parsonage-house was built, "forty-two feet in length,
twenty feet broad, thirteen-feet stud, four chimneys, and no
gable-ends." It was the custom to have a leanto attached to their
houses, generally on the northern side; and one was finally added to
the parsonage. There was a garden within the enclosure. Joseph
Hutchinson gave an acre out of his broad meadow as a site for the
meeting-house and it was erected; "thirty-four feet in length,
twenty-eight feet broad, and sixteen feet between joints." Two end
galleries were added, and a "canopy" placed over the pulpit. The
mother-church, having about the same time built a new meeting-house,
voted to give "the farmers their old pulpit and deacons' seats," which
were brought up and duly installed. In the course of these
proceedings, some slight differences arose among them about matters of
detail, but not more than is usual in such cases. In order to
despatch at once all that may be required to be said about the
meeting-houses of the village, it may be allowable here to mention,
that the original building did not survive the century. In 1700,
partly because the growth of the society began to require it, but
mainly, no doubt, to escape from the painful associations which had
become connected with it, a new meeting-house was built on another
site. The old one was dismantled of all its removable parts, and the
site reverted to Joseph Hutchinson. It is supposed that he removed the
frame to the other side of the road, and converted it into a barn; and
that it was used as such until, in the memory of old persons now
living, it mouldered, crumbled into powder-post, and sunk to the
ground. It stood, after being converted into a barn, on the south side
of the road, nearly in front of Joseph Hutchinson's homestead.
Hutchinson's dwelling-house was probably some distance further down in
the field, where the remains of an old cellar are still to be seen.
Nathaniel Ingersoll gave the land for the new meeting-house. The
records contain the vote, that it "shall stand upon Watch-House Hill,
before Deacon Ingersoll's door." The meeting-houses of the society
have stood there ever since. At that time, it was an elevated spot,
probably covered with the original forest; for the work of clearing,
levelling, and preparing it for occupancy was so considerable as to
require a special provision. The labor and expense of the operation
were put on that portion of the congregation brought nearer to the
meeting-house by the change of the site.

In urging their petition to be set off as an independent parish,
distinct from the First Church in Salem, the people of the village
declared, that, if they could not have a ministry established among
them, they would soon "become worse than the heathen around them."
Little did they foresee the immediate, long-continued, and terrible
effects that were to follow the boon thus prayed for. The
establishment of the ministry among them was not merely an opening of
Pandora's box: it was emptying and shaking it over their heads. It led
them to a condition of bitterness and violence, of confusion and
convulsion, of horror and misery, of cruelty and outrage, worse than
heathen ever experienced or savages inflicted.

James Bayley of Newbury, born Sept. 12, 1650, a graduate of Harvard
College in the class of 1669, was employed to preach at the village.
In October, 1671, he transferred his relations from the church in
Newbury to the First Church in Salem. It seems that several persons of
considerable influence in the village were dissatisfied with the
manner in which he had been brought forward, and became prejudiced
against him. The disaffection was not removed, but suffered to take
deep root in their minds. The parish soon became the scene of one of
those violent and heated dissensions to which religious societies are
sometimes liable. The unhappy strife was aggravated from day to day,
until it spread alienation and acrimony throughout the village. A
majority of the people were all along in favor of Bayley; but the
minority were implacable. His engagement to preach was renewed from
year to year. At length, the controversy waxed so warm that some
definite action became necessary. On the 10th of March, 1679, both
parties applied to the mother-church for advice. A paper was presented
by his opponents, with sixteen, and another from his friends, with
thirty-nine signers. There was still another, also in his favor,
signed by ten persons living near, but not within the village line.
Although the number of his opponents was so much less than of his
friends, they included persons, such as Nathaniel Putnam and Bray
Wilkins, of large estates and families, and much general influence;
and it is evident that the First Church was not inclined wholly to
disregard them. The record of that church says, "There was much
agitation on both sides, and divers things were spoken of by the
brethren; but the business being long, and many of the brethren gone,
we could not make a church act of advice in the case; therefore it was
left to another time." At a meeting on the 22d of April, the Salem
Church advised the minority "to submit to the generality for the
present;" but, when a church should be formed there, "then they might
choose him or any other." This advice does not appear to have
satisfied either party; and the quarrel went on with renewed vehemence
on both sides. At length, it reached such a pitch that it became
necessary to carry it up to the General Court. The whole affair was
investigated by that body, and all the papers that had passed in
relation to it were adduced. They are quite voluminous, and on file in
the office of the Secretary of State, in Boston. These interesting and
curious documents illustrate the energy of action of both parties; and
give, it is probable, the best picture anywhere to be found of a
first-rate parish controversy of the olden times.

The General Court came down upon the case with a strong hand. They
decided in favor of Bayley, whom they pronounced "orthodox, and
competently able, and of a blameless and self-denying conversation;"
and they "do order, that Mr. Bayley be continued and settled the
minister of that place, and that he be allowed sixty pounds per annum
for his maintenance, one-third part thereof in money, the other
two-thirds in provisions of all sorts such as a family needs, at equal
prices, and fuel for his family's occasions; this sum to be paid by
the inhabitants of that place." This was thirteen pounds a year more
than Bayley's friends had ever voted for him. To make the matter sure,
the General Court required the parish to choose three or five men
among themselves to apportion every man's share of the tax to secure
the sixty pounds: and, if any difficulty should occur in getting men
among themselves to perform this duty, they appointed to act, in that
event, Mr. Batter, Captain Jonathan Corwin, and Captain Price, of the
old parish of Salem, to make the rate; and gave ample power to the
constable of the village or the marshal of the county, to enforce the
collection of it, by distress and attachment, if any should neglect or
refuse to pay the sum assessed upon him. To make it still more certain
that Mr. Bayley should get his money, they ordered "that all the rate
is to be paid in for the use of the ministry unto two persons chosen
by the householders to supply the place of deacons for the time, who
are to reckon with the people, and to deliver the same to the said
minister or to his order." The arrangement as to the agency of deacons
was "to continue until the Court shall take further order, or that
there be a church of Christ orderly gathered and approved in that
place." This procedure of the Court was a pretty high-handed stretch
of power even for those days; and giving the appointment of officers,
with the title and character of deacons to mere householders, and
where there was no church or organized body of professed believers,
was in absolute conflict with the whole tenor and spirit of the
ecclesiastical system then in force and rigidly maintained elsewhere
throughout the colony. The Court seems itself to have been alarmed at
the extent to which it had gone in forcing Mr. Bayley upon the people
of Salem Village, and fell back, in conclusion, upon the following
proviso: "This order shall continue for one year only from the last of
September last past." The date of the order was the 15th of October,
1679. It had less than a year to run. In fact, the order, after all,
before it comes to the end, is diluted into a mere recommendation of
Mr. Bayley. "In the mean while, all parties," it is hoped, will
"endeavor an agreement in him or some other meet person for a minister
among them;" but the General Court takes care to wind up by demanding
"five pounds for hearing the case, the whole number of villagers
equally to bear their proportion thereof."

While the power thus incautiously conceded to householders was duly
noted, the apparently formidable action of the Court did not in the
least alarm the opposition, or in the slightest degree abate their
zeal. The householders continued, as before, to manage all affairs
relating to the ministry in general meetings of the inhabitants. They
proceeded at once to elect their two deacons. "Corporal Nathaniel
Ingersoll" was one of them; and he continued to hold the office, in
parish and in church, for forty years.

As no attention was paid to the order of the General Court, so far as
it attempted to fasten Mr. Bayley upon the parish; as the church in
Salem would not take the responsibility of recommending his ordination
in the face of such an opposition; and as it was out of the question
to think of reconciling or reducing it, Mr. Bayley concluded to retire
from the conflict and quit the field; and his ministry in the village
came to an end. As evidence that the heat of this protracted
controversy had not consumed all just and considerate sentiments in
the minds of the people, I present the substance of a deed found in
the Essex Registry. It will be noticed, that the most conspicuous of
Mr. Bayley's opponents, Nathaniel Putnam, is one of the parties to the
instrument.

"Thomas Putnam, Sr., Nathaniel Putnam, Sr., Thomas Fuller, Sr., John
Putnam, Sr., and Joseph Hutchinson, Sr. Deed of gift to Mr. James
Bayley. Whereas, Mr. James Bayley, minister of the gospel, now
resident of Salem Village, hath been in the exercise of his gifts by
preaching amongst us several years, having had a call thereunto by the
inhabitants of the place; and at the said Mr. Bayley's first coming
amongst us, we above-named put the said Bayley in possession of a
suitable accommodation of land and meadow, for his more comfortable
subsistence amongst us. But the providence of God having so ordered
it, that the said Mr. Bayley doth not continue amongst us in the work
of the ministry, yet, considering the premises, and as a testimony of
our good affection to the said Mr. Bayley, and as full satisfaction of
all demands of us or any of us, of land relating to the premises, do
by these presents fully grant, &c., to said Bayley" twenty-eight acres
of upland, and thirteen acres of meadow in all. The several lots are
described in the deed, and constitute a very valuable property. The
instrument bears date May 6, 1680. Mr. Bayley's residence is indicated
on the map. The land on which it stood belonged to the part
contributed by Nathaniel Putnam, with some acres in front of it
contributed by Joseph Hutchinson. He continued to own and occasionally
occupy his property in the village for some years after the witchcraft
transactions. He left the ministry, and prepared himself for the
profession of medicine, which he practised in Roxbury. He died on the
17th of January, 1707.

It is not very easy to ascertain from the parish records, or from the
mass of papers in the State-house files, the precise grounds of the
obstinate controversy in reference to him. It is evident that it began
in consequence of some alleged irregularity in the proceedings that
led to his first engagement to preach at the village. There are
intimations, that, in the tone and style of his preaching, he did not
quite come up to the mark required by some. The objection does not
seem to have been against his talents or learning, but, rather, that
he did not take hold with sufficient vehemence, or handle with
sufficient zeal and warmth, points then engrossing attention. One or
two expressions in the papers which proceeded from his opponents seem
to hint that he had not the degree of strictness or severity in his
aspect or ways thought necessary in a minister. Papers in the files of
the County Court bring to light, perhaps, precisely the shape in which
the charges against him had currency. On the 4th of April, 1679,
complaint was made by Thomas and John Putnam, Srs., Daniel Andrew, and
Nathaniel Ingersoll, against Henry Kenny "for slandering our minister,
Mr. Bayley, by reporting that he doth not perform family duties in his
family." This was an expression then in use for "family prayers." One
young woman testified as follows: "Being at Mr. Bayley's house three
weeks together, I never heard Mr. Bayley read a chapter, nor expound
on any part of the Scripture, which was a great grief to me." On the
other hand, three men and one woman depose thus: "Having, for a year,
some more, some less, since Mr. Bayley's coming to Salem Farms, lived
at his house, we testify to our knowledge, that he hath continually
performed family duties, morning and evening, unless sickness or some
other unavoidable providence hath prevented." Two of the above
witnesses depose more specifically as follows: "We testify,--one of us
being a boarder at Mr. Bayley's house, at times, for two or three
years, and the other having lived there about a year and a
quarter,--that Mr. Bayley did not only constantly perform family
prayers twice a day, except some unusual providence at any time
prevented, but also did sometimes read the Scriptures and other
profitable books, and also repeat his own sermons in his family that
he preached upon the Lord's Days; always endeavoring to keep good
order in his family, carrying himself exemplarily therein." The
evidence against Bayley was afterwards found to be unworthy of credit,
and was wholly overborne at the time by unimpeachable testimony in his
favor. The conclusion seems to be safe, from all the papers and
proceedings, that Mr. Bayley was, as the General Court had pronounced
him, "of a blameless conversation." A letter from him to his people,
relating to the disaffection of some, and expressing a willingness to
relinquish his position, if the interests of the society would thereby
be promoted, is among the papers. It is creditable to his
understanding, temper, and character.

The opposition to Mr. Bayley laid the train for all the disastrous and
terrible scenes that followed. His wife was Mary Carr, of Salisbury.
Her family, besides land in that town, owned the large island in the
Merrimack, just above Newburyport, called still by their name, and
occupied by their descendants to this day. Mrs. Bayley brought with
her to the village a younger sister, Ann, who, when scarcely sixteen
years of age,--on the 25th of November, 1678,--married Sergeant Thomas
Putnam. The Carrs were evidently well-educated young women; and there
is every indication that Ann was possessed of qualities which gave her
much influence in private circles. Her husband was the eldest son of
the richest man in the village, had the most powerful and extensive
connections, was a member of the company of troopers, had been in the
Narragansett fight, and, as his records show, was a well-educated
person. Marriage with him brought his wife into the centre of the
great Putnam family; and, her sister Bayley being the wife of the
minister, a powerful combination was secured to his support. The
opposition so obstinately made to his settlement, appearing to his
friends, as it does to us, so unreasonable, if not perverse,
engendered a very bitter resentment, which spread from house to house.
Every thing served to aggravate it. The disregard, by the opposition,
of the advice of the old church to agree to his ordination, and of the
strong endorsement of him by the General Court; and the failure of
either of those bodies to take the responsibility of proceeding to his
ordination,--made the dissatisfaction and disappointment of his
friends intense. His connection by marriage with such a wide-spread
influence, and the harmony and happiness of social life, made his
settlement so very desirable that his friends could not account for
the resistance made to it. His amiable character, which had been shown
to be proof against slander; and his domestic bereavements in the loss
of his wife and three children,--made him dear to his friends. More
than three to one earnestly, persistently, from year to year, begged
that he might be ordained; but what was regarded as an unworthy
faction was permitted to succeed in preventing it. All these things
sunk deep into the heart of the wife of Sergeant Thomas Putnam. She
was a woman of an excitable temperament, and, by her talents, zeal,
and personal qualities, wrought all within her influence into the
highest state of exasperation. This must be borne in mind when we
reach the details of our story. It is the key to all that followed.

The friends of Bayley, while they yielded to his determination to
withdraw from his disagreeable position, never relinquished the hope
to get him back, but renewed a struggle to that end, whenever a
vacancy occurred in the village ministry. With that object in view,
they were unwise and unjust enough to cherish aversion to every one
who succeeded him, and thus kept alive the fatal elements of division.
But it is due to him to say, that he does not appear to have been at
all responsible for the course of his friends. Although retaining his
property in the village, and often residing there, there is no
indication that he had a hand in subsequent proceedings, or was in the
slightest degree connected with the troubles that afterwards arose.
Arts were used to inveigle him into the witchcraft prosecutions: his
resentments, if he had any, were invoked; but in vain. He resisted
attempts, which were made with more effect upon one of his successors,
to rouse his passions against parties accused. He kept himself free
from the whole affair. His name nowhere appears as complainant,
witness, or actor in any shape. He was, so far as the evidence goes, a
peaceable, prudent, kind, and good man; and if the people of Salem
Village had been wise enough, or been permitted, to settle him, the
world might never have known that such a place existed.

George Burroughs, in November, 1680, was engaged to preach at Salem
Village. He is supposed to have been born in Scituate; but his origin
is as uncertain as his history was sad, and his end tragical. He was a
graduate of Harvard College in the class of 1670. What little is known
of him shows that he was a man of ability and integrity. Papers on
file in the State House prove, that, in the district of Maine, where
he lived and preached before and after his settlement at the village,
he was regarded with confidence by his neighbors, and looked up to as
a friend and counsellor. Certain incidents are related, which prove
that he was self-denying, generous, and public-spirited, laboring in
humility and with zeal in the midst of great privations, sharing the
exposures of his people to Indian violence, and experiencing all the
sufferings of an unprotected outpost. In 1676, while preaching at
Casco,--now Portland,--the entire settlement was broken up by an
Indian assault. Thirty-two of the inhabitants were killed or carried
into captivity. Mr. Burroughs escaped to an island in the bay, from
which he was rescued by timely aid from the mainland. He wrote an
account of the catastrophe, communicated by Brian Pendleton to the
Governor and Council at Boston. In 1683 he was again at Casco; and,
again driven off by the Indians in 1690, transferred his labors to
Wells. A grant of one hundred and fifty acres of land was made to him,
included in the site of the present city of Portland. As population
began to thicken near the spot, the town applied to him to relinquish
a part of it, other lands to be given him in exchange. In their
account of the transaction, they state, that, in answer to their
application, Mr. Burroughs said they were welcome to it; that he
freely gave it back, "not desiring any land anywhere else, nor any
thing else in consideration thereof."

In a vote passed at a meeting of Salem Village parish, Feb. 10, 1681,
it was agreed that Mr. Burroughs should receive £93. 6_s._ 8_d._ per
annum for three years, and £60 per annum afterwards. I suppose that he
had no money or property of any kind. The parsonage was out of repair;
and the larger sum for the first three years, amounting to £100, in
three instalments, was to be given him as an outfit in housekeeping.
Immediately upon coming to the village to reside, he encountered the
hostility of those persons who, as the special friends of Mr. Bayley,
allowed their prejudices to be concentrated upon his innocent
successor. The unhappy animosities arising from this source entirely
demoralized the Society, and, besides making it otherwise very
uncomfortable to a minister, led to a neglect and derangement of all
financial affairs. In September, 1681, Mr. Burroughs's wife died, and
he had to run in debt for her funeral expenses. Rates were not
collected, and his salary was in arrears. In making the contract with
the parish, he had taken care to add, at the end of the articles,
these words, "All is to be understood so long as I have gospel
encouragement." It is not improbable that there was a lack of sympathy
between him and the ministers in this part of the country. He
concluded that no benefit would accrue from calling a council to put
things into order; and, as he was in despair of remedying the evils
that had become fastened upon the village, he concluded to give up the
idea of getting a settlement of his accounts, abandoned his claims
altogether, and removed from the village.

At the April term of Court in Ipswich, 1683, a committee of the parish
petitioned for relief, stating that Mr. Burroughs had left them, and
that they had been without services in their meeting-house for four
sabbaths. They pray the Court, that "they be pleased to write to Mr.
Burroughs, requiring him to attend an orderly hearing and clearing up
the case," and "to come to account" with them. The Court accordingly
directed a meeting of the inhabitants to be held, and wrote to Mr.
Burroughs to attend it. When the day came, the Court sent a letter to
be read at the meeting, directing the parties to "reckon," and settle
their accounts. What transpired at this curious meeting is best given
by presenting the documents on file in a case that went into Court.
They show the proceedings that interrupted the "reckoning" at the
meeting in a most extraordinary manner:--

     [COUNTY COURT, June, 1683.--Lieutenant John Putnam
     _versus_ Mr. George Burroughs. Action of debt for two
     gallons of Canary wine, and cloth, &c., bought of Mr. Gedney
     on John Putnam's account, for the funeral of Mrs.
     Burroughs.]

     "_Deposition_.

     "We, whose names are underwritten, testify and say, that at
     a public meeting of the people of Salem Farms, April 24,
     1683, we heard a letter read, which letter was sent from the
     Court. After the said letter was read, Mr. Burroughs came
     in. After the said Burroughs had been a while in, he asked
     'whether they took up with the advice of the Court, given in
     the letter, or whether they rejected it.' The moderator made
     answer, 'Yes, we take up with it;' and not a man
     contradicted it to any of our hearing. After this was
     passed, was a discourse of settling accounts between the
     said Burroughs and the inhabitants, and issuing things in
     peace, and parting in love, as they came together in love.
     Further, we say that the second, third, and fourth days of
     the following week were agreed upon by Mr. Burroughs and
     the people to be the days for every man to come in and to
     reckon with the said Burroughs; and so they adjourned the
     meeting to the last of the aforesaid three days, in the
     afternoon, then to make up the whole account in public.

     "We further testify and say, that, May the second, 1683, Mr.
     Burroughs and the inhabitants met at the meeting-house to
     make up accounts in public, according to their agreement the
     meeting before; and, just as the said Burroughs began to
     give in his accounts, the marshal came in, and, after a
     while, went up to John Putnam, Sr., and whispered to him,
     and said Putnam said to him, 'You know what you have to do:
     do your office.' Then the marshal came to Mr. Burroughs, and
     said, 'Sir, I have a writing to read to you.' Then he read
     the attachment, and demanded goods. Mr. Burroughs answered,
     'that he had no goods to show, and that he was now reckoning
     with the inhabitants, for we know not yet who is in debt,
     but there was his body.' As we were ready to go out of the
     meeting-house, Mr. Burroughs said, 'Well, what will you do
     with me?' Then the marshal went to John Putnam, Sr., and
     said to him, 'What shall I do?' The said Putnam replied,
     'You know your business.' And then the said Putnam went to
     his brother, Thomas Putnam, and pulled him by the coat; and
     they went out of the house together, and presently came in
     again. Then said John Putnam, 'Marshal, take your prisoner,
     and have him up to the ordinary,--that is a public
     house,--and secure him till the morning.'

     (Signed) "NATHANIEL INGERSOLL, aged about fifty.
               SAMUEL SIBLEY, aged about twenty-four.

     "To the first of these, I, John Putnam, Jr., testify, being
     at the meeting."

The above document illustrates the general position of the Putnam
family through all the troubles of the Salem Village parish. Thomas
and John were the heads of two of its branches, and participated in
the proceedings against Burroughs. Nathaniel generally was on the
other side in the course of the various controversies which finally
culminated in the witchcraft delusion. His son, John Putnam, Jr., on
this occasion, was a witness friendly to Mr. Burroughs. Nathaniel
Ingersoll does not appear to have been a partisan on either side. His
sympathies, generally, were with the friends of Bayley; but, on this
occasion, his sense of justice led him to take the lead in behalf of
Burroughs. Other depositions are as follows:--

     "THE TESTIMONY OF THOMAS HAYNES, aged thirty-two
     years or thereabouts.--Testifieth and saith, that, at a
     meeting of the inhabitants of Salem Farms, May the second,
     1683, after the marshal had read John Putnam's attachment to
     Mr. Burroughs, then Mr. Burroughs asked Putnam 'what money
     it was he attached him for.' John Putnam answered, 'For five
     pounds and odd money at Shippen's at Boston, and for
     thirteen shillings at his father Gedney's, and for
     twenty-four shillings at Mrs. Darby's;' that then Nathaniel
     Ingersoll stood up, and said, 'Lieutenant, I wonder that you
     attach Mr. Burroughs for the money at Darby's and your
     father Gedney's, when, to my knowledge, you and Mr.
     Burroughs have reckoned and balanced accounts two or three
     times since, as you say, it was due, and you never made any
     mention of it when you reckoned with Mr. Burroughs.' John
     Putnam answered, 'It is true, and I own it.' Samuel Sibley,
     aged twenty-four years or thereabouts, testifieth to all
     above written."

     "THE TESTIMONY OF NATHANIEL INGERSOLL, _aged,
     &c._--Testifieth, that I heard Mr. Burroughs ask Lieutenant
     John Putnam to give him a bill to Mr. Shippen. The said
     Putnam asked the said Burroughs how much he would take up at
     Mr. Shippen's. Mr. Burroughs said it might be five pounds;
     but, after the said Burroughs had considered a little, he
     said to the said Putnam, 'It may be it might come to more:'
     therefore he would have him give him a bill to the value of
     five or six pounds,--when Putnam answered, it was all one to
     him. Then the said Putnam went and writ it, and read it to
     Mr. Burroughs, and said to him that it should go for part of
     the £33. 6_s._ 8_d._ for which he had given a bill to him in
     behalf of the inhabitants. I, Hannah Ingersoll, aged
     forty-six years or thereabouts, testify the same."

It seems by the foregoing, that Mr. Burroughs had presented a bill, of
the amount just mentioned, to John Putnam, who, as chairman of the
committee the preceding year, represented the inhabitants; and it was
deliberately and formally agreed, that the sum borrowed of Putnam by
Burroughs should "go for part of it." The records of the parish show,
that, on the 24th of May,--three weeks after this meeting "for
reckoning,"--a vote was passed to raise, by a rate, "fifteen pounds
for Mr. Burroughs for the last quarter of a year he preached with us."
At a meeting in December of the same year, a rate was ordered, to pay
the debts of the parish, amounting to £52. 1_s._ 1_d._ On the 22d of
the ensuing February, the parish voted to raise "fifteen pounds for
Mr. Burroughs." The record of a meeting in April, 1684, contains an
order, left on the book, with Mr. Burroughs's proper signature,
authorizing Lieutenant Thomas Putnam to receive of the committee "what
is due to me from the inhabitants of Salem Farms." Thus it is evident,
that, at the very day when the ruthless proceedings above described
took place, a considerable balance was due to Mr. Burroughs, after all
claims from all quarters had been "reckoned." The return of the
marshal, made to the Court, was as follows:--

     "I have attached the body of George Burroughs he tendered to
     me,--for he said he had no pay,--and taken bonds to the
     value of fourteen pounds money, and read this to him.

     Per me,

     HENRY SKERRY, _Marshal_."

The bond is as follows. I give the names of the signers. The persons
who interposed to rescue a persecuted man from unjust imprisonment
deserve to be held in honored remembrance.

     "We whose names are underwritten do bind ourselves jointly
     and severally to Henry Skerry, Marshal of Salem, our heirs,
     executors, and administrators, in the sum of fourteen pounds
     money, that George Burroughs shall appear at the next court
     at Salem, to answer to Lieutenant John Putnam, according to
     the summons of this attachment, and to abide the order of
     the court therein, and not to depart without license; as
     witness our hands this 2d of May, 1683.

     "GEORGE BURROUGHS.
     NATHANIEL INGERSOLL.
     JOHN BUXTON.
     THOMAS HAYNES.
     SAMUEL SIBLEY.
     WILLIAM SIBLEY.
     WILLIAM IRELAND, JR."

The case was withdrawn, and Burroughs was glad to get away. He
preferred the Indians at Casco Bay to the people here. When we
consider, that a committee of the parish petitioned the Court to have
such a meeting of the inhabitants; that it was held, by an order of
Court, in compliance with said petition; that Burroughs came back to
the village to attend it; that the meeting agreed, in answer to an
inquiry from him to that effect, to conform to the order of the Court
in making it the occasion of a full and final "reckoning" between
them; that they spent two days and a half in bringing in and sifting
all claims on either side; and that, when, at the time agreed
upon,--the afternoon of the third day,--the whole body of the
inhabitants had come together to ratify and give effect to the
"reckoning," the marshal came in with a writ, and, evidently in
violation of his feelings, was forced by John Putnam to arrest
Burroughs, thereby breaking up the proceedings asked for by the parish
and ordered by the Court, for a debt which he did not owe,--it must be
allowed, that it was one of the most audacious and abominable outrages
ever committed.

The scene presented in these documents is perhaps as vivid, and brings
the actual life before us as strikingly, as any thing that has come
down to us from that day. We can see, as though we were looking in at
the door, the spectacle presented in the old meeting-house: the
farmers gathered from their remote and widely scattered plantations,
some possibly coming in travelling family-vehicles,--although it is
quite uncertain whether there were any at that time among the
farmers; some in companies on farm-carts; many on foot; but the
greater number on horseback, in their picturesque costume of homespun
or moose-skin, with cowl-shaped hoods, or hats with a brim, narrow in
front, but broad and slouching behind, hanging over the shoulders.
Every man was belted and sworded. They did not wear weapons merely for
show. There was half a score of men in that assembly who were in the
Narragansett fight; and some bore on their persons scars from that
bloody scene of desperate heroism. Every man, it is probable, had come
to the meeting with his firelock on his shoulder, to defend himself
and companions against Indians lurking in the thick woods through
which they had to pass. Their countenances bespoke the passions to
which they had been wrought up by their fierce parish
quarrels,--rugged, severe, and earnest. We can see the grim bearing of
the cavalry lieutenant, John Putnam, and of his elder brother and
predecessor in commission. Marshal Skerry, with his badges of office,
is reluctant to execute its functions upon a persecuted and penniless
minister; but, in accordance with the stern demands of the inexorable
prosecutors, is faithful still to his painful duty. The minister is
the central object in the picture,--a small, dark-complexioned man,
the amazed but calm and patient victim of an animosity in which he had
no part, and for which he was in no wise responsible. The unresisting
dignity of his bearing is quite observable. "We are now reckoning; we
know not yet who is in debt. I have no pay; but here is my body."
Perhaps, in that unconspicuous frame, and through that humble garb,
the sinewy nerves and muscles of steel, the compact and concentrated
forces, that were the marvel of his times, and finally cost him his
life, were apparent in his movements and attitudes. It may be, that
the sufferings and exposures of his previous life had left upon his
swarthy features a stamp of care and melancholy, foreshadowing the
greater wrongs and trials in store for him. But the chief figure in
the group is the just man who rose and rebuked the harsh and
reprehensible procedure of the powerful landholder, neighbor and
friend though he was. The manner in which the arbitrary trooper bowed
to the rebuke, if it does not mitigate our resentment of his conduct,
illustrates the extraordinary influence of Nathaniel Ingersoll's
character, and demonstrates the deference in which all men held him.

There are in this affair other points worthy of notice, as showing the
effects of their bitter feuds in rendering them insensible to every
appeal of charity or humanity. Their minds had become so soured, and
their sense of what was right so impaired, that they neglected and
refused to fulfil their most ordinary obligations to each other, and
to themselves as a society. Rates were not collected, and contracts
were not complied with. The minister and his family were left without
the necessaries of life. They were compelled to borrow even their
clothing, articles of which constituted a part of the debt for which
he was arrested in such a public and unfeeling manner. A young woman
testifies that she lived with Mr. Burroughs about two years, and says:
"My mistress did tell me that she had some serge of John Putnam's
wife, to make Mary a coat; and also some fustian of his wife, to make
my mistress a pair of sleeves." The principal items in the account
were for articles required at the death of his wife, by the usages of
that day on funeral occasions. Surely it was an outrage upon human
nature to spring a suit at law and have a writ served on him, and take
him as a prisoner, on such an occasion, under such circumstances, on
an alleged debt incurred by such a bereavement, when poverty and
necessity had left him no alternative. The whole procedure receives
the stamp, not only of cruelty, but of infamy, from the fact, which
Nathaniel Ingersoll compelled Putnam to acknowledge before the whole
congregation, that the account had been settled and the debt paid long
before.

John Putnam, although a hard and stern man, had many traits of dignity
and respectability in his character. That he could have done this
thing, in this way, proves the extent to which prejudice and passion
may carry one, particularly where party spirit consumes individual
reason and conscience. At this point it is well to consider a piece of
testimony brought against Burroughs nine years afterwards. There was
no propriety or sense in giving it when it was adduced. It was, in
truth, an outrage to have introduced such testimony in a case where
Burroughs was on trial for witchcraft; and it was allowed, only to
prejudice and mislead the minds of a jury and of the public. But it is
proper to be taken into view, in forming a just estimate, with an
impartial aim, of his general character. The document is found in a
promiscuous bundle of witchcraft papers.

     "THE DEPOSITION OF JOHN PUTNAM AND REBECCA HIS
     WIFE.--Testifieth and saith, that, in the year 1680, Mr.
     Burroughs lived in our house nine months. There being a great
     difference betwixt said Burroughs and his wife, the
     difference was so great that they did desire us, the
     deponents, to come into their room to hear their difference.
     The controversy that was betwixt them was, that the aforesaid
     Burroughs did require his wife to give him a written
     covenant, under her hand and seal, that she would never
     reveal his secrets. Our answer was, that they had once made a
     covenant we did conceive did bind each other to keep their
     lawful secrets. And further saith, that, all the time that
     said Burroughs did live at our house, he was a very harsh and
     sharp man to his wife; notwithstanding, to our observation,
     she was a very good and dutiful wife to him."

The first observation that occurs in examining this piece of testimony
is, that the answer made by Putnam and his wife was excellent, and,
like every thing from him, shows that he was a man of strong common
sense, and had a forcible and effectual way of expressing himself. The
next thing to be considered is, that Mr. Burroughs probably
discovered, soon after coming to the village, into what a hornets'
nest he had got,--every one tattling about and backbiting each other.
His innocent and unsuspicious wife may have indulged a little in what
is considered the amiable proclivity of her sex, and have let fall, in
tea-table talk, what cavillers and mischief-makers were on hand to
take up; and he may have found it both necessary and difficult to
teach her caution and reserve. He saw, more perhaps than she did, the
danger of getting involved in the personal acrimonies with which the
whole community was poisoned. Her unguarded carelessness might get
herself and him into trouble, and vitally impair their happiness and
his usefulness. The only other point to be remarked upon is the
general charge against Mr. Burroughs's temper and disposition. It may
be that he became so disgusted with the state of things as to have
shown some acerbity in his manners, but such a supposition is not in
harmony with what little is known of him from other sources; and John
Putnam's conduct at the meeting described proves that his mind was
fully perverted, and bereft as it were of all moral rectitude of
judgment, in reference to Mr. Burroughs. We must part with Mr.
Burroughs for the present. We shall meet him again, where the powers
of malignity will be more shamelessly let loose upon him, and prevail
to his destruction.

He was succeeded in the ministry at Salem Village by a character of a
totally different class. Deodat Lawson is first heard of in this
country, according to Mr. Savage, at Martha's Vineyard in 1671. He
took the freeman's oath at Boston in 1680, and continued to have his
residence there. It was not until after much negotiation and
considerable importunity, that he was prevailed upon to enter into an
engagement to preach at the Village. He began his ministry early in
1684, as appears by the parish record of a meeting Feb. 22, 1684:
"Voted that Joseph Herrick, Jonathan Putnam, and Goodman Cloyse are
desired to take care for to get a boat for the removing of Mr.
Lawson's goods." Votes, about this time, were passed to repair the
parsonage, and the fences around the ministry land; thus putting
things in readiness to receive him. It does not appear that he became
particularly entangled in the conflicts which had so long disturbed
the Village, although, while the mother-church signified its readiness
to approve of his ordination, and some movement was made in the
Village to that end, it was found impossible to bring the hostile
parties sufficiently into co-operation to allow of any thing being
definitely accomplished. Fortunately for Mr. Lawson, the spirit of
strife found other objects upon which to expend its energies for the
time being. Some persons brought forward complaints, that the records
of the parish had not been correctly kept (this was before Sergeant
Thomas Putnam had been charged with that trust); that votes which had
passed in "Mr. Bayley's days" and in "Mr. Burroughs's days" had not
been truly recorded, or recorded at all; and that what had never been
passed had been entered as votes. A great agitation arose on this
subject, and many meetings were held. Some demanded that the spurious
votes should be expunged; others, that the omitted votes should be
inserted. Then there was an excited disputation about the ministry
lands, and the validity or sufficiency of their title to them. Joseph
Houlton had given them; but he had nothing to do with raising the
question, and did all he could to suppress it. Some person had
discovered that William Haynes, to whom Houlton had succeeded by the
right of his wife, had omitted to get his deed of purchase recorded,
and the original could not be found. Disputes also arose about the use
of the grounds around the meeting-house. These, added to the conflicts
with the "Topsfield men," and matters not fully adjusted with the town
of Salem, created and kept up a violent fermentation, in which all
were miscellaneously involved. In the midst of this confusion, the
matter of ordaining Mr. Lawson was put into the warrant for a meeting
to be held on the 10th of December, 1686. But it was found impossible
to recall the people from their divisions, and no favorable action
could be had.

At length, all attempts to settle their difficulties among themselves
were abandoned; and they called for help from outside. At a legally
warned meeting on the 17th of January, 1687, the inhabitants made
choice of "Captain John Putnam" (he had been promoted in the military
line since the affair in the meeting-house with Mr. Burroughs),
"Lieutenant Jonathan Walcot, Ensign Thomas Flint, and Corporal Joseph
Herrick, for to transact with Joseph Hutchinson, Job Swinnerton,
Joseph Porter, and Daniel Andrew about their grievances relating to
the public affairs of this place; and, if they cannot agree among
themselves, that then they shall refer their differences to the
Honored Major Gedney and John Hathorne, Esqs., and to the reverend
elders of the Salem Church, for a full determination of those
differences." Of course, it was impossible to settle the matter among
themselves, and the referees were called in. William Brown, Jr., Esq.,
was added to them. They were all of the old town, and men of the
highest consideration. Their judgment in the case is a well-drawn and
interesting document, and shows the view which near neighbors took of
the distractions in the village. The following passage will exhibit
the purport and spirit of it:--

     "_Loving Brethren, Friends and Neighbors_,--Upon serious
     consideration of, and mature deliberation upon, what hath
     been offered to us about your calling and transacting in
     order to the settling and ordaining the Rev. Mr. Deodat
     Lawson, and the grievances offered by some to obstruct and
     impede that proceeding, our sense of the matter is
     this,--first, that the affair of calling and transacting in
     order to the settling and ordaining the Reverend Mr. Lawson
     hath not been so inoffensively managed as might have
     been,--at least, not in all the parts and passages of it;
     second, that the grievances offered by some amongst you are
     not in themselves of sufficient weight to obstruct so great
     a work, and that they have not been improved so peaceably
     and orderly as Christian prudence and self-denial doth
     direct; third, to our grief, we observe such uncharitable
     expressions and uncomely reflections tossed to and fro as
     look like the effects of settled prejudice and resolved
     animosity, though we are much rather willing to account them
     the product of weakness than wilfulness: however, we must
     needs say, that, come whence they will, they have a tendency
     to make such a gap as we fear, if not timely prevented, will
     let out peace and order, and let in confusion and every evil
     work."

They then proceed to give some good advice to "prevent contention and
trouble for the future, that it may not devour for ever, and that, if
the Lord please, you may be happier henceforth than to make one
another miserable; and not make your place uncomfortable to your
present, and undesirable to any other, minister, and the ministry
itself in a great measure unprofitable: and that you may not bring
impositions on yourselves by convincing all about you that you cannot,
or will not, use your liberty as becomes the gospel." Their advice is,
"that you desist, at present, from urging the ordination of the Rev.
Mr. Lawson, till your spirits are better quieted and composed." They
give some judicious suggestions about various matters that had been
the occasion of difficulty among them, especially to help them get
their records put into good shape, and kept so for the future; and
wind up in the following excellent, and in some of the clauses rather
emphatic and pithy, expressions:--

     "Finally, we think peace cheap, if it may be procured by
     complying with the aforementioned particulars, which are
     few, fair, and easy; and that they will hardly pass for
     lovers of peace, truth, ministry, and order, in the day of
     the Lord, that shall so lean to their own understanding and
     will that they shall refuse such easy methods for the
     obtaining of them. And, if peace and agreement amongst you
     be once comfortably obtained, we advise you with all
     convenient speed to go on with your intended ordination; and
     so we shall follow our advice with our prayers. But, if our
     advice be rejected, we wish you better, and hearts to follow
     it; and only add, if you will unreasonably trouble
     yourselves, we pray you not any further to trouble us. We
     leave all to the blessing of God, the wonderful Counsellor,
     and your own serious consideration: praying you to read and
     consider the whole, and then act as God shall direct you.
     Farewell."

     [Salem, Feb. 14, 1687. Signed by the five referees,--John
     Higginson and Nicholas Noyes (the elders of the old church),
     and the three gentlemen before named.]

At a meeting of the inhabitants of the Village on the 18th of
February, it was voted that "we do accept of and embrace the advice of
the honored and reverend gentlemen of Salem, sent to us under their
hands, and order that it shall be entered on our book of records." But
they took care further to vote, that they accepted it "in general, and
not in parts." In accordance with the advice of the referees, they
brought up, considered anew, and put to question, every entry in their
past records about the genuineness and validity of which any division
of opinion existed. Some entries that had been complained of and given
offence as incorrect were voted out, and others were confirmed by
being adopted on a new vote. A new book of records was prepared, to
conform to these decisions, which, having been submitted for
examination to leading persons, appointed for the purpose at a legal
meeting representing both parties, and approved by them, was adopted
and sanctioned at a subsequent meeting also called for the purpose.

In accordance with the same advice "that the old book of records be
kept in being," it was ordered by the meeting to leave the votes that
had, by the foregoing proceedings, been rendered null and void, to
"lie in the old book of records as they are." From the new book of
records we learn that "some votes are left out that passed in Mr.
Bayley's days, and some that passed in Mr. Burroughs's days,"
particularly all the votes but one that passed at a meeting held on
the fifth day of June, 1683, the very time that Mr. Burroughs was
under bonds in the action of debt brought by John Putnam. The new
record specifies some few, but not all, of the votes that were
rescinded because it was adjudged that they had not rightfully passed,
or been correctly stated. Unfortunately, the old book, after all, has
not been "kept in being;" and much that would have exhibited more
fully and clearly the unhappy early history of the parish is for ever
lost. If the records that have been suffered to remain present the
picture I have endeavored faithfully to draw, how much darker might
have been its shades had we been permitted to behold what the parties
concerned concurred in thinking too bad to be left to view!

The attempt to expunge records is always indefensible, besides being
in itself irrational and absurd. It may cover up the details of wrong
and folly; but it leaves an unlimited range to the most unfriendly
conjecture. We are compelled to imagine what we ought to be allowed to
know; and, in many particulars, our fancies may be worse than the
facts. But later times, and public bodies of greater pretensions than
"the inhabitants of Salem Village," have attempted, and succeeded in
perpetrating, this outrage upon history. In trying to conceal their
errors, men have sometimes destroyed the means of their vindication.
This may be the case with the story that is to be told of "Salem
Witchcraft." It has been the case in reference to wider fields of
history. The Parliamentary journals and other public records of the
period of the Commonwealth and the Protectorate were suppressed by the
infatuated stupidity of the Government of the Restoration. They
foolishly imagined that they were hiding the shame, while they were
obscuring the glory, of their country. Every Englishman, every
intelligent man, now knows, that, during that very period, all that
has made England great was done. The seeds of her naval and maritime
prosperity were planted: and she was pushed at once by wise measures
of policy, internal and external; by legislation developing her
resources and invigorating the power of her people; by a decisive and
comprehensive diplomacy that commanded the respect of foreign courts,
and secured to her a controlling influence upon the traffic of the
world; by developments of her military genius under the greatest of
all the great generals of modern times; and by naval achievements that
snatched into her hands the balancing trident of the seas,--to the
place she still holds (how much longer she may hold it remains to be
seen) as the leading power of the world. If she has to relinquish that
position, it will only be to a power that is true to the spirit, and
is not ashamed of the name, of a republic. The nation that fully
develops the policy which pervaded the records of the English
Commonwealth will be the leader of the world. The suppression of those
records has not suppressed the spirit of popular liberty, or the
progress of mankind in the path of reform, freedom, equal rights, and
a true civilization. It has only cast a shadow, which can never wholly
be dispelled, over what otherwise would have been the brightest page
in the annals of a great people. We depend for our knowledge of the
steps by which England then made a most wonderful stride to prosperity
and power, not upon official and authoritative records, but upon the
desultory and sometimes merely gossiping memoirs of particular
persons, and such other miscellaneous materials as can be picked up.
The only consequence of an attempt to extinguish the memory of
republicans, radicals, reformers, and regicides has been, that the
history of England's true glory can never be adequately written.

The referees used the following language touching the point of the
ordination of Mr. Lawson: "If more than a mere major part should not
consent to it, we should be loath to advise our brethren to proceed."
This, in connection with the other sentence I have quoted from their
communication recommending them "to desist at present" from urging it,
was fatal to the immediate movement in his favor; and, not seeing any
prospect of their "spirits becoming better quieted and composed," and
weary of the attempt to bring them to any comfortable degree of
unanimity, Mr. Lawson threw up his connection with them, and removed
back to Boston. We shall meet him again; but it is well to despatch at
this point what is to be said of his character and history.

It is evident that Deodat Lawson had received the best education of
his day. It is not easy to account for his not having left a more
distinguished mark in Old or New England. He had much learning and
great talents. Of his power in getting up pulpit performances in the
highest style of eloquence, of which that period afforded remarkable
specimens, I shall have occasion to speak. Among his other
attainments, he was, what cannot be said of learned and professional
men generally now any more than then, an admirable penman. The village
parish adopted the practice at the beginning, when paying the salaries
of its ministers from time to time, instead of taking receipts on
detached and loose pieces of paper, of having them write them out in
their own hand on the pages of the record-book, with their signatures.
It is a luxury, in looking over the old volume, to come upon the
receipts of Deodat Lawson, in his plain, round hand. A specimen is
given among the autographs. His chirography is easy, free, graceful,
clear, and clean. It unites with wonderful taste the highest degrees
of simplicity and ornament. Each style is used, and both are blended,
as occasion required. During his ministry, the trouble about the old
record-book occurred. The first four pages of the new book are in his
handwriting. The ink has somewhat faded; the paper has become
discolored, and, around the margins and at the bottom of the leaves,
lamentably worn and broken. The first page exhibits Lawson's
penmanship in its various styles. It is artistically executed in
several sizes of letters, appropriate to the position of the clauses
and the import and weight of the matter. In each there is an elegant
combination of ornament and simplicity. His chirography was often had
in requisition; and papers, evidently from his pen, are on file in
various cases, occurring in court at the time, in which his friends
were interested.

The first four ministers of the village parish were excellent penmen.
Bayley's hand is more like the modern style than the rest. Burroughs's
is as legible as print, uniform in its character, open and upright.
The specimen among the autographs is from the record referred to at
the top of page 262. As it was written at the bottom of a page in the
record-book, where there was hardly sufficient room, it had to be in a
slanting line. I give it just as it there appears. Parris wrote three
different hands, all perfectly easy to read. The larger kind was used
when signing his name to important papers, or in brief entries of
record. The specimen I give is from a receipt in the parish-book,
which Thomas Putnam, as clerk, made oath in court, that Parris wrote
and signed in his presence. His notes of examinations of persons
charged with witchcraft by the committing magistrate, many of which
are preserved, are in his smallest hand, very minute, but always
legible. In his church-records he uses sometimes a medium hand, and
sometimes the smallest. The autographs of Townsend Bishop and Thomas
Putnam show the handwriting that seems to have prevailed among
well-educated people in England at the time of the first settlement of
this country. There was often a profusion of flourishes that obscured
the letters. The initial capitals were quite complicated and very
curious. The signature of Thomas Putnam, Jr., exhibits his excellent
handwriting.

[Illustration]

[Illustration]

I have adduced these facts and given these illustrations to show,
that, in this branch of education,--the value and desirableness of
which cannot be overrated,--it is at least an open question, whether
we have much ground to boast of being in advance of the first
generations of our ancestors in America. The early ministers of the
Salem Village parish certainly compare, in this particular, favorably
with ministers and professional men, and recording officers generally
in public bodies of all kinds, in later times.

Sergeant Thomas Putnam did not act as clerk of the parish from April,
1687, to April, 1694. A few entries are made by his hand; but the
record, very meagre and fragmentary, is for the most part made by
others. This is much to be regretted, as the interval covers the very
period of our history. His time, probably, was taken up, and his mind
wholly engrossed, by an unhappy family difficulty, in which, during
that period, he was involved. Thomas Putnam Sr. died, as has been
stated, in 1686. It was thought, by the children of his first wife,
that the influence of the second wife had been unduly exercised over
him, in his last years, so as to induce him to make a will giving to
her, and her only child by him, Joseph, a very unfair proportion of
his estate. It was felt by them to be so unjust that they attempted to
break the will. The management of the case was confided to Sergeant
Thomas Putnam, as the eldest son of the family; and the affair, it may
be supposed, absorbed his thoughts to such a degree as to render it
necessary for him to abandon his services as clerk of the parish. The
attempt to set aside the will failed. The circumstances connected with
the subject disturbed very seriously--perhaps permanently--the
happiness of the whole family, and may have contributed to create the
morbid excitement which afterwards was so fearfully displayed by the
wife of the younger Thomas.

While Mr. Lawson was at the village, he lost his wife and daughter. In
1690, he was again married, to Deborah Allen. He was settled
afterwards over the Second Society in Scituate,--it is singular that
our local histories do not tell us when, but that we get all we know
on the point from a sentence written by the pen on a leaf of one of
the two folio volumes of John Quick's "Synodicon in Gallia Reformata,"
in the possession of a gentleman in this country, Henry M. Dexter, who
says it is evidently Quick's autograph. It is in these words: "For my
reverend and dear brother, Mr. Lawson, minister of the gospel, and
pastor of the church of Scituate, in the province of Massachusetts in
New England; from the publisher, John Quick, _honoris et amoris ergo_,
Aug. 6, 1693." In 1696, Mr. Lawson went over to England, merely for a
short visit, as his people supposed. They heard from him no more. He
never asked a dismission, or communicated with them in any way. In
1698, an ecclesiastical council declared them free to settle another
minister, which they did in due time. He was, no doubt, alive and in
London when, in 1704, his famous Salem Village sermon was reprinted
there. But this is the last glimpse we have of him. An inscrutable
mystery covers the rest of his history. His manner of leaving the
Scituate parish shows him to have been an eccentric person, leaves an
unfavorable impression of his character, and is as inexplicable as the
only other reference to him that has thus far been found. Calamy, in
his "Continuation of the Account of Ejected Ministers," published in
1727, has a notice of Thomas Lawson, whom he describes as minister of
Denton in the county of Norfolk, educated at Katherine Hall in
Cambridge, and afterwards chosen "to a fellowship in St. John's. He
was a man of parts, but had no good utterance. He was the father of
the unhappy Mr. Deodat Lawson, who came hither from New England." With
all his abilities, learning, and eloquence, he disappears, after the
re-publication of his Salem Village sermon in London, in the dark,
impenetrable cloud of this expression, "the unhappy Mr. Deodat
Lawson." Of the melancholy fate implied in the language of Calamy, I
have not been able to obtain the slightest information.

The troubles that covered the whole period, since the beginning of Mr.
Bayley's ministry, had led to the neglect and derangement of the
entire organization of the Village, and resulted in the loss of what
little opportunities for education might otherwise have been provided.
So great was this evil regarded, that the old town felt it necessary
to interpose; and we find it voted Jan. 24, 1682, that "Lieutenant
John Putnam is desired, and is hereby empowered, to take care that the
law relating to the catechising of children and youth be duly attended
at the Village." He is also "desired to have a diligent care that all
the families do carefully and constantly attend the due education of
their children and youth according to law." We cannot but feel that
the man who was ready to fight the "Topsfield men" in the woods--who,
when they asked him, "What, by violence?" answered, with axe in hand,
"Ay, by violence," and who figured in the manner described in the
scene with Mr. Burroughs--was a singular person to intrust with the
charge of "catechising the children and youth." But those were queer
times, and he was a queer character. He had always been a
church-member; and, to the day of his death, church and prayer
meetings were more frequently held at his house than in any other. He
was a rough man, but he was no hypocrite. He was in the front of every
encounter; but he was tolerant, too, of difference of opinion. When,
at one time, the contests of the Village were at their height, and two
committees were raised representing the two conflicting parties, he
was at the head of one, and his eldest son (Jonathan) of the other.
Their opposition does not seem to have alienated them. While I have
found it necessary to hold him up, in some of his actions, for
condemnation, there were many good points about him; although he was
not the sort of man that would be likely, in our times, to be selected
to execute the functions of a Sunday-school teacher.

During all this period, there was a variety of minor controversies
among themselves, causing greater or less disturbance. Joseph
Hutchinson, who had given a site out of his homestead-grounds for the
meeting-house, had no patience with their perpetual wranglings. He
fenced up his lands around the meeting-house lot, leaving them an
entrance on the end towards the road. They went to court about it, and
he was called to account by the usual process of law. The plain, gruff
old farmer, who seems all along to have been a man of strong sense and
decided character, filed an answer, which is unsurpassed for bluntness
of expression. It has no language of ceremony, but goes to the point
at once. It has a general interest as showing, to how late a period
the inhabitants of this neighborhood were exposed to Indian attacks,
and what means of defence were resorted to by the Village worshippers.
The document manifests the contempt in which he held the complainants,
and it was all the satisfaction they got.

     "Joseph Hutchinson his answer is as followeth:--

     "First, as to the covenant they spoke of, I conceive it is
     neither known of by me nor them, as will appear by records
     from the farmer's book.

     "Second, I conceive they have no cause to complain of me for
     fencing in my own land; for I am sure I fenced in none of
     theirs. I wish they would not pull down my fences. I am
     loath to complain, though I have just cause.

     "Third, for blocking up the meeting-house, it was they did
     it, and not I, in the time of the Indian wars; and they made
     Salem pay for it. I wish they would bring me my rocks they
     took to do it with; for I want them to make fence with.

     "Thus, hoping this honored Court will see that there was no
     just cause to complain against me, and their cause will
     appear unjust in that they would in an unjust way take away
     my land, I trust I shall have relief; so I rest, your
     Honor's servant,

     JOSEPH HUTCHINSON."

     [Nov. 27, 1686.]

The next minister of Salem Village brought matters to a crisis. Samuel
Parris is stated to have been a son of Thomas Parris, of London, and
was born in 1653. He was, for a time, a member of Harvard College, but
did not finish the academic course, being drawn to a commercial life.
He was engaged in the West-India business, and probably lived at
Barbadoes. After a while, he abandoned commerce, and prepared himself
for the ministry. There was at this time, and long subsequently, a
very particular mercantile connection between Salem and Barbadoes. The
former husband of the wife of Thomas Putnam, Sr.,--Nathaniel
Veren,--as has been stated, had property in that island, and was more
or less acquainted with its people. Perhaps it was through this
channel that the thoughts of the people of the Village were turned
towards Mr. Parris. From a deposition made by him a few years
afterwards in a suit at law between him and his parishioners, we learn
some interesting facts relating to the negotiations that led to his
settlement.

It appears from his statement that a committee, consisting of "Captain
John Putnam, Mr. Joshua Rea, Sr., and Francis Nurse," was appointed,
on the 15th of November, 1688, to treat with him "about taking
ministerial office." On the 25th of November, "after the services in
the afternoon, the audience was stayed, and, by a general vote,
requested Mr. Parris to take office." He hung back for a while, and
exercised the skill and adroitness acquired in his mercantile life in
making as sharp a bargain as he could.

At that time, there appeared to be a degree of harmony among the
people, such as they had never known before. There was a disposition
on all sides to come together, and avail themselves of the occasion
of settling a new minister, to bury their past animosities, and
forget their grievances; and there is every reason to believe, if Mr.
Parris had promptly closed with their terms, he might have enjoyed a
peaceful ministry, and a happy oblivion have covered for ever his name
and the history of the village. But he withheld response to the call.
The people were impatient, and felt that the golden opportunity might
be lost, and the old feuds revive. On the 10th of December, another
committee was raised, consisting of Lieutenant Nathaniel Putnam,
Sergeant Fuller, Mr. Joshua Rea, Sr., and Sergeant Ingersoll, as
"messengers, to know whether Mr. Parris would accept of office." His
answer was, "the work was weighty; they should know in due time." They
were thus kept in suspense during the whole winter, getting no reply
from him. On the 29th of April, 1689, "Deacons Nathaniel Ingersoll and
Edward Putnam, Daniel Rea, Thomas Fuller, Jr., and John Tarbell, came
to Mr. Parris from the meeting-house," where there had been a general
meeting of the inhabitants, and said, "Being the aged men had had the
matter of Mr. Parris's settlement so long in hand, and effected
nothing, they were desirous to try what the younger could do." Deacon
Ingersoll was about fifty-five years of age; but his spirit and
character kept him in sympathy with the progressive impulses of
younger men. Deacon Putnam was thirty-four years of age. Daniel Rea
was the son of Joshua; Thomas Fuller, Jr., the son of Sergeant Fuller;
and John Tarbell, the son-in-law of Francis Nurse.

This is the first appearance, I believe, in our history, of that
notorious and most pretentious personage who has figured so largely in
all our affairs ever since, "Young America." The sequel shows, that,
in this instance at least, no benefit arose from discarding the
caution and experience of years. The "younger men" were determined to
"go ahead." They said they were desirous of a speedy answer. Finding
them in a temper to "finish the thing up," at any rate, and seeing
that they were ambitious to get the credit of "effecting something,"
and, for that end, predisposed to come to his terms, he disclosed
them. They had offered him a salary of sixty pounds per annum,--one
third in money, the rest in provisions, at certain specified rates. He
agreed to accept the call on the foregoing terms, with certain
additional conditions thus described by himself: "First, when money
shall be more plenteous, the money part to be paid me shall
accordingly be increased. Second, though corn or like provisions
should arise to a higher price than you have set, yet, for my own
family use, I shall have what is needful at the price now stated, and
so if it fall lower. Third, the whole sixty pounds to be only from our
inhabitants that are dwelling in our bounds, proportionable to what
lands they have within the same. Fourth, no provision to be brought in
without first asking whether needed, and myself to make choice of
what, unless the person is unable to pay in any sort but one. Fifth,
firewood to be given in yearly, freely. Sixth, two men to be chosen
yearly to see that due payments be made. Seventh, contributions each
sabbath in papers; and only such as are in papers, and dwelling within
our bounds, to be accounted a part of the sixty pounds. Eighth, as God
shall please to bless the place so as to be able to rise higher than
the sixty pounds, that then a proportionable increase be made. If God
shall please, for our sins, to diminish the substance of said place, I
will endeavor accordingly to bear such losses, by proportionable
abatements of such as shall reasonably desire it."

A contribution-box was either handed around by the deacons, before the
congregation was dismissed, or attached permanently near the porch or
door. Rate-payers would inclose their money in papers, with their
names, and drop them in. When the box was opened, the sums inclosed
would be entered to their credit on the rate-schedule. There was
always a considerable number of stated worshippers in the congregation
who lived without the bounds of the village, and often transient
visitors or strangers happened to be at meeting. It was a point that
had not been determined, whether moneys collected from the above
descriptions of persons should go into the general treasury of the
parish, to be used in meeting their contract to pay the minister's
salary, or be kept as a separate surplus.

The terms, as thus described by Mr. Parris, show that he had profited
by his experience in trade, and knew how to make a shrewd bargain. It
was quite certain that a farming community in a new country, with
fields continually reclaimed from the wilderness and added to
culture, would increase in substance: if so, his annual stipend would
increase. If the place should decline, he was to abate the tax of
individuals, if desired by them personally, so far as he should judge
their petition to that effect reasonable. If "strangers' money," or
contributions from "outsiders," were not to go to make up his sixty
pounds, it was quite probable that it would come into his pocket as an
extra allowance, or perquisite.

He says that the committee accepted these terms, and agreed to them,
expressing their belief that the people also would. No record appears
on the parish-books of the appointment of this committee of the
"younger men," or of the action of the society on their report, or of
any report having been made at that time. In the mean while, Mr.
Parris continued to preach and act as the minister of the society
until his ordination, near the close of the year. There was a meeting
on the 21st of May; but the record consists of but a single
entry,--the appointment of a committee "as overseers for the year
ensuing, to take care of our meeting-house and other public charges,
and to make return according to law." The next entry is of a general
meeting of the inhabitants, on the 18th of June, 1689. The choice of
the regular standing committee for the year is recorded. Immediately
following this entry, are these words:--

     "At the same meeting,--the 18th of June, 1689,--it was
     agreed and voted by general concurrence, that, for Mr.
     Parris, his encouragement and settlement in the work of the
     ministry amongst us, we will give him sixty six pounds for
     his yearly salary,--one-third paid in money, the other
     two-third parts for provisions, &c.; and Mr. Parris to find
     himself firewood, and Mr. Parris to keep the ministry-house
     in good repair; and that Mr. Parris shall also have the use
     of the ministry-pasture, and the inhabitants to keep the
     fence in repair; and that we will keep up our contributions,
     and our inhabitants to put their money in papers, and this
     to continue so long as Mr. Parris continues in the work of
     the ministry amongst us, and all productions to be good and
     merchantable. And, if it please God to bless the
     inhabitants, we shall be willing to give more; and to
     expect, that if God shall diminish the estates of the
     people, that then Mr. Parris do abate of his salary
     according to proportion."

Comparing this record with the account given by Mr. Parris of the
eight conditions upon which he agreed, in conference with the
committee of the "younger" sort, on the 29th of April, to accept the
call of the parish, the difference is not very essential. The matter
of firewood was arranged, according to his account, by mutual
agreement, they to add six pounds to his salary, and he to find his
own wood. The rates of "the inhabitants" were to be paid "in papers."
The only point of difference, touching this matter, is that the record
is silent about contributions by outsiders and strangers; whereas he
says it was agreed, on the 29th of April, that they should not go
towards making up his salary. The idea of his salary rising with the
growth and sinking with the decline of the society is expressed in the
record substantially as it is by him, only it is made exact; and, in
case of a decline in the means of the people, a corresponding decline
is to be in the aggregate of his salary, and not by abatements made by
him in individual cases. The variations are nearly, if not quite, all
unimportant in their nature, and such as a regard to mutual
convenience would suggest. Yet there was something in the above record
which highly exasperated Mr. Parris.

In his deposition he states, that, at a meeting held on the 17th of
May, of which there is no record in the parish book, he was sent for
and was present. He says that there was "much agitation" at the
meeting. He says that objection was made by the people to two of his
"eight" conditions, the fifth and seventh. But there is nothing in the
record of the 18th of June in conflict with what he says was finally
agreed upon, except the disposition that should be made of "strangers'
money." The question then recurs, What was the cause of the "much
agitation" at that meeting? What was it in the language of that record
which always so excited Mr. Parris's wrath?

I am inclined to think that the offensive words were those which
require "Mr. Parris to keep the ministry house in good repair," and
that he "shall also have the use of the ministry pasture;" and this
was not objectionable as involving any expense upon him, but solely
because the language employed precluded the supposition that the
parish had countenanced the idea of ever conveying the parsonage and
parsonage lands to him in his own right and absolutely. This was an
object which he evidently had in view from the first, and to which he
clung to the last. It is to be feared, that some of the members of the
"Young-America" committee, in their heedless and inconsiderate
eagerness to "effect" something, to settle Mr. Parris forthwith, and
thereby prove how much more competent they were than "the aged men" to
transact a weighty business, had encouraged Mr. Parris to think that
his favorite object could be accomplished. Upon a little inquiry,
however, they discovered that it could not be done; but that the house
and land were secured by the original deeds of conveyance, and by
irreversible agreements and conditions, to the use of the ministry,
for the time being and for ever. So far as the committee or any of its
members had favored this idea in their conference with Mr. Parris,
they had taken a position from which they had to retreat. They had
compromised themselves and the parish. For this reason, perhaps, they
made no report; and no mention of their agency appears on the records.
How far Deacon Ingersoll was misled by his younger associates on this
occasion, I know not; but he was not a man to break a promise if he
could keep it, no matter how much to his own loss. He recognized his
responsibility as chairman of the unfortunate committee, and retrieved
the mistake they had made, by giving to Mr. Parris, by deed, a lot of
land adjoining the parsonage property, and in value equal to the whole
of it. The date of that conveyance, immediately after Mr. Parris's
ordination, corroborates the conjecture that it was made to
compensate Mr. Parris for the failure of his expectation to get
possession of the ministry property. It ought to have been received by
him as an equivalent, and have soothed his angry disappointment; but
it did not. He had indulged the belief, that he had effected a bargain
with the parish, at his settlement, which had made him the owner, in
fee simple, of the parish property; and when he found that the record
of the terms of his settlement, in the parish-book, absolutely
precluded that idea, his exasperation was great, and no reparation
Deacon Ingersoll or any one else could make was suffered to appease
it. The following deposition, made in court some years afterwards,
gives an account of a scene in the meeting-house after Parris's
ordination:--

     "IPSWICH COURT, 1697.--Parris _versus_ Inhabitants
     of Salem Village.

     "We the undersigned testify and say, that, a considerable
     time after Mr. Parris his ordination, there was a meeting of
     the inhabitants of Salem Village at the usual place of
     meeting; and the occasion of the meeting was concerning Mr.
     Parris, and several persons were at that meeting, that had
     not, before this meeting, joined with the people in calling
     or agreeing with Mr. Parris; and the said persons desired
     that those things that concerned Mr. Parris and the people
     might be read, and accordingly it was. And the entry, that
     some call a salary, being read, there arose a difference
     among the people, the occasion of which was finding an entry
     in the book of the Village records, relating to Mr. Parris
     his maintenance, which was dated the 18th of June, 1689;
     and, the entry being read to the people, some replied that
     they believed that Mr. Parris would not comply with that
     entry; whereupon one said it was best to send for Mr. Parris
     to resolve the question. Accordingly, he was sent for. He
     coming to the people, this entry of the 18th of June, 1689,
     was read to Mr. Parris. His answer was as follows: 'He never
     heard or knew any thing of it, neither could or would he
     take up with it, or any part of it;' and further he said,
     'They were knaves and cheaters that entered it.' And
     Lieutenant Nathaniel Putnam, being moderator of that
     meeting, replied to Mr. Parris, and said, 'Sir, then there
     is only proposals on both sides, and no agreement between
     you and the people.' And Mr. Parris answered and said, 'No
     more, there is not; for I am free from the people, and the
     people free from me:' and so the meeting broke up. And we
     further testify, that there hath not been any agreement made
     with Mr. Parris, that we knew of or ever heard of,--never
     since.

     "JOSEPH PORTER.
     DANIEL ANDREW.
     JOSEPH PUTNAM.

     "Sworn in Court, at Ipswich, April 13, 1697, by all three.

     Attest, STEPHEN SEWALL, _Clerk_."

The answer which Mr. Parris made to Nathaniel Putnam's inquiry
probably settled the question in the suit then pending, and led to the
final release of the parish from him. It is hard to find any point of
difference between his own account of the conditions he himself made,
and the record of the parish-book, of sufficient importance to account
for the storm of passion into which the reading of the latter drove
him, except in the language which I have suggested as the probable
occasion of his wrath. Unfortunately for him, there is evidence quite
corroborative of this suggestion.

The parish-book has the following record:--

     "At a general meeting of the inhabitants of Salem Village,
     Oct. 10, 1689, it was agreed and voted, that the vote, in
     our book of record of 1681, that lays, as some say, an
     entailment upon our ministry house and land, is hereby made
     void and of no effect; one man only dissenting.

     "It was voted and agreed by a general concurrence, that we
     will give to Mr. Parris our ministry house and barn, and two
     acres of land next adjoining to the house; and that Mr.
     Parris take office amongst us, and live and die in the work
     of the ministry among us; and, if Mr. Parris or his heirs do
     sell the house and land, that the people may have the first
     refusal of it, by giving as much as other men will. A
     committee was chosen to lay out the land, and make a
     conveyance of the house and land, and to make the conveyance
     in the name and in the behalf of the inhabitants unto Mr.
     Parris and his heirs."

The record of these votes is not signed by the clerk, and there is no
evidence that the meeting was legally warned. It does not appear in
whose custody the book then was. But, however the entry got in, it
proves that Parris's friends were determined to gratify his all but
insane purpose to get possession of what he ought to have known it was
impossible for the parish to give, or for him or his heirs to hold. It
was indeed a miserable commencement of his ministry, to introduce
such a strife with a people who really seem to have had an earnest
desire to receive him with united hearts, and make his settlement and
ministry the harbinger of a better day. But he alienated many of them,
at the very start, by his sharp practice in negotiating about the
pecuniary details of his agreement with the parish. When, after all
their care to prevent it, it became known that somehow or other a vote
had got upon the records, conveying to him outright their ministerial
property, there was great indignation; and a determined effort was
made to recover what they declared to be "a fraudulent conveying-away"
of the property of the society.

A more violent conflict than any before was let loose upon that
devoted people. The old passions were rekindled. Men ranged themselves
as the friends and opponents of Mr. Parris in bitter antagonism. Rates
were not collected; the meeting-house went into dilapidation;
complaints were made to the County Court; orders were issued to
collect rates, but they were disregarded; and all was confusion,
disorder, and contention.

A church was organized in connection with the village parish, and Mr.
Parris ordained on Monday, Nov. 19, 1689. The covenant adopted was the
"confession of faith owned and consented unto by the elders and
messengers of the churches assembled at Boston, New England, May 12,
1680." In the library of the Connecticut Historical Society, there is
a manuscript volume of sermons and abstracts of sermons preached by
Mr. Parris between November, 1689, and May, 1694. It begins with his
ordination sermon, which has this prefix: "My poor and weak ordination
sermon, at the embodying of a church at Salem Village on the 19th of
the ninth month, 1689, the Rev. Mr. Nicholas Noyes embodying of us;
who also ordained my most unworthy self pastor, and, together with the
Rev. Mr. Samuel Phillips and the Rev. Mr. John Hale, imposed
hands,--the same Mr. Phillips giving me the right hand of fellowship
with beautiful loveliness and humility." The text is from Josh. v. 9:
"And the Lord said unto Joshua, This day have I rolled away the
reproach of Egypt from off you."

The first entry in the church-records, after the covenant and the
names of the members, is the following: "Nov. 24, 1689.--Sab: day.
Brother Nathaniel Ingersoll chosen, by a general vote of the brethren,
to officiate in the place of a deacon for a time."

Mr. Parris commenced his administration by showing that he meant to
exercise the disciplinary powers intrusted to him, as pastor of a
church, with a high hand, and without much regard to persons or
circumstances. Ezekiel Cheever had been a member of the mother-church
in Salem twenty years before, was one of the founders of the parish
church, and appears to have been a worthy and amiable person,
occupying and owning the farm of his uncle, Captain Lothrop. On the
sudden illness of a member of his family, being "in distress for a
horse," none of his own being available at the time, he rushed, in
his hurry and alarm, to the stable of a neighbor, took one of his
horses, "without leave or asking of it," and rode, post haste, for a
doctor. One would have thought that an affair of this sort, in such an
exigency, might have been left to neighborly explanation or
adjustment. But Mr. Parris regarded it as giving a good opportunity
for an exercise of power that would strike the terrors of discipline
home upon the whole community. About five or six weeks after the
occurrence, Cheever was dealt with in the manner thus described by Mr.
Parris, in his church-record, dated "Sab: 30 March, 1690." He was
"called forth to give satisfaction to the offended church, as also the
last sabbath he was called forth for the same purpose; but then he
failed in giving satisfaction, by reason of somewhat mincing in the
latter part of his confession, which, in the former, he had more
ingenuously acknowledged: but this day, the church received
satisfaction, as was testified by their holding-up of their hands;
and, after the whole, a word of caution by the pastor was dropped upon
the offender in particular, and upon us all in general."

Mr. Parris was evidently inclined to magnify the importance of the
church, and to get it into such a state of subserviency to his
authority, that he could wield it effectually as a weapon in his fight
with the congregation. With this view, he endeavored to render the
action of the church as dignified and imposing as possible; to enlarge
and expand its ceremonial proceedings, and make it the theatre for the
exercise of his authority as its head and ruler. This feature of his
policy was so strikingly illustrated in the course he took in
reference to the deacons, that I must present it as recorded by him in
the church-book. It is worth preserving as a curiosity in
ecclesiastical administration.

Nathaniel Ingersoll had been a professor of religion almost as long as
Mr. Parris had lived. He was eminently a Christian man, of
acknowledged piety, and beloved and revered by all. He had been the
patron, benefactor, and guardian of the parish and all its interests
from its formation. He had long held the title of deacon, and
exercised the functions of that office so far as they could be
exercised previous to the organization of a church. He had been the
almoner of the charities of the people, and their adviser and
religious friend in all things. He was approaching the boundaries of
advanced years, and already recognized among the fathers of the
community. It would have seemed no more than what all might have
expected, to have had him recognized as a deacon of the church, in
full standing, at the first. It was, no doubt, what all did expect.
But no: he must be put upon probation. He was chosen deacon "for the
present" in November, 1689. Mr. Parris kept the matter of confirmation
hanging in his own hands for a year and a half. The appointment of the
other deacon was kept suspended for a full year. On the 30th of
November, 1690, there is the following entry:--

     "This evening, after the public service was over, the church
     was, by the pastor, desired to stay, and then by him Brother
     Edward Putnam was propounded as a meet person for to be
     chosen as another deacon. The issue whereof was, that, it
     being now an excessive cold day, some did propose that
     another season might be pitched upon for discourse thereof.
     Whereupon the pastor mentioned the next fourth day, at two
     of the clock, at the pastor's house, for further discourse
     thereof; to which the church agreed by not dissenting."

The record of the proceedings on the "next fourth day" is as
follows:--

     "3 December, 1690.--This afternoon, at a church meeting
     appointed the last sabbath, Brother Edward Putnam was again
     propounded to the church for choice to office in the place
     of a deacon to join with, and be assistant to, Brother
     Ingersoll in the service, and in order to said Putnam's
     ordination in the office, upon his well approving himself
     therein. Some proposed that two might be nominated to the
     church, out of which the church to choose one. But arguments
     satisfactory were produced against that way. Some also moved
     for a choice by papers; but that way also was disapproved by
     the arguments of the pastor and some others. In fine, the
     pastor put it to vote (there appearing not the least
     exception from any, unless a modest and humble exception of
     the person himself, once and again), and it was carried in
     the affirmative by a universal vote, _nemine non
     suffragante_.

     "Afterwards, the pastor addressed himself to the elected
     brother, and, in the name of the church, desired his answer,
     who replied to this purpose:--

     'Seeing, sir, you say the voice of God's people is the voice
     of God, desiring your prayers and the prayers of the church
     for divine assistance therein, I do accept of the call.'"

When we consider that Edward Putnam was, at Mr. Parris's ordination
more than a year before, and had been for some time previous to that
event, Ingersoll's associate deacon, and that there probably never was
any other person spoken or thought of than these two for deacons, it
is evident that it was Mr. Parris's policy to make a great matter of
the affair, and produce a general feeling of the weighty importance of
church action in the premises. But this was only the beginning of the
long-drawn ceremonial solemnities by which the occasion was magnified.

     "Sab: day, 7 December, 1690.--After the evening public
     service was over, several things needful were transacted;
     viz.:--

     "1. The pastor acquainted those of the church that were
     ignorant of it, that Brother Edward Putnam was chosen deacon
     the last church meeting.

     "2. He also generally admonished those of the brethren that
     were absent at that time, of their disorderliness therein,
     telling them that such, the apostle bids, should be noted or
     marked (2 Thess. iii. 6-16); that is, with a church mark,--a
     mark in a disciplinary way; and therefore begged amendment
     for the future in that point and to that purpose.

     "3. He propounded whether they so far were satisfied in
     Brother Ingersoll's service as to call him to settlement in
     the deaconship by ordination, or had aught against it. But
     no brother made personal exception. Therefore, it being put
     to vote, it was carried in the affirmative by a plurality,
     if not universality.

     "4. The Lord's Table, not being provided for with aught else
     but two pewter tankards, the pastor propounded and desired
     that the next sacrament-day, which is to be the 21st
     instant, there be a more open and liberal contribution by
     the communicants, that so the deacons may have wherewith to
     furnish the said table decently; which was consented to."

The last clause, "which was consented to," is in a smaller hand than
the rest of the record. It was written by Mr. Parris, but apparently
some time afterwards, and with fainter ink. There is reason to suppose
that nothing was accomplished at that time in the way of getting rid
of the "pewter tankards." The farmers were too hard pressed by taxes
imposed by the province, and by the weight of local assessments, to
listen to fanciful appeals. They probably continued for some time, and
perhaps until after receiving Deacon Ingersoll's legacy, in 1720, to
get along as they were. They did not believe, that, in order to
approach the presence, and partake of the memorials, of the Saviour,
it was necessary to bring vessels of silver or gold. In their
circumstances, gathered in their humble rustic edifice for worship,
they did not feel that, in the sight of the Lord, costly furniture
would add to the adornment of his table.

Nearly six months after Putnam's election, Mr. Parris brought up the
matter again at a meeting of the church, on the 31st of May, 1691, and
made a speech relating to it, which he entered on the records thus:--

     "The pastor spoke to the brethren to this purpose, viz.:--

     "BRETHREN,--The ordination of Brother Ingersoll has
     already been voted a good while since, and I thought to have
     consummated the affair a good time since, but have been put
     by, by diversity of occurrents; and, seeing it is so long
     since, I think it needless to make two works of one, and
     therefore intend the ordination of Brother Putnam together
     with Brother Ingersoll in the deaconship, if you continue in
     the same mind as when you elected him: therefore, if you are
     so, let a vote manifest it. Voted by all, or at least the
     most. I observed none that voted not."

At last the mighty work was accomplished. Deacon Ingersoll had been on
probation for eighteen months from the date of his election, which
took place five days after Mr. Parris's ordination. His final
induction to office was observed with great formality, and in the
presence of the whole congregation. Mr. Parris enters the order of
performances in the church records as follows:--

     "Sab: 28 June, 1691.--After the afternoon sermon upon 1 Tim.
     iii. 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, as the brethren had renewed their
     call of Brother Ingersoll to the office of a deacon, and he
     himself had declared his acceptance, the pastor proceeded to
     ordain him, using the form following:

     "BELOVED BROTHER, God having called you to the
     office of a deacon by the choice of the brethren and your
     own acceptance, and that call being now to be consummated
     according to the primitive pattern, 6 Acts 6, by prayer and
     imposition of hands,--

     "We do, therefore, by this solemnity, declare your
     investiture into that office, solemnly charging you in the
     name of our Lord Jesus Christ, the King of his Church, who
     walks in the midst of his golden candlesticks, with eyes as
     of a flame of fire, exactly observing the demeanor of all in
     his house, both officers and members, that you labor so to
     carry it, as to evidence you are sanctified by grace,
     qualified for this work, and to grow in those
     qualifications; behaving of yourself gravely, sincerely,
     temperately, with due care for the government of your own
     house, holding the mystery of the faith in a pure
     conscience; that as they in this office are called 'helps,'
     so you be helpful in your place and capacity, doing what is
     your part for the promoting of the work of Christ here. We
     do charge you, that, whatever you do in this office, you do
     it faithfully, giving with simplicity, showing mercy with
     cheerfulness. Look on it, brother, as matter of care, and
     likewise of encouragement, that both the office itself and
     also your being set up in it is of God, who, being waited
     upon, will be with you, and accept you therein, assisting
     you to use the office of a deacon well, so as that you may
     be blameless, purchasing to yourself a good degree and great
     boldness in the faith.

     "NOTE.--That Brother Putnam was not yet willing to
     be ordained, but desired further considering time, between
     him and I and Brother Ingersoll, in private discourse the
     week before the ordination above said."

"Brother Putnam" probably partook of the general wonder what all this
appearance of difficulty and delay, under the peculiar circumstances
of the case, meant; and being, as the record truly says, a modest and
humble man, he naturally shrank from the formidable ceremoniousness
and pretentious parade with which Mr. Parris surrounded the
transaction. At any rate, he hesitated long before he was willing to
encounter it. It is probable that he positively refused to have his
induction to the office heralded with such solemn pomp. There is no
mention of his public ordination, which Mr. Parris would not have
omitted to record, had any such scene occurred. All we know is that he
was recognized as deacon forthwith, and held the office for forty
years.

The disposition of Mr. Parris to make use of his office, as the head
of the church, to multiply occasions for the exercise of his
influence, and to gain control over the minds of the brethren, is
apparent throughout his records. He raised objections in order to show
how he could remove them, and started difficulties about matters which
had not before been brought into question. In the beginning of his
ministry, he manifested this propensity. At a church meeting at John
Putnam's house, Feb. 20, 1690, less than three months after his
ordination, he threw open the whole question of baptism for discussion
among the brethren. There is no reason to suppose that their attention
had been drawn to it before. He propounded the question to the plain,
practical husbandmen, "Who are the proper subjects of baptism?" He
laid down the true doctrine, as he regarded it, in this answer,
"Covenant-professing believers and their infant seed." He put the
answer to vote, and none voted against it. He then proceeded with
another question, "How far may we account such seed infant seed, and
so to be baptized?" Here he had got beyond their depth, and, as some
of them thought, his own too; for there was only a "major vote" in
favor of his answer: "two or three, I think not four, dissented."
There was some danger of getting into divisions by introducing such
questions; but he managed to avoid it, so far as his church was
concerned. He worked them up to the highest confidence in his learning
and wisdom, and gained complete ascendency over them. He aggrandized
their sense of importance, and accomplished his object in securing
their support in his controversies with his congregation. The
brethren, after a while, became his devoted body-guard, and the church
a fortress of defence and assault. There is reason, however, to
believe, that the points he raised on the subject of baptism led to
perplexities, in some minds, which long continued to disturb them.
While showing off his learning, and displaying his capacity to dispose
of the deep questions of theology, he let fall seeds of division and
doubt that ripened into contention in subsequent generations. The only
ripple on the surface of the Village Church during its long record of
peace, since the close of his disastrous ministry, was occasioned by
differing opinions on this subject. It required all the wisdom of his
successors to quiet them. From time to time, formulas had to be
constructed, half-way covenants of varying expressions to be framed,
to meet and dispose of the difficulties thus gratuitously raised by
him.

The following passages from his record-book show how he made much of a
matter which any other pastor would have quietly arranged without
calling for the intervention of church or congregation: they are also
interesting as a picture of the times:--

     "Sab: 9 Aug. 1691.--After all public worship was over, and
     the church stayed on purpose, I proposed to the church
     whether they were free to admit to baptism, upon occasion,
     such as were not at present free to come up to full
     communion. I told them there was a young woman, by name Han:
     Wilkins, the daughter of our Brother Thomas Wilkins, who
     much desired to be baptized, but yet did not dare to come to
     the Lord's Supper. If they had nothing against it, I should
     take their silence for consent, and in due time acquaint
     them with what she had offered me to my satisfaction, and
     proceed accordingly."

No answer was made _pro_ or _con_, and so the church was dismissed.

     "Sab: 23 Aug. 1691.--Hannah Wilkins, aged about twenty-one
     years, was called forth, and her relation read in the full
     assembly, and then it was propounded to the church, that, if
     they had just exceptions, or, on the other hand, had any
     thing farther to encourage, they had opportunity and liberty
     to speak. None said any thing but Brother Bray Wilkins (Han:
     grandfather), who said, that, for all he knew, such a
     relation as had been given and a conversation suitable (as
     he judged hers to be) was enough to enjoy full communion.
     None else saying any thing, it was put to vote whether they
     were so well satisfied as to receive this young woman into
     membership, and therefore initiate her therein by baptism.
     It was voted fully. Whereupon the covenant was given to her
     as if she had entered into full communion. And the pastor
     told her, in the name of the church, that we would expect
     and wait for her rising higher, and therefore advised her to
     attend all means conscientiously for that end.

     "After all, I pronounced her a member of this church, and
     then baptized her.

     "28 August, 1691.--This day, Sister Hannah Wilkins aforesaid
     came to me, and spake to this like effect, following:--

     "Before I was baptized (you know, sir), I was desirous of
     communion at the Lord's Table, but not yet; I was afraid of
     going so far: but since my baptism I find my desires growing
     to the Lord's Table, and I am afraid to turn my back upon
     that ordinance, or to refuse to partake thereof. And that
     which moves me now to desire full communion, which I was
     afraid of before, is that of Thomas, 20 John 26, &c., where
     he, being absent from the disciples, though but once, lost a
     sight of Christ, and got more hardness of heart, or increase
     of unbelief. And also those words of Ananias to Paul after
     his conversion, 22 Acts 16, 'And now why tarriest thou?
     Arise,' &c. So I am afraid of tarrying. The present time is
     only mine. And God having, beyond my deserts, graciously
     opened a door, I look upon it my duty to make present
     improvement of it.

     "Sab: and Sacrament Day, 30 Aug. 1691.--Sister Han:
     Wilkins's motion (before the celebration of the Lord's
     Supper was begun) was mentioned or propounded to the church,
     and what she said to me (before hinted) read to them, and
     then their vote was called for, to answer her desire if they
     saw good; whereupon the church voted in the affirmative
     plentifully."

The foregoing passages illustrate Mr. Parris's propensity to magnify
the operations of the church, and to bring its movements as
conspicuously and as often as possible before the eyes of the people.
It is evident that the humble and timid scruples of this interesting
and intelligent young woman might have been met and removed by
personal conference with her pastor. As her old grandfather seemed to
think, there was no difficulty in the case whatever. The reflections
of a few days made the path plain before her. But Mr. Parris paraded
the matter on three sabbaths before the church, and on one of them at
least before the congregation. He called her to come forth, and stand
out in the presence of the "full assembly." As the result of the
ordeal, she owned the covenant; the church voted her in, as to full
communion; and the pastor pronounced her a member of the church, and
baptized her as such. Her sensible conversation with him the next
Friday was evidently intended for the satisfaction of him and others,
as explaining her appearance at the next communion. But another
opportunity was offered to make a display of the case, and he could
not resist the temptation. He desired to create an impression by
reading what she had said to him in his study, before the church, if
not before the whole congregation. To give a show of propriety in
bringing it forward again, he felt that some action must be had upon
it; hence the vote. Accordingly, Hannah Wilkins appears by the record
to have been twice, on two successive Lord's Days, voted "plentifully"
into the Salem Village Church, when there was no occasion for such an
extraordinary repetition, as everybody from the first welcomed her
into it with the cordial confidence she merited. I have spread out
this proceeding to your view, not altogether from its intrinsic
interest, but because, perhaps, it affords the key to interpret the
course of this ill-starred man in his wrangles with his congregation,
and his terrible prominency in the awful scenes of the witchcraft
delusion. He seemed to have had a love of excitement that was
irrepressible, an all but insane passion for getting up a scene. When
we come to the details of our story, it will be for a charitable
judgment to determine whether this trait of his nature may not be
regarded as the cause of all the woes in which he involved others and
became involved himself.

The church records are, in one respect, in singular contrast with the
parish records. The latter are often silent in reference to matters of
interest at the time, which might without impropriety have been
entered in them. They are confined strictly to votes and proceedings
in legal meetings, or what purport to have been meetings legally
called; and we look in vain for comments or notices relating to
outside matters. Except when kept by Sergeant Thomas Putnam, they are
defective and imperfect. The church records, while made by Mr. Parris,
are full of side remarks, and touches of criticism concerning whatever
was going on. This makes them particularly interesting and valuable
now. They are composed in their author's clear, natural, and sprightly
style; and, although for the most part in an exceedingly small hand,
are legible with perfect ease, and give us a transcript, not only of
the formal doings of the church, but of the writer's mind and feelings
about matters and things in general. We gather from them by far the
greater part of all we know relating to his quarrel with his
congregation.

This subject constantly engrossed his thoughts. He was continually
introducing, at church meetings, complaints against the conduct of the
parish committee, and enlarging upon the wrongs he was suffering at
their hands. He took occasion on Lecture days, if not in ordinary
discourses on the Lord's Day, to give all possible circulation and
publicity to his grievances. The effect of this was, instead of
bringing his people into subjection and carrying his points against
them, to aggravate their alienation. His manner of dealing with the
difficulties of the situation into which they had been brought was
harsh and exasperating, and utterly injudicious, imprudent, and
mischievous in all its bearings, producing a condition of things truly
scandalous. His notions and methods, acquired in his mercantile life;
his haggling with the people about the terms of his salary; and his
general manner and tone, particularly so far as they had been formed
by residence in West-India slave Islands,--were thoroughly
distasteful, and entirely repugnant, to the feelings, notions, ideas,
and spirit of the farmers of Salem Village. At their meetings, they
showed a continually increasing strength of opposition to him, and
were careful to appoint committees who could not be brought under his
influence, and would stand firm against all outside pressure.

It is quite apparent, that Mr. Parris employed his church, and the
ministerial offices generally, as engines to operate against his
opponents; and sometimes rather unscrupulously, as a collocation of
dates and entries shows. A meeting of the parish was warned to be held
Oct. 16, 1691. It was important to bring his machinery to bear upon
the feelings of the people, so as to strengthen the hands of his
friends at that meeting. The following entry is in the church-book,
dated 8th October, 1691: "Being my Lecture-day, after public service
was ended, I was so bare of firewood, that I was forced publicly to
desire the inhabitants to take care that I might be provided for;
telling them, that, had it not been for Mr. Corwin (who had bought
wood, being then at my house), I should hardly have any to burn."
According to his own account, as we have seen, it had been arranged,
by mutual agreement, that he was to provide his own firewood, six
pounds per annum having been added to his salary for that purpose. He
selected that item as one of the necessaries of which he was in want,
probably because, as the winter was approaching, it would be the best
point on which to appeal to the public sympathies, and get up a
clamor against his opponents.

The parish meeting was duly held on the 16th of October. Mr. Parris's
speech, at the preceding Lecture-day, about "firewood," was found not
to have produced the desired effect. The majority against him was as
strong as ever. A committee made up of his opponents was elected. A
motion to instruct them to make a rate was rejected, and a warrant
ordered to be forthwith issued for a special meeting of the
inhabitants, to examine into all the circumstances connected with the
settlement of Mr. Parris, and to ascertain whether the meetings which
had acted therein were legally called, and by what means the right and
title of the parish to its ministry house and lands had been brought
into question. This was pressing matters to an issue. Mr. Parris saw
it, and determined to meet it in advance. He resorted to his church,
as usual, to execute his plan, as the following entries on the
record-book show:--

     "1 Nov. 1691.--The pastor desired the brethren to meet at my
     house, on to-morrow, an hour and half before sundown.

     "2 Nov. 1691.--After sunset, about seventeen of the brethren
     met; to whom, after prayer, I spoke to this effect:
     Brethren, I have not much to trouble you with now; but you
     know what committee, the last town-meeting here, were
     chosen; and what they have done, or intend to do; it may be
     better than I. But, you see, I have hardly any wood to
     burn. I need say no more, but leave the matter to your
     serious and godly consideration.

     "In fine, after some discourse to and fro, the church voted
     that Captain Putnam and the two deacons should go, as
     messengers from the church, to the committee, to desire them
     to make a rate for the minister, and to take care of
     necessary supplies for him; and that said messengers should
     make their return to the church the next tenth day, an hour
     before sunset, at the minister's house, where they would
     expect it.

     "10 Nov. 1691.--The messengers abovesaid came with their
     return, as appointed; which was, that the committee did not
     see good to take notice of their message, without they had
     some letter to show under the church's and pastor's hand.
     But, at this last church meeting, besides the three
     messengers, but three other brethren did appear,--namely,
     Brother Thomas Putnam, Thomas Wilkins, and Peter
     Prescot,--which slight and neglect of other brethren did not
     a little trouble me, as I expressed myself. But I told these
     brethren I expected the church should be more mindful of me
     than other people, and their way was plain before them, &c.

     "Sab: 15 Nov. 1691.--The church were desired to meet at
     Brother Nathaniel Putnam's, the next 18th instant, at twelve
     o'clock, to spend some time in prayer, and seeking God's
     presence with us, the next Lord's Day, at his table, as has
     been usual with us, some time before the sacrament.

     "18 Nov. 1691.--After some time spent, as above said, at
     this church meeting, the pastor desired the brethren to
     stay, forasmuch as he had somewhat to offer to them, which
     was to this purpose; viz.: Brethren, several church
     meetings have been occasionally warned, and sometimes the
     appearance of the brethren is but small to what it might be
     expected, and particularly the case mentioned 10th instant.
     I told them I did not desire to warn meetings unnecessarily,
     and, therefore, when I did, I prayed them they would
     regularly attend them.

     "Furthermore, I told them I had scarce wood enough to burn
     till the morrow, and prayed that some care might be taken.
     In fine, after discourses passed, these following votes were
     made unanimously, namely:--

     "1. That it was needful that complaint should be made to the
     next honored County Court, to sit at Salem, the next third
     day of the week, against the neglects of the present
     committee.

     "2. That the said complaint should be drawn up, which was
     immediately done by one of the brethren, and consented to.

     "3. That our brethren, Nathaniel Putnam, Thomas Putnam, and
     Thomas Wilkins, should sign said complaint in behalf of the
     church.

     "4. Last, That our brethren, Captain John Putnam and the two
     deacons, should be improved to present the said complaint to
     the said Court.

     "In the mean time, the pastor desired the brethren that care
     might be taken that he might not be destitute of wood."

The record proceeds to give several other votes, the object of which
was to arrange the details of the manner in which the business was to
be put into court. There we leave it for the present, and there it
remained for nearly seven years. Mr. Parris probably got the start of
his opponents, in being first to invoke the law. This is what he meant
when he told his church "that their way was plain before them." If
extraordinary and unforeseen circumstances had not intervened, the
case would more speedily have been disposed of, and we cannot doubt
what would have been its issue. Whatever might be the bias or
prejudice of the courts, or however they might have attempted to
enforce their first decisions, there can be no question, that, in such
a contest, the people would have finally prevailed. The committee were
men competent to carry the parish through. A religious society, with
such feelings between them and their minister, after all that had
happened, and the just grounds given them of dissatisfaction and
resentment, could not always, or long, have been kept under such an
infliction.

In the immediately preceding entries, there are some points that
illustrate the policy on which Mr. Parris acted, and exhibit the skill
and vigilance of his management. The motive that led him to harp so
constantly upon "firewood" is obvious. It was to create a sympathy in
his behalf, and bring opprobrium upon his opponents. But it cannot
stand the test of scrutiny: for it had been expressly agreed, as I
have said, that he should find his own fuel; and it cannot be supposed
that his friends, if he then had any real ones, surrounded, as they
were, with forests of their own, within sight of the parsonage, would
have allowed him to suffer from this cause. There is indication that
the "brethren of the church" were getting lukewarm, as their
non-attendance at important meetings led Mr. Parris to fear. At any
rate, he felt it necessary to administer some rather significant
rebukes to them. The meeting for prayer, preparatory to the ensuing
communion service, was very adroitly converted into a business
consultation to inaugurate a lawsuit. But the most characteristic
thing, in this part of the church-book, is a marginal entry, against
the first paragraph of the record of the 2d November, 1691. It is in
these words:--

     "The town-meeting, about or at 16th October last. Jos:
     Porter, Jos: Hutchinson, Jos: Putnam, Dan: Andrew, Francis
     Nurse."

These were the committee appointed at the meeting. Their names, thus
abbreviated, are given, and not a syllable added. But the manner, the
then state of things, and their relation to the controversy, give a
deep import and intense bitterness to this entry. He knew the men, and
in their names read the handwriting on the wall.

But a turn was soon given to the current that was bearing Mr. Parris
down. A power was evoked--whether he raised it designedly, or whether
it merely happened to appear on the scene, we cannot certainly say;
but it came into action just at the nick of time--which instantly
reversed the position of the parties, and clothed him with a terrible
strength, enabling him to crush his opponents beneath his feet. In a
few short months, he was the arbiter of life and death of all the
people of the village and the country. "Jos: Porter and Jos:
Hutchinson" escaped. The power of destruction broke down before it
became strong enough to reach them perhaps. "Jos: Putnam" was kept for
six months in the constant peril of his life. During all that time, he
and his family were armed, and kept watch. "Dan: Andrew" saved himself
from the gallows by flight to a foreign land. The unutterable woes
brought upon the family of "Francis Nurse" remain to be related.

The witchcraft delusion at Salem Village, in 1692, has attracted
universal attention, constitutes a permanent chapter in the world's
history, and demands a full exposition, and, if possible, a true
solution. Being convinced that it cannot be correctly interpreted
without a thorough knowledge of the people among whom it appeared, I
have felt it indispensable, before opening its scenes to view, or
treating the subject of demonology, of which it was an outgrowth, in
the first place to prepare myself, and those who accompany me in its
examination and discussion, to fully comprehend it, by traversing the
ground over which we have now passed. By a thorough history of Salem
Village from its origin to the period of our story, by calling its
founders and their children and successors into life before you by
personal, private, domestic, and local details, gleaned from old
records and documents, I have tried to place you at the standpoint
from which the entire occurrence can be intelligibly contemplated. We
can in no other way get a true view of a passage of history than by
looking at the men who acted in it, as they really were. We must
understand their characters, enter into their life, see with their
eyes, feel with their hearts, and be enveloped, as it were, with their
associations, sentiments, beliefs, and principles of action. In this
way only can we bring the past into our presence, comprehend its
elements, fathom its depths, read its meaning, or receive its lessons.

I am confident you will agree with me, that it was not because the
people of Salem Village were more ignorant, stupid, or weak-minded
than the people of other places, that the delusion made its appearance
or held its sway among them. This is a vital point to the just
consideration of the subject. I do not mean justice to them so much as
to ourselves and all who wish to understand, and be benefited by
understanding, the subject. There never was a community composed
originally of better materials, or better trained in all good usages.
Although the generations subsequent to the first had not enjoyed, to
any considerable extent, the advantages of education, the
circumstances of their experience had kept their faculties in the
fullest exercise. They were an energetic and intelligent people. Their
moral condition, social intercourse, manners, and personal bearing,
were excellent. The lesson of the catastrophe impending over them, at
the point to which we have arrived, can only be truly and fully
received, for the warning of all coming time, by having correct views
on this point. The delusion that brought ruin upon them was not the
result of any essential inferiority in their moral or intellectual
condition. What we call their ignorance was the received philosophy
and wisdom of the day, accepted generally by the great scholars of
that and previous ages, preached from the pulpits, taught in the
universities, recognized in law and in medicine as well as theology,
and carried out in the proceedings of public tribunals and legislative
assemblies.

The history of the planting, settlement, and progress of Salem
Village, to 1692, has now been given. We know, so far as existing
materials within reach enable us to know, what sort of a population
occupied the place at the date of our story. Their descent, breeding,
and experiences have been related. They were, at least, equal in
intelligence to any of the people of their day. They were strenuous in
action, trained to earnestness and zeal, accustomed to become deeply
engaged in whatever interested them, and to take strong hold of the
ideas and sentiments they received. It becomes necessary, therefore,
in the next place, to ascertain what their ideas were in reference to
witchcraft, diabolical agency, and supernaturalism generally. I shall
proceed accordingly to give the condition of opinion, at that time, on
the subject of demonology.




PART SECOND.




WITCHCRAFT.


Demonology, as a general term, may be employed, for convenience, to
include a whole class of ideas--which, under different names and a
vast variety of conceptions, have come through all ages, and prevailed
among all races of mankind--relating to the supposed agency of
supernatural, invisible, and spiritual beings in terrestrial affairs.
As necessarily applicable to evil spirits, particularly to the
arch-enemy and supreme adversary of God and man under the name of
Satan or the Devil, the term does not appear to have been used in
ancient times. Professed communications with supernatural beings were
not originally stamped with a diabolical character, but, like some
alleged to be had in our day, were regarded as innocent, and even
creditable. Men sought to hold intercourse with spirits belonging to
the unseen world, as some persons do now; assuming that they were
worthy of confidence, and that responses from them were valuable and
desirable. This was the case under the reign of classical mythology,
and of heathen superstition in general. Those individuals who were
supposed to be conversant with demons were looked upon by the
credulous multitude as a highly privileged class; and they arrogated
the credit of being raised to a higher sphere of knowledge than the
rest of mankind.

It is one of the most remarkable peculiarities of the Hebrew polity,
that it denounced such pretended communications as criminal, and
subjected the practice to the highest penalties. It was assumed to be
dangerous; the welfare of individuals and of society requiring that
such pretensions and practices should be abandoned. The observation
and experience of mankind have justified this view. In the first ages
of Christianity, it was believed that the Divine Being alone was to be
sought in prayer for light and guidance by the human soul. Gradually,
as the dark ages began to settle upon Christendom, the doctrine of the
Devil as the head and ruler of a world of demons, and as able to hold
communications with mortals, to interfere in their affairs, and to
exercise more or less control over the laws and phenomena of nature,
began to become prevalent. It was believed that human beings could
enter into alliance with the Prince of the power of the air; become
his confederates; join in a league with him and wicked spirits
subordinate to him, in undermining the Gospel and overthrowing the
Church; and conspire and co-operate in rebellion against God. This,
of course, was regarded as the most flagrant of crimes, and
constituted the real character of the sin denominated "witchcraft."

As the fullest, most memorable, and, by the notice it has ever since
attracted throughout the world, the pre-eminent instance and
demonstration of this supposed iniquity was in the crisis that took
place in Salem Village in 1692, it justly claims a place in history.
The community in which it occurred has been fully described, in its
moral, social, and intellectual condition, so far as the materials I
have been enabled to obtain have rendered possible. It has, I believe,
been made to appear, that, in their training, experience, and traits
of character, they were well adapted to give full effect to any
excitement, or earnest action of any kind, that could be got up among
them,--a people of great energy, courage, and resolution, well
prepared to carry out to its natural and legitimate results any
movement, and follow established convictions fearlessly to logical
conclusions. The experiment of bringing supernaturalism to operate in
human affairs, to become a ground of action in society, and to
interfere in the relations of life and the dealings of men with each
other, was as well tried upon this people as it ever could or can be
anywhere.

All that remains to be brought to view, before entering upon the
details of the narrative, is to give a just and adequate idea of the
form and shape in which the general subject of supernaturalism, in its
aspect as demonology, lay in the minds of men here at that time. To
do this, I must give a sketch, as condensed and brief as I can make
it, of the formation and progress of opinions and notions touching the
subject, until they reached their full demonstration and final
explosion, in this neighborhood, at Salem Village, near the close of
the seventeenth century.

No person who looks around him on the scene in which he is placed,
reflects upon the infinite wonders of creation, and meditates upon the
equal wonders of his own mind, can be at a loss respecting the sources
and causes of superstition. Let him transport himself back to the
condition of a primitive and unlettered people, before whom the world
appears in all its original and sublime mystery. Science has not
lifted to their eyes the curtain behind which the secret operations of
nature are carried on. They observe the tides rise and fall, but know
not the attractive law that regulates their movements; they
contemplate the procession of the seasons, without any conception of
the principles and causes that determine and produce their changes;
they witness the storm as it rises in its wrath; they listen with awe
to the thunder-peal, and gaze with startling terror upon the lightning
as it flashes from within the bosom of the black cloud, and are
utterly ignorant to what power to attribute the dreadful phenomena;
they look upward to the face of the sky, and see the myriad starry
hosts that glitter there, and all is to them a mighty maze of dazzling
confusion. It is for their fancy to explain, interpret, and fill up
the brilliant and magnificent scene.

The imagination was the faculty the exercise of which was chiefly
called for in such a state as this. Before science had traced the
operations and unfolded the secrets of nature, man was living in a
world full of marvel and mystery. His curiosity was attracted to every
object within the reach of his senses; and, in the absence of
knowledge, it was imagination alone that could make answer to its
inquiries. It is natural to suppose that he would be led to attribute
all the movements and operations of the external world which did not
appear to be occasioned by the exercise of his own power, or the power
of any other animal, to the agency of supernatural beings. We may also
conclude, that his belief would not be likely to fix upon the notion
of a single overruling Being. Although revelation and science have
disclosed to us a beautiful and entire unity and harmony in the
creation, the phenomena of the external world would probably impress
the unenlightened and unphilosophic observer with the belief that
there was a diversity in the powers which caused them. He would
imagine the agency of a being of an amiable and beneficent spirit in
the bright sunshine, the fresh breeze, and the mild moonlight; and his
fancy would suggest to his fears, that a dark, severe, and terrible
being was in the ascendant during a day overshadowed by frowning
clouds, or a night black with the storm and torn by the tempest.

By the aid of such reflections as these, we are easily conducted to a
satisfactory and sufficient explanation of the origin of the mythology
and fabulous superstitions of all ancient and primitive nations. From
this the progress is plain, obvious, and immediate to the pretensions
of magicians, diviners, sorcerers, conjurers, oracles, soothsayers,
augurs, and the whole catalogue of those persons who professed to hold
intercourse with higher and spiritual powers. There are several
classes into which they may be divided.

There were those who, to acquire an influence over the people,
pretended to possess the confidence, and enjoy the friendship and
counsel, of some one or more deities. Such was Numa, the early
lawgiver of the Roman State. In order to induce the people to adopt
the regulations, institutions, and religious rites he proposed, he
made them believe that he had access to a divinity, and received all
his plans and ideas as a communication from on high.

Persons who, in consequence of their superior acquirements, were
enabled to excel others in any pursuit, or who could foresee and avail
themselves of events in the natural world, were liable, without any
intention to deceive, to be classed under some of these denominations.
For instance, a Roman farmer, Furius Cresinus, surpassed all his
neighbors in the skill and success with which he managed his
agricultural affairs. He was accordingly accused of using magic arts
in the operations of his farm. So far were his neighbors carried by
their feelings of envy and jealousy, that they explained the fact of
his being able to derive more produce from a small lot of land than
they could from large ones, by charging him with attracting and
drawing off the productions of their fields into his own by the
employment of certain mysterious charms. For his defence, as we are
informed by Pliny, he produced his strong and well-constructed
ploughs, his light and convenient spades, and his sun-burnt daughters,
and pointing to them exclaimed: "Here are my charms; this is my magic;
these only are the witchcraft I have used." Zoroaster, the great
philosopher and astronomer of the ancient East, was charged with
divination and magic, merely, it is probable, because he possessed
uncommon acquirements.

There were persons who had acquired an extraordinary amount of natural
knowledge, and, for the sake of being regarded with wonder and awe by
the people, pretended to obtain their superior endowments from
supernatural beings. They affected the name and character of
sorcerers, diviners, and soothsayers. It is easy to conceive of the
early existence and the great influence of such impostors. Patient
observation, and often mere accident, would suggest discoveries of the
existence and operation of natural causes in producing phenomena
before ascribed to superhuman agency. The knowledge thus acquired
would be cautiously concealed, and cunningly used, to create
astonishment and win admiration. Its fortunate possessors were enabled
to secure the confidence, obedience, and even reverence, of the
benighted and deceived people.

Every one, indeed, who could discover a secret of nature, and keep it
secret, was able to impose himself on the world as being allied with
supernatural powers. Hence arose the whole host of diviners,
astrologers, soothsayers, and oracles. After having once acquired
possession of the credulous faith of the people, they could impose
upon them almost without limit.

Those who pretended to hold this kind of intercourse with divinity
became, as a natural consequence, the priests of the nation,
constituted a distinct and regular profession, and perpetuated their
body by the admission of new members, to whom they explained their
arts, and communicated their knowledge. While they were continually
discovering and applying the secret principles and laws of nature, and
the people were kept in utter ignorance and darkness, it is no wonder
that they reached a great and unparalleled degree of power over the
mass of the population. In this manner we account for the origin, and
trace the history, of the Chaldean priests in Assyria, the Bramins of
India, the Magi of Persia, the Oracles of Greece, the Augurs of Italy,
the Druids of Britain, and the Pow-wows, Prophets, or "Medicins," as
they sometimes called them, among our Indians.

It is probable that the witches mentioned in the Scriptures were of
this description. Neither in sacred nor profane ancient history do we
find what was understood in the days of our ancestors by witchcraft,
which meant a formal and actual compact with the great Prince of evil
beings. The sorcery of antiquity consisted in pretending to possess
certain mysterious charms, and to do by their means, or by the
co-operation of superhuman spirits, without any reference to their
character as evil or good beings, what transcends the action of mere
natural powers.

The witch of Endor, for instance, was a conjurer and necromancer,
rather than a witch. By referring to the 28th chapter of 1 Samuel,
where the interview between her and Saul is related, you will find no
ground for the opinion that the being from whom she pretended to
receive her mysterious power was Satan. Saul, as the ruler of a people
who were under the special government, and enjoyed the peculiar
protection of the true God, had forbidden, under the sanction of the
highest penalties, the exercise of the arts of divination and sorcery
within his jurisdiction. Some time after this, the unfortunate monarch
was overtaken by trouble and distress. His enemies had risen up, and
were gathered in fearful strength around him. His "heart greatly
trembled," a dark and gloomy presentiment came over his spirit, and
his bosom was convulsed by an agony of solicitude. He turned toward
his God for light and strength. He applied for relief to the priests
of the altar, and to the prophets of the Most High; but his prayers
were unanswered, and his efforts vain. In his sorrow and apprehension,
he appealed to a woman who was reputed to have supernatural powers,
and to hold communion with spiritual beings; thus violating his own
law, and departing from duty and fidelity to his God. He begged her
to recall Samuel to life, that he might be comforted and instructed by
him. She pretended to comply with his request; but, before she could
commence her usual mysterious operations, Samuel arose! and the
forlorn, wretched, and heart-broken king listened to his tremendous
doom, as it was uttered by the spirit of the departed prophet.

I have alluded particularly to the witch of Endor, because she will
serve to illustrate the sorcery or divination of antiquity. She was
probably possessed of some secret knowledge of natural properties; was
skilful in the use of her arts and pretended charms; had, perhaps, the
peculiar powers of a ventriloquist; and, by successful imposture, had
acquired an uncommon degree of notoriety, and the entire confidence of
the public. She professed to be in alliance with supernatural beings,
and, by their assistance, to raise the dead.

This passage has afforded a topic for a great deal of discussion among
interpreters. It seems to me, on the face of the narrative, to suggest
the following view of the transaction: The woman was an impostor. When
she summoned the spirit of Samuel, instead of the results of her magic
lantern, or of whatever contrivances she may have had, by the
immediate agency of the Almighty the spirit of Samuel really rose, to
the consternation and horror of the pretended necromancer. The writer
appears to have indicated this as the proper interpretation of the
scene, by saying, "that, when the woman saw Samuel, she cried with a
loud voice;" thus giving evidence of alarm and surprise totally
different from the deportment of such pretenders on such occasions:
they used rather to exhibit joy at the success of their arts, and a
proud composure and dignified complacency in the control they were
believed to exercise over the spirits that appeared to have obeyed
their call. Sir Walter Scott took this view of the transaction. His
opinion, it is true, would be considered more important in any other
department than that of biblical interpretation: on all questions,
however, connected with the spiritual world of fancy and with its
history, he must be allowed to speak, if not with the authority, at
least with the tone of a master. This wonderful author, in the
infinite profusion and variety of his productions, published a volume
upon Demonology and Witchcraft: it is, of course, entertaining and
instructive to all who are curious to know the capacity and to
appreciate the operations of the human imagination.

It will be regarded by intelligent and judicious persons as a
circumstance of importance in reference to the view now given of the
transaction in which the witch of Endor acts the leading part, that
Hugh Farmer, beyond all question the most learned, discreet, and
profound writer on such subjects, is inclined to throw the weight of
his authority in its favor. His ample and elaborate discussion of the
question is to be seen in his work on Miracles, chap. iv. sec. 2.

Among the heathen nations of antiquity, the art of divination
consisted, to a great degree, in the magical use of mysterious
charms. Many plants were considered as possessed of wonderful virtues,
and there was scarcely a limit to the supposed power of those persons
who knew how to use and apply them skilfully. Virgil, in his eighth
eclogue, thus speaks of this species of sorcery:--

    "These herbs did Moeris give to me
      And poisons pluckt at Pontus;
    For there they grow and multiplie
      And do not so amongst us:
    With these she made herselfe become
      A wolfe, and hid hir in the wood;
    She fetcht up souls out of their toome,
      Removing corne from where it stood."

In the fourth Æneid, the lovesick Tyrian queen is thus made to
describe the magic which was then believed to be practised:--

    "Rejoice," she said: "instructed from above,
    My lover I shall gain, or lose my love;
    Nigh rising Atlas, next the falling sun
    Long tracts of Ethiopian climates run:
    There a Massylian priestess I have found,
    Honored for age, for magic arts renowned:
    The Hesperian temple was her trusted care;
    'Twas she supplied the wakeful dragon's fare;
    She, poppy-seeds in honey taught to steep,
    Reclaimed his rage, and soothed him into sleep;
    She watched the golden fruit. Her charms unbind
    The chains of love, or fix them on the mind;
    She stops the torrent, leaves the channel dry,
    Repels the stars, and backward bears the sky.
    The yawning earth rebellows to her call,
    Pale ghosts ascend, and mountain ashes fall."

Tibullus, in the second elegy of his first book, gives the following
account of the powers ascribed to a magician:--

    "She plucks each star out of his throne,
      And turneth back the raging waves;
    With charms she makes the earth to cone,
      And raiseth souls out of their graves;
    She burns men's bones as with a fire,
      And pulleth down the lights of Heaven,
    And makes it snow at her desire
      E'en in the midst of summer season."

These views continued to hold undisturbed dominion over the people
during a long succession of centuries. As the twilight of the dark
ages began to settle upon Christendom, superstition, that
night-blooming plant, extended itself rapidly, and in all directions,
over the surface of the world. While every thing else drooped and
withered, it struck deeper its roots, spread wider its branches, and
brought forth more abundantly its fruit. The unnumbered fables of
Greek and Roman mythology, the arts of augury and divination, the
visions of oriental romance, the fanciful and attenuated theories of
the later philosophy, the abstract and spiritual doctrines of
Platonism, and all the grosser and wilder conceptions of the northern
conquerors of the Roman Empire, became mingled together in the faith
of the inhabitants of the European kingdoms. From this multifarious
combination, the infinitely diversified popular superstitions of the
modern nations have sprung.

We first begin to trace the clear outlines of the doctrine of
witchcraft not far from the commencement of the Christian era. It
presupposes the belief of the Devil. I shall not enter upon the
question, whether the Scriptures, properly interpreted, require the
belief of the existence of such a being. Directing our attention
solely to profane sources of information, we discover the heathen
origin of the belief of the existence of the Devil in the ancient
systems of oriental philosophy. Early observers of nature in the East
were led to the conclusion, that the world was a divided empire, ruled
by the alternate or simultaneous energy of two great antagonist
principles or beings, one perfectly good, and the other perfectly bad.
It was for a long time, and perhaps is at this day, a prevalent faith
among Christians, that the Bible teaches a similar doctrine; that it
presents, to our adoration and obedience, a being of infinite
perfections in the Deity; and to our abhorrence and our fears, a being
infinitely wicked, and of great power, in the Devil.

It is obvious, that, when the entire enginery of supernaturalism was
organized in adaptation to the idea of the Devil, and demonology
became synonymous with diabolism, the credulity and superstition of
mankind would give a wide extension to that form of belief. It soon
occupied a large space in the theories of religion and the fancies of
the people, and got to be a leading element in the life of society. It
made its impress on the forms of speech, and many of the phrases to
which it gave rise still remain in familiar use. It figured in the
rituals of religion, in the paraphernalia of public shows, and in
fireside tales. It afforded leading characters to the drama in the
miracle plays and the moral plays, as they were called, at successive
periods. It offered a ready weapon to satire, and also to defamation.
Gerbert, a native of France, who was elevated to the pontificate about
the close of the tenth century, under the name of Sylvester II., is
eulogized by Mosheim as the first great restorer of science and
literature. He was a person of an extensive and sublime genius, of
wonderful attainments in learning, particularly mathematics, geometry,
and arithmetic. He broke the profound sleep of the dark ages, and
awakened the torpid intellect of the European nations. His efforts in
this direction roused the apprehensions and resentment of the monks;
and they circulated, after Gerbert's death, and made the ignorant
masses believe the story, that he had obtained his rapid promotion in
the Church by the practice of the black art, which he disguised under
the show of learning; that he secured the Archbishopric of Ravenna by
bribery and corruption; and that, finally, he made a bargain with
Satan, promising him his soul after death, on condition that he
(Satan) should put forth his great influence over the cardinals in
such a manner as would secure his election to the throne of St. Peter.
The arrangement was carried into successful operation. Sylvester, the
monks averred, consulted the Devil through the medium of a brazen head
during his whole reign, and enjoyed his faithful friendship and
unwavering patronage. But, when His Holiness came to die, he
endeavored to defraud Satan of his rightful claim to his soul, by
repenting, and acknowledging his sin. This illustrates the way in
which the popular idea of the Devil was used to awaken ridicule and
gratify malignity.

The natural and ultimate effect of the diffusion of Christianity was
to overthrow, or rather to revolutionize, the whole system of
incantation and sorcery.

In heathen countries, as in the East at present and with those among
us who profess to hold communications with spirits, no reproach or
sentiment of disapprobation, as has already been observed, was
necessarily connected with the arts of divination; for the
supernatural beings with whom intercourse was alleged to be had were
not, with a few exceptions, regarded as evil beings. The persons who
were thought to be skilful in their use were, on the contrary, held in
great esteem, and looked upon with reverence. Magicians and
philosophers were convertible and synonymous terms. Learned and
scientific men were induced to encourage, and turn to their own
advantage, the popular credulity that ascribed their extraordinary
skill to their connection with spiritual and divine beings. At length,
however, they found themselves placed in a very uncomfortable
predicament by the prevalence of the new theology. It was exceedingly
difficult to dispel the delusion, and correct the error they had
previously found it for their interest to perpetuate in the minds of
the community. They could not convince them that their knowledge was
acquired from natural sources, or their operations conducted solely
by the aid of natural causes and laws. The people would not surrender
the belief, that the results of scientific experiments, and the
accuracy of predictions of physical phenomena, were secured by the
assistance of supernatural beings.

As the doctrines of the gospel gradually undermined the popular belief
in other spiritual beings inferior to the Deity, and were at the same
time supposed to teach the existence and extensively diffused energy
of an almost infinite and omnipotent agent of evil, it was exceedingly
natural, nay, it necessarily followed, that the credulity and
superstition which had led to the supposition of an alliance between
philosophers and spiritual beings should settle down into a full
conviction that the Devil was the being with whom they were thus
confederated. The consequence was that they were charged with
witchcraft, and many fell victims to the general prejudice and
abhorrence occasioned by the imputation. The influence of this state
of things was soon seen: it was one of the most effectual causes of
the rapid diffusion of knowledge in modern times. Philosophers and men
of science became as anxious to explain and publish their discoveries
as they had been in former ages to conceal and cover them with
mystery. The following instances will be sufficient to illustrate the
correctness of these views.

In the thirteenth century, Roger Bacon was charged with witchcraft on
account of his discoveries in optics, chemistry, and astronomy; and,
although he did what he could to circulate and explain his own
acquirements, he could not escape a papal denunciation, and two long
and painful imprisonments. In 1305, Arnold de Villa Nova, a learned
physician and philosopher, was burned at Padua, by order of
inquisitors, on the charge of witchcraft. He was eighty years of age.
Ten years afterwards, Peter Apon, also of Padua, who had made
extraordinary progress in knowledge, was accused of the same crime,
and condemned to death, but expired previous to the time appointed for
his execution.

I will now present a brief sketch of the most noticeable facts
relating to the subject in Europe and Great Britain previous to the
close of the seventeenth century. Some writers have computed that
thirty thousand persons were executed for this supposed crime, within
one hundred and fifty years. It will of course be in my power to
mention only a few instances.

In 1484, Pope Innocent the Eighth issued a bull encouraging and
requiring the arrest and punishment of persons suspected of
witchcraft. From this moment, the prosecutions became frequent and the
victims numerous in every country. The very next year, forty-one aged
females were consigned to the flames in one nation; and, not long
after, a hundred were burned by one inquisition in the devoted valleys
of Piedmont; forty-eight were burned in Ravensburg in five years; and,
in the year 1515, five hundred were burned at Geneva in three months!
One writer declares that "almost an infinite number" were burned for
witchcraft in France,--a thousand in a single diocese! These
sanguinary and horrible transactions were promoted and sanctioned by
theological hatred and rancor. It was soon perceived that there was no
kind of difficulty in clearing the Church of heretics by hanging or
burning them all as witches! The imputation of witchcraft could be
fixed upon any one with the greatest facility. In the earlier part of
the fifteenth century, the Earl of Bedford, having taken the
celebrated Joan of Arc prisoner, put her to death on this charge. She
had been almost adored by the people rescued by her romantic valor,
and was universally known among them by the venerable title of "Holy
Maid of God;" but no difficulty was experienced in procuring evidence
enough to lead her to the stake as a servant and confederate of Satan!
Luther was just beginning his attack upon the papal power, and he was
instantly accused of being in confederacy with the Devil.

In 1534, Elizabeth Barton, "the Maid of Kent," was executed for
witchcraft in England, together with seven men who had been
confederate with her. In 1541 the Earl of Hungerford was beheaded for
inquiring of a witch how long Henry VIII. would live. In 1549 it was
made the duty of bishops, by Archbishop Cranmer's articles of
visitation, to inquire of their clergy, whether "they know of any that
use charms, sorcery, enchantments, witchcraft, soothsaying, or any
like craft invented by the Devil." In 1563 the King of Sweden carried
four witches with him, as a part of his armament, to aid him in his
wars with the Danes. In 1576, seventeen or eighteen were condemned in
Essex, in England. A single judge or inquisitor, Remigius, condemned
and burned nine hundred within fifteen years, from 1580 to 1595, in
the single district of Lorraine; and as many more fled out of the
country; whole villages were depopulated, and fifteen persons
destroyed themselves rather than submit to the torture which, under
the administration of this successor of Draco and rival of Jeffries,
was the first step taken in the trial of an accused person. The
application of the rack and other instruments of torment, in the
examination of prisoners, was recommended by him in a work on
witchcraft. He observes that "scarcely any one was known to be brought
to repentance and confession but by these means"!

The most eminent persons of the sixteenth century were believers in
the popular superstition respecting the existence of compacts between
Satan and human beings, and in the notions associated with it. The
excellent Melancthon was an interpreter of dreams and caster of
nativities. Luther was a strenuous supporter of the doctrine of
witchcraft, and seems to have seriously believed that he had had
frequent interviews with the arch-enemy himself, and had disputed with
him on points of theology, face to face. In his "Table-Talk," he gives
the following account of his intimacy with the Devil: speaking of his
confinement in the Castle of Wartburg, he says, "Among other things
they brought me hazel-nuts, which I put into a box, and sometimes I
used to crack and eat of them. In the night-times, my gentleman, the
Devil, came and got the nuts out of the box, and cracked them against
one of the bedposts, making a very great noise and rumbling about my
bed; but I regarded him nothing at all: when afterwards I began to
slumber, then he kept such a racket and rumbling upon the chamber
stairs, as if many empty barrels and hogsheads had been tumbled down."
Kepler, whose name is immortalized by being associated with the laws
he discovered that regulate the orbits of the heavenly bodies, was a
zealous advocate of astrology; and his great predecessor and master,
the Prince of Astronomers, as he is called, Tycho Brahe, kept an idiot
in his presence, fed him from his own table, with his own hand, and
listened to his incoherent, unmeaning, and fatuous expressions as to a
revelation from the spiritual world.

The following is the language addressed to Queen Elizabeth by Bishop
Jewell. He was one of the most learned persons of his age, and is to
this day regarded as the mighty champion of the Church of England, and
of the cause of the Reformation in Great Britain. He was the terrible
foe of Roman-Catholic superstition. "It may please Your Grace," says
he, "to understand that witches and sorcerers within these four last
years are marvellously increased within Your Grace's realm; Your
Grace's subjects pine away even unto the death; their color fadeth,
their flesh rotteth, their speech is benumbed, their senses are
bereft. I pray God," continues the courtly preacher, "they never
practise further than upon the subject." The petition of the polite
prelate appears to have been answered. The virgin queen resisted
inexorably the arts of all charmers, and is thought never to have been
bewitched in her life.

It is probable that Spenser, in his "Faërie Queen," has described with
accuracy the witch of the sixteenth century in the following beautiful
lines:--

      "There, in a gloomy hollow glen, she found
      A little cottage built of sticks and weedes,
      In homely wise, and wald with sods around,
      In which a witch did dwell in loathly weedes
      And wilful want, all careless of her needes;
      So choosing solitarie to abide
      Far from all neighbors, that her devilish deedes
      And hellish arts from people she might hide,
    And hurt far off unknowne whomever she envide."

So prone were some to indulge in the contemplation of the agency of
the Devil and his myrmidons, that they strained, violated, and
perverted the language of Scripture to make it speak of them. Thus
they insisted that the word "Philistines" meant confederates and
subjects of the Devil, and accordingly interpreted the expression, "I
will deliver you into the hands of the Philistines," thus, "I will
deliver you into the hands of demons."

I cannot describe the extent to which the superstition we are
reviewing was carried about the close of the sixteenth century in
stronger language than the following, from a candid and learned French
Roman-Catholic historian: "So great folly," says he, "did then
oppress the miserable world, that Christians believed greater
absurdities than could ever be imposed upon the heathens."

       *       *       *       *       *

We have now arrived at the commencement of the seventeenth century,
within which the prosecutions for witchcraft took place in Salem. To
show the opinions of the clergy of the English Church at this time, I
will quote the following curious canon, made by the convocation in
1603:--

"That no minister or ministers, without license and direction of the
bishop, under his hand and seal obtained, attempt, upon any pretence
whatsoever, either of possession or obsession, by fasting and prayer,
to cast out any devil or devils, under pain of the imputation of
imposture or cozenage, and deposition from the ministry." In the same
year, licenses were actually granted, as required above, by the Bishop
of Chester; and several ministers were duly authorized by him to cast
out devils!

During this whole century, there were trials and executions for
witchcraft in all civilized countries. More than two hundred were
hanged in England, thousands were burned in Scotland, and still larger
numbers in various parts of Europe.

Edward Fairfax, the poet, was one of the most accomplished men in
England. He is celebrated as the translator of Tasso's "Jerusalem
Delivered," in allusion to which work Collins thus speaks of him:--

    "How have I sate, while piped the pensive wind,
      To hear thy harp, by British Fairfax strung,
    Prevailing poet, whose undoubting mind
      Believed the magic wonders that he sung."

This same Fairfax prosecuted six of his neighbors for bewitching his
children. The trials took place about the time the first pilgrims came
to America.

In 1634, Urbain Grandier, a very learned and eminent French minister,
rendered himself odious to the bigoted nuns of Loudun, by his
moderation towards heretics. Secretly instigated, as has been
supposed, by Cardinal Richelieu, against whom he had written a satire,
they pretended to be bewitched by him, and procured his prosecution:
he was tortured upon the rack until he swooned, and then was burned at
the stake. In 1640, Dr. Lamb, of London, was murdered in the streets
of that city by the mob, on suspicion of witchcraft. Several were
hanged in England, only a few years before the proceedings commenced
in Salem. Some were tried by water ordeal, and drowned in the process,
in Suffolk, Essex, Cambridgeshire, and Northamptonshire, at the very
time the executions were going on here; and a considerable number of
capital punishments took place in various parts of Great Britain, some
years after the prosecution had ceased in America.

The trials and executions in England and Scotland were attended by
circumstances as painful, as barbarous, and in all respects as
disgraceful, as those occurring in Salem. Every species of torture
seems to have been resorted to: the principles of reason, justice,
and humanity were set at defiance, and the whole body of the people
kept in a state of the most fierce excitement against the sufferers.
Indeed, there is nothing more distressing in the contemplation of
these sanguinary proceedings than the spirit of deliberate and
unmitigated cruelty with which they were conducted. No symptoms of
pity, compassion, or sympathy, appear to have been manifested by the
judges or the community. The following account of the expenses
attending the execution of two persons convicted of witchcraft in
Scotland, shows in what a cool, business-like style the affair was
managed:--

"For ten loads of coal, to burn them            £3   6   8
For a tar barrel                                 0  14   0
For towes                                        0   6   0
For hurden to be jumps for them                  3  10   0
For making of them                               0   8   0
For one to go to Finmouth for the Laird to sit
  upon their assize as judge                     0   6   0
For the executioner for his pains                8  14   0
For his expenses here                            0  16   4"

The brutalizing effects of capital punishments are clearly seen in
these, as in all other instances. They gradually impart a feeling of
indifference to the value of human life, or to the idea of cutting it
off by the hand of violence, to all who become accustomed to the
spectacle. In various ways they exercise influences upon the tone and
temper of society, which cannot but be regarded with regret by the
citizen, the legislator, the moralist, the philanthropist, and the
Christian.

Sinclair, in his work called "Satan's Invisible World Discovered,"
gives the following affecting declaration made by one of the
confessing witches, as she was on her way to the stake:--

     "Now all you that see me this day know that I am now to die
     as a witch by my own confession; and I free all men,
     especially the ministers and magistrates, of the guilt of my
     blood; I take it wholly upon myself, my blood be upon my own
     head: and, as I must make answer to the God of heaven
     presently, I declare I am as free of witchcraft as any
     child; but, being delated by a malicious woman, and put in
     prison under the name of a witch, disowned by my husband and
     friends, and seeing no ground of hope of my coming out of
     prison, or ever coming in credit again, through the
     temptation of the Devil, I made up that confession on
     purpose to destroy my own life, being weary of it, and
     choosing rather to die than live."

Sir George Mackenzie says that he went to examine some women who had
confessed, and that one of them, who was a silly creature, told him,
"under secresie," "that she had not confessed because she was guilty,
but, being a poor creature, who wrought for her meat, and being
defamed for a witch, she knew she would starve, for no person
thereafter would either give her meat or lodging, and that all men
would beat her, and hound dogs at her, and that therefore she desired
to be out of the world." Whereupon she wept most bitterly, and, upon
her knees, called God to witness to what she said.

A wretch, named Matthew Hopkins, rendered himself infamously
conspicuous in the prosecutions for witchcraft that took place in the
counties of Essex, Sussex, Norfolk, and Huntingdon, in England, in the
years 1645 and 1646. The title he assumed indicates the part he acted:
it was "Witch-finder-general." He travelled from place to place; his
expenses were paid; and he required, in addition, regular fees for the
discovery of a witch. Besides pricking the body to find the
witch-mark, he compelled the wretched and decrepit victims of his
cruel practices to sit in a painful posture, on an elevated stool,
with their limbs crossed; and, if they persevered in refusing to
confess, he would prolong their torture, in some cases, to more than
twenty-four hours. He would prevent their going to sleep, and drag
them about barefoot over the rough ground, thus overcoming them with
extreme weariness and pain: but his favorite method was to tie the
thumb of the right hand close to the great toe of the left foot, and
draw them through a river or pond; if they floated, as they would be
likely to do, while their heavier limbs were thus sustained and
upborne by the rope, it was considered as conclusive proof of their
guilt. This monster was encouraged and sanctioned by the government;
and he procured the death, in one year and in one county, of more than
three times as many as suffered in Salem during the whole delusion.
He and his exploits are referred to in the following lines, from that
storehouse of good sense and keen wit, Butler's "Hudibras:"--

    "Hath not this present Parliament
    A leiger to the Devil sent,
    Fully empowered to treat about
    Finding revolted witches out?
    And has he not within a year
    Hanged threescore of them in one shire?"

The infatuated people looked upon this Hopkins with admiration and
astonishment, and could only account for his success by the
supposition, which, we are told, was generally entertained, that he
had stolen the memorandum-book in which Satan had recorded the names
of all the persons in England who were in league with him!

The most melancholy circumstance connected with the history of this
creature is, that Richard Baxter and Edmund Calamy--names dear and
venerable in the estimation of all virtuous and pious men--were
deceived and deluded by him: they countenanced his conduct, followed
him in his movements, and aided him in his proceedings.

At length, however, some gentlemen, shocked at the cruelty and
suspicious of the integrity of Hopkins, seized him, tied his thumbs
and toes together, threw him into a pond, and dragged him about to
their hearts' content. They were fully satisfied with the result of
the experiment. It was found that he did not sink. He stood condemned
on his own principles; and thus the country was rescued from the
power of the malicious impostor.

Among the persons whose death Hopkins procured, was a venerable,
gray-headed clergyman, named Lewis. He was of the Church of England,
had been the minister of a congregation for more than half a century,
and was over eighty years of age. His infirm frame was subjected to
the customary tests, even to the trial by water ordeal: he was
compelled to walk almost incessantly for several days and nights,
until, in the exhaustion of his nature, he yielded assent to a
confession that was adduced against him in Court; which, however, he
disowned and denied there and at all times, from the moment of release
from the torments, by which it had been extorted, to his last breath.
As he was about to die the death of a felon, he knew that the rites of
sepulture, according to the forms of his denomination, would be denied
to his remains. The aged sufferer, it is related, read his own funeral
service while on the scaffold. Solemn, sublime, and affecting as are
passages of this portion of the ritual of the Church, surely it was
never performed under circumstances so well suited to impress with awe
and tenderness as when uttered by the calumniated, oppressed, and
dying old man. Baxter had been tried for sedition, on the ground that
one of his publications contained a reflection upon Episcopacy, and
was imprisoned for two years. It is a striking and melancholy
illustration of the moral infirmity of human nature, that the author
of the "Saints' Everlasting Rest," and the "Call to the Unconverted,"
permitted such a vengeful feeling against the Establishment to enter
his breast, that he took pleasure, and almost exulted, in relating the
fate of this innocent and aged clergyman, whom he denominates, in
derision, a "Reading Parson."

Baxter's writings are pervaded by his belief in all sorts of
supernatural things. In the "Saints' Everlasting Rest," he declares
his conviction of the reality and authenticity of stories of ghosts,
apparitions, haunted houses, &c. He placed full faith in a tale,
current among the people of his day, of the "dispossession of the
Devil out of many persons together in a room in Lancashire, at the
prayer of some godly ministers." In his "Dying Thoughts," he says, "I
have had many convincing proofs of witches, the contracts they have
made with devils, and the power which they have received from them;"
and he seems to have credited the most absurd fables ever invented on
the subject by ignorance, folly, or fraud.

The case to which he refers, as one of the "dispossession of devils,"
may be found in a tract published in London in 1697, entitled, "The
Surey Demoniac; or, an Account of Satan's strange and dreadful
actings, in and about the body of Richard Dugdale, of Surey, near
Whalley, in Lancashire. And how he was dispossessed by God's blessing
on the Fastings and Prayers of divers Ministers and People. The matter
of fact attested by the oaths of several creditable persons, before
some of his Majestie's Justices of the Peace in the said county." The
"London Monthly Repository" (vol. v., 1810) describes the affair as
follows: "These dreadful actings of Satan continued above a year;
during which there was a desperate struggle between him and nine
ministers of the gospel, who had undertaken to cast him out, and, for
that purpose, successively relieved each other in their daily combats
with him: while Satan tried all his arts to baffle their attempts,
insulting them with scoffs and raillery, puzzling them sometimes with
Greek and Latin, and threatening them with the effects of his
vengeance, till he was finally vanquished and put to flight by the
persevering prayers and fastings of the said ministers."

No name in English history is regarded with more respect and
admiration, by wise and virtuous men, than that of Sir Matthew Hale.
His character was almost venerated by our ancestors; and it has been
thought that it was the influence of his authority, more than any
thing else, that prevailed upon them to pursue the course they adopted
in the prosecutions at Salem. This great and good man presided, as
Lord Chief Baron, at the trial of two females,--Amy Dunny and Rose
Cullender,--at Bury St. Edmunds, in Suffolk, in the year 1664. They
were convicted and executed.

Baxter relates the following circumstance as having occurred at this
trial: "A godly minister, yet living, sitting by to see one of the
girls (who appeared as a witness against the prisoners) in her fits,
suddenly felt a force pull one of the hooks from his breeches; and,
while he looked with wonder at what was become of it, the tormented
girl vomited it up out of her mouth."

To give an idea of the nature of the testimony upon which the
principal stress was laid by the government, I will extract the
following passages from the report of the trial: "Robert Sherringham
testified that the axle-tree of his cart, happening, in passing, to
break some part of Rose Cullender's house, in her anger at it, she
vehemently threatened him his horses should suffer for it; and, within
a short time, all his four horses died; after which he sustained many
other losses, in the sudden dying of his cattle. He was also taken
with a lameness in his limbs, and so far vexed with lice of an
extraordinary number and bigness, that no art could hinder the
swarming of them, till he burned up two suits of apparel."--"Margaret
Arnold testified that Amy Dunny afflicted her children: they (the
children), she said, would see mice running round the house, and, when
they caught them and threw them into the fire, they would screech out
like rats."--"A thing like a bee flew at the face of the younger
child; the child fell into a fit, and at last vomited up a two-penny
nail, with a broad head, affirming that the bee brought this nail, and
forced it into her mouth."--"She one day caught an invisible mouse,
and, throwing it into the fire, it flashed like to gunpowder. None
besides the child saw the mouse, but every one saw the flash!"

In this instance we perceive the influence of prejudice in perverting
evidence. The circumstance that the mouse was invisible to all eyes
but those of the child ought to have satisfied the Court and jury that
she was either under the power of a delusion or practising an
imposture. But, as they were predisposed to find something
supernatural in the transaction, their minds seized upon the pretended
invisibility of the mouse as conclusive proof of diabolical agency.

Many persons who were present expressed the opinion, that the issue of
the trial would have been favorable to the prisoners, had it not been
for the following circumstance: Sir Thomas Browne, a physician,
philosopher, and scholar of unrivalled celebrity at that time,
happened to be upon the spot; and it was the universal wish that he
should be called to the stand, and his opinion be obtained on the
general subject of witchcraft. An enthusiastic contemporary admirer of
Sir Thomas Browne thus describes him: "The horizon of his
understanding was much larger than the hemisphere of the world: all
that was visible in the heavens he comprehended so well, that few that
are under them knew so much; and of the earth he had such a minute and
exact geographical knowledge as if he had been by Divine Providence
ordained surveyor-general of the whole terrestrial globe and its
products, minerals, plants, and animals." His memory is stated to have
been inferior only to that of Seneca or Scaliger; and he was reputed
master of seven languages. Dr. Johnson, who has written his biography,
sums up his character in the following terms: "But it is not on the
praises of others, but on his own writings, that he is to depend for
the esteem of posterity, of which he will not easily be deprived,
while learning shall have any reverence among men: for there is no
science in which he does not discover some skill; and scarce any kind
of knowledge, profane or sacred, abstruse or elegant, which he does
not appear to have cultivated with success."

Sir Thomas Browne was considered by those of his own generation to
have made great advances beyond the wisdom of his age. He claimed the
character of a reformer, and gave to his principal publication the
title of an "Enquiry into Vulgar Errors." So bold and free were his
speculations, that he was looked upon invidiously by many as a daring
innovator, and did not escape the denunciatory imputation of heresy.
Nothing could be more unjust, however, than this latter charge. He was
a most ardent and zealous believer in the doctrines of the Established
Church. He declares "that he assumes the honorable style of a
Christian," not because "it is the religion of his country," but
because, "having in his riper years and confirmed judgment seen and
examined all, he finds himself obliged, by the principles of grace and
the law of his own reason, to embrace no other name but this." He
exults and "blesses himself, that he lived not in the days of
miracles, when faith had been thrust upon him, but enjoys that greater
blessing pronounced to all that believed, and saw not:" nay, he goes
so far as to say, that they only had the advantage "of a bold and
noble faith, who lived before the coming of the Saviour, and, upon
obscure prophecies and mystical types, could raise a belief." The fact
that such a man was accused of infidelity is an affecting proof of the
injustice that is sometimes done by the judgment of contemporaries.

This prodigy of learning and philosophy went into Court, took the
stand, and declared his opinion in favor of the reality of witchcraft,
entered into a particular discussion of the subject before the jury,
threw the whole weight of his great name into the wavering scales of
justice, and the poor women were convicted. The authority of Sir
Thomas Browne, added to the other evidence, perplexed Sir Matthew
Hale. A reporter of the trial says, "that it made this great and good
man doubtful; but he was in such fears, and proceeded with such
caution, that he would not so much as sum up the evidence, but left it
to the jury with prayers, 'that the great God of heaven would direct
their hearts in that weighty matter.'"

The result of this important trial established decisively the
interpretation of English law; and the printed report of it was used
as an authoritative text-book in the Court at Salem.

The celebrated Robert Boyle flourished in the latter half of the
seventeenth century. He is allowed by all to have done much towards
the introduction of an improved philosophy, and the promotion of
experimental science. But he could not entirely shake off the
superstition of his age.

A small city in Burgundy, called Mascon, was famous in the annals of
witchcraft. In a work called "The Theatre of God's Judgments,"
published, in London, by Thomas Beard in 1612, there is the following
passage: "It was a very lamentable spectacle that chanced to the
Governor of Mascon, a magician, whom the Devil snatched up in
dinner-while, and hoisted aloft, carrying him three times about the
town of Mascon, in the presence of many beholders, to whom he cried in
this manner, 'Help, help, my friends!' so that the whole town stood
amazed thereat; yea, and the remembrance of this strange accident
sticketh at this day fast in the minds of all the inhabitants of this
country." A malicious and bigoted monk, who discharged the office of
chief legend-maker to the Benedictine Abbey, in the vicinity of
Mascon, fabricated this ridiculous story for the purpose of bringing
the Governor into disrepute. An account of another diabolical
visitation, suggested, it is probable, by the one just described, was
issued from the press, under the title of "The Devil of Mascon,"
during the lifetime of Boyle, who gave his sanction to the work,
promoted its version into English, and, as late as 1678, publicly
declared his belief of the supernatural transaction it related.

The subject of demonology, in all its forms and phases, embracing
witchcraft, held a more commanding place throughout Europe, in the
literature of the centuries immediately preceding the eighteenth, than
any other. Works of the highest pretension, elaborate, learned,
voluminous, and exhausting, were published, by the authority of
governments and universities, to expound it. It was regarded as
occupying the most eminent department of jurisprudence, as well as of
science and theology.

Raphael De La Torre and Adam Tanner published treatises establishing
the right and duty of ecclesiastical tribunals to punish all who
practised or dealt with the arts of demonology. In 1484, Sprenger came
out with his famous book, "Malleus Maleficarum;" or, the "Hammer of
Witches." Paul Layman, in 1629, issued an elaborate work on "Judicial
Processes against Sorcerers and Witches." The following is the title
of a bulky volume of some seven hundred pages: "Demonology, or Natural
Magic or demoniacal, lawful and unlawful, also open or secret, by the
intervention and invocation of a Demon," published in 1612. It
consists of four books, treating of the crime of witchcraft, and its
punishment in the ordinary tribunals and the Inquisitorial office. Its
author was Don Francisco Torreblanca Villalpando, of Cordova, Advocate
Royal in the courts of Grenada. It was republished in 1623, by command
of Philip III. of Spain, on the recommendation of the Fiscal General,
and with the sanction of the Royal Council and the Holy Inquisition.
This work may be considered as establishing and defining the
doctrines, in reference to witchcraft, prevailing in all Catholic
countries. It was indorsed by royal, judicial, academical, and
ecclesiastical approval; is replete with extraordinary erudition,
arranged in the most scientific form, embracing in a methodical
classification all the minutest details of the subject, and codifying
it into a complete system of law. There was no particular in all the
proceedings and all the doctrines brought out at the trials in Salem,
which did not find ample justification and support in this work of
Catholic, imperial, and European authority.

But perhaps the writer of the greatest influence on this subject in
England and America, during the whole of the seventeenth century, was
William Perkins, "the learned, pious, and painful preacher of God's
Word, at St. Andrew's, in Cambridge," where he died, in 1602, aged
forty-four years. He was quite a voluminous author; and many of his
works were translated into French, Dutch, Italian, and Spanish.
Fuller, in "The Holy State," selects him as the impersonation of the
qualities requisite to "the Faithful Minister." In his glowing
eulogium upon his learning and talents, he says:--

     "He would pronounce the word _damne_ with such an emphasis
     as left a doleful echo in his auditors' ears a good while
     after. And, when catechist of Christ's College, in
     expounding the Commandments, applied them so home,--able
     almost to make his hearers' hearts fall down, and hairs to
     stand upright. But, in his older age, he altered his voice,
     and remitted much of his former rigidness, often professing
     that to preach mercy was that proper office of the ministers
     of the gospel."--"Our Perkins brought the schools into the
     pulpit, and, unshelling their controversies out of their
     hard school-terms, made thereof plain and wholesome meat for
     his people; for he had a capacious head, with angles
     winding, and roomy enough to lodge all controversial
     intricacies."--"He had a rare felicity in speedy reading of
     books; so that, as it were, riding post through an author,
     he took strict notice of all passages. Perusing books so
     speedily, one would think he read nothing; so accurately,
     one would think he read all."

An octavo volume, written by this great scholar and divine, was
published at Cambridge in England, under the title, "Discourse of the
Damned Art of Witchcraft." It went through several editions, and had a
wide and permanent circulation.

This work, the character of which is sufficiently indicated in its
emphatic title, was the great authority on the subject with our
fathers; and Mr. Parris had a copy of it in his possession when the
proceedings in reference to witchcraft began at Salem Village.

John Gaule published an octavo volume in London, in 1646, entitled,
"Select Cases of Conscience concerning Witches and Witchcraft." He is
one of the most exact writers on the subject, and arranges witches in
the following classes: "1. The diviner, gypsy, or fortune-telling
witch; 2. The astrologian, star-gazing, planetary, prognosticating
witch; 3. The chanting, canting, or calculating witch, who works by
signs and numbers; 4. The venefical, or poisoning witch; 5. The
exorcist, or conjuring witch; 6. The gastronomic witch; 7. The
magical, speculative, sciential, or arted witch; 8. The necromancer."

Besides innumerable writers of this class, who spread out the
scholastic learning on the subject, and presented it in a logical and
theological form, there were others who treated it in a more popular
style, and invested it with the charms of elegant literature. Henry
Hallywell published an octavo in London, in 1681, in which, while the
main doctrines of witchcraft as then almost universally received are
enforced, an attempt was made to divest it of some of its most
repulsive and terrible features. He gives the following account of the
means by which a person may place himself beyond the reach of the
power of witchcraft:--

     "It is possible for the soul to arise to such a height, and
     become so divine, that no witchcraft or evil demons can have
     any power upon the body. When the bodily life is too far
     invigorated and awakened, and draws the intellect, the
     flower and summity of the soul, into a conspiration with it,
     then are we subject and obnoxious to magical assaults. For
     magic or sorcery, being founded only in this lower or
     mundane spirit, he that makes it his business to be freed
     and released from all its blandishments and flattering
     devocations, and endeavors wholly to withdraw himself from
     the love of corporeity and too near a sympathy with the
     frail flesh, he, by it, enkindles such a divine principle as
     lifts him above the fate of this inferior world, and adorns
     his mind with such an awful majesty that beats back all
     enchantments, and makes the infernal fiends tremble at his
     presence, hating those vigorous beams of light which are so
     contrary and repugnant to their dark natures."

The mind of this beautiful writer found encouragement and security in
the midst of the diabolical spirits, with whom he believed the world
to be infested, in the following views and speculations:--

     "For there is a chain of government that runs down from God,
     the Supreme Monarch, whose bright and piercing eyes look
     through all that he has made, to the lowest degree of the
     creation; and there are presidential angels of empires and
     kingdoms, and such as under them have the tutelage of
     private families; and, lastly, every man's particular
     guardian genius. Nor is the inanimate or material world left
     to blind chance or fortune; but there are, likewise, mighty
     and potent spirits, to whom is committed the guidance and
     care of the fluctuating and uncertain motions of it, and by
     their ministry, fire and vapor, storms and tempests, snow
     and hail, heat and cold, are all kept within such bounds and
     limits as are most serviceable to the ends of Providence.
     They take care of the variety of seasons, and superintend
     the tillage and fruits of the earth; upon which account,
     Origen calls them _invisible_ husbandmen. So that, all
     affairs and things being under the inspection and government
     of these incorporeal beings, the power of the dark kingdom
     and its agents is under a strict confinement and restraint;
     and they cannot bring a general mischief upon the world
     without a special permission of a superior Providence."

Spenser has the same imagery and sentiment:--

    "How oft do they their silver bowers leave,
    To come to succor us, that succor want?
    How oft do they with golden pinions cleave
    The flitting skies, like flying pursuivant,
    Against foul fiends to aid us militant?
    They for us fight, they watch and duly ward,
    And their bright squadrons round about us plant,
    And all for love and nothing for reward:
    Oh! why should heavenly God to man have such regard?"

While there can be no doubt that the superstitious opinions we have
been reviewing were diffused generally among the great body of the
people of all ranks and conditions, it would be unjust to truth not to
mention that there were some persons who looked upon them as empty
fables and vain imaginations. Error has never yet made a complete and
universal conquest. In the darkest ages and most benighted regions, it
has been found impossible utterly to extinguish the light of reason.
There always have been some in whose souls the torch of truth has been
kept burning with vestal watchfulness: we can discern its glimmer here
and there through the deepest night that has yet settled upon the
earth. In the midst of the most extravagant superstition, there have
been individuals who have disowned the popular belief, and considered
it a mark of wisdom and true philosophy to discard the idle fancies
and absurd schemes of faith that possessed the minds of the great mass
of their contemporaries. This was the case with Horace, as appears
from lines thus quite freely but effectively translated:--

    "These dreams and terrors magical,
    These miracles and witches,
    Night-walking spirites or Thessal bugs,
    Esteeme them not two rushes."

The intellect of Seneca also rose above the reach of the popular
credulity with respect to the agency of supernatural beings and the
efficacy of mysterious charms.

If we could but obtain access to the secret thoughts of the wisest
philosophers and of the men of genius of antiquity, we should probably
find that many of them were superior to the superstitions of their
times. Even in the thick darkness of the dark ages, there were minds
too powerful to be kept in chains by error and delusion.

Henry Cornelius Agrippa, who was born in the latter part of the
fifteenth century, was, perhaps, the greatest philosopher and scholar
of his period. In early life, he was very much devoted to the science
of magic, and was a strenuous supporter of demonology and witchcraft.
In the course of his studies and meditations, he was led to a change
of views on these subjects, and did all that he could to warn others
from putting confidence in such vain, frivolous, and absurd
superstitions as then possessed the world. The consequence was, that
he was denounced and prosecuted as a conjurer, and charged with having
written against magic and witchcraft, in order the more securely to
shelter himself from the suspicion of practising them. As an instance
of the calumnies that were heaped upon him, I would mention that
Paulus Jovius asserted that "Cornelius Agrippa went always accompanied
with an evil spirit in the similitude of a black dog;" and that, when
the time of his death drew near, "he took off the enchanted collar
from the dog's neck, and sent him away with these terms, 'Get thee
hence, thou cursed beast, which hast utterly destroyed me:' neither
was the dog ever seen after." Butler, in his "Hudibras," has not
neglected to celebrate this remarkable connection between Satan and
the man of learning:--

    "Agrippa kept a Stygian pug
    I' th' garb and habit of a dog,
    That was his tutor; and the cur
    Read to th' occult philosopher."

John Wierus wrote an elaborate, learned, and judicious book, in which
he treated at large of magic, sorcery, and witchcraft, and did all
that scholarship, talent, and philosophy could do to undermine and
subvert the whole system of the prevailing popular superstition. But
he fared no better than his predecessor, patron, and master, Agrippa;
for, like him, he was accused of having attempted to persuade the
world that there was no reality in supernatural charms and diabolical
confederacies, in order that he might devote himself to them without
suspicion or molestation, and was borne down by the bigotry and
fanaticism of his times.

King James merely gave utterance to the general sentiment, and
pronounced the verdict of popular opinion, in the following extract
from the preface to his "Demonologie:" "Wierus, a German physician,
sets out a public apologie for all these crafts-folkes, whereby,
procuring for them impunitie, he plainly bewrays himself to have been
of that profession."

In 1584, a quarto volume was published in London, the work of Reginald
Scott, a learned English gentleman, whose title sufficiently indicates
its import, "The Discovery of Witchcraft, wherein the lewde dealing
of witches and witchmongers is notably detected; the knavery of
conjurers, the impiety of inchanters, the folly of soothsayers, the
impudent falsehood of cozeners, the infidelity of atheists, the
pestilent practices of pythonists, the curiosities of figure-casters,
the vanity of dreamers, the beggarly art of alcumstrie, the
abomination of idolatrie, the horrible art of poisoning, the virtue
and power of natural magic, and all the conveniencies of legerdemaine
and juggling, are discovered, &c."

In 1599, Samuel Harsnett, Archbishop of York, wrote a work, published
in London, to expose certain persons who pretended to have the power
of casting out devils, and detecting their "deceitful trade." This
writer was among the first to bring the power of bold satire and open
denunciation to bear against the superstitions of demonology. He thus
describes the motives and the methods of such impostors:--

     "Out of these," saith he, "is shaped us the true idea of a
     witch,--an old, weather-beaten crone, having her chin and
     her knees meeting for age, walking like a bow, leaning on a
     staff; hollow-eyed, untoothed, furrowed on her face, having
     her limbs trembling with the palsy, going mumbling in the
     streets; one that hath forgotten her Pater-noster, and yet
     hath a shrewd tongue to call a drab a drab. If she hath
     learned of an old wife, in a chimney-end, Pax, Max, Fax, for
     a spell, or can say Sir John Grantham's curse for the
     miller's eels, 'All ye that have stolen the miller's eels,
     Laudate dominum de coelis: and all they that have consented
     thereto, Benedicamus domino:' why then, beware! look about
     you, my neighbors. If any of you have a sheep sick of the
     giddies, or a hog of the mumps, or a horse of the staggers,
     or a knavish boy of the school, or an idle girl of the
     wheel, or a young drab of the sullens, and hath not fat
     enough for her porridge, or butter enough for her bread, and
     she hath a little help of the epilepsy or cramp, to teach
     her to roll her eyes, wry her mouth, gnash her teeth,
     startle with her body, hold her arms and hands stiff, &c.;
     and then, when an old Mother Nobs hath by chance called her
     an idle young housewife, or bid the Devil scratch her, then
     no doubt but Mother Nobs is the witch, and the young girl is
     owl blasted, &c. They that have their brains baited and
     their fancies distempered with the imaginations and
     apprehensions of witches, conjurers, and fairies, and all
     that lymphatic chimera, I find to be marshalled in one of
     these five ranks: children, fools, women, cowards, sick or
     black melancholic discomposed wits."

In 1669, a work was published in London with the following title: "The
Question of Witchcraft Debated; or, a Discourse against their Opinions
that affirm Witches." It is a work of great merit, and would do honor
to a scholar and logician of the present day. The author was John
Wagstaffe, of Oxford University: he is described as a crooked,
shrivelled, little man, of a most despicable appearance. This
circumstance, together with his writings against the popular belief in
witchcraft, led his academical associates to accuse him, some of them
in sport, but others with grave suspicion, of being a wizard. Wood,
the historian of Oxford, says that "he died in a manner distracted,
occasioned by a deep conceit of his own parts, and by a continual
bibbing of strong and high-tasted liquors." But poor Wagstaffe was
assailed by something more than private raillery and slander. His
heretical sentiments exposed him to the battery of the host of writers
who will always be found ready to advocate a prevailing opinion. But
Wagstaffe was not left entirely alone to defend the cause of reason
and truth. He had one most zealous advocate and ardent admirer in the
author of a work on "The Doctrine of Devils," published in 1676. This
writer sums up a panegyric upon Wagstaffe's performance, by
pronouncing it "a judicious book, that contains more good reason, true
religion, and right Christianity, than all those lumps and cartloads
of luggage that hath been fardled up by all the faggeters of
demonologistical winter-tales, and witchcraftical legendaries, since
they first began to foul clean paper."

Dr. Balthasar Bekker, of Amsterdam, who was equally eminent in
astronomy, philosophy, and theology, published in 1691 a learned and
powerful work, called "The World Bewitched," in which he openly
assailed the doctrines of witchcraft and of the Devil, and anticipated
many of the views and arguments presented in Farmer's excellent
publications. As a reward for his exertions to enlighten his
fellow-creatures, he was turned out of the ministry, and assaulted by
nearly all the writers of his age.

Dr. Bekker was one of the ablest and boldest writers of his day, and
did much to advance the cause of natural science, scriptural
interpretation, and the principles of enlightened Christianity. In
1680 he published an "Inquiry concerning Comets," rescuing them from
the realm of superstition, placing them within the natural physical
laws, and exploding the then-received opinion, that, in any way, they
are the presages or forerunners of evil. His "Exposition on the
Prophet Daniel" gives proof of his learning and judgment. His great
merits were recognized by John Locke and Richard Bentley. In the
preface to his "World Bewitched," he says, that it grieved him to see
the great honors, powers, and miracles which are ascribed to the
Devil. "It has come to that pass," to use his own language, "that men
think it piety and godliness to ascribe a great many wonders to the
Devil, and impiety and heresy, if a man will not believe that the
Devil can do what a thousand persons say he does. It is now reckoned
godliness, if a man who fears God fear also the Devil. If he be not
afraid of the Devil, he passes for an atheist, who does not believe in
God, because he cannot think that there are two gods, the one good,
the other bad. But these, I think, with much more reason, may be
called ditheists. For my part, if, on account of my opinion, they will
give me a new name, let them call me a monotheist, a believer of but
one God." The work struck down the whole system of demonology and
witchcraft, by proving that there never was really such a thing as
sorcery or possession, and that devils have no influence over human
affairs or the persons of men. It is not surprising that it raised a
great clamor. The wonder is that it did not cost him his life. It is
probable that his protection was the confidence the people had in his
character and learning. Attempts were made to diminish that
confidence, and bring him into odium, by levelling against him every
form of abuse. A medal was struck, and extensively circulated,
representing the Devil, clothed like a minister or priest, riding on
an ass. The device was so arranged as to excite ridicule and
abhorrence, in the vulgar mind, against Bekker. But it was found
impossible to turn the popular feeling, which had set in his favor;
and his persecutors and defamers were completely baffled. He was
followed, soon after, by the learned Thomasius, whose writings against
demonology produced a decided effect upon the convictions of the age.

While Bekker, and the other writers of his class, endeavored to
overthrow the superstitious practices and fancies then prevalent
respecting demonology and communications with spiritual beings, they
so far acceded to the popular theology as to maintain the doctrine of
the personality of the Devil. They believed in the existence of the
arch-fiend, but denied his agency in human affairs. They held that he
was kept confined "to bottomless perdition, there to dwell--

    "In adamantine chains and penal fire."

Sir Robert Filmer, in 1680, published "An Advertisement to the jurymen
of England, touching Witches," in which he criticised and condemned
many of the opinions and methods then countenanced on the subject.

But Bekker, Thomasius, and Filmer appeared too late to operate upon
the prevalent opinions of Europe or America prior to the witchcraft
delusion of 1692. The productions of the other writers, in the same
direction, to whom I have referred, probably had a very limited
circulation, and made at the time but little impression. Error is
seldom overthrown by mere reasoning. It yields only to the logic of
events. No power of learning or wit could have rooted the witchcraft
superstitions out of the minds of men. Nothing short of a
demonstration of their deformities, follies, and horrors, such as here
was held up to the view of the world, could have given their
death-blow. This was the final cause of Salem Witchcraft, and makes it
one of the great landmarks in the world's history.

A full and just view of the position and obligations of the persons
who took part in the transactions at Salem requires a previous
knowledge of the principles and the state of the law, as it was then
in force and understood by the courts, and all concerned in judicial
proceedings. Although the ancients did not regard pretended
intercourse between magicians and enchanters and spiritual beings as
necessarily or always criminal, we find that they enacted laws against
the abuse of the power supposed to result from the connection. The old
Roman code of the Twelve Tables contained the following prohibition:
"That they should not bewitch the fruits of the earth, nor use any
charms, to draw their neighbor's corn into their own fields." There
were several special edicts on the subject during the existence of
the Roman State. In the early Christian councils, sorcery was
frequently made the object of denunciation. At Laodicea, for instance,
in the year 364, it was voted to excommunicate any clergymen who were
magicians, enchanters, astrologers, or mathematicians! The Bull of
Pope Innocent VIII., near the close of the fifteenth century, has
already been mentioned.

Dr. Turner, in his history of the Anglo-Saxons, says that they had
laws against sorcerers and witches, but that they did not punish them
with death. There was an English statute against witchcraft, in the
reign of Henry VIII., and another in that of Elizabeth.

Up to this time, however, the legislation of parliament on the subject
was merciful and judicious: for it did not attach to the guilt of
witchcraft the punishment of death, unless it had been used to destroy
life; that is, unless it had become murder.

On the demise of Elizabeth, James of Scotland ascended the throne. His
pedantic and eccentric character is well known. He had an early and
decided inclination towards abstruse or mysterious speculations.
Before he had reached his twentieth year, he undertook to accomplish
what only the most sanguine and profound theologians have ever dared
to attempt: he expounded the Book of Revelation. When he was about
twenty-five years of age, he published a work on the "Doctrine of
Devils and Witchcraft." Not long after, he succeeded to the British
crown. It may easily be imagined that the subject of demonology soon
became a fashionable and prevailing topic of conversation in the royal
saloons and throughout the nation. It served as a medium through which
obsequious courtiers could convey their flattery to the ears of their
accomplished and learned sovereign. His Majesty's book was reprinted
and extensively circulated. It was of course praised and recommended
in all quarters.

The parliament, actuated by a base desire to compliment the vain and
superstitious king, enacted a new and much more severe statute against
witchcraft, in the very first year of his reign. It was under this law
that so many persons here and in England were deprived of their lives.
The blood of hundreds of innocent persons was thus unrighteously shed.
It was a fearful price which these servile lawgivers paid for the
favor of their prince.

But this was not the only mischief brought about by courtly deference
to the prejudices of King James. It was under his direction that our
present translation of the Scriptures was made. To please His Royal
Majesty, and to strengthen the arguments in his work on demonology,
the word "witch" was used to represent expressions in the original
Hebrew, that conveyed an entirely different idea; and it was freely
inserted in the headings of the chapters.[B] A person having "a
familiar spirit" was a favorite description of a witch in the king's
book. The translators, forgetful of their high and solemn function,
endeavored to establish this definition by inserting it into their
version. Accordingly, they introduced it in several places; in the
eleventh verse of the eighteenth chapter of Deuteronomy, for instance,
"a consulter with familiar spirits." There is no word in the Hebrew
which corresponds with "familiar." And this is the important, the
essential word in the definition. It conveys the idea of alliance,
stated connection, confederacy, or compact, which is characteristic
and distinctive of a witch. The expression in the original signifies
"a consulter with spirits,"--especially, as was the case with the
"Witch of Endor," a consulter with departed spirits. It was a shocking
perversion of the word of God, for the purpose of flattering a frail
and mortal sovereign! King James lived to see and acknowledge the
error of his early opinions, and he would gladly have counteracted
their bad effect; but it is easier to make laws and translations than
it is to alter and amend them.

[Footnote B: For a thorough discussion of the several Hebrew words
that relate to Divination and Magic, see Wierus de Præstigiis, L. 2,
c. 1.]

While the law of the land required the capital punishment of witches,
no blame ought to be attached to judges and jurors for discharging
their respective duties in carrying it into execution. It will not do
for us to assert, that they ought to have refused, let the
consequences to themselves have been what they would, to sanction and
give effect to such inhuman and unreasonable enactments. We cannot
consistently take this ground; for there is nothing more certain than
that, with their notions, our ancestors had at least as good reasons
to advance in favor of punishing witchcraft with death, as we have for
punishing any crime whatsoever in the same awful and summary manner.
We appeal, in defence of our capital punishments, to the text of
Moses, "Whoso sheddeth man's blood, by man shall his blood be shed."
The apologist of our fathers, for carrying into effect the law making
witchcraft a capital offence, tells us in reply, in the first place,
that this passage is not of the nature of a precept, but merely of an
admonition; that it does not enjoin any particular method of
proceeding, but simply describes the natural consequences of cruel and
contentious conduct; and that it amounts only to this: that
quarrelsome, violent, and bloodthirsty persons will be apt to meet the
same fate they bring upon others; that the duellist will be likely to
fall in private combat, the ambitious conqueror to perish, and the
warlike nation to be destroyed, on the field of battle. If this is not
considered by us a sufficient and satisfactory answer, he advances to
our own ground, points to the same text where we place our defence,
and puts his finger on the following plain and authoritative precept:
"Thou shalt not suffer a witch to live." Indeed we must acknowledge,
that the capital punishment of witches is as strongly supported and
fortified by the Scriptures of the Old Testament--at least, as they
appear in our present version--as the capital punishment of any crime
whatever.

If we adopt another line of argument, and say that it is necessary to
punish some particular crimes with death, in order to maintain the
security of society, or hold up an impressive warning to others, here
also we find that our opponent has full as much to offer in defence of
our fathers as can be offered in our own defence. He describes to us
the tremendous and infernal power which was universally believed by
them to be possessed by a witch; a power which, as it was not derived
from a natural source, could not easily be held in check by natural
restraints: neither chains nor dungeons could bind it down or confine
it. You might load the witch with irons, you might bury her in the
lowest cell of a feudal prison, and still it was believed that she
could send forth her imps or her spectre to ravage the fields, and
blight the meadows, and throw the elements into confusion, and torture
the bodies, and craze the minds, of any who might be the objects of
her malice.

Shakspeare, in the description which he puts into the mouth of Macbeth
of the supernatural energy of witchcraft, does not surpass, if he does
justice to, the prevailing belief on the subject:--

    "I conjure you, by that which you profess,
    (Howe'er you came to know it) answer me,--
    Though you untie the winds, and let them fight
    Against the churches; though the yesty waves
    Confound and swallow navigation up;
    Though bladed corn be lodged, and trees blown down;
    Though castles topple on their warders' heads;
    Though palaces and pyramids do slope
    Their heads to their foundations; though the treasure
    Of nature's germins tumble all together,
    Even till destruction sicken,--answer me
    To what I ask you."

There was indeed an almost infinite power to do mischief associated
with a disposition to do it. No human strength could strip the witch
of these mighty energies while she lived; nothing but death could
destroy them. There was, as our ancestors considered, incontestable
evidence, that she had put them forth to the injury, loss, and perhaps
death, of others.

Can it be wondered at, that, under such circumstances, the law
connecting capital punishment with the guilt of witchcraft was
resorted to as the only means to protect society, and warn others from
entering into the dark, wicked, and malignant compact?

It is not probable that even King James's Parliament would have been
willing to go to the length of Selden in his "Table-Talk," who takes
this ground in defence of the capital punishment of witches. "The law
against witches does not prove there be any, but it punishes the
malice of those people that use such means to take away men's lives.
If one should profess, that, by turning his hat thrice and crying
'Buzz,' he could take away a man's life (though in truth he could do
no such thing), yet this were a just law made by the State, that
whoever should turn his hat thrice and cry 'Buzz,' with an intention
to take away a man's life, shall be put to death."

There are other considerations that deserve to be weighed before a
final judgment should be made up respecting the conduct of our fathers
in the witchcraft delusion. Among these is the condition of physical
science in their day. But little knowledge of the laws of nature was
possessed, and that little was confined to a few. The world was still,
to the mass of the people, almost as full of mystery in its physical
departments as it was to its first inhabitants. Politics, poetry,
rhetoric, ethics, and history had been cultivated to a great extent in
previous ages; but the philosophy of the natural and material world
was almost unknown. Astronomy, chemistry, optics, pneumatics, and even
geography, were involved in the general darkness and error. Some of
our most important sciences, such as electricity, date their origin
from a later period.

This remarkable tardiness in the progress of physical science for some
time after the era of the revival of learning is to be accounted for
by referring to the erroneous methods of reasoning and observation
then prevalent in the world. A false logic was adopted in the schools
of learning and philosophy. The great instrument for the discovery and
investigation of truth was the syllogism, the most absurd contrivance
of the human mind; an argumentative process whose conclusion is
contained in the premises; a method of proof, in the first step of
which the matter to be proved is taken for granted.[C] In a word, the
whole system of philosophy was made up of hypotheses, and the only
foundation of science was laid in conjecture. The imagination, called
necessarily into extraordinary action, in the absence of scientific
certainty, was still further exercised in vain attempts to discover,
unassisted by observation and experiment, the elements and first
principles of nature. It had reached a monstrous growth about the time
to which we are referring. Indeed it may be said, that all the
intellectual productions of modern times, from the seventeenth century
back to the dark ages, were works of imagination. The bulkiest and
most voluminous writings that proceeded from the cloisters or the
universities, even the metaphysical disquisitions of the Nominalists
and Realists, and the boundless subtleties of the contending schools
of the "Divine Doctors," Thomas Aquinas and Duns Scotus, fall under
this description. Dull, dreary, unintelligible, and interminable as
they are, they are still in reality works of fancy. They are the
offspring, almost exclusively, of the imaginative faculty. It ought
not to create surprise, to find that this faculty predominated in the
minds and characters of our ancestors, and developed itself to an
extent beyond our conception, when we reflect that it was almost the
only one called into exercise, and that it was the leading element of
every branch of literature and philosophy.

[Footnote C: The syllogism was originally designed to serve as a
_method of determining the arrangement and classification of truth
already shown_; and, when employed for this purpose, was of great
value and excellence. It was its perverted application to the
_discovery_ of truth which rendered utterly worthless so large a part
of the learning and philosophy of the middle ages. The reader will
perceive, that it is to the syllogism, as thus misapplied and
misunderstood by the schoolmen, not as designed and used by Aristotle,
that the remarks in the text are intended to apply.]

It is true, that, in the earlier part of the seventeenth century, Lord
Bacon made his sublime discoveries in the department of physical
science. By disclosing the true method of investigation and reasoning
on such subjects, he may be said to have found, or rather to have
invented, the key that unlocked the hitherto unopened halls of nature.
He introduced man to the secret chambers of the universe, and placed
in his hand the thread by which he has been conducted to the
magnificent results of modern science, and will undoubtedly be led on
to results still more magnificent in times to come. But it was not for
human nature to pass in a moment from darkness to light. The
transition was slow and gradual: a long twilight intervened before the
sun shed its clear and full radiance upon the world.

The great discoverer himself refused to admit, or was unable to
discern, some of the truths his system had revealed. Bacon was
numbered among the opponents of the Copernican or true system of
astronomy to the day of his death; so also was Sir Thomas Browne, the
great philosopher already described, and who flourished during the
latter half of the same century. Indeed, it may be said, that, at the
time of the witchcraft delusion, the ancient empire of darkness which
had oppressed and crushed the world of science had hardly been shaken.
The great and triumphant progress of modern discovery had scarcely
begun.

I shall now proceed to illustrate these views of the state of science
in the world at that time by presenting a few instances. The
slightest examination of the accounts which remain of occurrences
deemed supernatural by our ancestors will satisfy any one that they
were brought about by causes entirely natural, although unknown to
them. For instance, the following circumstances are related by the
Rev. James Pierpont, pastor of a church in New Haven, in a letter to
Cotton Mather, and published by him in his "Magnalia:"[D]--

In the year 1646, a new ship, containing a valuable cargo, and having
several distinguished persons on board as passengers, put to sea from
New Haven in the month of January, bound to England. The vessels that
came over the ensuing spring brought no tidings of her arrival in the
mother-country. The pious colonists were earnest and instant in their
prayers that intelligence might be received of the missing vessel. In
the month of June, 1648, "a great thunder-storm arose out of the
north-west; after which (the hemisphere being serene), about an hour
before sunset, a ship of like dimensions with the aforesaid, with her
canvas and colors abroad (although the wind was northerly), appeared
in the air, coming up from the harbor's mouth, which lies southward
from the town,--seemingly with her sails filled under a fresh gale,
holding her course north, and continuing under observation, sailing
against the wind for the space of half an hour." The phantom-ship was
borne along, until, to the excited imaginations of the spectators, she
seemed to have approached so near that they could throw a stone into
her. Her main-topmast then disappeared, then her mizzen-topmast; then
her masts were entirely carried away; and, finally, her hull fell off,
and vanished from sight,--leaving a dull and smoke-colored cloud,
which soon dissolved, and the whole atmosphere became clear. All
affirmed that the airy vision was a precise copy and image of the
missing vessel, and that it was sent to announce and describe her
fate. They considered it the spectre of the lost ship; and the Rev.
Mr. Davenport declared in public, "that God had condescended, for the
quieting their afflicted spirits, this extraordinary account of his
sovereign disposal of those for whom so many fervent prayers were made
continually."

[Footnote D: The manner in which Dr. Mather brings forward this affair
shows how loose and inaccurate he was in his description of events. It
also illustrates the tendency of the times to exaggerate, or to paint
in the highest colors, whatever was susceptible of being represented
as miraculous. There is no reason, however, to doubt that the facts
took place substantially as described in the text. The reader is
referred, on this as on all points connected with our early history,
to Mr. Savage's instructive, elaborate, and entertaining edition of
Winthrop's "New England."]

The results of modern science enable us to explain the mysterious
appearance. It is probable that some Dutch vessel, proceeding slowly,
quietly, and unconsciously on her voyage from Amsterdam to the New
Netherlands, happened at the time to be passing through the Sound. At
the moment the apparition was seen in the sky, she was so near, that
her reflected image was painted or delineated, to the eyes of the
observers, on the clouds, by laws of optics now generally well known,
before her actual outlines could be discerned by them on the horizon.
As the sun sunk behind the western hills, and his rays were gradually
withdrawn, the visionary ship slowly disappeared; and the approach of
night effectually concealed the vessel as she continued her course
along the Sound.

The optical illusions that present themselves on the sea-shore, by
which distant objects are raised to view, the opposite capes and
islands made to loom up, lifted above the line of the apparent
circumference of the earth, and thrown into every variety of shape
which the imagination can conceive, are among the most beautiful
phenomena of nature; and they impress the mind with the idea of
enchantment and mystery, more perhaps than any others: but they have
received a complete solution from modern discovery.

It should be observed, that the optical principles which explain these
phenomena have recently afforded a foundation for the science, or
rather art, of nauscopy; and there are persons in some places,--in the
Isle of France, as I have been told,--whose calling and profession is
to ascertain and predict the approach of vessels, by their reflection
in the atmosphere and on the clouds, long before they are visible to
the eye, or through the glass.

The following opinion prevailed at the time of our narrative. The
discoveries in electricity, itself a recent science, have rendered it
impossible for us to contemplate it without ridicule. But it was the
sober opinion of the age. "A great man has noted it," says a learned
writer, "that thunders break oftener on churches than any other
houses, because demons have a peculiar spite at houses that are set
apart for the peculiar service of God."

Every thing that was strange or remarkable--every thing at all out of
the usual course, every thing that was not clear and plain--was
attributed to supernatural interposition. Indeed, our fathers lived,
as they thought, continually in the midst of miracles; and felt
themselves surrounded, at all times, in all scenes, with innumerable
invisible beings. The beautiful verse of Milton describes their
faith:--

    "Millions of spiritual creatures walk the earth
    Unseen, both when we wake and when we sleep."

What was to him, however, a momentary vision of the imagination, was
to them like a perpetual perception of the senses: it was a practical
belief, an everyday common sentiment, an all-pervading feeling. But
these supernatural beings very frequently were believed to have become
visible to our superstitious ancestors. The instances, indeed, were
not rare, of individuals having seen the Devil himself with their
mortal eyes. They may well be brought to notice, as illustrating the
ideas which then prevailed, and had an immediate, practical effect on
the conduct of men, in reference to the power, presence, and action of
the Devil in human affairs. This, in fact, is necessary, that we may
understand the narrative we are preparing to contemplate of
transactions based wholly on those ideas.

The following passage is extracted from a letter written to Increase
Mather by the Rev. John Higginson:--

     "The godly Mr. Sharp, who was ruling elder of the church of
     Salem almost thirty years after, related it of himself,
     that, being bred up to learning till he was eighteen years
     old, and then taken off, and put to be an apprentice to a
     draper in London, he yet notwithstanding continued a strong
     inclination and eager affection to books, with a curiosity
     of hearkening after and reading of the strangest and oddest
     books he could get, spending much of his time that way to
     the neglect of his business. At one time, there came a man
     into the shop, and brought a book with him, and said to him,
     'Here is a book for you, keep this till I call for it
     again;' and so went away. Mr. Sharp, after his wonted
     bookish manner, was eagerly affected to look into that book,
     and read it, which he did: but, as he read in it, he was
     seized on by a strange kind of horror, both of body and
     mind, the hair of his head standing up; and, finding these
     effects several times, he acquainted his master with it,
     who, observing the same effects, they concluded it was a
     conjuring book, and resolved to burn it, which they did. He
     that brought it in the shape of a man never coming to call
     for it, they concluded it was the Devil. He, taking this as
     a solemn warning from God to take heed what books he read,
     was much taken off from his former bookishness; confining
     himself to reading the Bible, and other known good books of
     divinity, which were profitable to his soul."

Kircher relates the following anecdote, with a full belief of its
truth: He had a friend who was zealously and perseveringly devoted to
the study of alchemy. At one time, while he was intent upon his
operations, a gentleman entered his laboratory, and kindly offered to
assist him. In a few moments, a large mass of the purest gold was
brought forth from the crucible. The gentleman then took his hat, and
went out: before leaving the apartment, however, he wrote a recipe for
making the precious article. The grateful and admiring mortal
continued his operations, according to the directions of his visitor;
but the charm was lost: he could not succeed, and was at last
completely ruined by his costly and fruitless experiments. Both he and
his friend Kircher were fully persuaded that the mysterious
stranger-visitor was the Devil.

Baxter has recorded a curious interview between Satan and Mr. White,
of Dorchester, assessor to the Westminster Assembly:--

"The Devil, in a light night, stood by his bedside. The assessor
looked a while, whether he would say or do any thing, and then said,
'If thou hast nothing to do, I have;' and so turned himself to sleep."
Dr. Hibbert is of opinion, that the Rev. Mr. White treated his satanic
majesty, on this occasion, with "a cool contempt, to which he had not
often been accustomed."

Indeed, there is nothing more curious or instructive, in the history
of that period, than the light which it sheds upon the influence of
the belief of the personal existence and operations of the Devil, when
that belief is carried out fully into its practical effects. The
Christian doctrine had relapsed into a system almost identical with
Manicheism. Wierus thus describes Satan, as he was regarded in the
prevalent theology: "He possesses great courage, incredible cunning,
superhuman wisdom, the most acute penetration, consummate prudence, an
incomparable skill in veiling the most pernicious artifices under a
specious disguise, and a malicious and infinite hatred towards the
human race, implacable and incurable." Milton merely responded to the
popular sentiment in making Satan a character of lofty dignity, and in
placing him on an elevation not "less than archangel ruined."
Hallywell, in his work on witchcraft, declares that "that mighty angel
of darkness is not foolishly nor idly to be scoffed at or blasphemed.
The Devil," says he, "may properly be looked upon as a dignity, though
his glory be pale and wan, and those once bright and orient colors
faded and darkened in his robes; and the Scriptures represent him as a
prince, though it be of devils." Although our fathers cannot be
charged with having regarded the Devil in this respectful and
deferential light, it must be acknowledged that they gave him a
conspicuous and distinguished--we might almost say a dignified--agency
in the affairs of life and the government of the world: they were
prone to confess, if not to revere, his presence, in all scenes and at
all times. He occupied a wide space, not merely in their theology and
philosophy, but in their daily and familiar thoughts.[E]

[Footnote E: It is much to be regretted, that Farmer, after having
written with such admirable success upon the temptation, the
demoniacs, miracles, and the worship of human spirits, did not live to
accomplish his original design, by giving the world a complete
discussion and elucidation of the Scripture doctrine of the Devil.]

Cotton Mather, in one of his sermons, carries home this peculiar
belief to the consciences of his hearers, in a manner that could not
have failed to quicken and startle the most dull and drowsy among
them.

     "No place," says he, "that I know of, has got such a spell
     upon it as will always keep the Devil out. The
     meeting-house, wherein we assemble for the worship of God,
     is filled with many holy people and many holy concerns
     continually; but, if our eyes were so refined as the servant
     of the prophet had his of old, I suppose we should now see a
     throng of devils in this very place. The apostle has
     intimated that angels come in among us: there are angels, it
     seems, that hark how I preach, and how you hear, at this
     hour. And our own sad experience is enough to intimate that
     the devils are likewise rendezvousing here. It is reported
     in Job i. 5, 'When the sons of God came to present
     themselves before the Lord, Satan came also among them.'
     When we are in our church assemblies, oh, how many devils,
     do you imagine, crowd in among us! There is a devil that
     rocks one to sleep. There is a devil that makes another to
     be thinking of, he scarcely knows what himself. And there is
     a devil that makes another to be pleasing himself with
     wanton and wicked speculations. It is also possible, that we
     have our closets or our studies gloriously perfumed with
     devotions every day; but, alas! can we shut the Devil out of
     them? No: let us go where we will, we shall still find a
     devil nigh unto us. Only when we come to heaven, we shall be
     out of his reach for ever."

It is very remarkable, that such a train of thought as this did not
suggest to the mind of Dr. Mather the true doctrine of the Bible
respecting the Devil. One would have supposed, that, in carrying out
the mode of speaking of him as a person to this extent, it would have
occurred to him, that it might be that the scriptural expressions of a
similar kind were also mere personifications of moral and abstract
ideas. In describing the inattention, irreverence, and unholy
reflections of his hearers as the operations of the Devil, it is
wonderful that his eyes were not opened to discern the import of our
Saviour's interpretation of the Parable of the Tares, in which he
declares, that he understands by the Devil whatever obstructs the
growth of virtue and piety in the soul, the causes that efface good
impressions and give a wrong inclination to the thoughts and
affections, such as "the cares of this world" or "the deceitfulness of
riches." By these are the tares planted, and by these is their growth
promoted. "The enemy that sowed them is the Devil."

Satan was regarded as the foe and opposer of all improvement in
knowledge and civilization. The same writer thus quaintly expresses
this opinion: He "has hindered mankind, for many ages, from hitting
those useful inventions which yet were so obvious and facile that it
is everybody's wonder that they were not sooner hit upon. The bemisted
world must jog on for thousands of years without the knowledge of the
loadstone, till a Neapolitan stumbled upon it about three hundred
years ago. Nor must the world be blessed with such a matchless engine
of learning and virtue as that of printing, till about the middle of
the fifteenth century. Nor could one old man, all over the face of the
whole earth, have the benefit of such a little, though most needful,
thing as a pair of spectacles, till a Dutchman, a little while ago,
accommodated us. Indeed, as the Devil does begrudge us all manner of
good, so he does annoy us with all manner of woe." In one of his
sermons, Cotton Mather claimed for himself and his clerical brethren
the honor of being particularly obnoxious to the malice of the Evil
One. "The ministers of God," says he, "are more dogged by the Devil
than other persons are."

Without a knowledge of this sentiment, the witchcraft delusion of our
fathers cannot be understood. They were under an impression, that the
Devil, having failed to prevent the progress of knowledge in Europe,
had abandoned his efforts to obstruct it effectually there; had
withdrawn into the American wilderness, intending here to make a final
stand; and had resolved to retain an undiminished empire over the
whole continent and his pagan allies, the native inhabitants. Our
fathers accounted for the extraordinary descent and incursions of the
Evil One among them, in 1692, on the supposition that it was a
desperate effort to prevent them from bringing civilization and
Christianity within his favorite retreat; and their souls were fired
with the glorious thought, that, by carrying on the war with vigor
against him and his confederates, the witches, they would become
chosen and honored instruments in the hand of God for breaking down
and abolishing the last stronghold on the earth of the kingdom of
darkness.

That this opinion was not merely a conceit of their vanity, or an
overweening estimate of their local importance, but a calm, deliberate
conviction entertained by others as well as themselves, can be shown
by abundant evidence from the literature of that period. I will quote
a single illustration of the form in which this thought occupied their
minds. The subject is worthy of being thoroughly appreciated, as it
affords the key that opens to view the motives and sentiments which
gave the mighty impetus to the witchcraft prosecution here in New
England.

Joseph Mede, B.D., Fellow of Christ's College, in Cambridge, England,
died in 1638, at the age of fifty-three years. He was perhaps, all
things considered, the most profound scholar of his times. His
writings give evidence of a brilliant genius and an enlightened
spirit. They were held in the highest esteem by his contemporaries of
all denominations, and in all parts of Europe. He was a Churchman; but
had, to a remarkable degree, the confidence of nonconformists. He
entertained, as will appear by what follows, in the boldest form, the
then prevalent opinions concerning diabolical agency and influence;
but, at the same time, was singularly free from some of the worst
traits of superstition and bigotry. His intimacy with the learned Dr.
William Ames, and the general tone and tendency of his writings,
naturally made him an authority with Protestants, particularly the
Pilgrims and Puritans of New England. His posthumous writings,
published in 1652, are exceedingly interesting. They contain fragments
found among his papers, brief discussions of points of criticism,
philosophy, and theology, and a varied correspondence on such subjects
with eminent men of his day. Among his principal correspondents was
Dr. William Twiss, himself a person of much ingenious learning, and
whom John Norton, as we are told by Cotton Mather, "loved and admired"
above all men of that age. The following passages between them
illustrate the point before us.

In a letter dated March 2, 1634, Twiss writes thus:--

     "Now, I beseech you, let me know what your opinion is of our
     English plantations in the New World. Heretofore, I have
     wondered in my thoughts at the providence of God concerning
     that world; not discovered till this Old World of ours is
     almost at an end; and then no footsteps found of the
     knowledge of the true God, much less of Christ; and then
     considering our English plantations of late, and the opinion
     of many grave divines concerning the gospel's fleeting
     westward. Sometimes I have had such thoughts, Why may not
     _that_ be the place of the _New Jerusalem_? But you have
     handsomely and fully cleared me from such odd conceits. But
     what, I pray? Shall our English there degenerate, and join
     themselves with Gog and Magog? We have heard lately divers
     ways, that our people there have no hope of the conversion
     of the natives. And, the very week after I received your
     last letter, I saw a letter, written from New England,
     discoursing of an impossibility of subsisting there; and
     seems to prefer the confession of God's truth in any
     condition here in Old England, rather than run over to enjoy
     their liberty there; yea, and that the gospel is like to be
     more dear in New England than in Old. And, lastly, unless
     they be exceeding careful, and God wonderfully merciful,
     they are like to lose that life and zeal for God and his
     truth in New England which they enjoyed in Old; as whereof
     they have already woful experience, and many there feel it
     to their smart."

Mr. Mede's answer was as follows:--

     "Concerning our plantations in the American world, I wish
     them as well as anybody; though I differ from them far, both
     in other things, and on the grounds they go upon. And though
     there be but little hope of the general conversion of those
     natives or any considerable part of that continent, yet I
     suppose it may be a work pleasing to Almighty God and our
     blessed Saviour to affront the Devil with the sound of the
     gospel and the cross of Christ, in those places where he had
     thought to have reigned securely, and out of the din
     thereof; and, though we make no Christians there, yet to
     bring some thither to disturb and vex him, where he reigned
     without check.

     "For that I may reveal my conceit further, though perhaps I
     cannot prove it, yet I think thus,--that those countries
     were first inhabited since our Saviour and his apostles'
     times, and not before; yea, perhaps, some ages after, there
     being no signs or footsteps found among them, or any
     monuments of older habitation, as there is with us.

     "That the Devil, being impatient of the sound of the gospel
     and cross of Christ, in every part of this Old World, so
     that he could in no place be quiet for it; and foreseeing
     that he was like to lose all here; so he thought to provide
     himself of a seed over which he might reign securely, and in
     a place _ubi nec Pelopidarum facta neque nomen audiret_.
     That, accordingly, he drew a colony out of some of those
     barbarous nations dwelling upon the Northern Ocean (whither
     the sound of Christ had not yet come), and promising them by
     some oracle to show them a country far better than their own
     (which he might soon do), pleasant and large, where never
     man yet inhabited; he conducted them over those desert lands
     and islands (of which there are many in that sea) by the way
     of the north into America, which none would ever have gone,
     had they not first been assured there was a passage that way
     into a more desirable country. Namely, as when the world
     apostatized from the worship of the true God, God called
     Abraham out of Chaldee into the land of Canaan, of him to
     raise a seed to preserve a light unto his name: so the
     Devil, when he saw the world apostatizing from him, laid the
     foundations of a new kingdom, by deducting this colony from
     the north into America, where they have increased since into
     an innumerable multitude. And where did the Devil ever reign
     more absolutely, and without control, since mankind first
     fell under his clutches?

     "And here it is to be noted, that the story of the Mexican
     kingdom (which was not founded above four hundred years
     before ours came thither) relates, out of their own
     memorials and traditions, that they came to that place from
     the _north_, whence their god, _Vitziliputzli_, led them,
     going in an ark before them: and, after divers years' travel
     and many stations (like enough after some generations), they
     came to the place which the sign he had given them at their
     first setting-forth pointed out; where they were to finish
     their travels, build themselves a _city_, and their god a
     _temple_, which is the place where Mexico was built. Now, if
     the Devil were God's ape in _this_, why might he not be
     likewise in bringing the first colony of men into that world
     out of ours? namely, by oracle, as God did Abraham out of
     Chaldee, whereto I before resembled it.

     "But see the hand of Divine Providence. When the offspring
     of these _runagates_ from the sound of Christ's gospel had
     now replenished that other world, and began to flourish in
     those two kingdoms of Peru and Mexico, Christ our Lord sends
     his mastives, the Spaniards, to hunt them out, and worry
     them; which they did in so hideous a manner, as the like
     thereunto scarce ever was done since the sons of Noah came
     out of the ark. What an affront to the Devil was this, where
     he had thought to have reigned securely, and been for ever
     concealed from the knowledge of the followers of Christ!

     "Yet the Devil perhaps is _less grieved_ for the loss of his
     servants by the _destroying_ of them, than he would be to
     lose them by the _saving_ of them; by which latter way, I
     doubt the Spaniards have despoiled him but of a few. What,
     then, if Christ our Lord will give him his _second affront_
     with better Christians, which may be more grievous to him
     than the former? And, if Christ shall set him up a light in
     this manner to dazzle and torment the Devil at his own home,
     I hope they (viz., the Americans) shall not so far
     degenerate (not all of them) as to come into that army of
     Gog and Magog against the kingdom of Christ, but be
     translated thither before the Devil be loosed; if not,
     presently after his tying up."

Dr. Twiss, in a reply to the above, dated April 6, 1635, thanks Mede
for his letter, which he says he read "with recreation and delight;"
and, particularly in reference to the "peopling of the New World," he
affirms that there is "more in this letter of yours than formerly I
have been acquainted with. Your conceit thereabouts, if I have any
judgment, is grave and ponderous."

This correspondence, while it serves as a specimen of the style of
Mede, is a remarkable instance of the power of a sagacious intellect
to penetrate through the darkness of theoretical and fanciful errors,
and behold the truth that lies behind and beyond. The whole
superstructure of the Devil, his oracles, and his schemes of policy
and dominion, covers, in this brief familiar epistle, what is, I
suppose, the theory most accredited at this day of the origin and
traduction of the aboriginal races of America, proceeding from the
nearest portions of the ancient continent on the North, and advancing
down over the vast spaces towards Central and South America. The
letter also foreshadows the decisive conflict which is here to be
waged between the elements of freedom and slavery, between social and
political systems that will rescue and exalt humanity, and those which
depress and degrade it. In the phraseology of that age, it was to be
determined whether--the Old World, in the language of Twiss, "being
almost at an end"--a "light" should be "set up" here to usher in the
"kingdom of Christ," or America also be for ever given over to the
"army of Gog and Magog."

Our fathers were justified in feeling that this was the sense of their
responsibility entertained by all learned men and true Christians in
the Old World; and they were ready to meet and discharge it faithfully
and manfully. They were told, and they believed, that it had fallen to
their lot to be the champions of the cross of Christ against the power
of the Devil. They felt, as I have said, that they were fighting him
in his last stronghold, and they were determined to "tie him up" for
ever.

This is the true and just explanation of their general policy of
administration, in other matters, as well as in the witchcraft
prosecutions.

The conclusion to which we are brought, by a review of the seventeenth
century up to the period when the prosecutions took place here, is,
that the witchcraft delusion pervaded the whole civilized world and
every profession and department of society. It received the sanction
of all the learned and distinguished English judges who flourished
within the century, from Sir Edward Coke to Sir Matthew Hale. It was
countenanced by the greatest philosophers and physicians, and was
embraced by men of the highest genius and accomplishments, even by
Lord Bacon himself. It was established by the convocation of bishops,
and preached by the clergy. Dr. Henry More, of Christ's College,
Cambridge, in addition to his admirable poetical and philosophical
works, wrote volumes to defend it. It was considered as worthy of the
study of the most cultivated and liberal minds to discover and
distinguish "a true witch by proper trials and symptoms." The
excellent Dr. Calamy has already been mentioned in this connection;
and Richard Baxter wrote his work entitled "The Certainty of the World
of Spirits," for the special purpose of confirming and diffusing the
belief. He kept up a correspondence with Cotton Mather, and with his
father, Increase Mather, through the medium of which he stimulated and
encouraged them in their proceedings against supposed witches in
Boston and elsewhere. The divines of that day seem to have persuaded
themselves into the belief that the doctrines of demonology were
essential to the gospel, and that the rejection of them was equivalent
to infidelity. A writer in one of our modern journals, in speaking of
the prosecutions for witchcraft, happily and justly observes, "It was
truly hazardous to oppose those judicial murders. If any one ventured
to do so, the Catholics burned him as a heretic, and the Protestants
had a vehement longing to hang him for an atheist." The writings of
Dr. More, of Baxter, Glanvil, Perkins, and others, had been
circulating for a long time in New England before the trials began at
Salem. It was such a review of the history of opinion as we have now
made, which led Dr. Bentley to declare that "the agency of invisible
beings, if not a part of every religion, is not contrary to any one.
It may be found in all ages, and in the most remote countries. It is
then no just subject for our admiration, that a belief so alarming to
our fears, so natural to our prejudices, and so easily abused by
superstition, should obtain among our fathers, when it had not been
rejected in the ages of philosophy, letters, and even revelation."

The works on demonology, the legal proceedings in prosecutions, and
the phraseology of the people, gave more or less definite form to
certain prominent points which may be summarily noticed. Several terms
and expressions were employed to characterize persons supposed to be
conversant with supernatural and magic art; such as diviner,
enchanter, charmer, conjurer, necromancer, fortune-teller, soothsayer,
augur, and sorcerer. These words are sometimes used as more or less
synonymous, although, strictly speaking, they have meanings quite
distinct. But none of them convey the idea attached to the name of
witch. It was sometimes especially used to signify a female, while
wizard was exclusively applied to a male. The distinction was not,
however, often attempted to be made; the former title being
prevailingly applied to either sex. A witch was regarded as a person
who had made an actual, deliberate, formal compact with Satan, by
which it was agreed that she should become his faithful subject, and
do all in her power to aid him in his rebellion against God and his
warfare against the gospel and church of Christ; and, in consideration
of such allegiance and service, Satan, on his part, agreed to exercise
his supernatural powers in her favor, and communicate to her those
powers, in a greater or less degree, as she proved herself an
efficient and devoted supporter of his cause. Thus, a witch was
considered as a person who had transferred allegiance and worship from
God to the Devil.

The existence of this compact was supposed to confer great additional
power on the Devil, as well as on his new subject; for the doctrine
seems to have prevailed, that, for him to act with effect upon men,
the intervention, instrumentality, and co-operation of human beings
was necessary; and almost unlimited potency was ascribed to the
combined exertions of Satan and those persons in league with him. A
witch was believed to have the power, through her compact with the
Devil, of afflicting, distressing, and rending whomsoever she would.
She could cause them to pine away, throw them into the most frightful
convulsions, choke, bruise, pierce, and craze them, subjecting them to
every description of pain, disease, and torture, and even to death
itself. She was believed to possess the faculty of being present, in
her shape or apparition, at a different place, at any distance
whatever, from that which her actual body occupied. Indeed, an
indefinite amount of supernatural ability, and a boundless freedom and
variety of methods for its exercise, were supposed to result from the
diabolical compact. Those upon whom she thus exercised her malignant
and mysterious energies were said to be bewitched.

Beside these infernal powers, the alliance with Satan was believed to
confer knowledge such as no other mortal possessed. The witch could
perform the same wonders, in giving information of the things that
belong to the invisible world, which is alleged in our day, by
spirit-rappers, to be received through mediums. She could read inmost
thoughts, suggest ideas to the minds of the absent, throw temptations
in the path of those whom she desired to delude and destroy, bring up
the spirits of the departed, and hear from them the secrets of their
lives and of their deaths, and their experiences in the scenes of
being on which they entered at their departure from this.

When we consider that these opinions were not merely prevalent among
the common people, but sanctioned by learning and philosophy, science
and jurisprudence; that they possessed an authority, which but few
ventured to question and had been firmly established by the
convictions of centuries,--none can be surprised at the alarm it
created, when the belief became current, that there were those in the
community, and even in the churches, who had actually entered into
this dark confederacy against God and heaven, religion and virtue; and
that individuals were beginning to suffer from their diabolical power.
It cannot be considered strange, that men looked with more than common
horror upon persons against whom what was regarded as overwhelming
evidence was borne of having engaged in this conspiracy with all that
was evil, and this treason against all that was good.

Elaborate works, scientific, philosophical, and judicial in their
pretensions and reputation,--to some of which reference has been
made,--defined and particularized the various forms of evidence by
which the crime of confederacy with Satan could be proved.

It was believed that the Devil affixed his mark to the bodies of those
in alliance with him, and that the point where this mark was made
became callous and dead. The law provided, specifically, the means of
detecting and identifying this sign. It required that the prisoner
should be subjected to the scrutiny of a jury of the same sex, who
would make a minute inspection of the body, shaving the head and
handling every part. They would pierce it with pins; and if, as might
have been expected, particularly in aged persons, any spot could be
found insensible to the torture, or any excrescence, induration, or
fixed discoloration, it was looked upon as visible evidence and
demonstration of guilt. A physician or "chirurgeon" was required to be
present at these examinations. In conducting them, there was liability
to great roughness and unfeeling recklessness of treatment; and the
whole procedure was barbarous and shocking to every just and delicate
sensibility. There is reason to believe, that, in the trials here,
there was more considerateness, humanity, and regard to a sense of
decent propriety, than in similar proceedings in other countries, so
far as this branch of the investigation is regarded.

Another accredited field of evidence, recognized in the books and in
legal proceedings, was as follows: It was believed, that, when witches
found it inconvenient from any cause to execute their infernal designs
upon those whom they wished to afflict by going to them in their
natural human persons, they transformed themselves into the likeness
of some animal,--a dog, hog, cat, rat, mouse, or toad;
birds--particularly yellow birds--were often imagined to perform this
service, as representing witches or the Devil. They also had imps
under their control. These imps were generally supposed to bear the
resemblance of some small insect,--such as a fly or a spider. The
latter animal was prevailingly considered as most likely to act in
this character. The accused person was closely watched, in order that
the spider imp might be seen when it approached to obtain its
nourishment, as it was thought to do, from the witchmark on the body
of the culprit. Within the cells of a prison, spiders were, of course,
often seen. Whenever one made its appearance, the guard attacked it
with all the zeal and vehemence with which it was natural and proper
to assault an agent of the Wicked One. If the spider was killed in the
encounter, it was considered as an innocent animal, and all suspicion
was removed from its character as the diabolical confederate of the
prisoner; but if it escaped into a crack or crevice of the apartment,
as spiders often do when assailed, all doubt of its guilty connection
with the person accused of witchcraft was removed: it was set down as,
beyond question or cavil, her veritable imp; and the evidence of her
confederacy with Satan was thenceforward regarded as complete. The
books of law and other learned writings, as well as the practice of
courts in the old countries, recognized this doctrine of
transformation into the shapes of animals, and the employment of imps.
Where judicial tribunals countenanced the popular credulity in
maintaining these ideas, there was no security for innocence, and no
escape from wrong. No matter how clear and certain the evidence
adduced, that an accused individual, at the time alleged, was absent
from the specified place; no matter how far distant, whether twenty or
a thousand miles, it availed him nothing; for it was charged that he
was present, and acted through his agent or imp. This notion was
further enlarged by the establishment of the additional doctrine, that
a witch could be present, and act with demoniac power upon her
victims, anywhere, at all times, and at any distance, without the
instrumental agency of any other animal or being, in her spirit,
spectre, or apparition. When the person on trial was accused of having
tortured or strangled or pinched or bruised another, it did not break
the force of the accusation to bring hundreds of witnesses to prove
that he was, at the very time, in another remote place or country; for
it was alleged that he was present in the spectral shape in which
Satan enabled his spirit to be and to act any and every where at once.
It was impossible to disprove the charge, and the last defence of
innocence was swept away.

If any thing strange or remarkable could be discovered in the persons,
histories, or deportment of accused persons, the usage of the
tribunals, and the books of authority on the subject, allowed it to be
brought in evidence against them. If any thing they had forewarned,
or even conjectured, happened to come to pass, any careless speech had
been verified by events, any extraordinary knowledge had been
manifested, or any marvellous feats of strength or agility been
displayed, they were brought up with decisive and fatal effect.

A witch was believed to have the power of operating upon her victims,
at any distance, by the instrumentality of puppets. She would procure
or make an object like a doll, or a figure of some animal,--any little
bunch of cloth or bundle of rags would answer the purpose. She would
will the puppet to represent the person whom she proposed to torment
or afflict; and then whatever she did to the puppet would be suffered
by the party it represented at any distance, however remote. A pin
stuck into the puppet would pierce the flesh of the person whom she
wished to afflict, and produce the appropriate sensations of pain. So
would a pinch, or a blow, or any kind of violence. When any one was
arrested on the charge of witchcraft, a search was immediately made
for puppets from garret to cellar; and if any thing could be found
that might possibly be imagined to possess that character,--any
remnant of flannel or linen wrapped up, the foot of an old stocking,
or a cushion of any kind, particularly if there were any pins in
it,--it was considered as weighty and quite decisive evidence against
the accused party.

A writer, in a recent number of the "North-American Review," on the
superstitions of the American Indians, makes the following
statement:--

     "The sorcerer, by charms, magic songs, magic feats, and the
     beating of his drum, had power over the spirits, and those
     occult influences inherent in animals and inanimate things.
     He could call to him the souls of his enemies. They appeared
     before him in the form of stones. He chopped and bruised
     them with his hatchet; blood and flesh issued forth; and the
     intended victim, however distant, languished and died. Like
     the sorcerer of the middle ages, he made images of those he
     wished to destroy, and, muttering incantations, punctured
     them with an awl; whereupon the persons represented sickened
     and pined away."

It was a received opinion, accredited and acted upon in courts, that a
person in confederacy with the Evil One could not weep. Those accused
of this crime, both in Europe and America, were, in many instances, of
an age and condition which rendered it impossible for them, however
innocent, to escape the effect of this test. A decrepit, emaciated
person, shrivelled and desiccated by age, was placed at the bar: and
if she could not weep on the spot; if, in consequence of her withered
frame, her amazement and indignation at the false and malignant
charges by which she was circumvented, her exhausted sensibility, her
sullen despair, the hopeless horror of her situation, or, from what
often was found to be the effect of the treatment such persons
received, a high-toned consciousness of innocence, and a brave
defiance and stern condemnation of her maligners and persecutors; if,
from any cause, the fountain of tears was closed or dried up,--their
failure to come forth at the bidding of her defamers was regarded as a
sure and irrefragable proof of her guilt.

King James explains the circumstance, that witches could not weep, in
rather a curious manner:--

     "For as, in a secret murther, if the dead carkasse bee at
     any time thereafter handled by the murtherer it will gush
     out of bloud, as if the bloud were crying to the heaven for
     revenge of the murtherer, God having appointed that secret
     supernaturall signe for triall of that secret unnaturall
     crime; so it appeares that God hath appointed (for a
     supernaturall signe of the monstrous impietie of witches),
     that the water shall refuse to receive them in her bosome
     that have shaken off them the sacred water of baptisme, and
     wilfully refused the benefite thereof: no, not so much as
     their eyes are able to shed teares (threaten and torture
     them as ye please), while first they repent (God not
     permitting them to dissemble their obstinacie in so horrible
     a crime), albeit the woman kind especially be able otherwise
     to shed teares at every light occasion when they will,--yea,
     although it were dissemblingly like the crocodiles."

Reginald Scott, in introducing a Romish form of adjuration, makes the
following excellent remarks on the trial by tears:--

     "But alas that teares should be thought sufficient to excuse
     or condemn in so great a cause, and so weightie a triall! I
     am sure that the worst sort of the children of Israel wept
     bitterlie; yea, if there were any witches at all in Israel,
     they wept. For it is written, that all the children of
     Israel wept. Finallie, if there be any witches in hell, I am
     sure they weepe; for there is weeping and wailing and
     gnashing of teeth. But God knoweth many an honest matron
     cannot sometimes in the heaviness of her heart shed teares;
     the which oftentimes are more readie and common with crafty
     queans and strumpets than with sober women. For we read of
     two kinds of teares in a woman's eie; the one of true
     greefe, and the other of deceipt. And it is written, that
     'Dediscere flere foeminam est mendacium;' which argueth that
     they lie, which saie that wicked women cannot weepe. But let
     these tormentors take heed, that the teares in this case
     which runne down the widowe's cheeks, with their crie,
     spoken of by Jesus Sirach, be not heard above. But, lo, what
     learned, godlie and lawful meanes these Popish Inquisitors
     have invented for the triall of true or false teares:--

     'I conjure thee, by the amorous tears which Jesus Christ,
     our Saviour, shed upon the crosse for the salvation of the
     world; and by the most earnest and burning teares of his
     mother, the most glorious Virgine Marie, sprinkled upon his
     wounds late in the evening; and by all the teares which
     everie saint and elect vessell of God hath poured out heere
     in the world, and from whose eies he hath wiped awaie all
     teares,--that, if thou be without fault, thou maist poure
     downe teares aboundantlie; and, if thou be guiltie, that
     thou weep in no wise. In the name of the Father, of the
     Sonne, and of the Holie Ghost. Amen.'

     "The more you conjure, the lesse she weepeth."

A distinction was made between black and white witches. The former
were those who had leagued with Satan for the purpose of doing injury
to others, while the latter class was composed of such persons as had
resorted to the arts and charms of divination and sorcery in order to
protect themselves and others from diabolical influence. They were
both considered as highly, if not equally, criminal. Fuller, in his
"Profane State," thus speaks of them: "Better is it to lap one's
pottage like a dog, than to eat it mannerly, with a spoon of the
Devil's giving. Black witches hurt and do mischief; but, in deeds of
darkness, there is no difference of colors. The white and the black
are both guilty alike in compounding with the Devil." White witches
pretended to extract their power from the mysterious virtues of
certain plants. The following form of charmed words was used in
plucking them:--

    "Hail to thee, holy herb,
      Growing in the ground;
    On the Mount of Calvarie,
      First wert thou found;
    Thou art good for many a grief,
      And healest many a wound:
    In the name of sweet Jesu,
      I lift thee from the ground."

Then there was the evidence of ocular fascination. The accused and the
accusers were brought into the presence of the examining magistrate,
and the supposed witch was ordered to look upon the afflicted persons;
instantly upon coming within the glance of her eye, they would scream
out, and fall down as in a fit. It was thought that an invisible and
impalpable fluid darted from the eye of the witch, and penetrated the
brain of the bewitched. By bringing the witch so near that she could
touch the afflicted persons with her hand, the malignant fluid was
attracted back into her hand, and the sufferers recovered their
senses. It is singular to notice the curious resemblance between this
opinion--the joint product of superstition and imposture--and the
results to which modern science has led us in the discoveries of
galvanism and animal electricity. The doctrine of fascination
maintained its hold upon the public credulity for a long time, and
gave occasion to the phrase, still in familiar use among us, of
"looking upon a person with an evil eye." Its advocates claimed, in
its defence, the authority of the Cartesian philosophy; but it cannot
be considered, in an age of science and reason, as having any better
support than the rural superstition of Virgil's simple shepherd, who
thus complains of the condition of his emaciated flock:--

                     "They look so thin,
    Their bones are barely covered with their skin.
    What magic has bewitched the woolly dams?
    And what ill eyes beheld the tender lambs?"

Witchcraft, in all ages and countries, was recognized as a reality,
just as much as any of the facts of nature, or incidents to which
mankind is liable. By the laws of all nations, Catholic and Protestant
alike, in the old country and in the new, it was treated as a capital
offence, and classed with murder and other highest crimes, although
regarded as of a deeper dye and blacker character than them all.
Indictments and trials of persons accused of it were not, therefore,
considered as of any special interest, or as differing in any
essential particulars from proceedings against any other description
of offenders. There had been many such proceedings in the American
colonies,--more, perhaps, than have come to our knowledge,--previous
to 1692. They were not looked upon as sufficiently extraordinary to be
transferred, from the oblivion sweeping like a perpetual deluge over
the vast multitude of human experiences, to the ark of history, which
rescues only a select few. The following are the principal facts of
this class of which we have information:--

William Penn presided, in his judicial character, at the trial of two
Swedish women for witchcraft; the grand jury, acting under
instructions from him, having found bills against them. They were
saved, not in consequence of any peculiar reluctance to proceed
against them arising out of the nature of the alleged crime, but only
from some technical defect in the indictment. If it had not been for
this accidental circumstance, as the annalist of Philadelphia
suggests, scenes similar to those subsequently occurring in Salem
Village might have darkened the history of the Quakers, Swedes,
Germans, and Dutch, who dwelt in the City of Brotherly Love and the
adjacent colonies. There had been trials and executions for witchcraft
in other parts of New England, and excitements had obtained more or
less currency in reference to the assaults of the powers of darkness
upon human affairs. These incidents prepared the way for the delusion
in Salem, and provided elements to form its character. They must not,
therefore, be wholly overlooked. But the memorials for their
elucidation are very defective. Hutchinson's "History of
Massachusetts" is, perhaps, the most valuable authority on the
subject. He enjoyed an advantage over any other writer, before, since,
or hereafter, so far as relates to the witchcraft proceedings in 1692;
for he had access to all the records and documents connected with it,
a great part of which have subsequently been lost or destroyed. His
treatment of that particular topic is more satisfactory than can
elsewhere be found. But of incidents of the sort that preceded it, his
information appears to have been very slight and unreliable. It is a
singular fact, that we know more of the history of the first century
of New England than was known by the most enlightened persons of the
intermediate century. There was no regular organized newspaper press,
the commemorative age had not begun, and none seem to have been fully
aware of the importance of putting events on record. The publication,
but a few years since, of the colonial journals of the first
half-century of Massachusetts; researches by innumerable hands among
papers on file in public offices; the printing of town-histories, and
the collections made by historical and genealogical societies,--have
rescued from oblivion, and redeemed from error, many points of the
greatest interest and importance.

Winthrop, in his "Journal," gives an account of the execution of
Margaret Jones, of Charlestown, who had been tried and condemned by
the Court of Assistants. The charges against her were, that she had a
malignant touch, so that many persons,--"men, women, and
children,"--on coming in contact with her, were "taken with deafness,
vomiting, or other violent pains or sickness;" that she practised
physic, and her medicines, "being such things as (by her own
confession) were harmless, as aniseed, liquors, &c., yet had
extraordinary violent effects;" and that they found on her body, "upon
a forced search," the witchmarks, particularly "a teat, as fresh if it
had been newly sucked." Other ridiculous allegations were made against
her. As for the effects of the touch, it is obvious that they could be
easily simulated by evil-disposed persons. The whole substance of her
offence seems to have been, that she was very successful in the use of
simple prescriptions for the cure of diseases. Her practice was
charged as "against the ordinary course, and beyond the apprehension
of all physicians and surgeons." A bitter animosity was, accordingly,
raised against her. She treated her accusers and defamers with
indignant resentment. "Her behavior at her trial," says Winthrop, "was
very intemperate, lying notoriously, and railing upon the jury and
witnesses, &c.; and, in the like distemper, she died." We shall find
that the bold assertion of innocence, and indignant denunciations of
the persecutors and defamers who had destroyed their reputations and
pursued them to the death, by persons tried and executed for
witchcraft, in 1692, were regarded by some, as they were by Winthrop,
as proofs of ill-temper and falsehood. The Governor closes his
statement about Margaret Jones, by relating what he regarded as a
demonstration of her guilt: "The same day and hour she was executed,
there was a very great tempest at Connecticut, which blew down many
trees, &c." The records of the General Court contain no express notice
of this case. Perhaps it is referred to in the following paragraph,
under date of May 13, 1648:--

     "This Court, being desirous that the same course which hath
     been taken in England for the discovery of witches, by
     watching, may also be taken here, with the witch now in
     question, and therefore do order that a strict watch be set
     about her every night, and that her husband be confined to a
     private room, and watched also."

Margaret Jones was executed in Boston on the 15th of June. Hutchinson
refers to the statement made by Johnson, in the "Wonder-working
Providence," that "more than one or two in Springfield, in 1645, were
suspected of witchcraft; that much diligence was used, both for the
finding them and for the Lord's assisting them against their witchery;
yet have they, as is supposed, bewitched not a few persons, among whom
two of the reverend elder's children." Johnson's loose and
immethodical narrative covers the period from 1645 till toward the end
of 1651; and Hutchinson was probably misled in supposing that the
Springfield cases occurred as early as 1645. The Massachusetts
colonial records, under the date of May 8, 1651, have this entry:--

     "The Court, understanding that Mary Parsons, now in prison,
     accused for a witch, is likely, through weakness, to die
     before trial, if it be deferred, do order, that, on the
     morrow, by eight o'clock in the morning, she be brought
     before and tried by the General Court, the rather that Mr.
     Pinchon may be present to give his testimony in the case."

Mr. Pinchon was probably able to stay a few days longer. She was not
brought to trial before the Court until the 13th, under which date is
the following:--

     "Mary Parsons, wife of Hugh Parsons, of Springfield, being
     committed to prison for suspicion of witchcraft, as also for
     murdering her own child, was this day called forth, and
     indicted for witchcraft. 'By the name of Mary Parsons, you
     are here, before the General Court, charged, in the name of
     this Commonwealth, that, not having the fear of God before
     your eyes nor in your heart, being seduced by the Devil, and
     yielding to his malicious motion, about the end of February
     last, at Springfield, to have familiarity, or consulted
     with, a familiar spirit, making a covenant with him; and
     have used divers devilish practices by witchcraft, to the
     hurt of the persons of Martha and Rebecca Moxon, against the
     word of God and the laws of this jurisdiction, long since
     made and published.' To which indictment she pleaded 'Not
     guilty.' All evidences brought in against her being heard
     and examined, the Court found the evidences were not
     sufficient to prove her a witch, and therefore she was
     cleared in that respect.

     "At the same time, she was indicted for murdering her child.
     'By the name of Mary Parsons, you are here, before the
     General Court, charged, in the name of this Commonwealth,
     that, not having the fear of God before your eyes nor in
     your heart, being seduced by the Devil, and yielding to his
     instigations and the wickedness of your own heart, about the
     beginning of March last, in Springfield, in or near your own
     house, did wilfully and most wickedly murder your own child,
     against the word of God and the laws of this jurisdiction,
     long since made and published.' To which she acknowledged
     herself guilty.

     "The Court, finding her guilty of murder by her own
     confession, &c., proceeded to judgment: 'You shall be
     carried from this place to the place from whence you came,
     and from thence to the place of execution, and there hang
     till you be dead.'"

Under the same date--May 13--is an order of the Court appointing a day
of humiliation "throughout our jurisdiction in all the churches," in
consideration, among other things, of the extent to which "Satan
prevails amongst us in respect of witchcrafts."

The colonial records, under date of May 31, 1652, recite the facts,
that Hugh Parsons, of Springfield, had been tried before the Court of
Assistants--held at Boston, May 12, 1652--for witchcraft; that the
case was transferred to a "jury of trials," which found him guilty.
The magistrates not consenting to the verdict of the jury, the case
came legally to the General Court, which body decided that "he was not
legally guilty of witchcraft, and so not to die by law."

When these citations are collated and examined, and it is remembered
that Mr. Moxon was the "reverend elder" of the church at Springfield,
it cannot be doubted that the case of the Parsonses is that referred
to by Johnson in the "Wonder-working Providence," and that Hutchinson
was in error as to the date. We are left in doubt as to the fate of
Mary Parsons. There is a marginal entry on the records, to the effect
that she was reprieved to the 29th of May. Neither Johnson nor
Hutchinson seem to have thought that the sentence was ever carried
into effect. It clearly never ought to have been. The woman was in a
weak and dying condition, her mind was probably broken down,--the
victim of that peculiar kind of mania--partaking of the character of a
religious fanaticism and perversion of ideas--that has often led to
child-murder.

These instances show, that, at that time, the General Court exercised
consideration and discrimination in the treatment of questions of this
kind brought before it.

Hutchinson, on the authority of Hale, says that a woman at Dorchester,
and another at Cambridge, were executed, not far from this time, for
witchcraft; and that they asserted their innocence with their dying
breath. He also says, that, in 1650, "a poor wretch,--Mary
Oliver,--probably weary of her life from the general reputation of
being a witch, after long examination, was brought to a confession of
her guilt; but I do not find that she was executed."

In 1656, a very remarkable case occurred. William Hibbins was a
merchant in Boston, and one of the most prominent and honored citizens
of Massachusetts. He was admitted a freeman in 1640; was deputy in
the General Court in that and the following year; was elected an
assistant for twelve successive years,--from 1643 to 1654; represented
the Colony, for a time, as its agent in England, and received the
thanks of the General Court for his valuable service there. No one
appears to have had more influence, or to have enjoyed more honorable
distinction, during his long legislative career. He died in 1654.
Hutchinson says, in the text of his first and second volumes, that his
widow was tried, condemned, and hanged as a witch in 1655, although he
corrects the error in a note to the passage in the first volume. The
following is the statement of the case in the Massachusetts colonial
records, under the date of May 14, 1656:--

     "The magistrates not receiving the verdict of the jury in
     Mrs. Hibbins her case, having been on trial for witchcraft,
     it came and fell, of course, to the General Court. Mrs. Ann
     Hibbins was called forth, appeared at the bar, the
     indictment against her was read; to which she answered, 'Not
     guilty,' and was willing to be tried by God and this Court.
     The evidence against her was read, the parties witnessing
     being present, her answers considered on; and the whole
     Court, being met together, by their vote, determined that
     Mrs. Ann Hibbins is guilty of witchcraft, according to the
     bill of indictment found against her by the jury of life and
     death. The Governor, in open Court, pronounced sentence
     accordingly; declaring she was to go from the bar to the
     place from whence she came, and from thence to the place of
     execution, and there to hang till she was dead.

     "It is ordered, that warrant shall issue out from the
     secretary to the marshal general, for the execution of Mrs.
     Hibbins, on the fifth day next come fortnight, presently
     after the lecture at Boston, being the 19th of June next;
     the marshal general taking with him a sufficient guard."

Mrs. Hibbins is stated to have been a sister of Richard Bellingham, at
that very time deputy-governor, and always regarded as one of the
chief men in the country. Strange to say, very little notice appears
to have been taken of this event, beyond the immediate locality; but
what little has come down to us indicates that it was a case of
outrageous folly and barbarity, justly reflecting infamy upon the
community at the time. Hutchinson, who wrote a hundred years after the
event, and evidently had no other foundation for his opinion than
vague conjectural tradition, gives the following explanation of the
proceedings against her: "Losses, in the latter part of her husband's
life, had reduced his estate, and increased the natural crabbedness of
his wife's temper, which made her turbulent and quarrelsome, and
brought her under church censures, and at length rendered her so
odious to her neighbors as to cause some of them to accuse her of
witchcraft."

While this is hardly worthy of being considered a sufficient
explanation of the matter,--it being beyond belief, that, even at that
time, a person could be condemned and executed merely on account of a
"crabbed temper,"--it is not consistent with the facts, as made known
to us from the record-offices. She could not have been so reduced in
circumstances as to produce such extraordinary effects upon her
character, for she left a good estate. The truth is, that the tongue
of slander was let loose upon her, and the calumnies circulated by
reckless gossip became so magnified and exaggerated, and assumed such
proportions, as enabled her vilifiers to bring her under the censure
of the church, and that emboldened them to cry out against her as a
witch. Hutchinson expresses the opinion that she was the victim of
popular clamor. But that alone, without some pretence or show of
evidence, could not have brought the General Court, in reversal of the
judgment of the magistrates, to condemn to death a person of such a
high social position.

The only clue we have to the kind of evidence bearing upon the charge
of witchcraft that brought this recently bereaved widow to so cruel
and shameful a death, is in a letter, written by a clergyman in
Jamaica to Increase Mather in 1684, in which he says, "You may
remember what I have sometimes told you your famous Mr. Norton once
said at his own table,--before Mr. Wilson, the pastor, elder Penn, and
myself and wife, &c., who had the honor to be his guests,--that one of
your magistrate's wives, as I remember, was hanged for a witch only
for having more wit than her neighbors. It was his very expression;
she having, as he explained it, unhappily guessed that two of her
persecutors, whom she saw talking in the street, were talking of her,
which, proving true, cost her her life, notwithstanding all he could
do to the contrary, as he himself told us." Nothing was more natural
than for her to suppose, knowing the parties, witnessing their
manner, considering their active co-operation in getting up the
excitement against her, which was then the all-engrossing topic, that
they were talking about her. But, in the blind infatuation of the
time, it was considered proof positive of her being possessed, by the
aid of the Devil, of supernatural insight,--precisely as, forty years
afterwards, such evidence was brought to bear, with telling effect,
against George Burroughs.--The body of this unfortunate lady was
searched for witchmarks, and her trunks and premises rummaged for
puppets.

It is quite evident that means were used to get up a violent popular
excitement against her, which became so formidable as to silence every
voice that dared to speak in her favor. Joshua Scottow, a citizen of
great respectability and a selectman, ventured to give evidence in her
favor, counter, in its bearings, to some testimony against her; and he
was dealt with very severely, and compelled to write an humble apology
to the Court, to disavow all friendly interest in Mrs. Hibbins, and to
pray "that the sword of justice may be drawn forth against all
wickedness." He says, "I am cordially sorry that any thing from me,
either by word or writing, should give offence to the honored Court,
my dear brethren in the church, or any others."

Hutchinson states that there were, however, some persons then in
Boston, who denounced the proceedings against Mrs. Hibbins, and
regarded her, not merely as a persecuted woman, but as "a saint;" that
a deep feeling of resentment against her persecutors long remained in
their minds; and that they afterwards "observed solemn marks of
Providence set upon those who were very forward to condemn her." It is
evident that the Court of Magistrates were opposed to her conviction,
and that Mr. Norton did what he could to save her. He was one of the
four "great Johns," who were the first ministers of the church in
Boston; and it is remarkable, as showing the violence of the people
against her, that even his influence was of no avail in her favor. But
she had other friends, as appears from her will, which, after all, is
the only source of reliable information we have respecting her
character. It is dated May 27, 1656, a few days after she received the
sentence of death. In it she names, as overseers and administrators of
her estate, "Captain Thomas Clarke, Lieutenant Edward Hutchinson,
Lieutenant William Hudson, Ensign Joshua Scottow, and Cornet Peter
Oliver." In a codicil, she says, "I do earnestly desire my loving
friends, Captain Johnson and Mr. Edward Rawson, to be added to the
rest of the gentlemen mentioned as overseers of my will." It can
hardly be doubted, that these persons--and they were all leading
citizens--were known by her to be among her friends.

The whole tone and manner of these instruments give evidence, that she
had a mind capable of rising above the power of wrong, suffering, and
death itself. They show a spirit calm and serene. The disposition of
her property indicates good sense, good feeling, and business
faculties suitable to the occasion. In the body of the will, there is
not a word, a syllable, or a turn of expression, that refers to, or is
in the slightest degree colored by, her peculiar situation. In the
codicil, dated June 16, there is this sentence: "My desire is, that
all my overseers would be pleased to show so much respect unto my dead
corpse as to cause it to be decently interred, and, if it may be, near
my late husband."

When married to Mr. Hibbins, she was a widow, named Moore. There were
no children by her last marriage,--certainly none living at the time
of her death. There were three sons by her former marriage,--John,
Joseph, and Jonathan. These were all in England; but the youngest,
hearing of her situation, embarked for America. When she wrote the
codicil,--three days before her execution,--she added, at the end,
having apparently just heard of his coming, "I give my son Jonathan
twenty pounds, over and above what I have already given him, towards
his pains and charge in coming to see me, which shall be first paid
out of my estate." There is reason to cherish the belief that he
reached her in the short interval between the date of the codicil and
her death, from the tenor of the following postscript, written and
signed on the morning of her execution: "My further mind and will is,
out of my sense of the more than ordinary affection and pains of my
son Jonathan in the times of my distress, I give him, as a further
legacy, ten pounds." The will was proved in Court, July 2, 1656. The
will and codicil speak of her "farms at Muddy River;" and of chests
and a desk, in which were valuables of such importance that she took
especial pains to intrust the keys of them to Edward Rawson, in a
provision of the codicil. The estate was inventoried at £344. 14_s._,
which was a considerable property in those days, as money was then
valued.

Hutchinson mentions a case of witchcraft in Hartford, in 1662, where
some women were accused, and, after being proceeded against until they
were confounded and bewildered, one of them made the most preposterous
confessions, which ought to have satisfied every one that her reason
was overthrown; three of them were condemned, and one,
certainly,--probably all,--executed. In 1669, he says that Susanna
Martin, of Salisbury,--whom we shall meet again,--was bound over to
the Court on the same charge, "but escaped at that time." Another case
is mentioned by him as having occurred, in 1671, at Groton, in which
the party confessed, and thereby avoided condemnation. In 1673, a case
occurred at Hampton; but the jury, although, as they said, there was
strong ground of suspicion, returned a verdict of "Not guilty;" the
evidence not being deemed quite sufficient. There were several other
cases, about this time, in which some persons were severely handled in
consequence of being reputed witches; and others suffered, as they
imagined, "under an evil hand."

In this immediate neighborhood, there had been several attempts,
previous to the delusion at Salem Village in 1692, to get up
witchcraft prosecutions, but without much success. The people of this
county had not become sufficiently infected with the fanaticism of the
times to proceed to extremities.

In September, 1652, the following presentment was made by the grand
jury:--

     "We present John Bradstreet, of Rowley, for suspicion of
     having familiarity with the Devil. He said he read in a book
     of magic, and that he heard a voice asking him what work he
     had for him. He answered, 'Go make a bridge of sand over the
     sea; go make a ladder of sand up to heaven, and go to God,
     and come down no more.'

     "Witness hereof, FRANCIS PARAT and his wife, of Rowley.
     "Witness, WILLIAM BARTHOLOMEW, of Ipswich."

On the 28th of that month, the jury at Ipswich, "upon examination of
the case, found he had told a lie, which was a second, being convicted
once before. The Court sets a fine of twenty shillings, or else to be
whipped."

Bradstreet was probably in the habit of romancing, and it was wisely
concluded not to take a more serious view of his offences.

In 1658, a singular case of this kind occurred in Essex County. The
following papers relating to it illustrate the sentiments and forms of
thought prevalent at that time, and give an insight of the state of
society in some particulars:--

     _"To the Honored Court to be holden at Ipswich, this twelfth
     month, '58 or '59._

     "HONORED GENTLEMEN,--Whereas divers of esteem with
     us, and as we hear in other places also, have for some time
     suffered losses in their estates, and some affliction in
     their bodies also,--which, as they suppose, doth not arise
     from any natural cause, or any neglect in themselves, but
     rather from some ill-disposed person,--that, upon
     differences had betwixt themselves and one John Godfrey,
     resident at Andover or elsewhere at his pleasure, we whose
     names are underwritten do make bold to sue by way of request
     to this honored court, that you, in your wisdom, will be
     pleased, if you see cause for it, to call him in question,
     and to hear, at present or at some after sessions, what may
     be said in this respect.

     "JAMES DAVIS, Sr., in the behalf of his son EPHRAIM DAVIS.
      JOHN HASELDIN, and JANE his wife.
      ABRAHAM WHITAKER, for his ox and other things.
      EPHRAIM DAVIS, in the behalf of himself."

The petitioners mention in brief some instances in confirmation of
their complaint. There are several depositions. That of Charles Browne
and wife says:--

     "About six or seven years since, in the meeting-house of
     Rowley, being in the gallery in the first seat, there was
     one in the second seat which he doth, to his best
     remembrance, think and believe it was John Godfrey. This
     deponent did see him, yawning, open his mouth; and, while he
     so yawned, this deponent did see a small teat under his
     tongue. And, further, this deponent saith that John Godfrey
     was in this deponent's house about three years since.
     Speaking about the power of witches, he the said Godfrey
     spoke, that, if witches were not kindly entertained, the
     Devil will appear unto them, and ask them if they were
     grieved or vexed with anybody, and ask them what he should
     do for them; and, if they would not give them beer or
     victuals, they might let all the beer run out of the cellar;
     and, if they looked steadfastly upon any creature, it would
     die; and, if it were hard to some witches to take away life,
     either of man or beast, yet, when they once begin it, then
     it is easy to them."

The depositions in this case are presented as they are in the
originals on file, leaving in blank such words or parts of words as
have been worn off. They are given in full.

     "THE DEPOSITION OF ISABEL HOLDRED, who testifieth
     that John Godfree came to the house of Henry Blazdall, where
     her husband and herself were, and demanded a debt of her
     husband, and said a warrant was out, and Goodman Lord was
     suddenly to come. John Godfree asked if we would not pay
     him. The deponent answered, 'Yes, to-night or to-morrow, if
     we had it; for I believe we shall not ... we are in thy
     debt.' John Godfree answered, 'That is a bitter word;' ...
     said, 'I must begin, and must send Goodman Lord.' The
     deponent answered, '... when thou wilt. I fear thee not, nor
     all the devils in hell!' And, further, this deponent
     testifieth, that, two days after this, she was taken with
     those strange fits, with which she was tormented a fortnight
     together, night and day. And several apparitions appeared to
     the deponent in the night. The first night, a humble-bee,
     the next night a bear, appeared, which grinned the teeth and
     shook the claw: 'Thou sayest thou art not afraid. Thou
     thinkest Harry Blazdall's house will save thee.' The
     deponent answered, 'I hope the Lord Jesus Christ will save
     me.' The apparition then spake: 'Thou sayst thou art not
     afraid of all the devils in hell; but I will have thy
     heart's blood within a few hours!' The next was the
     apparition of a great snake, at which the deponent was
     exceedingly affrighted, and skipt to Nathan Gold, who was in
     the opposite chimney-corner, and caught hold of the hair of
     his head; and her speech was taken away for the space of
     half an hour. The next night appeared a great horse; and,
     Thomas Hayne being there, the deponent told him of it, and
     showed him where. The said Tho. Hayne took a stick, and
     struck at the place where the apparition was; and his stroke
     glanced by the side of it, and it went under the table. And
     he went to strike again; then the apparition fled to the ...
     and made it shake, and went away. And, about a week after,
     the deponent ... son were at the door of Nathan Gold, and
     heard a rushing on the ... The deponent said to her son,
     'Yonder is a beast.' He answered, ''Tis one of Goodman
     Cobbye's black oxen;' and it came toward them, and came
     within ... yards of them. The deponent her heart began to
     ache, for it seemed to have great eyes; and spoke to the
     boy, 'Let's go in.' But suddenly the ox beat her up against
     the wall, and struck her down; and she was much hurt by it,
     not being able to rise up. But some others carried me into
     the house, all my face being bloody, being much bruised. The
     boy was much affrighted a long time after; and, for the
     space of two hours, he was in a sweat that one might have
     washed hands on his hair. Further this deponent affirmeth,
     that she hath been often troubled with ... black cat
     sometimes appearing in the house, and sometimes in the night
     ... bed, and lay on her, and sometimes stroking her face.
     The cat seemed ... thrice as big as an ordinary cat."

     "THOMAS HAYNE testifieth, that, being with Goodwife
     Holdridge, she told me that she saw a great horse, and
     showed me where it stood. I then took a stick, and struck on
     the place, but felt nothing; and I heard the door shake, and
     Good. H. said it was gone out at the door. Immediately
     after, she was taken with extremity of fear and pain, so
     that she presently fell into a sweat, and I thought she
     would swoon. She trembled and shook like a leaf.

     "THOMAS HAYNE."

     "NATHAN GOULD being with Goodwife Holgreg one
     night, there appeared a great snake, as she said, with open
     mouth; and she, being weak,--hardly able to go alone,--yet
     then ran and laid hold of Nathan Gould by the head, and
     could not speak for the space of half an hour.

     "NATHAN GOULD."

     "WILLIAM OSGOOD testifieth, that, in the yeare '40,
     in the month of August,--he being then building a barn for
     Mr. Spencer,--John Godfree being then Mr. Spencer's
     herdsman, he on an evening came to the frame, where divers
     men were at work, and said that he had gotten a new master
     against the time he had done keeping cows. The said William
     Osgood asked him who it was. He answered, he knew not. He
     again asked him where he dwelt. He answered, he knew not. He
     asked him what his name was. He answered, he knew not. He
     then said to him, 'How, then, wilt thou go to him when thy
     time is out?' He said, 'The man will come and fetch me
     then.' I asked him, 'Hast thou made an absolute bargain?' He
     answered that a covenant was made, and he had set his hand
     to it. He then asked of him whether he had not a counter
     covenant. Godfree answered, 'No.' W.O. said, 'What a mad
     fellow art thou to make a covenant in this manner!' He said,
     'He's an honest man.'--'How knowest thou?' said W.O. J.
     Godfree answered. 'He looks like one.' W.O. then answered,
     'I am persuaded thou hast made a covenant with the Devil.'
     He then skipped about, and said, 'I profess, I profess!'

     WILLIAM OSGOOD."

The proceedings against Godfrey were carried up to other tribunals, as
appears by a record of the County Court at Salem, 28th of June,
1659:--

     "John Godfrey stands bound in one hundred pound bond to the
     treasurer of this county for his appearance at a General
     Court, or Court of Assistants, when he shall be legally
     summonsed thereunto."

What action, if any, was had by either of these high courts, I have
found no information. But he must have come off unscathed; for, soon
after, he commenced actions in the County Court for defamation against
his accusers; with the following results:--

     "John Godfery plt. agst. Will. Simonds & Sam.ll his son
     dfts. in an action of slander that the said Sam.ll son to
     Will. Simons, hath don him in his name, Charging him to be a
     witch, the jury find for the plt. 2d damage & cost of Court
     29sh., yet notwithstanding doe conceiue, that by the
     testmonyes he is rendred suspicious."

     "John Godfery plt. agst. Jonathan Singletary defendt. in an
     action of Slander & Defamation for calling him witch & said
     is this witch on this side Boston Gallows yet, the
     attachm.t & other evidences were read, committed to the
     Jury & are on file. The Jury found for the plt. a publique
     acknowledgmt, at Haverhill within a month that he hath done
     the plt. wrong in his words or 10sh damage & costs of Court
     £2-16-0."

In the trial of the case between Godfrey and Singletary, the latter
attempted to prove the truth of his allegations against the former, by
giving the following piece of testimony, which, while it failed to
convince the jury, is worth preserving, from the inherent interest of
some of its details:--

     "Date the fourteenth the twelfth month, '62.--THE DEPOSITION
     OF JONATHAN SINGLETARY, aged about 23, who testifieth that I,
     being in the prison at Ipswich this night last past between
     nine and ten of the clock at night, after the bell had rung,
     I being set in a corner of the prison, upon a sudden I heard
     a great noise as if many cats had been climbing up the prison
     walls, and skipping into the house at the windows, and
     jumping about the chamber; and a noise as if boards' ends or
     stools had been thrown about, and men walking in the
     chambers, and a crackling and shaking as if the house would
     have fallen upon me. I seeing this, and considering what I
     knew by a young man that kept at my house last Indian
     Harvest, and, upon some difference with John Godfre, he was
     presently several nights in a strange manner troubled, and
     complaining as he did, and upon consideration of this and
     other things that I knew by him, I was at present something
     affrighted; yet considering what I had lately heard made out
     by Mr. Mitchel at Cambridge, that there is more good in God
     than there is evil in sin, and that although God is the
     greatest good, and sin the greatest evil, yet the first Being
     of evil cannot weane the scales or overpower the first Being
     of good: so considering that the author of good was of
     greater power than the author of evil, God was pleased of his
     goodness to keep me from being out of measure frighted. So
     this noise abovesaid held as I suppose about a quarter of an
     hour, and then ceased: and presently I heard the bolt of the
     door shoot or go back as perfectly, to my thinking, as I did
     the next morning when the keeper came to unlock it; and I
     could not see the door open, but I saw John Godfre stand
     within the door and said, 'Jonathan, Jonathan.' So I, looking
     on him, said, 'What have you to do with me?' He said, 'I come
     to see you: are you weary of your place yet?' I answered, 'I
     take no delight in being here, but I will be out as soon as I
     can.' He said, 'If you will pay me in corn, you shall come
     out.' I answered, 'No: if that had been my intent, I would
     have paid the marshal, and never have come hither.' He,
     knocking of his fist at me in a kind of a threatening way,
     said he would make me weary of my part, and so went away, I
     knew not how nor which way; and, as I was walking about in
     the prison, I tripped upon a stone with my heel, and took it
     up in my hand, thinking that if he came again I would strike
     at him. So, as I was walking about, he called at the window,
     'Jonathan,' said he, 'if you will pay me corn, I will give
     you two years day, and we will come to an agreement;' I
     answered him saying, 'Why do you come dissembling and playing
     the Devil's part here? Your nature is nothing but envy and
     malice, which you will vent, though to your own loss; and you
     seek peace with no man.'--'I do not dissemble,' said he: 'I
     will give you my hand upon it, I am in earnest.' So he put
     his hand in at the window, and I took hold of it with my left
     hand, and pulled him to me; and with the stone in my right
     hand I thought I struck him, and went to recover my hand to
     strike again, and his hand was gone, and I would have struck,
     but there was nothing to strike: and how he went away I know
     not; for I could neither feel when his hand went out of
     mine, nor see which way he went."

It can hardly be doubted, that Singletary's story was the result of
the workings of an excited imagination, in wild and frightful dreams
under the spasms of nightmare. We shall meet similar phenomena, when
we come to the testimony in the trials of 1692.

Godfrey was a most eccentric character. He courted and challenged the
imputation of witchcraft, and took delight in playing upon the
credulity of his neighbors, enjoying the exhibition of their
amazement, horror, and consternation. He was a person of much
notoriety, had more lawsuits, it is probable, than any other man in
the colony, and in one instance came under the criminal jurisdiction
for familiarity with other than immaterial spirits; for we find, by
the record of Sept. 25, 1666, that John Godfrey was "fined for being
drunk."

I have allowed so much space to the foregoing documents, because they
show the fancies which, fermenting in the public mind, and inflamed by
the prevalent literature, theology, and philosophy, came to a head
thirty years afterwards; and because they prove that in 1660 a
conviction for witchcraft could not be obtained in this county. The
evidence against none of the convicts in 1692, throwing out of view
the statements and actings of the "afflicted children," was half so
strong as that against Godfrey. Short work would have been made with
him then.

There is one particularly interesting item in Singletary's
deposition. It illustrates the value of good preaching. This young
man, in his gloomy prison, and overwhelmed with the terrors of
superstition, found consolation, courage, and strength in what he
remembered of a sermon, to which he had happened to listen, from
"Matchless Mitchel." It was indeed good doctrine; and it is to be
lamented that it was not carried out to its logical conclusions, and
constantly enforced by the divines of that and subsequent times.

In November, 1669, there was a prosecution of "Goody Burt," a widow,
concerning whom the most marvellous stories were told. The principal
witness against her was Philip Reed, a physician, who on oath declared
his belief that "no natural cause" could produce such effects as were
wrought by Goody Burt upon persons whom she afflicted. Her range of
operations seems to have been confined to Marblehead, Lynn, Salem, and
the vicinity: as nothing more was ever heard of the case, another
evidence is afforded, that an Essex jury, notwithstanding this
positive opinion of a doctor, was not ready to convict on the charge
of witchcraft. This same Philip Reed tried very hard to prosecute
proceedings, eleven years afterwards, against Margaret Gifford as a
witch. But she failed to appear, and no effort is recorded as having
been made to apprehend her.

In 1673, Eunice Cole, of Hampton, was tried before a county court, at
Salisbury, on the charge of witchcraft; and she was committed to jail,
in Boston, for further proceedings. She was subsequently indicted by
the Grand Jury for the Massachusetts jurisdiction for "familiarity
with the Devil." The Court of Assistants found that there was "just
ground of vehement suspicion of her having had familiarity with the
Devil," and got rid of the case by ordering her "to depart from and
abide out of this jurisdiction."

At a County Court, held at Salem, Nov. 24, 1674, a case was brought
up, of which the following is all we know:--

     "Christopher Browne having reported that he had been
     treating or discoursing with one whom he apprehended to be
     the Devil, which came like a gentleman, in order to his
     binding himself to be a servant to him, upon his
     examination, his discourse seeming inconsistent with truth,
     &c., the Court, giving him good counsel and caution, for the
     present dismiss him."

It would have been well if the action of this Court had been followed
as an authoritative precedent.

In the year 1679, the house of William Morse, of Newbury, was, for
more than two months, infested in a most strange and vexatious manner.
The affair was brought into court, where it played a conspicuous part,
and was near reaching a tragical conclusion. The history of the
proceedings in reference to it is very curious.

Mr. John Woodbridge, of Newbury, had been for some time an associate
county judge, and was commissioned to administer oaths and join
persons in marriage. The following is a record of what occurred
before him, sitting as a magistrate, and as a commissioner to
adjudicate in small, local causes, and hold examinations in matters
that went to higher courts:--

     "Dec. 3, 1679.--Caleb Powell, being complained of for
     suspicion of working with the Devil to the molesting of
     William Morse and his family, was by warrant directed to the
     constable brought in by him. The accusation and testimonies
     were read, and the complaint respited till the Monday
     following.

     "Dec. 8, 1679.--Caleb Powell appeared according to order,
     and further testimony produced against him by William Morse,
     which being read and considered, it was determined that the
     said William Morse should prosecute the case against said
     Powell at the County Court to be held at Ipswich the last
     Tuesday in March ensuing; and, in order hereunto, William
     Morse acknowledgeth himself indebted to the Treasurer of the
     County of Essex the full sum of twenty pounds. The condition
     of this obligation is, that the said William Morse shall
     prosecute his complaint against Caleb Powell at that Court.

     "Caleb Powell was delivered as a prisoner to the constable
     till he could find security of twenty pounds for the
     answering of the said complaint, or else he was to be
     carried to prison.

     "JO: WOODBRIDGE, _Commissioner_."

Powell was accordingly brought before the Court at Ipswich, March 30,
1680, under an indictment for witchcraft. Before giving the substance
of the evidence adduced on this occasion, it will be well to mention
the manner in which he got into the case as a principal. He was a
mate of a vessel. While at home, between voyages, he happened to hear
of the wonderful occurrences at Mr. Morse's house. His curiosity was
awakened, and he was also actuated by feelings of commiseration for
the family under the torments and terrors with which they were said to
be afflicted. Determined to see what it all meant, and to put a stop
to it if he could, he went to the house, and soon became satisfied
that a roguish grandchild was the cause of all the trouble. He
prevailed upon the old grandparents to let him take off the boy.
Immediately upon his removal, the difficulty ceased.

New-England navigators, at that time and long afterwards, sailed
almost wholly by the stars; and Powell probably had often related his
own skill, which, as mate of a vessel, he would have been likely to
acquire, in calculating his position, rate of sailing, and distances,
on the boundless and trackless ocean, by his knowledge and
observations of the heavenly bodies. He had said, perhaps, that, by
gazing among the stars, he could, at any hour of the night, however
long or far he had been tossed and driven on the ocean, tell exactly
where his vessel was. Hence the charge of being an astrologist.
Probably, like other sailors, Powell may have indulged in "long yarns"
to the country people, of the wonders he had seen, "some in one
country, and some in another." It is not unlikely, that, in foreign
ports, he had witnessed exhibitions of necromancy and mesmerism,
which, in various forms and under different names, have always been
practised. Possibly he may have boasted to be a medium himself, a
scholar and adept in the mystic art, able to read and divine "the
workings of spirits." At any rate, when it became known, that, at a
glance, he attributed to the boy the cause of the mischief, and that
it ceased on his taking him away from the house, the opinion became
settled that he was a wizard. He was arrested forthwith, and brought
to trial, as has been stated, for witchcraft. His astronomy,
astrology, and spiritualism brought him in peril of his life.

     "THE TESTIMONY OF WILLIAM MORSE: which saith,
     together with his wife, aged both about sixty-five years:
     that, Thursday night, being the twenty-seventh day of
     November, we heard a great noise without, round the house,
     of knocking the boards of the house, and, as we conceived,
     throwing of stones against the house. Whereupon myself and
     wife looked out and saw nobody, and the boy all this time
     with us; but we had stones and sticks thrown at us, that we
     were forced to retire into the house again. Afterwards we
     went to bed, and the boy with us; and then the like noise
     was upon the roof of the house.

     "2. The same night about midnight, the door being locked
     when we went to bed, we heard a great hog in the house grunt
     and make a noise, as we thought willing to get out; and,
     that we might not be disturbed in our sleep, I rose to let
     him out, and I found a hog in the house and the door
     unlocked: the door was firmly locked when we went to bed.

     "3. The next morning, a stick of links hanging in the
     chimney, they were thrown out of their place, and we hanged
     them up again, and they were thrown down again, and some
     into the fire.

     "4. The night following, I had a great awl lying in the
     window, the which awl we saw fall down out of the chimney
     into the ashes by the fire.

     "5. After this, I bid the boy put the same awl into the
     cupboard, which we saw done, and the door shut to: this same
     awl came presently down the chimney again in our sight, and
     I took it up myself. Again, the same night, we saw a little
     Indian basket, that was in the loft before, come down the
     chimney again. And I took the same basket, and put a piece
     of brick into it, and the basket with the brick was gone,
     and came down again the third time with the brick in it, and
     went up again the fourth time, and came down again without
     the brick; and the brick came down again a little after.

     "6. The next day, being Saturday, stones, sticks, and pieces
     of bricks came down, so that we could not quietly dress our
     breakfast; and sticks of fire also came down at the same
     time.

     "7. That day in the afternoon, my thread four times taken
     away, and came down the chimney; again, my awl and gimlet,
     wanting, came down the chimney; again, my leather, taken
     away, came down the chimney; again, my nails, being in the
     cover of a firkin, taken away, came down the chimney. Again,
     the same night, the door being locked, a little before day,
     hearing a hog in the house, I rose, and saw the hog to be
     mine: I let him out.

     "8. The next day being sabbath-day, many stones and sticks
     and pieces of bricks came down the chimney: on the Monday,
     Mr. Richardson and my brother being there, the frame of my
     cowhouse they saw very firm. I sent my boy out to scare the
     fowls from my hog's meat: he went to the cowhouse, and it
     fell down, my boy crying with the hurt of the fall. In the
     afternoon, the pots hanging over the fire did dash so
     vehemently one against the other, we set down one that they
     might not dash to pieces. I saw the andiron leap into the
     pot, and dance and leap out, and again leap in and dance and
     leap out again, and leap on a table and there abide, and my
     wife saw the andiron on the table: also I saw the pot turn
     itself over, and throw down all the water. Again, we saw a
     tray with wool leap up and down, and throw the wool out, and
     so many times, and saw nobody meddle with it. Again, a tub
     his hoop fly off of itself and the tub turn over, and nobody
     near it. Again, the woollen wheel turned upside down, and
     stood up on its end, and a spade set on it; Steph.
     Greenleafe saw it, and myself and my wife. Again, my
     rope-tools fell down upon the ground before my boy could
     take them, being sent for them; and the same thing of nails
     tumbled down from the loft into the ground, and nobody near.
     Again, my wife and boy making the bed, the chest did open
     and shut: the bed-clothes could not be made to lie on the
     bed, but fly off again.

     "Again, Caleb Powell came in, and, being affected to see our
     trouble, did promise me and my wife, that, if we would be
     willing to let him keep the boy, we should see ourselves
     that we should be never disturbed while he was gone with
     him: he had the boy, and had been quiet ever since.

     "THO. ROGERS and GEORGE HARDY, being at
     William Morse his house, affirm that the earth in the
     chimney-corner moved, and scattered on them; that Tho.
     Rogers was hit with somewhat, Hardy with an iron ladle as is
     supposed. Somewhat hit William Morse a great blow, but it
     was so swift that they could not certainly tell what it was;
     but, looking down after they heard the noise, they saw a
     shoe. The boy was in the corner at the first, afterwards in
     the house.

     "Mr. RICHARDSON on Saturday testifieth that a board
     flew against his chair, and he heard a noise in another
     room, which he supposed in all reason to be diabolical.

     "JOHN DOLE saw a pine stick of candlewood to fall
     down, a stone, a firebrand; and these things he saw not what
     way they came, till they fell down by him.

     "The same affirmed by John Tucker: the boy was in one
     corner, whom they saw and observed all the while, and saw no
     motion in him.

     "ELIZABETH TITCOMB affirmeth that Powell said that
     he could find the witch by his learning, if he had another
     scholar with him: this she saith were his expressions, to
     the best of her memory.

     "JO. TUCKER affirmeth that Powell said to him, he
     saw the boy throw the shoe while he was at prayer.

     "JO. EMERSON affirmeth that Powell said he was
     brought up under Norwood; and it was judged by the people
     there, that Norwood studied the black art.

     "A FURTHER TESTIMONY OF WILLIAM MORSE AND HIS WIFE.--We saw a
     keeler of bread turn over against me, and struck me, not any
     being near it, and so overturned. I saw a chair standing in
     the house, and not anybody near: it did often bow towards me,
     and so rise up again. My wife also being in the chamber, the
     chamber-door did violently fly together, not anybody being
     near it. My wife, going to make a bed, it did move to and
     fro, not anybody being near it. I also saw an iron wedge and
     spade was flying out of the chamber on my wife, and did not
     strike her. My wife going into the cellar, a drum, standing
     in the house, did roll over the door of the cellar; and,
     being taken up again, the door did violently fly down again.
     My barn-doors four times unpinned, I know not how. I, going
     to shut my barn-door, looking for the pin,--the boy being
     with me, as I did judge,--the pin, coming down out of the
     air, did fall down near to me. Again, Caleb Powell came in,
     as beforesaid, and, seeing our spirits very low by the sense
     of our great affliction, began to bemoan our condition, and
     said that he was troubled for our afflictions, and said that
     he had eyed this boy, and drawed near to us with great
     compassion: 'Poor old man, poor old woman! this boy is the
     occasion of your grief; for he hath done these things, and
     hath caused his good old grandmother to be counted a witch.'
     'Then,' said I, 'how can all these things be done by him?'
     Said he, 'Although he may not have done all, yet most of
     them; for this boy is a young rogue, a vile rogue: I have
     watched him, and see him do things as to come up and down.'
     Caleb Powell also said he had understanding in astrology and
     astronomy, and knew the working of spirits, some in one
     country, and some in another; and, looking on the boy, said,
     'You young rogue, to begin so soon. Goodman Morse, if you be
     willing to let me have this boy, I will undertake you shall
     be free from any trouble of this kind while he is with me.' I
     was very unwilling at the first, and my wife; but, by often
     urging me, till he told me whither, and what employment and
     company, he should go, I did consent to it, and this was
     before Jo. Badger came; and we have been freed from any
     trouble of this kind ever since that promise, made on Monday
     night last, to this time, being Friday in the afternoon. Then
     we heard a great noise in the other room, oftentimes, but,
     looking after it, could not see any thing; but, afterwards
     looking into the room, we saw a board hanged to the press.
     Then we, being by the fire, sitting in a chair, my chair
     often would not stand still, but ready to throw me backward
     oftentimes. Afterward, my cap almost taken off my head three
     times. Again, a great blow on my poll, and my cat did leap
     from me into the chimney corner. Presently after, this cat
     was thrown at my wife. We saw the cat to be ours: we put her
     out of the house, and shut the door. Presently, the cat was
     throwed into the house. We went to go to bed. Suddenly,--my
     wife being with me in bed, the lamp-light by our side,--my
     cat again throwed at us five times, jumping away presently
     into the floor; and, one of those times, a red waistcoat
     throwed on the bed, and the cat wrapped up in it. Again, the
     lamp, standing by us on the chest, we said it should stand
     and burn out; but presently was beaten down, and all the oil
     shed, and we left in the dark. Again, a great voice, a great
     while, very dreadful. Again, in the morning, a great stone,
     being six-pound weight, did remove from place to place,--we
     saw it,--two spoons throwed off the table, and presently the
     table throwed down. And, being minded to write, my inkhorn
     was hid from me, which I found, covered with a rag, and my
     pen quite gone. I made a new pen; and, while I was writing,
     one ear of corn hit me in the face, and fire, sticks, and
     stones throwed at me, and my pen brought to me. While I was
     writing with my new pen, my inkhorn taken away: and, not
     knowing how to write any more, we looked under the table, and
     there found him; and so I was able to write again. Again, my
     wife her hat taken from her head, sitting by the fire by me,
     the table almost thrown down. Again, my spectacles thrown
     from the table, and thrown almost into the fire by me, and my
     wife and the boy. Again, my book of all my accounts thrown
     into the fire, and had been burnt presently, if I had not
     taken it up. Again, boards taken off a tub, and set upright
     by themselves; and my paper, do what I could, hardly keep it
     while I was writing this relation, and things thrown at me
     while a-writing. Presently, before I could dry my writing, a
     mormouth hat rubbed along it; but I held so fast that it did
     blot but some of it. My wife and I, being much afraid that I
     should not preserve it for public use, did think best to lay
     it in the Bible, and it lay safe that night. Again, the next,
     I would lay it there again; but, in the morning, it was not
     there to be found, the bag hanged down empty; but, after, was
     found in a box alone. Again, while I was writing this
     morning, I was forced to forbear writing any more, I was so
     disturbed with so many things constantly thrown at me.

     "This relation brought in Dec. 8.

     "I, ANTHONY MORSE, occasionally being at my brother
     Morse's house, my brother showed me a piece of a brick which
     had several times come down the chimney. I sitting in the
     corner, I took the piece of brick in my hand. Within a
     little space of time, the piece of brick was gone from me, I
     knew not by what means. Quickly after, the piece of brick
     came down the chimney. Also, in the chimney-corner I saw a
     hammer on the ground: there being no person near the hammer,
     it was suddenly gone, by what means I know not. But, within
     a little space after, the hammer came down the chimney. And,
     within a little space of time after that, came a piece of
     wood down the chimney, about a foot long; and, within a
     little after that, came down a firebrand, the fire being
     out. This was about ten days ago.

     "JOHN BADGER affirmeth, that, being at William
     Morse his house, and heard Caleb Powell say that he thought
     by astrology, and I think he said by astronomy too, with it,
     he could find out whether or no there were diabolical means
     used about the said Morse his trouble, and that the said
     Caleb said he thought to try to find it out.

     "THE DEPOSITION OF MARY TUCKER, aged about
     twenty.--She remembered that Caleb Powell came into her
     house, and said to this purpose: That he, coming to William
     Morse his house, and the old man, being at prayer, he
     thought not fit to go in, but looked in at the window; and
     he said he had broken the enchantment; for he saw the boy
     play tricks while he was at prayer, and mentioned some, and,
     among the rest, that he saw him to fling the shoe at the
     said Morse's head.

     "Taken on oath, March 29, 1680, before me,

     "JO: WOODBRIDGE, _Commissioner_.

     "Mary Richardson confirmed the truth of the above written
     testimony, on oath, at the same time."

There seem to have been several hearings before Commissioner
Woodbridge. The boy had returned to his grandparents before the last
deposition of William Morse, and his audacious operations were
persisted in to the last. The final decision of the Court was as
follows:--

     "Upon the hearing the complaint brought to this Court
     against Caleb Powell for suspicion of working by the Devil
     to the molesting of the family of William Morse of Newbury,
     though this court cannot find any evident ground of
     proceeding further against the said Caleb Powell, yet we
     determine that he hath given such ground of suspicion of his
     so dealing that we cannot so acquit him, but that he justly
     deserves to bear his own share and the costs of the
     prosecution of the complaint.

     "Referred to Mr. Woodbridge to examine and determine the
     charges."

The entry of this sentence, in the records of the County Court, is as
follows; the clerk strangely mistaking the name of the party:--

     "The Court held at Ipswich, the 30th of March, 1680.

     "In the case of Abell Powell, though the Court do not see
     sufficient to charge further, yet find so much suspicion as
     that he pay the charges. The ordering of the charges left to
     Mr. Jo: Woodbridge."

The matter of Powell's connection with the affair being thus disposed
of, and no one seeming to entertain his idea of the guilt of the boy,
the next step was to fasten suspicion upon the good old grandmother;
and a general outcry was raised against her. Her arrest and
condemnation were clamored for. But the result of Powell's trial, and
all preceding cases, showed that an Essex jury could not yet be relied
on for a conviction in witchcraft cases; and it was resolved to
institute proceedings in a more favorable quarter. The Grand Jury
returned a bill of indictment against her to the Court of Assistants,
sitting in Boston. This was the highest tribunal in the country,
subject only to the General Court, and embracing the whole colony in
its jurisdiction. The following is the substance of the record of the
case:--

At a Court of Assistants, on adjournment, held at Boston, on the 20th
of May, 1680.

The Grand Jury having presented Elizabeth Morse, wife of William
Morse, she was tried and convicted of the crime of witchcraft. The
Governor, on the 27th of May, "after the lecture," in the First
Church of Boston, pronounced the sentence of death upon her. On the
1st of June, the Governor and Assistants voted to reprieve her "until
the next session of the Court in Boston." At the said next session,
the reprieval was still further continued. This seems to have produced
much dissatisfaction, as is shown by the following extract from the
records of the House of Deputies:--

     "The Deputies, on perusal of the Acts of the Honored Court
     of Assistants, relating to the woman condemned for
     witchcraft, do not understand the reason why the sentence,
     given against her by said Court, is not executed: and the
     second reprieval seems to us beyond what the law will allow,
     and do therefore judge meet to declare ourselves against it,
     with reference to the concurrence of the honored magistrates
     hereto.

     WILLIAM TORREY, _Clerk_."

The action of the magistrates, on this reference, is recorded as
follows:--

     "3d of November, 1680.--Not consented to by magistrates.

     EDWARD RAWSON, Secretary."

The evidence against Mrs. Morse was frivolous to the last degree,
without any of the force and effect given to support the prosecutions
in Salem, twelve years afterwards, by the astounding confessions of
the accused, and the splendid acting of the "afflicted children;" yet
she was tried and condemned in Boston, and sentenced there on
"Lecture-day." The representatives of the people, in the House of
Deputies, cried out against her reprieve. She was saved by the
courage and wisdom of Governor Bradstreet, subsequently a resident of
Salem, where his ashes rest. He was living here, at the age of ninety
years, during the witchcraft prosecutions in 1692; but, old as he was,
he made known his entire disapprobation of them. It is safe to say,
that, if he had not been superseded by the arrival of Sir William
Phipps as governor under the new charter, they would never have taken
place. Notwithstanding all this,--in spite of the remonstrances, at
the time, of Brattle, and afterwards of Hutchinson,--Boston and other
towns (earlier, if not equally, committed to such proceedings) have,
by a sort of general conspiracy, joined the rest of the world in
trying to throw and fasten the whole responsibility and disgrace of
witchcraft prosecutions upon Salem.

Things continued in the condition just described,--Mrs. Morse in jail
under sentence of death; that sentence suspended by reprieves from the
Governor, from time to time, until the next year, when her husband, in
her behalf and in her name, presented an earnest and touching petition
"to the honored Governor, Deputy-governor, Magistrates, and Deputies
now assembled in Court, May the 18th, 1681," that her case might be
concluded, one way or another. After referring to her condemnation,
and to her attestation of innocence, she says, "By the mercy of God,
and the goodness of the honored Governor, I am reprieved." She begs
the Court to "hearken to her cry, a poor prisoner." She places herself
at the foot of the tribunal of the General Court: "I now stand humbly
praying your justice in hearing my case, and to determine therein as
the Lord shall direct. I do not understand law, nor do I know how to
lay my case before you as I ought; for want of which I humbly beg of
your honors that my request may not be rejected." The House of
Deputies, on the 24th of May, voted to give her a new trial. But the
magistrates refused to concur in the vote; and so the matter stood,
for how long a time there are, I believe, no means of knowing.
Finally, however, she was released from prison, and allowed to return
to her own house. This we learn from a publication made by Mr. Hale,
of Beverly, in 1697. It seems, that, after getting her out of prison
and restored to her home, to use Mr. Hale's words, "her husband, who
was esteemed a sincere and understanding Christian by those that knew
him, desired some neighbor ministers, of whom I was one, to discourse
his wife, which we did; and her discourse was very Christian, and
still pleaded her innocence as to that which was laid to her charge."
From Mr. Hale's language, it may be inferred that she had not been
pardoned or discharged, but still lay under sentence of death, after
her removal to her own house: for he and his brethren did not "esteem
it prudence to pass any definite sentence upon one under her
circumstances;" but they ventured to say that they were "inclined to
the more charitable side." Mr. Hale states, that, "in her last
sickness, she was in much trouble and darkness of spirit, which
occasioned a judicious friend to examine her strictly, whether she
had been guilty of witchcraft; but she said _no_, but the ground of
her trouble was some impatient and passionate speeches and actions of
hers while in prison, upon the account of her suffering wrongfully,
whereby she had provoked the Lord by putting contempt upon his Word.
And, in fine, she sought her pardon and comfort from God in Christ;
and died, so far as I understand, praying to and relying upon God in
Christ for salvation."

The cases of Margaret Jones, Ann Hibbins, and Elizabeth Morse
illustrate strikingly and fully the history and condition of the
public mind in New England, and the world over, in reference to
witchcraft in the seventeenth century. They show that there was
nothing unprecedented, unusual, or eminently shocking, after all, in
what I am about to relate as occurring in Salem, in 1692. The only
real offence proved upon Margaret Jones was that she was a successful
practitioner of medicine, using only simple remedies. Ann Hibbins was
the victim of the slanderous gossip of a prejudiced neighborhood; all
our actual knowledge of her being her Will, which proves that she was
a person of much more than ordinary dignity of mind, which was kept
unruffled and serene in the bitterest trials and most outrageous
wrongs which it is possible for folly and "man's inhumanity to man" to
bring upon us in this life. Elizabeth Morse appears to have been one
of the best of Christian women. The accusations against them, as a
whole, cover nearly the whole ground upon which the subsequent
prosecutions in Salem rested. John Winthrop passed sentence upon
Margaret Jones, John Endicott upon Ann Hibbins, and Simon Bradstreet
upon Elizabeth Morse. The last-named governor performed the office as
an unavoidable act of official duty, and prevented the execution of
the sentence by the courageous use of his prerogative, in defiance of
public clamor and the wrath of the representatives of the whole people
of the colony. These facts sufficiently show, that the proceedings
afterwards had in Salem accorded with those in like cases, of that and
preceding generations; and were sanctioned by the all but universal
sentiments of mankind and a uniform chain of precedents.

The trial of Bridget Bishop, in 1680, before the County Court at
Salem, for witchcraft, and her acquittal, have already been mentioned
in the account of Salem Village, in the First Part.

In 1688, an Irish woman, named Glover, was executed in Boston for
bewitching four children belonging to the family of a Mr. Goodwin. She
was a Roman Catholic, represented to have been quite an ignorant
person, and seems, moreover, from the accounts given of her, to have
been crazy. The oldest of the children was only about thirteen years
of age. The most experienced physicians pronounced them bewitched.
Their conduct, as it is related by Cotton Mather, was indeed very
extraordinary. At one time they would bark like dogs, and then again
they would purr like cats. "Yea," says he, "they would fly like
geese, and be carried with an incredible swiftness, having but just
their toes now and then upon the ground, sometimes not once in twenty
feet, and their arms waved like the wings of a bird."

One of the children seems to have had a genius scarcely inferior to
that of Master Burke himself: there was no part nor passion she could
not enact. She would complain that the old Irish woman had tied an
invisible noose round her neck, and was choking her; and her
complexion and features would instantly assume the various hues and
violent distortions natural to a person in such a predicament. She
would declare that an invisible chain was fastened to one of her
limbs, and would limp about precisely as though it were really the
case. She would say that she was in an oven; the perspiration would
drop from her face, and she would exhibit every appearance of being
roasted: then she would cry out that cold water was thrown upon her,
and her whole frame would shiver and shake. She pretended that the
evil spirit came to her in the shape of an invisible horse; and she
would canter, gallop, trot, and amble round the rooms and entries in
such admirable imitation, that an observer could hardly believe that a
horse was not beneath her, and bearing her about. She would go up
stairs with exactly such a toss and bound as a person on horseback
would exhibit.

After some time, Cotton Mather took her into his own family, to see
whether he could not exorcise her. His account of her conduct, while
there, is highly amusing for its credulous simplicity. The cunning and
ingenious child seems to have taken great delight in perplexing and
playing off her tricks upon the learned man. Once he wished to say
something in her presence, to a third person, which he did not intend
she should understand. He accordingly spoke in Latin. But she had
penetration enough to conjecture what he had said: he was amazed. He
then tried Greek: she was equally successful. He next spoke in Hebrew:
she instantly detected the meaning. At last he resorted to the Indian
language, and that she pretended not to know. He drew the conclusion
that the evil being with whom she was in compact was acquainted
familiarly with the Latin, Greek, and Hebrew, but not with the Indian
tongue.

It is curious to notice how adroitly she fell into the line of his
prejudices. He handed her a book written by a Quaker, to which sect it
is well known he was violently opposed: she would read it off with
great ease, rapidity, and pleasure. A book written against the Quakers
she could not read at all. She could read Popish books, but could not
decipher a syllable of the Assembly's Catechism. Dr. Mather was
earnestly opposed to the order and liturgy of the Church of England.
The artful little girl worked with great success upon this prejudice.
She pretended to be very fond of the Book of Common Prayer, and called
it her Bible. It would relieve her of her sufferings, in a moment, to
put it into her hands. While she could not read a word of the
Scriptures in the Bible, she could read them very easily in the
Prayer-book; but she could not read the Lord's Prayer even in this her
favorite volume. All these things went far to strengthen the
conviction of Dr. Mather that she was in league with the Devil; for
this was the only explanation that could be given to satisfy his mind
of her partiality to the productions of Quakers, Catholics, and
Episcopalians, and her aversion to the Bible and the Catechism.

She exhibited the most exquisite ingenuity in beguiling Dr. Mather by
the force of a charm, the power of which he could not resist for a
moment,--flattery. He thus describes, with a complacency but thinly
concealed under the veil of affected modesty, the part she played, in
order to give the impression--which it was the great object of his
ambition to make upon the public mind--that the Devil stood in special
fear of his presence:--

     "There then stood open the study of one belonging to the
     family, into which, entering, she stood immediately on her
     feet, and cried out, 'They are gone! they are gone! They say
     that they cannot,--God won't let 'em come here!' adding a
     reason for it which the owner of the study thought more kind
     than true; and she presently and perfectly came to herself,
     so that her whole discourse and carriage was altered into
     the greatest measure of sobriety."

Upon quitting the study, "the demons" would instantly again take hold
of her. Mather continues the statement, by saying that some persons,
wishing to try the experiment, had her brought "up into the study;"
but he says that she at once became--

     "so strangely distorted, that it was an extreme difficulty
     to drag her up stairs. The demons would pull her out of the
     people's hands, and make her heavier than, perhaps, three of
     herself. With incredible toil (though she kept screaming,
     'They say I must not go in'), she was pulled in; where she
     was no sooner got, but she could stand on her feet, and,
     with altered note, say, 'Now I am well.' She would be faint
     at first, and say 'she felt something to go out of her' (the
     noises whereof we sometimes heard like those of a mouse);
     but, in a minute or two, she could apply herself to
     devotion. To satisfy some strangers, the experiment was,
     divers times, with the same success, repeated, until my
     lothness to have any thing done like making a charm of a
     room, caused me to forbid the repetition of it."

Even in her most riotous proceedings, she kept her eye fixed upon the
doctor's weak point. When he called the family to prayers, she would
whistle and sing and yell to drown his voice, would strike him with
her fist, and try to kick him. But her hand or foot would always
recoil when within an inch or two of his body; thus giving the idea
that there was a sort of invisible coat of mail, of heavenly temper,
and proof against the assaults of the Devil, around his sacred person!
After a while, Dr. Mather concluded to prepare an account of these
extraordinary circumstances, wherewithal to entertain his congregation
in a sermon. She seemed to be quite displeased at the thought of his
making public the doings of her master, the Evil One, attempted to
prevent his writing the intended sermon, and disturbed and interrupted
him in all manner of ways. For instance, she once knocked at his study
door, and said that "there was somebody down stairs that would be glad
to see him." He dropped his pen, and went down. Upon entering the
room, he found nobody there but the family. The next time he met her,
he undertook to chide her for having told him a falsehood. She denied
that she had told a falsehood. "Didn't you say," said he, "that there
was somebody down stairs that would be glad to see me?"--"Well," she
replied, with inimitable pertness, "is not Mrs. Mather always glad to
see you?"

She even went much farther than this in persecuting the good man while
he was writing his sermon: she threw large books at his head. But he
struggled manfully against these buffetings of Satan, as he considered
her conduct to be, finished the sermon, related all these
circumstances in it, preached, and published it. Richard Baxter wrote
the preface to an edition printed in London, in which he declares that
he who will not be convinced by all the evidence Dr. Mather presents
that the child was bewitched "must be a very obdurate Sadducee." It is
so obvious, that, in this whole affair, Cotton Mather was grossly
deceived and audaciously imposed upon by the most consummate and
precocious cunning, that it needs no comment. I have given this
particular account of it, because there is reason to believe that it
originated the delusion in Salem. It occurred only four years before.
Dr. Mather's account of the transaction filled the whole country; and
it is probable that the children in Mr. Parris's family undertook to
re-enact it.

There is nothing in the annals of the histrionic art more illustrative
of the infinite versatility of the human faculties, both physical and
mental, and of the amazing extent to which cunning, ingenuity,
contrivance, quickness of invention, and presence of mind can be
cultivated, even in very young persons, than such cases as this just
related. It seems, at first, incredible that a mere child could carry
on such a complex piece of fraud and imposture as that enacted by the
little girl whose achievements have been immortalized by the famous
author of the "Magnalia." Many other instances, however, are found
recorded in the history of the delusion we are discussing.

That of the grandchild of William and Elizabeth Morse, in Newbury, was
nearly as marvellous, and perfectly successful in deceiving the whole
country except Caleb Powell; and he got into much trouble in
consequence of seeing through it. A similar instance of juvenile
imposture is related as having occurred at Amsterdam in 1560. Twenty
or thirty boys pretended to be suddenly seized with a kind of rage and
fury, were cast upon the ground, and tormented with great agony. These
fits were intermittent; and, when they had passed off, their subjects
did not seem to be conscious of what had taken place. While they
lasted, the boys threw up, apparently from their stomachs, large
quantities of needles, pins, thimbles, pieces of cloth, fragments of
pots and kettles, bits of glass, locks of hair, and a variety of other
articles. There was no doubt, at the time, that they were suffering
under the influence of the Devil; and multitudes crowded round them,
and gazed upon them with wonder and horror.

The details of the cases in Newbury and Charlestown were dressed up by
Cotton Mather and other writers in the strongest colors that credulous
superstition and the peculiar views of that age on the subject of
demonology could employ. They were almost universally received as
proof that Satan had commenced an onslaught, such as had never before
been known, upon the Church and the world! They appear to us as simply
absurd, and the result of precocious knavery; not so to the people of
that generation. They were looked upon as fearful demonstrations of
diabolical power, and preludes to the coming of Satan, with his
infernal confederates, to overwhelm the land. The imaginations of all
were excited, and their apprehensions morbidly aroused. The very air
was filled with rumors, fancies, and fears. The ministers sounded the
alarm from their pulpits. The magistrates sharpened the sword of
justice. The deputy-governor of the colony, Danforth, began to arrest
suspected persons months before proceedings commenced, or were thought
of, in Salem Village. It was believed that evil spirits had been seen,
by men's bodily eyes, in a neighboring town. They glided over the
fields, hovered around the houses, appeared, vanished, and
re-appeared on the outskirts of the woods, in the vicinity of
Gloucester. Their movements were observed by several of the
inhabitants; and the whole population of the Cape was kept in a state
of agitation and alarm, in consequence of the mysterious phenomena,
for three weeks. The inhabitants retired to the garrison, and put
themselves in a state of defence against the diabolical besiegers.
Sixty men were despatched from Ipswich, in military array, to
re-enforce the garrison, and several valiant sallies were made from
its walls. Much powder was expended, but no corporeal or incorporeal
blood was shed. An account of these events was drawn up by the Rev.
John Emerson, then the minister of the first parish in Gloucester,
from which the facts now mentioned have been selected. It is very
minute and particular. The appearance and dress of the supernatural
enemies are described. They wore white waistcoats, blue shirts, and
white breeches, and had bushy heads of black hair. Mr. Emerson
concludes his account by expressing the hope that "all rational
persons will be satisfied that Gloucester was not alarmed last summer
for above a fortnight together by real French and Indians, but that
the Devil and his agents were the cause of all the molestation which
at this time befell the town."

These wonderful things took place at Cape Ann, about the time that the
great conflict between the Devil and his confederates on the one hand,
and the ministers and magistrates on the other, at Salem Village, was
reaching its height. It is said that it was regarded by the most
considerate persons, at the time, as an artful contrivance of the
Devil to create a diversion of the attention of the pious colonists
from his operations through the witches in Salem, and, by dividing and
distracting their forces, to obtain an advantage over them in the war
he was waging against their churches and their religion.

       *       *       *       *       *

We are now ready to enter upon the story of Salem witchcraft. We have
endeavored to become acquainted with the people who acted conspicuous
parts in the drama, and to understand their character; and have tried
to collect, and bring into appreciating view, the opinions and
theories, the habits of thought, the associations of mind, the
passions, impulses, and fantasies that guided, moulded, and controlled
their conduct. The law, literature, and theology of the age, as they
bore on the subject, have been brought before us. The last great
display of the effects of the doctrines of demonology, of the belief
of the agency of invisible, irresponsible beings, whether fallen
angels or departed spirits, upon the actions of men and human affairs,
is now to open before us. The final results of superstitions and
fables and fancies, accumulating through the ages, are to be exhibited
in a transaction, an actual demonstration in real life. They are to
present an exemplification that will at once fully display their
power, and deal their death-blow.

Without the least purpose or wish to cover up or extenuate the
follies, excesses, or outrages I am about to describe, into which the
community suffered itself to be led in the witchcraft proceedings of
1692,--with a desire, on the contrary, to make the lesson then given
of the mischief resulting from misguided enthusiasm, and which will
always result when popular excitement is allowed to wield the
organized powers of society, as impressive as facts and truth will
justify,--I feel bound to say, in advance, that there are some
considerations which we must keep before us, while reviewing the
incidents of the transaction. The theological, legal, and
philosophical doctrines and the popular beliefs, on which it was
founded, have, as I have shown, led, in other countries and periods,
to similar, and often vastly more shameful, cruel, and destructive
results. But there was something in the affair, as it was developed
here, that has arrested the notice of mankind, and clothed it with an
inherent interest, beyond all other events of the kind that have
elsewhere or ever occurred.

The moral force engendered in the civilization planted on these
shores, and pervading the whole body of society, supplied a mightier
momentum, as it does to this day, and ever will, to the movement of
the people, acting in a mass and as a unit, than can anywhere else be
found. A population, invigorated by hardy enterprise, and the constant
exercise of all the faculties of freedom, and actuated throughout by
individual energy of character, must be mightier in motion than any
other people. Such a population multiplies tenfold its physical
forces, by the addition of moral and intellectual energies. The men
of the day and scene we are now to contemplate, however deluded, to
whatever extremities carried, were controlled by fixed, absolute,
sharply defined, and, in themselves, great ideas. They believed in
God. They also believed in the Devil. They bowed in an adoration that
penetrated their inmost souls, before the one as a being of infinite
holiness: they regarded the other as a being of an all but infinite
power of evil. They feared and worshipped God. They hated and defied
the Devil. They believed that Satan was waging war against Jehovah,
and that the conflict was for the dominion of the world, for the
establishment or the overthrow of the Church of Christ. The battle,
they fully believed, could have no other issue than the salvation or
the ruin of the souls of men. This was not, with them, a mere
technical, verbal creed. It was a deep-seated conviction, held
earnestly with a clear and distinct apprehension of its import, by
every individual mind. For this warfare, they put on the whole armor
of faith, rallied to the banner of the Most High, and met Satan face
to face. In this one great idea, a stern, determined, unflinching,
all-sacrificing people concentrated their strength. No wonder that the
conflict reached a magnitude which made it observable to the whole
country and all countries at the time, and will make it memorable
throughout all time. Those engaged in it, with this sentiment
absorbing their very souls, passed, for the time, out of the realm of
all other sentiments, and were insensible to all other
considerations. The nearer and dearer the relatives, the higher and
more conspicuous the persons, who, in their belief, were in league
with the Devil, the more profound the abhorrence of their crime, and
the determination to cut off and destroy them utterly. They believed
that Satan had, once before, "against the throne and monarchy of God,
raised impious war and battle proud;" and that for this he had been
cast out from "heaven, with all his host of rebel angels;" that he,
with his army of subordinate wicked spirits, was making a desperate
effort to retrieve his lost estate, by a renewed rebellion against
God; and they were determined to drive him, and all his confederates,
for ever from the confines of the earth. The humble hamlet of Salem
Village was felt to be the great and final battle-ground. However wild
and absurd this idea is now regarded, it was then sincerely and
thoroughly entertained, and must be taken into the account, in coming
to a just estimate of the character of the transaction, and of those
engaged in it.

One other thought is to be borne in mind, as we pass through the
scenes that are to be spread before us. The theology of Christendom,
at that time, so far as it relates to the power and agency of Satan
and demonology in general,--and this is the only point of view on
which I ever refer to theology in this discussion,--and the whole
fabric of popular superstitions founded upon it, had reached their
culmination. The beginning, middle, and close of the seventeenth
century, witnessed the greatest display of those superstitions, and
prepared the way for their final explosion. As the hour of their
dissolution was at hand, and they were doomed to vanish before the
light of science and education, to pass from the realm of supposed
reality into that of acknowledged fiction, it seems to have been
ordered that they should leave monuments behind them, from which their
character, elements, and features, and their terrible influence, might
be read and studied in all subsequent ages.

The ideas in reference to the agency and designs of the great enemy of
God and man, and all his subordinate hosts, witches, fairies, ghosts,
"gorgons and hydras, and chimeras dire," "apparitions, signs, and
prodigies," by which the minds of men had so long been filled, and
their fearful imaginations exercised, as they took their flight,
imprinted themselves, for perpetual remembrance, in productions which,
more than any works of mere human genius, are sure to live for ever.
They left their forms crystallized, with imperishable lineaments, in
the greatest of dramas and the greatest of epics. The plays of
Shakespeare, as the century opened, and the verse of Milton in its
central period, are their record and their picture.

But there was another shape and aspect in which it was pre-eminently
important to have their memory preserved; and that was their
application to life, their influence upon the conduct of men, the
action of tribunals, and the movements of society, and, in general,
their effects, when allowed full operation, upon human happiness and
welfare. This want was supplied, as the century terminated, by the
tragedy in real life, whose scenes are now to be presented in
WITCHCRAFT AT SALEM VILLAGE.

However strange it seems, it is quite worthy of observation, that the
actors in that tragedy, the "afflicted children," and other witnesses,
in their various statements and operations, embraced about the whole
circle of popular superstition. How those young country girls, some of
them mere children, most of them wholly illiterate, could have become
familiar with such fancies, to such an extent, is truly surprising.
They acted out, and brought to bear with tremendous effect, almost all
that can be found in the literature of that day, and the period
preceding it, relating to such subjects. Images and visions which had
been portrayed in tales of romance, and given interest to the pages of
poetry, will be made by them, as we shall see, to throng the woods,
flit through the air, and hover over the heads of a terrified court.
The ghosts of murdered wives and children will play their parts with a
vividness of representation and artistic skill of expression that have
hardly been surpassed in scenic representations on the stage. In the
Salem-witchcraft proceedings, the superstition of the middle ages was
embodied in real action. All its extravagances, absurdities, and
monstrosities appear in their application to human experience. We see
what the effect has been, and must be, when the affairs of life, in
courts of law and the relations of society, or the conduct or feelings
of individuals, are suffered to be under the control of fanciful or
mystical notions. When a whole people abandons the solid ground of
common sense, overleaps the boundaries of human knowledge, gives
itself up to wild reveries, and lets loose its passions without
restraint, it presents a spectacle more terrific to behold, and
becomes more destructive and disastrous, than any convulsion of mere
material nature; than tornado, conflagration, or earthquake.


END OF VOL. I.







AMERICAN CLASSICS


SALEM WITCHCRAFT

_With an Account of Salem Village and A History of Opinions on
Witchcraft and Kindred Subjects_


CHARLES W. UPHAM


_Volume II_


FREDERICK UNGAR PUBLISHING CO.

_New York_

_Fourth Printing, 1969_
_Printed in the United States of America_
Library of Congress Catalog Card No. 59-10887


[Illustration: THE PHILIP ENGLISH HOUSE.--VOL. II., 142.]

[Illustration: Witch Hill. 1866.]




PART THIRD.

WITCHCRAFT AT SALEM VILLAGE.


We left Mr. Parris in the early part of November, 1691, at the crisis
of his controversy with the inhabitants of Salem Village, under
circumstances which seemed to indicate that its termination was near
at hand. The opposition to him had assumed a form which made it quite
probable that it would succeed in dislodging him from his position.
But the end was not yet. Events were ripening that were to give him a
new and fearful strength, and open a scene in which he was to act a
part destined to attract the notice of the world, and become a
permanent portion of human history. The doctrines of demonology had
produced their full effect upon the minds of men, and every thing was
ready for a final display of their power. The story of the Goodwin
children, as told by Cotton Mather, was known and read in all the
dwellings of the land, and filled the imaginations of a credulous age.
Deputy-governor Danforth had begun the work of arrests; and persons
charged with witchcraft, belonging to neighboring towns, were already
in prison.

Mr. Parris appears to have had in his family several slaves, probably
brought by him from the West Indies. One of them, whom he calls, in
his church-record book, "my negro lad," had died, a year or two
before, at the age of nineteen. Two of them were man and wife. The
former was always known by the name of "John Indian;" the latter was
called "Tituba." These two persons may have originated the "Salem
witchcraft." They are spoken of as having come from New Spain, as it
was then called,--that is, the Spanish West Indies, and the adjacent
mainlands of Central and South America,--and, in all probability,
contributed, from the wild and strange superstitions prevalent among
their native tribes, materials which, added to the commonly received
notions on such subjects, heightened the infatuation of the times, and
inflamed still more the imaginations of the credulous. Persons
conversant with the Indians of Mexico, and on both sides of the
Isthmus, discern many similarities in their systems of demonology with
ideas and practices developed here.

Mr. Parris's former residence in the neighborhood of the Spanish Main,
and the prominent part taken by his Indian slaves in originating the
proceedings at the village, may account for some of the features of
the transaction.

During the winter of 1691 and 1692, a circle of young girls had been
formed, who were in the habit of meeting at Mr. Parris's house for the
purpose of practising palmistry, and other arts of fortune-telling,
and of becoming experts in the wonders of necromancy, magic, and
spiritualism. It consisted, besides the Indian servants, mainly of the
following persons:--

Elizabeth, daughter of Mr. Parris, was nine years of age. She seems to
have performed a leading part in the first stages of the affair, and
must have been a child of remarkable precocity. It is a noticeable
fact, that her father early removed her from the scene. She was sent
to the town, where she remained in the family of Stephen Sewall, until
the proceedings at the village were brought to a close. Abigail
Williams, a niece of Mr. Parris, and a member of his household, was
eleven years of age. She acted conspicuously in the witchcraft
prosecutions from beginning to end. Ann Putnam, daughter of Sergeant
Thomas Putnam, the parish clerk or recorder, was twelve years of age.
The character and social position of her parents gave her a prominence
which an extraordinary development of the imaginative faculty, and of
mental powers generally, enabled her to hold throughout. This young
girl is perhaps entitled to be regarded as, in many respects, the
leading agent in all the mischief that followed. Mary Walcot was
seventeen years of age. Her father was Jonathan Walcot (vol. i. p.
225). His first wife, Mary Sibley, to whom he was married in 1664, had
died in 1683. She was the mother of Mary. It is a singular fact, and
indicates the estimation in which Captain Walcot was held, that,
although not a church-member, he filled the office of deacon of the
parish for several years before the formation of the church. Mercy
Lewis was also seventeen years of age. When quite young, she was, for
a time, in the family of the Rev. George Burroughs: and, in 1692, was
living as a servant in the family of Thomas Putnam; although,
occasionally, she seems to have lived, in the same capacity, with that
of John Putnam, Jr., the constable of the village. He was a son of
Nathaniel, and resided in the neighborhood of Thomas and Deacon Edward
Putnam. Mercy Lewis performed a leading part in the proceedings, had
great energy of purpose and capacity of management, and became
responsible for much of the crime and horror connected with them.
Elizabeth Hubbard, seventeen years of age, who also occupies a bad
eminence in the scene, was a niece of Mrs. Dr. Griggs, and lived in
her family. Elizabeth Booth and Susannah Sheldon, each eighteen years
of age, belonged to families in the neighborhood. Mary Warren, twenty
years of age, was a servant in the family of John Procter; and Sarah
Churchill, of the same age, was a servant in that of George Jacobs,
Sr. These two last were actuated, it is too apparent, by malicious
feelings towards the families in which they resided, and contributed
largely to the horrible tragedy. The facts to be exhibited will enable
every one who carefully considers them, to form an estimate, for
himself, of the respective character and conduct of these young
persons. It is almost beyond belief that they were wholly actuated by
deliberate and cold-blooded malignity. Their crime would, in that
view, have been without a parallel in monstrosity of wickedness, and
beyond what can be imagined of the guiltiest and most depraved
natures. For myself, I am unable to determine how much may be
attributed to credulity, hallucination, and the delirium of
excitement, or to deliberate malice and falsehood. There is too much
evidence of guile and conspiracy to attribute all their actions and
declarations to delusion; and their conduct throughout was stamped
with a bold assurance and audacious bearing. With one or two slight
and momentary exceptions, there was a total absence of compunction or
commiseration, and a reckless disregard of the agonies and destruction
they were scattering around them. They present a subject that justly
claims, and will for ever task, the examination of those who are most
competent to fathom the mysteries of the human soul, sound its depths,
and measure the extent to which it is liable to become wicked and
devilish. It will be seen that other persons were drawn to act with
these "afflicted children," as they were called, some from contagious
delusion, and some, as was quite well proved, from a false,
mischievous, and malignant spirit.

Besides the above-mentioned persons, there were three married women,
rather under middle life, who acted with the afflicted children,--Mrs.
Ann Putnam, the mother of the child of that name; Mrs. Pope; and a
woman, named Bibber, who appears to have lived at Wenham. Another
married woman,--spoken of as "ancient,"--named Goodell, had also been
in the habit of attending their meetings; but she is not named in any
of the documents on file, and was probably withdrawn, at an early
period, from participating in the transaction.

In the course of the winter, they became quite skilful and expert in
the arts they were learning, and gradually began to display their
attainments to the admiration and amazement of beholders. At first,
they made no charges against any person, but confined themselves to
strange actions, exclamations, and contortions. They would creep into
holes, and under benches and chairs, put themselves into odd and
unnatural postures, make wild and antic gestures, and utter incoherent
and unintelligible sounds. They would be seized with spasms, drop
insensible to the floor, or writhe in agony, suffering dreadful
tortures, and uttering loud and piercing outcries. The attention of
the families in which they held their meetings was called to their
extraordinary condition and proceedings; and the whole neighborhood
and surrounding country soon were filled with the story of the strange
and unaccountable sufferings of the "afflicted girls." No explanation
could be given, and their condition became worse and worse. The
physician of the village, Dr. Griggs, was called in, a consultation
had, and the opinion finally and gravely given, that the afflicted
children were bewitched. It was quite common in those days for the
faculty to dispose of difficult cases by this resort. When their
remedies were baffled, and their skill at fault, the patient was said
to be "under an evil hand." In all cases, the sage conclusion was
received by nurses, and elderly women called in on such occasions, if
the symptoms were out of the common course, or did not yield to the
prescriptions these persons were in the habit of applying. Very soon,
the whole community became excited and alarmed to the highest degree.
All other topics were forgotten. The only thing spoken or thought of
was the terrible condition of the afflicted children in Mr. Parris's
house, or wherever, from time to time, the girls assembled. They were
the objects of universal compassion and wonder. The people flocked
from all quarters to witness their sufferings, and gaze with awe upon
their convulsions. Becoming objects of such notice, they were
stimulated to vary and expand the manifestations of the extraordinary
influence that was upon them. They extended their operations beyond
the houses of Mr. Parris, and the families to which they belonged, to
public places; and their fits, exclamations, and outcries disturbed
the exercises of prayer meetings, and the ordinary services of the
congregation. On one occasion, on the Lord's Day, March 20th, when the
singing of the psalm previous to the sermon was concluded, before the
person preaching--Mr. Lawson--could come forward, Abigail Williams
cried out, "Now stand up, and name your text." When he had read it, in
a loud and insolent voice she exclaimed, "It's a long text." In the
midst of the discourse, Mrs. Pope broke in, "Now, there is enough of
that." In the afternoon of the same day, while referring to the
doctrine he had been expounding in the preceding service, Abigail
Williams rudely ejaculated, "I know no doctrine you had. If you did
name one, I have forgot it." An aged member of the church was present,
against whom a warrant on the charge of witchcraft had been procured
the day before. Being apprised of the proceeding, Abigail Williams
spoke aloud, during the service, calling by name the person about to
be apprehended, "Look where she sits upon the beam, sucking her
yellow-bird betwixt her fingers." Ann Putnam, joining in, exclaimed,
"There is a yellow-bird sitting on the minister's hat, as it hangs on
the pin in the pulpit." Mr. Lawson remarks, with much simplicity, that
these things, occurring "in the time of public worship, did something
interrupt me in my first prayer, being so unusual." But he braced
himself up to the emergency, and went on with the service. There is no
intimation that Mr. Parris rebuked his niece for her disorderly
behavior. As at several other times, the people sitting near Ann
Putnam had to lay hold of her to prevent her proceeding to greater
extremities, and wholly breaking up the meeting. The girls were
supposed to be under an irresistible and supernatural impulse; and,
instead of being severely punished, were looked upon with mingled
pity, terror, and awe, and made objects of the greatest attention. Of
course, where members of the minister's family were countenanced in
such proceedings, during the exercises of public worship, on the
Lord's Day, in the meeting-house, it was not strange that people in
general yielded to the excitement. But all did not. Several members of
the family of Francis Nurse, Peter Cloyse and wife, and Joseph Putnam,
expressed their disapprobation of such doings being allowed, and
absented themselves from meeting. Perhaps others took the same course;
but whoever did were marked, as the sequel will show.

In the mean while the excitement was worked up to the highest pitch.
The families to which several of the "afflicted children" belonged
were led to apply themselves to fasting and prayer, on which occasions
the neighbors, under the guidance of the minister, would assemble, and
unite in invocations to the Divine Being to interpose and deliver them
from the snares and dominion of Satan. The "afflicted children" who
might be present would not, as a general thing, interrupt the prayers
while in progress, but would break out with their wild outcries and
convulsive spasms in the intervals of the service. In due time, Mr.
Parris sent for the neighboring ministers to assemble at his house,
and unite with him in devoting a day to solemn religious services and
earnest supplications to the throne of Mercy for rescue from the power
of the great enemy of souls. The ministers spent the day in Mr.
Parris's house, and the children performed their feats before their
eyes. The reverend gentlemen were astounded at what they saw, fully
corroborated the opinion of Dr. Griggs, and formally declared their
belief that the Evil One had commenced his operations with a bolder
front and on a broader scale than ever before in this or any other
country.

This judgment of the ministers was quickly made known everywhere; and,
if doubt remained in any mind, it was suppressed by the irresistible
power of an overwhelming public conviction. Individuals were lost in
the universal fanaticism. Society was dissolved into a wild and
excited crowd. Men and women left their fields, their houses, their
labors and employments, to witness the awful unveiling of the demoniac
power, and to behold the workings of Satan himself upon the victims of
his wrath.

It must be borne in mind, that it was then an established doctrine in
theology, philosophy, and law, that the Devil could not operate upon
mortals, or mortal affairs, except through the intermediate
instrumentality of human beings in confederacy with him, that is,
witches or wizards. The question, of course, in all minds and on all
tongues, was, "Who are the agents of the Devil in afflicting these
girls? There must be some among us thus acting, and who are they?" For
some time the girls held back from mentioning names; or, if they did,
it was prevented from being divulged to the public. In the mean time,
the excitement spread and deepened. At length the people had become so
thoroughly prepared for the work, that it was concluded to begin
operations in earnest. The continued pressure upon the "afflicted
children," the earnest and importunate inquiry, on all sides, "Who is
it that bewitches you?" opened their lips in response, and they began
to select and bring forward their victims. One after another, they
cried out "Good," "Osburn," "Tituba." On the 29th of February, 1692,
warrants were duly issued against those persons. It is observable,
that the complainants who procured the warrants in these cases were
Joseph Hutchinson, Edward Putnam, Thomas Putnam, and Thomas Preston.
This fact shows how nearly unanimous, at this time, was the conviction
that the sufferings of the girls were the result of witchcraft. Joseph
Hutchinson was a firm-minded man, of strong common sense, and from his
general character and ways of thinking and acting, one of the last
persons liable to be carried away by a popular enthusiasm, and was
found among the earliest rescued from it. Thomas Preston was a
son-in-law of Francis Nurse.

As all was ripe for the development of the plot, extraordinary means
were taken to give publicity, notoriety, and effect to the first
examinations. On the 1st of March the two leading magistrates of the
neighborhood, men of great note and influence, whose fathers had been
among the chief founders of the settlement, and who were
Assistants,--that is, members of the highest legislative and judicial
body in the colony, combining with the functions of a senate those of
a court of last resort with most comprehensive jurisdiction,--John
Hathorne and Jonathan Corwin, entered the village, in imposing array,
escorted by the marshal, constables, and their aids, with all the
trappings of their offices; reined up at Nathaniel Ingersoll's
corner, and dismounted at his door. The whole population of the
neighborhood, apprised of the occasion, was gathered on the lawn, or
came flocking along the roads. The crowd was so great that it was
necessary to adjourn to the meeting-house, which was filled at once by
a multitude excited to the highest pitch of indignation and abhorrence
towards the prisoners, and of curiosity to witness the novel and
imposing spectacle and proceedings. The magistrates took seats in
front of the pulpit, facing the assembly; a long table or raised
platform being placed before them; and it was announced, that they
were ready to enter upon the examination. On bringing in and
delivering over the accused parties, the officers who had executed the
warrants stated that they "had made diligent search for images and
such like, but could find none." After prayer, Constable George Locker
produced the body of Sarah Good; and Constable Joseph Herrick, the
bodies of Sarah Osburn, and Tituba Mr. Parris's Indian woman. The
evidence seems to indicate, that, on these occasions, the prisoners
were placed on the platform, to keep them from the contact of the
general crowd, and that all might see them.

Sarah Good was first examined, the other two being removed from the
house for the time. In complaining of her, and bringing her forward
first, the prosecutors showed that they were well advised. There was a
general readiness to receive the charge against her, as she was
evidently the object of much prejudice in the neighborhood. Her
husband, who was a weak, ignorant, and dependent person, had become
alienated from her. The family were very poor; and she and her
children had sometimes been without a house to shelter them, and left
to wander from door to door for relief. Whether justly or not, she
appears to have been subject to general obloquy. Probably there was no
one in the country around, against whom popular suspicion could have
been more readily directed, or in whose favor and defence less
interest could be awakened. She was a forlorn, friendless, and
forsaken creature, broken down by wretchedness of condition and
ill-repute. The following are the minutes of her examination, as found
among the files:--

     "_The Examination of Sarah Good before the Worshipful Esqrs.
     John Hathorne and Jonathan Corwin._

     "Sarah Good, what evil spirit have you familiarity
     with?--None.

     "Have you made no contracts with the Devil?--No.

     "Why do you hurt these children?--I do not hurt them. I
     scorn it.

     "Who do you employ then to do it?--I employ nobody.

     "What creature do you employ then?--No creature: but I am
     falsely accused.

     "Why did you go away muttering from Mr. Parris his house?--I
     did not mutter, but I thanked him for what he gave my child.

     "Have you made no contract with the Devil?--No.

     "Hathorne desired the children all of them to look upon her,
     and see if this were the person that hurt them; and so they
     all did look upon her, and said this was one of the persons
     that did torment them. Presently they were all tormented.

     "Sarah Good, do you not see now what you have done? Why do
     you not tell us the truth? Why do you thus torment these
     poor children?--I do not torment them.

     "Who do you employ then?--I employ nobody. I scorn it.

     "How came they thus tormented?--What do I know? You bring
     others here, and now you charge me with it.

     "Why, who was it?--I do not know but it was some you brought
     into the meeting-house with you.

     "We brought you into the meeting-house.--But you brought in
     two more.

     "Who was it, then, that tormented the children?--It was
     Osburn.

     "What is it you say when you go muttering away from persons'
     houses?--If I must tell, I will tell.

     "Do tell us then.--If I must tell, I will tell: it is the
     Commandments. I may say my Commandments, I hope.

     "What Commandment is it?--If I must tell you, I will tell:
     it is a psalm.

     "What psalm?

     "(After a long time she muttered over some part of a psalm.)

     "Who do you serve?--I serve God.

     "What God do you serve?--The God that made heaven and earth
     (though she was not willing to mention the word 'God'). Her
     answers were in a very wicked, spiteful manner, reflecting
     and retorting against the authority with base and abusive
     words; and many lies she was taken in. It was here said that
     her husband had said that he was afraid that she either was
     a witch or would be one very quickly. The worshipful Mr.
     Hathorne, asked him his reason why he said so of her,
     whether he had ever seen any thing by her. He answered 'No,
     not in this nature; but it was her bad carriage to him: and
     indeed,' said he, 'I may say with tears, that she is an
     enemy to all good.'"

The foregoing is in the handwriting of Ezekiel Cheever. The following
is in that of John Hathorne:--

     "Salem Village, March the 1st, 1692.--Sarah Good, upon
     examination, denied the matter of fact (viz.) that she ever
     used any witchcraft, or hurt the abovesaid children, or any
     of them.

     "The abovenamed children, being all present, positively
     accused her of hurting of them sundry times within this two
     months, and also that morning. Sarah Good denied that she
     had been at their houses in said time or near them, or had
     done them any hurt. All the abovesaid children then present
     accused her face to face; upon which they were all
     dreadfully tortured and tormented for a short space of time;
     and, the affliction and tortures being over, they charged
     said Sarah Good again that she had then so tortured them,
     and came to them and did it, although she was personally
     then kept at a considerable distance from them.

     "Sarah Good being asked if that she did not then hurt them,
     who did it; and the children being again tortured, she
     looked upon them, and said that it was one of them we
     brought into the house with us. We asked her who it was: she
     then answered, and said it was Sarah Osburn, and Sarah
     Osburn was then under custody, and not in the house; and the
     children, being quickly after recovered out of their fit,
     said that it was Sarah Good and also Sarah Osburn that then
     did hurt and torment or afflict them, although both of them
     at the same time at a distance or remote from them
     personally. There were also sundry other questions put to
     her, and answers given thereunto by her according as is also
     given in."

It will be noticed that the examination was conducted in the form of
questions put by the magistrate, Hathorne, based upon a foregone
conclusion of the prisoner's guilt, and expressive of a conviction,
all along on his part, that the evidence of "the afflicted" against
her amounted to, and was, absolute demonstration. It will also be
noticed, that, severe as was the opinion of her husband in reference
to her general conduct, he could not be made to say that he had ever
noticed any thing in her of the nature of witchcraft. The torments the
girls affected to experience in looking at her must have produced an
overwhelming effect on the crowd, as they did on the magistrate, and
even on the poor, amazed creature herself. She did not seem to doubt
the reality of their sufferings. In this, and in all cases, it must be
remembered that the account of the examination comes to us from those
who were under the wildest excitement against the prisoners; that no
counsel was allowed them; that, if any thing was suffered to be said
in their defence by others, it has failed to reach us; that the
accused persons were wholly unaccustomed to such scenes and exposures,
unsuspicious of the perils of a cross-examination, or of an
inquisition conducted with a design to entrap and ensnare; and that
what they did say was liable to be misunderstood, as well as
misrepresented. We cannot hear their story. All we know is from
parties prejudiced, to the highest degree, against them. Sarah Good
was an unfortunate and miserable woman in her circumstances and
condition: but, from all that appears on the record, making due
allowance for the credulity, extravagance, prejudice, folly, or
malignity of the witnesses; giving full effect to every thing that can
claim the character of substantial force alleged against her, it is
undeniable, that there was not, beyond the afflicted girls, a particle
of evidence to sustain the charge on which she was arraigned; and
that, in the worst aspect of her case, she was an object for
compassion, rather than punishment. Altogether, the proceedings
against her, which terminated with her execution, were cruel and
shameful to the highest degree.

On the conclusion of her examination, she was removed from the
meeting-house, and Sarah Osburn brought in. Her selection, as one of
the persons to be first cried out upon, was judicious. The public mind
was prepared to believe the charge against her. Her original name was
Sarah Warren. She was married, April 5, 1662, to Robert Prince, who
belonged to a leading family, and owned a valuable farm. He died
early, leaving her with two young children, James and Joseph.

In the early colonial period, it was the custom for persons who
desired to come from the old country to America, but had not the means
to defray the expenses of the passage, to let or sell themselves, for
a greater or less length of time, to individuals residing here who
needed their service. The practice continued down to the present
century. Emigrants who thus sold themselves for a period of years were
called "redemptioners." Alexander Osburn came over from Ireland in
this character. The widow of Robert Prince bought out the residue of
his time from the person to whom he was thus under contract, for
fifteen pounds, and employed him to carry on her farm. After a while,
she married him. This, it is probable, gave rise to some criticism;
and, as her boys grew up, became more and more disagreeable to them.
The marriage, as was natural, led to unhappy results. In 1720, after
Osburn had been dead some years, a curious case was brought into
court, in which the sons of Robert Prince testified that Osburn
treated their mother and them with great cruelty and barbarity. They
had become of age before their mother's death, and had signed their
names to a deed conveying away land belonging to their patrimony. The
object of the suit was to invalidate the conveyance by proving that
they were compelled by Osburn to sign the deed, he using threats and
violence upon them at the time. There was an extraordinary conflict of
testimony in the trial; some witnesses strongly corroborating the
accusations of the Princes, and some equally strong in vindication of
the character of Osburn. It was shown, that, in the opinion of several
of his neighbors, he was an industrious, respectable, and worthy
person. It is difficult to determine the precise merits of the case.
After the death of his wife, Osburn married Ruth, a daughter of
William Cantlebury, and widow of William Sibley. She was a woman of
unquestioned excellence of character, and of a large landed estate.
Osburn was her third husband, the first having been Thomas Small.
After her marriage to Osburn, he and she joined the church, and were
reputable persons in all respects. He was well regarded as a citizen,
and often on the parish committee. Neither he nor the widow Sibley
appear to have been implicated in the witchcraft proceedings in any
other particular than that he testified that his then wife Sarah had
not been for some time at meeting. There is no indication that this
was volunteer testimony. He and his wife Ruth were among the firmest
opponents of Mr. Parris. There is no mention of his having had
children by either of his American wives. His son John, who probably
came with him to the country, was an inhabitant of the Village; and
his name is on the rate-list, for the last time, in 1718, his father
having died some years before. The Osborne family, in this part of the
country, does not appear to have sprung from this source.

Without attempting to decide where, or in what proportions, the blame
is to be laid, the fact is evident, that the marriage of the widow
Sarah Prince to Alexander Osburn was an unhappy one. Her mind became
depressed, if not distracted. For some time, she had been bedridden.
Of course, as she had occupied a respectable social position, and was
a woman of property, her case naturally gave rise to scandal. Rumor
was busy and gossip rife in reference to her; and it was quite natural
that she should have been suggested for the accusing girls to pitch
upon. The following is an account of her examination by the
magistrates, in the handwriting of John Hathorne:--

     "Sarah Osburne, upon examination, denied the matter of fact,
     viz., that she ever understood or used any witchcraft, or
     hurt any of the abovesaid children.

     "The children above named, being all personally present,
     accused her face to face; which, being done, they were all
     hurt, afflicted, and tortured very much; which, being over,
     and they out of their fits, they said that said Sarah
     Osburne did then come to them, and hurt them, Sarah Osburne
     being then kept at a distance personally from them. Sarah
     Osburne was asked why she then hurt them. She denied it. It
     being asked of her how she could so pinch and hurt them, and
     yet she be at that distance personally from them, she
     answered she did not then hurt them, nor ever did. She was
     asked who, then, did it, or who she employed to do it. She
     answered she did not know that the Devil goes about in her
     likeness to do any hurt. Sarah Osburne, being told that
     Sarah Good, one of her companions, had, upon examination,
     accused her, she, notwithstanding, denied the same,
     according to her examination, which is more at large given
     in, as therein will appear."

The following is in the handwriting of Ezekiel Cheever:--

     "_Sarah Osburn her Examination._

     "What evil spirit have you familiarity with?--None.

     "Have you made no contract with the Devil?--No: I never saw
     the Devil in my life.

     "Why do you hurt these children?--I do not hurt them.

     "Who do you employ, then, to hurt them?--I employ nobody.

     "What familiarity have you with Sarah Good?--None: I have
     not seen her these two years.

     "Where did you see her then?--One day, agoing to town.

     "What communications had you with her?--I had none, only
     'How do you do?' or so. I do not know her by name.

     "What did you call her, then?

     "(Osburn made a stand at that; at last, said she called her
     Sarah.)

     "Sarah Good saith that it was you that hurt the children.--I
     do not know that the Devil goes about in my likeness to do
     any hurt.

     "Mr. Hathorne desired all the children to stand up, and look
     upon her, and see if they did know her, which they all did;
     and every one of them said that this was one of the women
     that did afflict them, and that they had constantly seen her
     in the very habit that she was now in. Three evidences
     declared that she said this morning, that she was more like
     to be bewitched than that she was a witch. Mr. Hathorne
     asked her what made her say so. She answered that she was
     frighted one time in her sleep, and either saw, or dreamed
     that she saw, a thing like an Indian all black, which did
     pinch her in her neck, and pulled her by the back part of
     her head to the door of the house.

     "Did you never see any thing else?--No.

     "(It was said by some in the meeting-house, that she had
     said that she would never believe that lying spirit any
     more.)

     "What lying spirit is this? Hath the Devil ever deceived
     you, and been false to you?--I do not know the Devil. I
     never did see him.

     "What lying spirit was it, then?--It was a voice that I
     thought I heard.

     "What did it propound to you?--That I should go no more to
     meeting; but I said I would, and did go the next
     sabbath-day.

     "Were you never tempted further?--No.

     "Why did you yield thus far to the Devil as never to go to
     meeting since?--Alas! I have been sick, and not able to go.

     "Her husband and others said that she had not been at
     meeting three years and two months."

The foregoing illustrates the unfairness practised by the examining
magistrate. He took for granted, as we shall find to have been the
case in all instances, the guilt of the prisoner, and endeavored to
entangle her by leading questions, thus involving her in
contradiction. By the force of his own assumptions, he had compelled
Sarah Good to admit the reality of the sufferings of the girls, and
that they must be caused by some one. The amount of what she had said
was, that, if caused by one or the other of them, "then it must be
Osburn," for she was sure of her own innocence. This expression, to
which she was driven in self-exculpation, was perverted by the
reporter, Ezekiel Cheever, and by the magistrate, into an indirect
confession and a direct accusation of Osburn. In the absence of Good,
the magistrate told Osburn that Good had confessed and accused her.
This was a misrepresentation of one, and a false and fraudulent trick
upon the other. Considering the feeble condition of Sarah Osburn
generally, the snares by which she was beset, the distressing and
bewildering circumstances in which she was placed, and the infirm
state of her reason, as evidenced in her statement of what she saw, or
dreamed that she saw and heard,--not having a clear idea which,--her
answers, as reported by the prosecutors, show that her broken and
disordered mind was essentially truthful and innocent.

Sarah Osburn was removed from the meeting-house, and Tituba brought in
and examined, as follows:--

     "Tituba, what evil spirit have you familiarity with?--None.

     "Why do you hurt these children?--I do not hurt them.

     "Who is it then?--The Devil, for aught I know.

     "Did you never see the Devil?--The Devil came to me, and bid
     me serve him.

     "Who have you seen?--Four women sometimes hurt the children.

     "Who were they?--Goody Osburn and Sarah Good, and I do not
     know who the others were. Sarah Good and Osburn would have
     me hurt the children, but I would not.

     "(She further saith there was a tall man of Boston that she
     did see.)

     "When did you see them?--Last night, at Boston.

     "What did they say to you?--They said, 'Hurt the children.'

     "And did you hurt them?--No: there is four women and one
     man, they hurt the children, and then they lay all upon me;
     and they tell me, if I will not hurt the children, they will
     hurt me.

     "But did you not hurt them?--Yes; but I will hurt them no
     more.

     "Are you not sorry that you did hurt them?--Yes.

     "And why, then, do you hurt them?--They say, 'Hurt children,
     or we will do worse to you.'

     "What have you seen?--A man come to me, and say, 'Serve me.'

     "What service?--Hurt the children: and last night there was
     an appearance that said, 'Kill the children;' and, if I
     would not go on hurting the children, they would do worse to
     me.

     "What is this appearance you see?--Sometimes it is like a
     hog, and sometimes like a great dog.

     "(This appearance she saith she did see four times.)

     "What did it say to you?--The black dog said, 'Serve me;'
     but I said, 'I am afraid.' He said, if I did not, he would
     do worse to me.

     "What did you say to it?--I will serve you no longer. Then
     he said he would hurt me; and then he looks like a man, and
     threatens to hurt me. (She said that this man had a
     yellow-bird that kept with him.) And he told me he had more
     pretty things that he would give me, if I would serve him.

     "What were these pretty things?--He did not show me them.

     "What else have you seen?--Two cats; a red cat, and a black
     cat.

     "What did they say to you?--They said, 'Serve me.'

     "When did you see them?--Last night; and they said, 'Serve
     me;' but I said I would not.

     "What service?--She said, hurt the children.

     "Did you not pinch Elizabeth Hubbard this morning?--The man
     brought her to me, and made pinch her.

     "Why did you go to Thomas Putnam's last night, and hurt his
     child?--They pull and haul me, and make go.

     "And what would they have you do?--Kill her with a knife.

     "(Lieutenant Fuller and others said at this time, when the
     child saw these persons, and was tormented by them, that she
     did complain of a knife,--that they would have her cut her
     head off with a knife.)

     "How did you go?--We ride upon sticks, and are there
     presently.

     "Do you go through the trees or over them?--We see nothing,
     but are there presently.

     "Why did you not tell your master?--I was afraid: they said
     they would cut off my head if I told.

     "Would you not have hurt others, if you could?--They said
     they would hurt others, but they could not.

     "What attendants hath Sarah Good?--A yellow-bird, and she
     would have given me one.

     "What meat did she give it?--It did suck her between her
     fingers.

     "Did you not hurt Mr. Curren's child?--Goody Good and Goody
     Osburn told that they did hurt Mr. Curren's child, and would
     have had me hurt him too; but I did not.

     "What hath Sarah Osburn?--Yesterday she had a thing with a
     head like a woman, with two legs and wings.

     "(Abigail Williams, that lives with her uncle Mr. Parris,
     said that she did see the same creature, and it turned into
     the shape of Goodie Osburn.)

     "What else have you seen with Osburn?--Another thing, hairy:
     it goes upright like a man, it hath only two legs.

     "Did you not see Sarah Good upon Elizabeth Hubbard, last
     Saturday?--I did see her set a wolf upon her to afflict her.

     "(The persons with this maid did say that she did complain
     of a wolf. She further said that she saw a cat with Good at
     another time.)

     "What clothes doth the man go in?--He goes in black clothes;
     a tall man, with white hair, I think.

     "How doth the woman go?--In a white hood, and a black hood
     with a top-knot.

     "Do you see who it is that torments these children
     now?--Yes: it is Goody Good; she hurts them in her own
     shape.

     "Who is it that hurts them now?--I am blind now: I cannot
     see.

     "Written by EZEKIEL CHEEVER.

     "SALEM VILLAGE, March the 1st, 1692."

Another report of Tituba's examination has been preserved, and may be
found in the second volume of the collection edited by Samuel G.
Drake, entitled the "Witchcraft Delusion in New England." It is in the
handwriting of Jonathan Corwin, very full and minute, and shows that
the Indian woman was familiar with all the ridiculous and monstrous
fancies then prevalent. The details of her statement cover nearly the
whole ground of them. While indicating, in most respects, a mind at
the lowest level of general intelligence, they give evidence of
cunning and wariness in the highest degree. This document is also
valuable, as it affords information about particulars, incidentally
mentioned and thus rescued from oblivion, which serve to bring back
the life of the past. Tituba describes the dresses of some of the
witches: "A black silk hood, with a white silk hood under it, with
top-knots." One of them wore "a serge coat, with a white cap." The
Devil appeared "in black clothes sometimes, sometimes serge coat of
other color." She speaks of the "lean-to chamber" in the parsonage,
and describes an aërial night ride "up" to Thomas Putnam's. "How did
you go? What did you ride upon?" asked the wondering magistrate. "I
ride upon a stick, or pole, and Good and Osburn behind me: we ride
taking hold of one another; don't know how we go, for I saw no trees
nor path, but was presently there when we were up." In both reports,
Tituba describes, quite graphically, the likenesses in which the Devil
appeared to his confederates; but Corwin gives the details more fully
than Cheever. What the latter reports of the appearances in which the
Devil accompanied Osburn, the former amplifies. "The thing with two
legs and wings, and a face like a woman," "turns" into a full woman.
The "hairy thing" becomes "a thing all over hairy, all the face hairy,
and a long nose, and I don't know how to tell how the face looks; is
about two or three feet high, and goeth upright like a man; and, last
night, it stood before the fire in Mr. Parris's hall."

It is quite evident that the part played by the Indian woman on this
occasion was pre-arranged. She had, from the first, been concerned
with the circle of girls in their necromantic operations; and her
statements show the materials out of which their ridiculous and
monstrous stories were constructed. She said that there were four who
"hurt the children." Upon being pressed by the magistrate to tell who
they were, she named Osburn and Good, but did "not know who the others
were." Two others were marked; but it was not thought best to bring
them out until these three examinations had first been made to tell
upon the public mind. Tituba had been apprised of Elizabeth Hubbard's
story, that she had been "pinched" that morning; and, as well as
"Lieutenant Fuller and others," had heard of the delirious exclamation
of Thomas Putnam's sick child during the night. "Abigail Williams,
that lives with her uncle Parris," had communicated to the Indian
slave the story of "the woman with two legs and wings." In fact, she
had been fully admitted to their councils, and made acquainted with
all the stories they were to tell. But, when it became necessary to
avoid specifications touching parties whose names it had been decided
not to divulge at that stage of the business, the wily old servant
escapes further interrogation, "I am blind now: I cannot see."

Proceedings connected with these examinations were continued several
days. The result appears, in the handwriting of John Hathorne, as
follows:--

     "Salem Village, March 1, 1691/2.--Tituba, an Indian woman,
     brought before us by Constable Jos. Herrick, of Salem, upon
     suspicion of witchcraft by her committed, according to the
     complaint of Jos. Hutchinson and Thomas Putnam, &c., of
     Salem Village, as appears per warrant granted, Salem, 29th
     February, 1691/2. Tituba, upon examination, and after some
     denial, acknowledged the matter of fact, as, according to
     her examination given in, more fully will appear, and who
     also charged Sarah Good and Sarah Osburn with the same.

     "Salem Village, March the 1st, 1691/2.--Sarah Good, Sarah
     Osburn, and Tituba, an Indian woman, all of Salem Village,
     being this day brought before us, upon suspicion of
     witchcraft, &c., by them and every one of them committed;
     Tituba, an Indian woman, acknowledging the matter of fact,
     and Sarah Osburn and Sarah Good denying the same before us;
     but there appearing, in all their examinations, sufficient
     ground to secure them all. And, in order to further
     examination, they were all _per mittimus_ sent to the jails
     in the county of Essex.

     "Salem, March 2.--Sarah Osburn again examined, and also
     Tituba, as will appear in their examinations given in.
     Tituba again acknowledged the fact, and also accused the
     other two.

     "Salem, March 3.--Sarah Osburn, and Tituba, Indian, again
     examined. The examination now given in. Tituba again said
     the same.

     "Salem, March 5.--Sarah Good and Tituba again examined; and,
     in their examination, Tituba acknowledged the same she did
     formerly, and accused the other two above said.

     [Illustration: [signatures]]

     "Salem, March the 7th, 1691/2.--Sarah Good, Sarah Osburn,
     and Tituba, an Indian woman, all sent to the jail in Boston,
     according to their _mittimuses_, then sent to their
     Majesties' jail-keeper."

It will be noticed that the magistrates did not venture to put into
this their final record, what they had unfairly tried to make Sarah
Osborn believe, that Sarah Good had been a witness against her. The
jail at Ipswich was at a distance of at least ten miles from the
village meeting-house, by any road that could then have been
travelled. The transference of the prisoners day after day must have
been very fatiguing to a sick woman like Sarah Osburn. Sarah Good
seems to have been able to bear it. Samuel Braybrook, an assistant
constable, having charge of her, says, that, on the way to Ipswich,
she "leaped off her horse three times;" that she "railed against the
magistrates, and endeavored to kill herself." He further testified,
that, at the very time she was performing these feats, Thomas Putnam's
daughter, "at her father's house, declared the same." As Braybrook was
many miles from Thomas Putnam's house, at the moment when his
wonderful daughter exercised this miraculous extent of vision, it
would have been more satisfactory to have had some other testimony to
the fact. I mention this to show of what stuff the evidence in these
cases was made, and the credulity with which every thing was
swallowed. The prisoners were put to examination each day.

Osburn and Good steadily maintained their innocence. Tituba all along
declared herself guilty, and accused the other two of having been
with her in confederacy with the Devil. Mr. Parris made the following
deposition, in relation to these examinations, to which he
subsequently swore in Court, at the trial of Sarah Good:--

     "THE DEPOSITION OF SAM: PARRIS, aged about thirty and nine
     years.--Testifieth and saith, that Elizabeth Parris, Jr., and
     Abigail Williams, and Ann Putnam, Jr., and Elizabeth Hubbard,
     were most grievously and several times tortured during the
     examination of Sarah Good, Sarah Osburn, and Tituba, Indian,
     before the magistrates at Salem Village, 1 March, 1692. And
     the said Tituba being the last of the above said that was
     examined, they, the above said afflicted persons, were
     grievously distressed until the said Indian began to confess,
     and then they were immediately all quiet the rest of the said
     Indian woman's examination. Also Thomas Putnam, aged about
     forty years, and Ezekiel Cheever, aged about thirty and six
     years, testify to the whole of the above said; and all the
     three deponents aforesaid further testify, that, after the
     said Indian began to confess, she was herself very much
     afflicted, and in the face of authority at the same time, and
     openly charged the abovesaid Good and Osburn as the persons
     that afflicted her, the aforesaid Indian."

By comparing these depositions with the other documents I have
presented, it will be seen how admirably the whole affair was
arranged, so far as concerned the part played by Tituba. She commences
her testimony by declaring her innocence. The afflicted children are
instantly thrown into torments, which, however, subside as soon as
she begins to confess. Immediately after commencing her confession,
and as she proceeds in it, she herself becomes tormented "in the face
of authority," before the eyes of the magistrates and the awestruck
crowd. Her power to afflict ceases as she breaks loose from her
compact with the Devil, who sends some unseen confederate, not then
brought to light, to wreak his vengeance upon her for having
confessed. Tituba, as well as the girls, showed herself an adept in
the arts taught in the circle.

All we know of Sarah Osburn beyond this date are the following items
in the Boston jailer's bill "against the country," dated May 29, 1692:
"To chains for Sarah Good and Sarah Osburn, 14 shillings:" "To the
keeping of Sarah Osburn, from the 7th of March to the 10th of May,
when she died, being nine weeks and two days, £1. 3_s._ 5_d._"

The only further information we have of Tituba is from Calef, who
says, "The account she since gives of it is, that her master did beat
her, and otherwise abuse her, to make her confess and accuse (such as
he called) her sister-witches; and that whatsoever she said by way of
confessing or accusing others was the effect of such usage: her master
refused to pay her fees, unless she would stand to what she had said.
Calef further states that she laid in jail until finally "sold for her
fees." The jailer's charge for her "diet in prison for a year and a
month" appears in a shape that corroborates Calef's statements, which
were prepared for publication in 1697, and printed in London in 1700.
Although zealously devoted to the work of exposing the enormities
connected with the witchcraft prosecutions, there is no ground to
dispute the veracity of Calef as to matters of fact. What he says of
the declarations of Tituba, subsequent to her examination, is quite
consistent with a critical analysis of the details of the record of
that examination. It can hardly be doubted, whatever the amount of
severity employed to make her act the part assigned her, that she was
used as an instrument to give effect to the delusion.

Now let us consider the state of things that had been brought about in
the village, and in the surrounding country, at the close of the first
week in March, 1692. The terrible sufferings of the girls in Mr.
Parris's family and of their associates, for the two preceding months,
had become known far and wide. A universal sympathy was awakened in
their behalf; and a sentiment of horror sunk deep into all hearts, at
the dread demonstration of the diabolical rage in their afflicted and
tortured persons. A few, very few, distrusted; but the great majority,
ninety-nine in a hundred of all the people, were completely swept into
the torrent. Nathaniel Putnam and Nathaniel Ingersoll were entirely
deluded, and continued so to the end. Even Joseph Hutchinson was, for
a while, carried away. The physicians had all given their opinion that
the girls were suffering from an "evil hand." The neighboring
ministers, after a day's fasting and prayer, and a scrutinizing
inspection of the condition of the afflicted children, had given it,
as the result of their most solemn judgment, that it was a case of
witchcraft. Persons from the neighboring towns had come to the place,
and with their own eyes received demonstration of the same fact. Mr.
Parris made it the topic of his public prayers and preaching. The
girls, Sunday after Sunday, were under the malign influence, to the
disturbance and affrightment of the congregation. In all companies, in
all families, all the day long, the sufferings and distraction
occurring in the houses of Mr. Parris, Thomas Putnam, and others, and
in the meeting-house, were topics of excited conversation; and every
voice was loud in demanding, every mind earnest to ascertain, who were
the persons, in confederacy with the Devil, thus torturing, pinching,
convulsing, and bringing to the last extremities of mortal agony,
these afflicted girls. Every one felt, that, if the guilty authors of
the mischief could not be discovered, and put out of the way, no one
was safe for a moment. At length, when the girls cried out upon Good,
Osburn, and Tituba, there was a general sense of satisfaction and
relief. It was thought that Satan's power might be checked. The
selection of the first victims was well made. They were just the kind
of persons whom the public prejudice and credulity were prepared to
suspect and condemn. Their examination was looked for with the utmost
interest, and all flocked to witness the proceedings.

In considering the state of mind of the people, as they crowded into
and around the old meeting-house, we can have no difficulty in
realizing the tremendous effects of what there occurred. It was felt
that then, on that spot, the most momentous crisis in the world's
history had come. A crime, in comparison with which all other crimes
sink out of notice, was being notoriously and defiantly committed in
their midst. The great enemy of God and man was let loose among them.
What had filled the hearts of mankind for ages, the world over, with
dread apprehension, was come to pass; and in that village the great
battle, on whose issue the preservation of the kingdom of the Lord on
the earth was suspended, had begun. Indeed, no language, no imagery,
no conception of ours, can adequately express the feeling of awful and
terrible solemnity with which all were overwhelmed. No body of men
ever convened in a more highly wrought state of excitement than
pervaded that assembly, when the magistrates entered, in all their
stern authority, and the scene opened on the 1st of March, 1692. A
minister, probably Mr. Parris, began, according to the custom of the
times, with prayer. From what we know of his skill and talent in
meeting such occasions, it may well be supposed that his language and
manner heightened still more the passions of the hour. The marshal, of
tall and imposing stature and aspect, accompanied by his constables,
brought in the prisoners. Sarah Good, a poverty-stricken, wandering,
and wretched victim of ill-fortune and ill-usage, was put to the bar.
Every effort was made by the examining magistrate, aided by the
officious interference of the marshal, or other deluded or
evil-disposed persons,--who, like him, were permitted to interpose
with charges or abusive expressions,--to overawe and confound, involve
in contradictions, and mislead the poor creature, and force her to
confess herself guilty and accuse others. In due time, the "afflicted
children" were brought in; and a scene ensued, such as no person in
that crowd or in that generation had ever witnessed before.
Immediately on being confronted with the prisoner, and meeting her
eye, they fell, as if struck dead, to the floor; or screeched in
agony; or went into fearful spasms or convulsive fits; or cried out
that they were pricked with pins, pinched, or throttled by invisible
hands. They were severally brought up to the prisoner, and, upon
touching her person, instantly became calm, quiet, and fully restored
to their senses. With one voice they all declared that Sarah Good had
thus tormented them, by her power as a witch in league with the Devil.
The truth of this charge, in the effect produced by the malign
influence proceeding from her, was thus visible to all eyes. All saw,
too, how instantly upon touching her the diabolical effect ceased; the
malignant fluid passing back, like an electric stream, into the body
of the witch. The spectacle was repeated once and again, the acting
perfect, and the delusion consummated. The magistrates and all present
considered the guilt of the prisoner demonstrated, and regarded her as
wilfully and wickedly obstinate in not at once confessing what her
eyes, as well as theirs, saw. Her refusal to confess was considered as
the highest proof of her guilt. They passed judgment against her,
committed her to the marshal, who hurried her to prison, bound her
with cords, and loaded her with irons; for it was thought that no
ordinary fastenings could hold a witch. Similar proceedings, with
suitable variations, were had with Sarah Osburn and Tituba. The
confession of the last-named, the immediate relief thereafter of the
afflicted children, and the dreadful torments which Tituba herself
experienced, on the spot, from the unseen hand of the Devil wreaking
vengeance upon her, put the finishing touch to the delusion. The
excitement was kept up, and spread far and wide, by the officers and
magistrates riding in cavalcade, day after day, to and from the town
and village; and by the constables, with their assistants, carrying
their manacled prisoners from jail to jail in Ipswich, Salem, and
Boston.

The point was now reached when the accusers could safely strike at
higher game. But time was taken to mature arrangements. Great
curiosity was felt to know who the other two were whom Tituba saw in
connection with Good and Osburn in their hellish operations. The girls
continued to suffer torments and fall in fits, and were constantly
urged by large numbers of people, going from house to house to witness
their sufferings, to reveal who the witches were that still afflicted
them. When all was prepared, they began to cry out, with more or less
distinctness; at first, in significant but general descriptions, and
at last calling names. The next victim was also well chosen. An
account has been given, in the First Part, of the notoriety which
circumstances had attached to Giles Corey. In 1691 he became a member
of the church, being then (Vol. I. p. 182) eighty years of age. Four
daughters, all probably by his first wife Margaret, the only children
of whom there is any mention, were married to John Moulton, John
Parker, and Henry Crosby, of Salem, and William Cleaves, of Beverly.
On the 11th of April, 1664, Corey was married to Mary Britt, who died,
as appears by the inscription on her gravestone in the old Salem
burial-ground, Aug. 27, 1684. Martha was his third wife. Her age is
unknown. It was entered on the record of the village church, at the
time of her admission to it, April 27, 1690; but the figures are worn
away from the edge of the page. She was a very intelligent and devout
person.

When the proceedings relating to witchcraft began, she did not approve
of them, and expressed her want of faith in the "afflicted children."
She discountenanced the whole affair, and would not follow the
multitude to the examinations; but was said to have spoken freely of
the course of the magistrates, saying that their eyes were blinded,
and that she could open them. It seemed to her clear that they were
violating common sense and the Word of God, and she was confident that
she could convince them of their errors. Instead of falling into the
delusion, she applied herself with renewed earnestness to keep her own
mind under the influence of prayer, and spent more time in devotion
than ever before. Her husband, however, was completely carried away by
the prevalent fanaticism, believed all he heard, and frequented the
examinations and the exhibitions of the afflicted children. This
disagreement became quite serious. Her preferring to stay at home,
shunning the proceedings, and expressing her disapprobation of what
was going on, caused an estrangement between them. Her peculiar course
created comment, in which he and two of his sons-in-law took part.
Some strong expressions were used by him, because she acted so
strangely at variance with everybody else. Her spending so much time
on her knees in devotion was looked upon as a matter of suspicion. It
was said that she tried to prevent him from following up the
examinations, and went so far as to remove the saddle from the horse
brought up to convey him to some meeting at the village connected with
the witchcraft excitement. Angry words, uttered by him, were heard and
repeated. As she was a woman of notable piety, a professor of
religion, and a member of the church, it was evident that her case, if
she were proceeded against, would still more heighten the panic, and
convulse the public mind. It would give ground for an idea which the
managers of the affair desired to circulate, that the Devil had
succeeded in making inroads into the very heart of the church, and was
bringing into confederacy with him aged and eminent church-members,
who, under color of their profession, threatened to extend his
influence to the overthrow of all religion. It was, indeed,
established in the popular sentiments, as a sign and mark of the
Devil's coming, that many professing godliness would join his
standard.

For a day or two, it was whispered round that persons in great repute
for piety were in the diabolical confederacy, and about to be
unmasked. The name of Martha Corey, whose open opposition to the
proceedings had become known, was passed among the girls in an
under-breath, and caught from one to another among those managing the
affair. On the 12th of March, Edward Putnam and Ezekiel Cheever,
having heard Ann Putnam declare that Goody Corey did often appear to
her, and torture her by pinching and otherwise, thought it their duty
to go to her, and see what she would say to this complaint; "she being
in church covenant with us." They mounted their horses about "the
middle of the afternoon," and first went to the house of Thomas Putnam
to see his daughter Ann, to learn from her what clothes Goody Corey
appeared to her in, in order to judge whether she might not have been
mistaken in the person. The girl told them, that Goody Corey, knowing
that they contemplated making this visit, had just appeared in spirit
to her, but had blinded her so that she could not tell what clothes
she wore. Highly wrought upon by the extraordinary statement of the
girl, which they received with perfect credulity, the two brethren
remounted, and pursued their way. Goody Corey had heard that her name
had been bandied about by the accusing girls: she also knew that it
was one of their arts to pretend to see the clothes people were
wearing at the time their spectres appeared to them. This required,
indeed, no great amount of necromancy; as it is not probable that
there was much variety in the costume of farmer's wives, at that time,
while about their ordinary domestic engagements.

They found her alone in her house. As soon as they commenced
conversation, "in a smiling manner she said, 'I know what you are come
for; you are come to talk with me about being a witch, but I am none:
I cannot help people's talking of me.'" Edward Putnam acknowledged
that their visit was in consequence of complaints made against her by
the afflicted children. She inquired whether they had undertaken to
describe the clothes she then wore. They answered that they had not,
and proceeded to repeat what Ann Putnam had said to them about her
blinding her so that she could not see her clothes. At this she
smiled, no doubt at Ann's cunning artifice to escape having to say
what dress she then had on. She declared to the two brethren, that
"she did not think that there were any witches." After considerable
talk, in which they did not get much to further their purpose, they
took their leave. The account of this interview, given by Putnam and
Cheever, indicates that Martha Corey was a sensible, enlightened, and
sprightly woman, perfectly free from the delusion of the day,
courteous in her manners and bearing, and a Christian, well grounded
in Scripture.

The two brethren returned forthwith to Thomas Putnam's house. Ann
told them that Goody Corey had not troubled her, nor her spectre
appeared, in their absence. She was not inclined to afford them an
opportunity to apply the test of the dress. Both the women showed
great acuteness and caution. As Corey expected the visit, and had
heard that the girls pretended to be able to say what dress persons
were wearing, she probably had attired herself in an unusual way on
the occasion, to put them at fault, and expose the falseness of their
claims to preternatural knowledge; and Ann Putnam--her sagacity
suggesting the risk she was running in the matter of Corey's
dress--took refuge in the pretence of blindness. The brethren were too
much under delusion to see through the sharp practice of both of them,
but considered the fact of Corey's inquiring of them whether Ann
described her dress, as, under the circumstances, proof positive
against the former.

Wishing to make assurance doubly sure, and to fasten the charge upon
Martha Corey, the managers of the affair sent for her to come to the
house of Thomas Putnam two days after this conference. Edward Putnam
was present, and testified that his niece Ann, immediately upon the
entrance of Goodwife Corey, experienced the most dreadful convulsions
and tortures and distinctly and positively declared that Corey was the
author of her sufferings. This was regarded as conclusive evidence;
and, on the 19th of March, a warrant was issued for her arrest. She
was brought to the house of Nathaniel Ingersoll, on Monday the 21st;
and the following is the account of her examination, in the
handwriting of Mr. Parris. The proceedings took place in the
meeting-house at the village. They were introduced by a prayer from
the Rev. Nicholas Noyes. On some of these occasions Mr. Hale and
perhaps others, but usually Mr. Noyes or Mr. Parris officiated. We may
suppose, from what we know of their general deportment in connection
with these scenes, that their performances, under the cover of a
devotional exercise, expressed and enforced a decided prejudgment of
the case in hand against the prisoners, and partook of the character
of indictments as much as of prayers.

     "_The Examination of Martha Corey._

     "Mr. HATHORNE: You are now in the hands of
     authority. Tell me, now, why you hurt these persons.--I do
     not.

     "Who doth?--Pray, give me leave to go to prayer.

     "(This request was made sundry times.)

     "We do not send for you to go to prayer; but tell me why you
     hurt these.--I am an innocent person. I never had to do with
     witchcraft since I was born. I am a gospel woman.

     "Do not you see these complain of you?--The Lord open the
     eyes of the magistrates and ministers: the Lord show his
     power to discover the guilty.

     "Tell us who hurts these children.--I do not know.

     "If you be guilty of this fact, do you think you can hide
     it?--The Lord knows.

     "Well, tell us what you know of this matter.--Why, I am a
     gospel woman; and do you think I can have to do with
     witchcraft too?

     "How could you tell, then, that the child was bid to
     observe what clothes you wore, when some came to speak with
     you?

     "(Cheever interrupted her, and bid her not begin with a lie;
     and so Edward Putnam declared the matter.)

     "Mr. HATHORNE: Who told you that?--He said the
     child said.

     "CHEEVER: You speak falsely.

     "(Then Edward Putnam read again.)

     "Mr. HATHORNE: Why did you ask if the child told
     what clothes you wore?--My husband told me the others told.

     "Who told you about the clothes? Why did you ask that
     question?--Because I heard the children told what clothes
     the others wore.

     "Goodman Corey, did you tell her?

     "(The old man denied that he told her so.)

     "Did you not say your husband told you so?

     "(No answer.)

     "Who hurts these children? Now look upon them.--I cannot
     help it.

     "Did you not say you would tell the truth why you asked that
     question? how came you to the knowledge?--I did but ask.

     "You dare thus to lie in all this assembly. You are now
     before authority. I expect the truth: you promised it. Speak
     now, and tell who told you what clothes.--Nobody.

     "How came you to know that the children would be examined
     what clothes you wore?--Because I thought the child was
     wiser than anybody if she knew.

     "Give an answer: you said your husband told you.--He told me
     the children said I afflicted them.

     "How do you know what they came for? Answer me this truly:
     will you say how you came to know what they came for?--I
     had heard speech that the children said I troubled them, and
     I thought that they might come to examine.

     "But how did you know it?--I thought they did.

     "Did not you say you would tell the truth? who told you what
     they came for?--Nobody.

     "How did you know?--I did think so.

     "But you said you knew so.

     "(CHILDREN: There is a man whispering in her ear.)

     "HATHORNE continued: What did he say to you?--We
     must not believe all that these distracted children say.

     "Cannot you tell what that man whispered?--I saw nobody.

     "But did not you hear?--No.

     "(Here was extreme agony of all the afflicted.)

     "If you expect mercy of God, you must look for it in God's
     way, by confession. Do you think to find mercy by
     aggravating your sins?--A true thing.

     "Look for it, then, in God's way.--So I do.

     "Give glory to God and confess, then.--But I cannot confess.

     "Do not you see how these afflicted do charge you?--We must
     not believe distracted persons.

     "Who do you improve to hurt them?--I improved none.

     "Did not you say our eyes were blinded, you would open
     them?--Yes, to accuse the innocent.

     "(Then Crosby gave in evidence.)

     "Why cannot the girl stand before you?--I do not know.

     "What did you mean by that?--I saw them fall down.

     "It seems to be an insulting speech, as if they could not
     stand before you.--They cannot stand before others.

     "But you said they cannot stand before you. Tell me what
     was that turning upon the spit by you?--You believe the
     children that are distracted. I saw no spit.

     "Here are more than two that accuse you for witchcraft. What
     do you say?--I am innocent.

     "(Then Mr. Hathorne read further of Crosby's evidence.)

     "What did you mean by that,--the Devil could not stand
     before you?

     "(She denied it. Three or four sober witnesses confirmed
     it.)

     "What can I do? Many rise up against me.

     "Why, confess.--So I would, if I were guilty.

     "Here are sober persons. What do you say to them? You are a
     gospel woman; will you lie?

     "(Abigail cried out, 'Next sabbath is sacrament-day; but she
     shall not come there.')

     "I do not care.

     "You charge these children with distraction: it is a note of
     distraction when persons vary in a minute; but these fix
     upon you. This is not the manner of distraction.--When all
     are against me, what can I help it?

     "Now tell me the truth, will you? Why did you say that the
     magistrates' and ministers' eyes were blinded, you would
     open them?

     "(She laughed, and denied it.)

     "Now tell us how we shall know who doth hurt these, if you
     do not?--Can an innocent person be guilty?

     "Do you deny these words?--Yes.

     "Tell us who hurts these. We came to be a terror to
     evil-doers. You say you would open our eyes, we are
     blind.--If you say I am a witch.

     "You said you would show us.

     "(She denied it.)

     "Why do you not now show us?--I cannot tell: I do not know.

     "What did you strike the maid at Mr. Tho. Putnam's with?--I
     never struck her in my life.

     "There are two that saw you strike her with an iron rod.--I
     had no hand in it.

     "Who had? Do you believe these children are bewitched?--They
     may, for aught I know: I have no hand in it.

     "You say you are no witch. Maybe you mean you never
     covenanted with the Devil. Did you never deal with any
     familiar?--No, never.

     "What bird was that the children spoke of?

     "(Then witnesses spoke: What bird was it?)

     "I know no bird.

     "It may be you have engaged you will not confess; but God
     knows.--So he doth.

     "Do you believe you shall go unpunished?--I have nothing to
     do with witchcraft.

     "Why was you not willing your husband should come to the
     former session here?--But he came, for all.

     "Did not you take the saddle off?--I did not know what it
     was for.

     "Did you not know what it was for?--I did not know that it
     would be to any benefit.

     "(Somebody said that she would not have them help to find
     out witches.)

     "Did you not say you would open our eyes? Why do you not?--I
     never thought of a witch.

     "Is it a laughing matter to see these afflicted persons?

     "(She denied it. Several prove it.)

     "Ye are all against me, and I cannot help it.

     "Do not you believe there are witches in the country?--I do
     not know that there is any.

     "Do not you know that Tituba confessed it?--I did not hear
     her speak.

     "I find you will own nothing without several witnesses, and
     yet you will deny for all.

     "(It was noted, when she bit her lip, several of the
     afflicted were bitten. When she was urged upon it that she
     bit her lip, saith she, What harm is there in it?)

     "(Mr. NOYES: I believe it is apparent she
     practiseth witchcraft in the congregation: there is no need
     of images.)

     "What do you say to all these things that are apparent?--If
     you will all go hang me, how can I help it?

     "Were you to serve the Devil ten years? Tell how many.

     "(She laughed. The children cried there was a yellow-bird
     with her. When Mr. Hathorne asked her about it, she laughed.
     When her hands were at liberty, the afflicted persons were
     pinched.)

     "Why do not you tell how the Devil comes in your shape, and
     hurts these? You said you would.--How can I know how?

     "Why did you say you would show us?

     "(She laughed again.)

     "What book is that you would have these children write
     in?--What book? Where should I have a book? I showed them
     none, nor have none, nor brought none.

     "(The afflicted cried out there was a man whispering in her
     ears.)

     "What book did you carry to Mary Walcot?--I carried none. If
     the Devil appears in my shape--

     "(Then Needham said that Parker, some time ago, thought this
     woman was a witch.)

     "Who is your God?--The God that made me.

     "What is his name?--Jehovah.

     "Do you know any other name?--God Almighty.

     "Doth _he_ tell you, that you pray to, that _he_ is God
     Almighty?--Who do I worship but the God that made [me]?

     "How many gods are there?--One.

     "How many persons?--Three.

     "Cannot you say, So there is one God in three blessed
     persons?

     [The answer is destroyed, being written in the fold of the
     paper, and wholly worn off.]

     "Do not you see these children and women are rational and
     sober as their neighbors, when your hands are fastened?

     "(Immediately they were seized with fits: and the
     standers-by said she was squeezing her fingers, her hands
     being eased by them that held them on purpose for trial.

     "Quickly after, the marshal said, 'She hath bit her lip;'
     and immediately the afflicted were in an uproar.)

     "[Tell] why you hurt these, or who doth?

     "(She denieth any hand in it.)

     "Why did you say, if you were a witch, you should have no
     pardon?--Because I am a ---- woman."

     "Salem Village, March the 21st, 1692.--The Reverend Mr.
     Samuel Parris, being desired to take, in writing, the
     examination of Martha Corey, hath returned it, as aforesaid.

     "Upon hearing the aforesaid, and seeing what we did then
     see, together with the charges of the persons then present,
     we committed Martha Corey, the wife of Giles Corey, of Salem
     Farms, unto the gaol in Salem, as _per mittimus_ then given
     out."

     [Illustration: [signatures]]

The foregoing is a full copy of the original document. One of Giles
Corey's daughters, Deliverance, had married, June 5, 1683, Henry
Crosby, who lived on land conveyed to him by her father in the
immediate neighborhood. He was the person whose written testimony was
read by the magistrate. Its purport seems to have been to prove that
Martha Corey had said that the accusing girls could not stand before
her, and that the Devil could not stand before her. She had,
undoubtedly, great confidence in her own innocence, and in the power
of truth and prayer, to silence false accusers, and expressed herself
in the forcible language which Parris's report of the examination
shows that she was well able to use. It is almost amusing to see how
the pride of the magistrates was touched, and their wrath kindled, by
what she was reported to have said, "that the magistrates' and
ministers' eyes were blinded, and that she would open them." It
rankled in Hathorne's breast: he returns to it again and again, and
works himself up to a higher degree of resentment on each recurrence.
Mr. Noyes's ire was roused, and he, too, put in a stroke. It will be
noticed, that she avoided a contradiction of her husband, and could
not be brought to give the names of persons from whom she had received
information. "If you will all go hang me, how can I help it?" "Ye are
all against me." "What can I do, when many rise up against me?" "When
all are against me, what can I [say to] help it?" Situated as she was,
all that she could do was to give them no advantage, or opportunity to
ensnare her, and to avoid compromising others; and it must be allowed
that she showed much presence and firmness of mind. Her request, made
at the opening of the examination, and at "sundry times," to "go to
prayer," somewhat confounded them. She probably was led to make and
urge the request particularly in consequence of the tenor of Mr.
Noyes's prayer at the opening. She felt that it was no more than fair
that there should be a prayer on her side, as well as on the other. It
might well be feared, that, if allowed to offer a prayer, coming from
a person in her situation, an aged professor, and one accustomed to
express herself in devotional exercises, it might produce a deep
impression upon the whole assembly. To refuse such a request had a
hard look; but, as the magistrates saw, it never would have done to
have permitted it. It would have reversed the position of all
concerned. The latter part of the examination has the appearance that
she was suspected to be unsound on a particular article of the
prevalent creed. It is much to be regretted that the abrasion of the
paper at the folding has obliterated her last answer to this part of
the inquisition. It is singular that Mr. Parris has left the blank in
her final answer. Probably she used her customary expression, "I am a
gospel woman." The writing, at this point, is very clear and distinct;
and a vacant space is left, just as it is given above.

The fact that Martha Corey was known to be an eminently religious
person, and very much given to acts of devotion, constituted a serious
obstacle, no doubt, in the way of the prosecutors. Parris's record of
the examination shows how they managed to get over it. They gave the
impression that her frequent and long prayers were addressed to the
Devil.

The disagreement between her and her husband, touching the witchcraft
prosecutions, brought him into a very uncomfortable predicament. With
his characteristic imprudence of speech, he had probably expressed
himself strongly against her unbelief in the sufferings of the girls
and her refusal to attend the exhibitions of their tortures, or the
examination of persons accused. He was, unquestionably, highly shocked
and incensed at her open repudiation of the whole doctrine of
witchcraft. Although he had become, in his old age, a professor and a
fervently religious man, perhaps he fell back, in his resentment of
her course, into his life-long rough phrases, and said that she acted
as though the Devil was in her. He might have said that she prayed
like a witch. Being entirely carried away by the delusion, he had his
own marvellous stories to tell about his cattle's being bewitched,
&c. His talk, undoubtedly, came to the ears of the prosecutors; and
they seem to have taken steps to induce him to come forward as a
witness against her. The following document is among the papers:--

     "The evidence of Giles Corey testifieth and saith, that last
     Saturday, in the evening, sitting by the fire, my wife asked
     me to go to bed. I told her I would go to prayer; and, when
     I went to prayer, I could not utter my desires with any
     sense, nor open my mouth to speak.

     "My wife did perceive it, and came towards me, and said she
     was coming to me.

     "After this, in a little space, I did, according to my
     measure, attend the duty.

     "Some time last week, I fetched an ox, well, out of the
     woods about noon: and, he laying down in the yard, I went to
     raise him to yoke him; but he could not rise, but dragged
     his hinder parts, as if he had been hip-shot. But after did
     rise.

     "I had a cat sometimes last week strangely taken on the
     sudden, and did make me think she would have died presently.
     My wife bid me knock her in the head, but I did not; and
     since, she is well.

     "Another time, going to duties, I was interrupted for a
     space; but afterward I was helped according to my poor
     measure. My wife hath been wont to sit up after I went to
     bed: and I have perceived her to kneel down on the hearth,
     as if she were at prayer, but heard nothing.

     "_At the examination of Sarah_ Good and others, my wife was
     willing

     "March 24, 1692."

The foregoing document does not express the idea that he thought his
wife was a witch. He states what he observed, and what happened to him
and to his cattle. He evidently supposed they were bewitched, and that
he was obstructed, in going to prayer, in a strange manner; but he
does not, in terms, charge it upon her. It gives an interesting
insight of the innermost domestic life of the period, in a farmhouse,
and exhibits striking touches of the character and ways of these two
old people. It illustrates the state of the imagination prevailing
among those who were carried away by the delusion. If an ox had a
sprained muscle, or a cat a fit of indigestion, it was thought to be
the work of an evil hand. Poor old Giles had come late to a religious
life, and, it is to be feared, was a novice in prayer. It is no wonder
that he was not an adept in "uttering his desires," and experienced
occasionally some difficulty in arranging and expressing his
devotional sentiments.

There is something very singular in the appearance of the foregoing
deposition. Purporting to be a piece of testimony, it was not given in
the usual and regular way. It does not indicate before whom it was
made. It is not attested in the ordinary manner; apparently, was not
sworn to in the presence of persons authorized to act in such cases;
was never offered in court or anywhere. It is a disconnected paper
found among the remnants of the miscellaneous collection in the
clerk's office, and is evidently an unfinished document; the words in
Italics, at the close, being erased by a line running through them.

It is probable that the parties who tried to get the old man to
testify against his wife discovered that they could not draw any thing
from him to answer their designs, but that there was danger that his
evidence would be favorable to her, and gave up the attempt to use him
on the occasion. The fact that he would not lend himself to their
purposes perhaps led to resentment on their part, which may explain
the subsequent proceedings against him.

The document, in its chirography, suggests the idea that it was
written by Mr. Noyes, which is not improbable, as Corey was a member
of his congregation and church. Noyes was deeply implicated in the
prosecutions, and violent in driving them on. The handwriting of the
original papers reveals the agency of those who were the most busy in
procuring evidence against persons accused. That of Thomas Putnam
occurs in very many instances. But Mr. Parris was, beyond all others,
the busiest and most active prosecutor. The depositions of the child
Abigail Williams, his niece and a member of his family, were written
by him, as also a great number of others. He took down most of the
examinations, put in a deposition of his own whenever he could, and
was always ready to indorse those of others.

It will be remembered, that, when Tituba was put through her
examination, she said "four women sometimes hurt the children." She
named Good and Osburn, but pretended to have been blinded as to the
others. Martha Corey was, in due time, as we have seen, brought out.
The fourth was the venerable head of a large and prominent family, and
a member of the mother-church in Salem. She had never transferred her
relations to the village church, with which, however, she had
generally worshipped, and probably communed. Being one of the chief
matrons of the place, she was seated in the meeting-house with ladies
of similar age and standing, occupying the same bench or compartment
with the widow of Thomas Putnam, Sr. The women were seated separately
from the men; and the only rule applied among them was eminence in
years and respectability.

It has always been considered strange and unaccountable, that a person
of such acknowledged worth as Rebecca Nurse, of infirm health and
advanced years, should have been selected among the early victims of
the witchcraft prosecutions. Jealousies and prejudices, such as often
infest rural neighborhoods, may have been engendered, in minds open to
such influences, by the prosperity and growing influence of her
family. It may be that animosities kindled by the long and violent
land controversy, with which many parties had been incidentally
connected, lingered in some breasts. There are decided indications,
that the passions awakened by the angry contest between the village
and "Topsfield men," and which the collisions of a half-century had
all along exasperated and hardened, may have been concentrated against
the Nurses. Isaac Easty, whose wife was a sister of Rebecca Nurse, and
the Townes, who were her brothers or near kinsmen, were the leaders
of the Topsfield men. It is a significant circumstance, in this
connection, that to one of the most vehement resolutions passed at
meetings of the inhabitants of the village, against the claims of
Topsfield, Samuel Nurse, her eldest son, and Thomas Preston, her
eldest son-in-law, entered their protest on the record; and, on
another similar occasion, her husband Francis Nurse, her son Samuel,
and two of her sons-in-law, Preston and Tarbell, took the same course.
So far as the family sided with Topsfield in that controversy, it
naturally exposed them to the ill-will of the people of the village.
An analysis of the names and residences of the persons proceeded
against, throughout the prosecutions, will show to what an extent
hostile motives were supplied from this quarter. The families of
Wildes, How, Hobbs, Towne, Easty, and others who were "cried out" upon
by the afflicted children, occupied lands claimed by parties adverse
to the village. What, more than all these causes, was sufficient to
create a feeling against the Nurses, is the fact that they were
opposed to the party which had existed from the beginning in the
parish composed originally of the friends of Bayley. To crown the
whole, when the excitement occasioned by the extraordinary doings in
Mr. Parris's family began to display itself, and the "afflicted
children" were brought into notice, the members of this family, with
the exception, for a time, of Thomas Preston, discountenanced the
whole thing. They absented themselves from meeting, on account of the
disturbances and disorders the girls were allowed to make during the
services of worship, in the congregation, on the Lord's Day.
Unfriendly remarks, from whatever cause, made in the hearing of the
girls, provided subjects for them to act upon. Some persons behind
them, suggesting names in this way, whether carelessly or with
malicious intent, were guilty of all the misery that was created and
blood that was shed.

It became a topic of rumor, that Rebecca Nurse was soon to be brought
out. It reached the ears of her friends, and the following document
comes in at this point:--

     "We whose names are underwritten being desired to go to
     Goodman Nurse his house, to speak with his wife, and to tell
     her that several of the afflicted persons mentioned her; and
     accordingly we went, and we found her in a weak and low
     condition in body as she told us, and had been sick almost a
     week. And we asked how it was otherwise with her: and she
     said she blessed God for it, she had more of his presence in
     this sickness than sometime she have had, but not so much as
     she desired; but she would, with the apostle, press forward
     to the mark; and many other places of Scripture to the like
     purpose. And then, of her own accord, she began to speak of
     the affliction that was amongst them, and in particular of
     Mr. Parris his family, and how she was grieved for them,
     though she had not been to see them, by reason of fits that
     she formerly used to have; for people said it was awful to
     behold: but she pitied them with all her heart, and went to
     God for them. But she said she heard that there was persons
     spoke of that were as innocent as she was, she believed;
     and, after much to this purpose, we told her we heard that
     she was spoken of also. 'Well,' she said, 'if it be so, the
     will of the Lord be done:' she sat still a while, being as
     it were amazed; and then she said, 'Well, as to this thing I
     am as innocent as the child unborn; but surely,' she said,
     'what sin hath God found out in me unrepented of, that he
     should lay such an affliction upon me in my old age?' and,
     according to our best observation, we could not discern that
     she knew what we came for before we told her.

     ISRAEL PORTER,
     ELIZABETH PORTER.

     "To the substance of what is above, we, if called thereto,
     are ready to testify on oath.

     DANIEL ANDREW,
     PETER CLOYSE."

Elizabeth Porter, who joins her husband in making this statement, was
a sister of John Hathorne, the examining magistrate, and the
mother-in-law of Joseph Putnam, who was among the very few that
condemned the proceedings from the first. She stood, therefore,
between the two parties. The character of each of the signers and
indorsers of this interesting paper is sufficient proof that its
statements are truthful. It cannot but excite the most affecting
sensibilities in every breast. This venerable lady, whose conversation
and bearing were so truly saint-like, was an invalid of extremely
delicate condition and appearance, the mother of a large family,
embracing sons, daughters, grandchildren, and one or more
great-grandchildren. She was a woman of piety, and simplicity of
heart. In all probability, she shared in the popular belief on the
subject of witchcraft, and supposed that the sufferings of the
children were real, and that they were afflicted by an "evil hand." At
the very time that she was sorrowfully sympathizing with them and Mr.
Parris's family, and praying for them, they were circulating
suspicions against her, and maturing their plans for her destruction.

Rebecca Nurse was a daughter of William Towne, of Yarmouth, Norfolk
County, England, where she was baptized, Feb. 21, 1621. Her sister
Mary, who married Isaac Easty, was baptized at the same place, Aug.
24, 1634. The records of the First Church at Salem, Sept. 3, 1648,
give the baptism of "Joseph and Sarah, children of Sister Towne."
Sarah was at that time seven years of age. She became the wife of
Edmund Bridges, and afterwards of Peter Cloyse.

On the 23d of March, a warrant was issued, on complaint of Edward
Putnam, and Jonathan, son of John Putnam, for the arrest of "Rebecca,
wife of Francis Nurse;" and the next morning, at eight o'clock, she
was brought to the house of Nathaniel Ingersoll, in the custody of
George Herrick, the marshal of Essex. There were several distinct
indictments, four of which, for having practised "certain detestable
arts called witchcraft" upon Ann Putnam, Mary Walcot, Elizabeth
Hubbard, and Abigail Williams, are preserved. The examination took
place forthwith at the meeting-house. The age, character, connections,
and appearance of the prisoner, made the occasion one of the extremest
interest. Hathorne, the magistrate, began the proceedings by
addressing one of the afflicted: "What do you say? Have you seen this
woman hurt you?" The answer was, "Yes, she beat me this morning."
Hathorne, addressing another of the afflicted, said, "Abigail, have
you been hurt by this woman?" Abigail answered, "Yes." At that point,
Ann Putnam fell into a grievous fit, and, while in her spasms, cried
out that it was Rebecca Nurse who was thus afflicting her. As soon as
Ann's fit was over, and order restored, Hathorne said, "Goody Nurse,
here are two, Ann Putnam the child, and Abigail Williams, complain of
your hurting them. What do you say to it?" The prisoner replied, "I
can say, before my eternal Father, I am innocent, and God will clear
my innocency." Hathorne, apparently touched for the moment by her
language and bearing, said, "Here is never a one in the assembly but
desires it; but, if you be guilty, pray God discover you." Henry
Kenney rose up from the body of the assembly to speak. Hathorne
permitted the interruption, and said, "Goodman Kenney, what do you
say?" Then Kenney complained of the prisoner, "and further said, since
this Nurse came into the house, he was seized twice with an amazed
condition." Hathorne, addressing the prisoner, said, "Not only these,
but the wife of Mr. Thomas Putnam, accuseth you by credible
information, and that both of tempting her to iniquity and of greatly
hurting her." The prisoner again affirmed her innocence, and said, in
answer to the charge of having hurt these persons, that "she had not
been able to get out of doors these eight or nine days." Hathorne
then called upon Edward Putnam, who, as the record says, "gave in his
relate," which undoubtedly was a statement of his having seen the
afflicted in their sufferings, and heard them accuse Rebecca Nurse as
their tormentor. Hathorne said, "Is this true, Goody Nurse?" She
denied that she had ever hurt them or any one else in her life.
Hathorne repeated, "You see these accuse you: is it true?" She
answered, "No." He again put the question, "Are you an innocent person
relating to this witchcraft?" It seems, from his manner, that he was
beginning really to doubt whether she might not be innocent; and
perhaps the feeling of the multitude was yielding in her favor.

Here Thomas Putnam's wife cried out, "Did you not bring the black man
with you? Did you not bid me tempt God, and die? How oft have you eat
and drank your own damnation?" This sudden outbreak, from such a
source, accompanied with the wild and apparently supernatural energy
and uncontrollable vehemence with which the words were uttered, roused
the multitude to the utmost pitch of horror; and the prisoner seems to
have been shocked at the dreadful exhibition of madness in the woman
and in the assembly. Releasing her hands from confinement, she spread
them out towards heaven, and exclaimed, "O Lord, help me!" Instantly,
the whole company of the afflicted children "were grievously vexed."
After a while, the tumult subsided, and Hathorne again addressed her,
"Do you not see what a solemn condition these are in? When your hands
are loosed, the persons are afflicted." Then Mary Walcot and Elizabeth
Hubbard came forward, and accused her. Hathorne again addressed her,
"Here are these two grown persons now accuse. What say you? Do not you
see these afflicted persons, and hear them accuse you?" She answered,
"The Lord knows I have not hurt them. I am an innocent person."
Hathorne continued, "It is very awful to all to see these agonies, and
you, an old professor, thus charged with contracting with the Devil by
the effects of it, and yet to see you stand with dry eyes where there
are so many wet." She answered, "You do not know my heart." Hathorne,
"You would do well, if you are guilty, to confess, and give glory to
God."--"I am as clear as the child unborn." Hathorne continued, "What
uncertainty there may be in apparitions, I know not: yet this with me
strikes hard upon you, that you are, at this very present, charged
with familiar spirits,--this is your bodily person they speak to; they
say now they see these familiar spirits come to your bodily person.
Now, what do you say to that?"--"I have none, sir."--"If you have,
confess, and give glory to God. I pray God clear you, if you be
innocent, and, if you are guilty, discover you; and therefore give me
an upright answer. Have you any familiarity with these spirits?"--"No:
I have none but with God alone." It looks as if again the magistrate
began to open his mind to a fair view of the case. He seems to have
sought satisfaction in reference to all the charges that had been
made against her. She was suffering from infirmities of body, the
result not only of age, but of the burdens of life often pressing down
the physical frame, particularly of those who have borne large
families of children. The magistrate had heard some malignant gossip
of this kind, and he asked, "How came you sick? for there is an odd
discourse of that in the mouths of many." She replied that she
suffered from weakness of stomach. He inquired, more specifically,
"Have you no wounds?" Her answer was, that her ailments and
weaknesses, all her bodily infirmities, were the natural effects of
what she had experienced in a long life. "I have none but old
age."--"You do know whether you are guilty, and have familiarity with
the Devil; and now, when you are here present, to see such a thing as
these testify,--a black man whispering in your ear, and birds about
you,--what do you say to it?"--"It is all false: I am
clear."--"Possibly, you may apprehend you are no witch; but have you
not been led aside by temptations that way?"--"I have not." At this
point, it almost seems that Hathorne was yielding to the moral effect
of the evidence she bore in her deportment and language, the impress
of conscious innocence in her countenance, and the manifestation of
true Christian purity and integrity in her whole manner and bearing.
Instead of pressing her with further interrogatories, he gave way to
an expression, in the form of a soliloquy or ejaculation, "What a sad
thing is it, that a church-member here, and now another of Salem,
should thus be accused and charged!" Upon hearing this rather
ambiguous expression of the magistrate, Mrs. Pope fell into a grievous
fit.

Mrs. Pope was the wife of Joseph Pope, living with his mother, the
widow Gertrude Pope, on the farm shown on the map. She had followed up
the meetings of the circle, been a constant witness of the sufferings
of the "afflicted children," and attended all the public examinations,
until her nervous system was excited beyond restraint, and for a while
she went into fits and her imagination was bewildered. She acted with
the accusers, and participated in their sufferings. On some occasions,
her conduct was wild and extravagant to the highest degree. At the
examination of Martha Corey, she was conspicuous for the violence of
her actions. In the midst of the proceedings, and in the presence of
the magistrates and hundreds of people, she threw her muff at the
prisoner; and, that missing, pulled off her shoe, and, more successful
this time, hit her square on the head. Hers seems, however, to have
been a case of mere delusion, amounting to temporary insanity. That it
was not deliberate and cold-blooded imposture is rendered probable by
the fact, that she was rescued from the hallucination, and, with her
husband, among the foremost to deplore and denounce the whole affair.
But, when a woman of her position acted in this manner, on such an
occasion, and then went into convulsions, and the whole company of
afflicted persons joined in, the confusion, tumult, and frightfulness
of the scene can hardly be imagined, certainly it cannot be described
in words.

Quiet being restored, Hathorne proceeded: "Tell us, have you not had
visible appearances, more than what is common in nature?"--"I have
none, nor never had in my life."--"Do you think these suffer voluntary
or involuntary?"--"I cannot tell."--"That is strange: every one can
judge."--"I must be silent."--"They accuse you of hurting them; and,
if you think it is not unwillingly, but by design, you must look upon
them as murderers."--"I cannot tell what to think of it." This answer
was considered as very aspersive in its bearing upon the witnesses,
and she was charged with having called them murderers. Being hard of
hearing, she did not always take in the whole import of questions put
to her. She denied that she said she thought them murderers; all she
said, and that she stood to to the last, was that she could not tell
what to make of their conduct. Finally, Hathorne put this question,
and called for an answer, "Do you think these suffer against their
wills or not?" She answered, "I do not think these suffer against
their wills." To this point she was not afraid or unwilling to go, in
giving an opinion of the conduct of the accusing girls. Infirm, half
deaf, cross-questioned, circumvented, surrounded with folly, uproar,
and outrage, as she was, they could not intimidate her to say less, or
entrap her to say more.

Then another line of criminating questions was started by the
magistrate: "Why did you never visit these afflicted
persons?"--"Because I was afraid I should have fits too." On every
motion of her body, "fits followed upon the complainants, abundantly
and very frequently." As soon as order was again restored, Hathorne,
being, as he always was, wholly convinced of the reality of the
sufferings of the "afflicted children," addressed her thus, "Is it not
an unaccountable case, that, when you are examined, these persons are
afflicted?" Seeing that he and the whole assembly put faith in the
accusers, her only reply was, "I have got nobody to look to but God."
As she uttered these words, she naturally attempted to raise her
hands, whereupon "the afflicted persons were seized with violent fits
of torture." After silence was again restored, the magistrate pressed
his questions still closer. "Do you believe these afflicted persons
are bewitched?" She answered, "I do think they are." It will be
noticed that there was this difference between Rebecca Nurse and
Martha Corey: The latter was an utter heretic on the point of the
popular faith respecting witchcraft; she did not believe that there
were any witches, and she looked upon the declarations and actions of
the "afflicted children" as the ravings of "distracted persons." The
former seems to have held the opinions of the day, and had no
disbelief in witchcraft: she was willing to admit that the children
were bewitched; but she knew her own innocence, and nothing could move
her from the consciousness of it. Mr. Hathorne continued, "When this
witchcraft came upon the stage, there was no suspicion of Tituba, Mr.
Parris's Indian woman. She professed much love to that child,--Betty
Parris; but it was her apparition did the mischief: and why should not
you also be guilty, for your apparition doth hurt also?" Her answer
was, "Would you have me belie myself?" Weary, probably, of the
protracted proceedings, her head drooped on one side; and forthwith
the necks of the afflicted children were bent in the same way. This
new demonstration of the diabolical power that proceeded from her
filled the house with increased awe, and spread horrible conviction of
her guilt through all minds. Elizabeth Hubbard's neck was fixed in
that direction, and could not be moved. Abigail Williams cried out,
"Set up Goody Nurse's head, the maid's neck will be broke." Whereupon,
some persons held the prisoner's head up, and "Aaron Way observed that
Betty Hubbard's was immediately righted." To consummate the effect of
the whole proceeding, Mr. Parris, by direction of the magistrates,
"read what he had in characters taken from Mr. Thomas Putnam's wife in
her fits." We shall come to the matter thus introduced by Mr. Parris,
at a future stage of the story. It is sufficient here to say, that it
contained the most positive and minute declarations that the
apparition of Rebecca Nurse had appeared to her, on several occasions,
and horribly tortured her. After hearing Parris's statement, Hathorne
asked the prisoner, "What do you think of this?" Her reply was, "I
cannot help it: the Devil may appear in my shape." It may be
mentioned, that Mrs. Ann Putnam was present during this examination,
and, in the course of it, went into the most dreadful bodily agony,
charging it on Rebecca Nurse. Her sufferings were so violent, and held
on so long, that the magistrates gave permission to her husband to
carry her out of the meeting-house, to free her from the malignant
presence of the prisoner. The record of the examination closes thus:--

     "Salem Village, March 24th, 1691/2.--The Reverend Mr. Samuel
     Parris, being desired to take in writing the examination of
     Rebecca Nurse, hath returned it as aforesaid.

     "Upon hearing the aforesaid, and seeing what we then did
     see, together with the charges of the persons then present,
     we committed Rebecca Nurse, the wife of Francis Nurse of
     Salem Village, unto Her Majesty's jail in Salem, as _per
     mittimus_ then given out, in order to further examination."

     [Illustration: [signatures]]

The presence of Ann Putnam, the mother, on this occasion; the
statement from her, read by Mr. Parris; and the terrible sufferings
she exhibited, produced, no doubt, a deep effect upon the magistrates
and all present. Her social position and personal appearance
undoubtedly contributed to heighten it. For two months, her house had
been the constant scene of the extraordinary actings of the circle of
girls of which her daughter and maid-servant were the leading
spirits. Her mind had been absorbed in the mysteries of spiritualism.
The marvels of necromancy and magic had been kept perpetually before
it. She had been living in the invisible world, with a constant sense
of supernaturalism surrounding her. Unconsciously, perhaps, the
passions, prejudices, irritations, and animosities, to which she had
been subject, became mixed with the vagaries of an excited
imagination; and, laid open to the inroads of delusion as her mind had
long been by perpetual tamperings with spiritual ideas and phantoms,
she may have lost the balance of reason and sanity. This, added to a
morbid sensibility, probably gave a deep intensity to her voice,
action, and countenance. The effect upon the excited multitude must
have been very great. Although she lived to realize the utter
falseness of all her statements, her monstrous fictions were felt by
her, at the time, to be a reality.

In concluding his report of this examination, Mr. Parris says, "By
reason of great noises by the afflicted and many speakers, many things
are pretermitted." He was probably quite willing to avoid telling the
whole story of the disgraceful and shocking scenes enacted in the
meeting-house that day. Deodat Lawson was present during the earlier
part of the proceedings. He says that Mr. Hale began with prayer; that
the prisoner "pleaded her innocency with earnestness;" that, at the
opening, some of the girls, Mary Walcot among them, declared that the
prisoner had never hurt them. Presently, however, Mary Walcot screamed
out that she was bitten, and charged it upon Rebecca Nurse. The marks
of teeth were produced on her wrist. Lawson says, "It was so disposed
that I had not leisure to attend the whole time of examination." The
meaning is, I suppose, that he desired to withdraw into the
neighboring fields to con over his manuscript, and make himself more
able to perform with effect the part he was to act that afternoon.
"There was once," he says, "such an hideous screech and noise (which I
heard as I walked at a little distance from the meeting-house) as did
amaze me; and some that were within told me the whole assembly was
struck with consternation, and they were afraid that those that sat
next to them were under the influence of witchcraft." The whole
congregation was in an uproar, every one afflicted by and affrighting
every other, amid a universal outcry of terror and horror.

As it was a part of the policy of the managers of the business to
utterly overwhelm the influence of all natural sentiment in the
community, they coupled with this proceeding against a venerable and
infirm great-grandmother, another of the same kind against a little
child. Immediately after the examination of Rebecca Nurse was
concluded, Dorcas, a daughter of Sarah Good, was brought before the
magistrates. She was between four and five years old. Lawson says,
"The child looked hale and well as other children." A warrant had been
issued for her apprehension, the day before, on complaint of Edward
and Jonathan Putnam. Herrick the marshal, who was a man that magnified
his office, and of much personal pride, did not, perhaps, fancy the
idea of bringing up such a little prisoner; and he deputized the
operation to Samuel Braybrook, who, the next morning, made return, in
due form, that "he had taken the body of Dorcas Good," and sent her to
the house of Nathaniel Ingersoll, where she was in custody. It seems
that Braybrook did not like the job, and passed the handling of the
child over to still another. Whoever performed the service probably
brought her in his arms, or on a pillion. The little thing could not
have walked the distance from Benjamin Putnam's farm. When led in to
be examined, Ann Putnam, Mary Walcot, and Mercy Lewis, all charged her
with biting, pinching, and almost choking them. The two former went
through their usual evolutions in the presence of the awe and terror
stricken magistrates and multitude. They showed the marks of her
little teeth on their arms; and the pins with which she pricked them
were found on their bodies, precisely where, in their shrieks, they
had averred that she was piercing them. The evidence was considered
overwhelming; and Dorcas was, _per mittimus_, committed to the jail,
where she joined her mother. By the bill of the Boston jailer, it
appears that they both were confined there: as they were too poor to
provide for themselves, "the country" was charged with ten shillings
for "two blankets for Sarah Good's child." The mother, we know, was
kept in chains; the child was probably chained too. Extraordinary
fastenings, as has been stated, were thought necessary to hold a
witch.

There was no longer any doubt, in the mass of the community, that the
Devil had effected a lodgement at Salem Village. Church-members,
persons of all social positions, of the highest repute and profession
of piety, eminent for visible manifestations of devotion, and of every
age, had joined his standard, and become his active allies and
confederates.

The effect of these two examinations was unquestionably very great in
spreading consternation and bewilderment far and wide; but they were
only the prelude to the work, to that end, arranged for the day. The
public mind was worked to red heat, and now was the moment to strike
the blow that would fix an impression deep and irremovable upon it. It
was Thursday, Lecture-day; and the public services usual on the
occasion were to be held at the meeting-house.

Deodat Lawson had arrived at the village on the 19th of March, and
lodged at Deacon Ingersoll's. The fact at once became known; and Mary
Walcot immediately went to the deacon's to see him. She had a fit on
the spot, which filled Lawson with amazement and horror. His turn of
mind led him to be interested in such an excitement; and he had become
additionally and specially exercised by learning that the afflicted
persons had intimated that the deaths of his wife and daughter, which
occurred during his ministry at the village, had been brought about by
the diabolical agency of the persons then beginning to be unmasked,
and brought to justice. He was prepared to listen to the hints thus
thrown out, and was ready to push the prosecutions on with an
earnestness in which resentment and rage were mingled with the
blindest credulity. After Mary Walcot had given him a specimen of what
the girls were suffering, he walked over, early in the evening, to Mr.
Parris's house; and there Abigail Williams went into the craziest
manifestations, throwing firebrands about the house in the presence of
her uncle, rushing to the back of the chimney as though she would fly
up through its wide flue, and performing many wonderful works. The
next day being Sunday, he preached; and the services were interrupted,
in the manner already described, by the outbreaks of the afflicted,
under diabolic influence. The next day, he attended the examination of
Martha Corey. On Wednesday, the 23d, he went up to Thomas Putnam's, as
he says, "on purpose to see his wife." He "found her lying on the bed,
having had a sore fit a little before: her husband and she both
desired me to pray with her while she was sensible, which I did,
though the apparition said I should not go to prayer. At the first
beginning, she attended; but, after a little time, was taken with a
fit, yet continued silent, and seemed to be asleep." She had
represented herself as being in conflict with the shape, or spectre,
of a witch, which, she told Lawson, said he should not pray on the
occasion. But he courageously ventured on the work. At the conclusion
of the prayer, "her husband, going to her, found her in a fit. He took
her off the bed to sit her on his knees; but at first she was so stiff
she could not be bended, but she afterwards sat down." Then she went
into that state of supernatural vision and exaltation in which she was
accustomed to utter the wildest strains, in fervid, extravagant, but
solemn and melancholy, rhapsodies: she disputed with the spectre about
a text of Scripture, and then poured forth the most terrible
denunciations upon it for tormenting and tempting her. She was
evidently a very intellectual and imaginative woman, and was perfectly
versed in all the imagery and lofty diction supplied by the prophetic
and poetic parts of Scripture. Again she was seized with a terrible
fit, that lasted "near half an hour." At times, her mouth was drawn on
one side and her body strained. At last she broke forth, and
succeeded, after many violent struggles against the spectre and many
convulsions of her frame, in saying what part of the Bible Lawson was
to read aloud, in order to relieve her. "It is," she said, "the third
chapter of the Revelation."--"I did," says Lawson, "something scruple
the reading it." He was loath to be engaged in an affair of that kind
in which the Devil was an actor. At length he overcame his scruples,
and the effect was decisive. "Before I had near read through the first
verse, she opened her eyes, and was well." Bewildered and amazed, he
went back to Parris's house, and they talked over the awful
manifestations of Satan's power. The next morning, he attended the
examination of Rebecca Nurse, retiring from it, at an early hour, to
complete his preparation for the service that had been arranged for
him that afternoon.

I say arranged, because the facts in this case prove long-concerted
arrangement. He was to preach a sermon that day. Word must have been
sent to him weeks before. After reaching the village, every hour had
been occupied in exciting spectacles and engrossing experiences,
filling his mind with the fanatical enthusiasm requisite to give force
and fire to the delivery of the discourse. He could not possibly have
written it after coming to the place. He must have brought it in his
pocket. It is a thoroughly elaborated and carefully constructed
performance, requiring long and patient application to compose it, and
exhausting all the resources of theological research and reference,
and of artistic skill and finish. It is adapted to the details of an
occasion which was prepared to meet it. Not only the sermon but the
audience were the result of arrangement carefully made in the stages
of preparation and in the elements comprised in it. The preceding
steps had all been seasonably and appositely taken, so that, when the
regular lecture afternoon came, Lawson would have his voluminous
discourse ready, and a congregation be in waiting to hear it, with
minds suitably wrought upon by the preceding incidents of the day, to
be thoroughly and permanently impressed by it. The occasion had been
heralded by a train of circumstances drawing everybody to the spot.
The magistrates were already there, some of them by virtue of the
necessity of official presence in the earlier part of the day, and
others came in from the neighborhood; the ministers gathered from the
towns in the vicinity; men and women came from all quarters, flocking
along the highways and the by-ways, large numbers on horseback, and
crowds on foot. Probably the village meeting-house, and the grounds
around it, presented a spectacle such as never was exhibited
elsewhere. Awe, dread, earnestness, a stern but wild fanaticism, were
stamped on all countenances, and stirred the heaving multitude to its
depths, and in all its movements and utterances. It is impossible to
imagine a combination of circumstances that could give greater
advantage and power to a speaker, and Lawson was equal to the
situation. No discourse was ever more equal, or better adapted, to its
occasion. It was irresistible in its power, and carried the public
mind as by storm.

The text is Zechariah, iii. 2: "And the Lord said unto Satan, The Lord
rebuke thee, O Satan! even the Lord that hath chosen Jerusalem rebuke
thee: is not this a brand plucked out of the fire?" After an allusion
to the rebellion of Satan, and his fall from heaven with his "accursed
legions," and after representing them as filled "with envy and malice
against all mankind," seeking "by all ways and means to work their
ruin and destruction for ever, opposing to the utmost all persons and
things appointed by the Lord Jesus Christ as means or instruments of
their comfort here or salvation hereafter," he proceeds, in the manner
of those days, to open his text and spread out his subject, all along
exhibiting great ability, skill, and power, showing learning in his
illustrations, drawing aptly and abundantly from the Scriptures, and,
at the right points, rising to high strains of eloquence in diction
and imagery.

He describes, at great length and with abundant instances ingeniously
selected from sacred and profane literature, the marvellous power with
which Satan is enabled to operate upon mankind. He says,--

     "He is a spirit, and hence strikes at the spiritual part,
     the most excellent (constituent) part of man. Primarily
     disturbing and interrupting the animal and vital spirits, he
     maliciously operates upon the more common powers of the soul
     by strange and frightful representations to the fancy or
     imagination; and, by violent tortures of the body, often
     threatening to extinguish life, as hath been observed in
     those that are afflicted amongst us. And not only so, but he
     vents his malice in diabolical operations on the more
     sublime and distinguishing faculties of the rational soul,
     raising mists of darkness and ignorance in the
     understanding.... Sometimes he brings distress upon the
     bodies of men, by malignant operations in, and diabolical
     impressions on, the spirituous principle or vehicle of life
     and motion.... There are certainly some lower operations of
     Satan (whereof there are sundry examples among us), which
     the bodies and souls of men and women are liable unto. And
     whosoever hath carefully observed those things must needs be
     convinced, that the motions of the persons afflicted, both
     as to the manner and as to the violence of them, are the
     mere effects of diabolical malice and operations, and that
     it cannot rationally be imagined to proceed from any other
     cause whatever.... Satan exerts his malice mediately by
     employing some of mankind and other creatures, and he
     frequently useth other persons or things, that his designs
     may be the more undiscernible. Thus he used the serpent in
     the first temptation (Gen. iii. 1). Hence he contracts and
     indents with witches and wizards, that they shall be the
     instruments by whom he may more secretly affect and afflict
     the bodies and minds of others; and, if he can prevail upon
     those that make a visible profession, it may be the better
     covert unto his diabolical enterprise, and may the more
     readily pervert others to consenting unto his subjection. So
     far as we can look into those hellish mysteries, and guess
     at the administration of that kingdom of darkness, we may
     learn that witches make witches by persuading one the other
     to subscribe to a book or articles, &c.; and the Devil,
     having them in his subjection, by their consent, he will use
     their bodies and minds, shapes and representations, to
     affright and afflict others at his pleasure, for the
     propagation of his infernal kingdom, and accomplishing his
     devised mischiefs to the souls, bodies, and lives of the
     children of men, yea, and of the children of God too, so far
     as permitted and is possible.... He insinuates into the
     society of the adopted children of God, in their most solemn
     approaches to him, in sacred ordinances, endeavoring to look
     so like the true saints and ministers of Christ, that, if it
     were possible, he would deceive the very elect (Matt. xxiv.
     24) by his subtilty: for it is certain he never works more
     like the Prince of darkness than when he looks most like an
     angel of light; and, when he most pretends to holiness, he
     then doth most secretly, and by consequence most surely,
     undermine it, and those that most excel in the exercise
     thereof."

The following is a specimen of the style in which he stirred up the
people:--

     "The application of this doctrine to ourselves remains now
     to be attended. Let it be for solemn warning and awakening
     to all of us that are before the Lord at this time, and to
     all others of this whole people, who shall come to the
     knowledge of these direful operations of Satan, which the
     holy God hath permitted in the midst of us.

     "The Lord doth terrible things amongst us, by lengthening
     the chain of the roaring lion in an extraordinary manner, so
     that the Devil is come down in great wrath (Rev. xii. 12),
     endeavoring to set up his kingdom, and, by racking torments
     on the bodies, and affrightening representations to the
     minds of many amongst us, to force and fright them to become
     his subjects. I may well say, then, in the words of the
     prophet (Mic. vi. 9), 'The Lord's voice crieth to the city,'
     and to the country also, with an unusual and amazing
     loudness. Surely, it warns us to awaken out of all sleep, of
     security or stupidity, to arise, and take our Bibles, turn
     to, and learn that lesson, not by rote only, but by heart. 1
     Pet. v. 8: 'Be sober, be vigilant; because your adversary
     the Devil goes about as a roaring lion, seeking whom amongst
     you he may distress, delude, and devour.'... Awake, awake
     then, I beseech you, and remain no longer under the dominion
     of that prince of cruelty and malice, whose tyrannical fury
     we see thus exerted against the bodies and minds of these
     afflicted persons!... This warning is directed to all manner
     of persons, according to their condition of life, both in
     civil and sacred order; both high and low, rich and poor,
     old and young, bond and free. Oh, let the observation of
     these amazing dispensations of God's unusual and strange
     Providence quicken us to our duty, at such a time as this,
     in our respective places and stations, relations and
     capacities! The great God hath done such things amongst us
     as do make the ears of those that hear them to tingle (Jer.
     xix. 3); and serious souls are at a loss to what these
     things may grow, and what we shall find to be the end of
     this dreadful visitation, in the permission whereof the
     provoked God as a lion hath roared, who can but fear? the
     Lord hath spoken, who can but prophesy? (Amos iii. 8.) The
     loud trumpet of God, in this thundering providence, is blown
     in the city, and the echo of it heard through the country,
     surely then the people must and ought to be afraid (Amos
     iii. 6).... You are therefore to be deeply humbled, and sit
     in the dust, considering the signal hand of God in singling
     out this place, this poor village, for the first seat of
     Satan's tyranny, and to make it (as 'twere) the rendezvous
     of devils, where they muster their infernal forces;
     appearing to the afflicted as coming armed to carry on their
     malicious designs against the bodies, and, if God in mercy
     prevent not, against the souls, of many in this place.... Be
     humbled also that so many members of this church of the Lord
     Jesus Christ should be under the influences of Satan's
     malice in these his operations; some as the objects of his
     tyranny on their bodies to that degree of distress which
     none can be sensible of but those that see and feel it, who
     are in the mean time also sorely distressed in their minds
     by frightful representations made by the devils unto them.
     Other professors and visible members of this church are
     under the awful accusations and imputations of being the
     instruments of Satan in his mischievous actings. It cannot
     but be matter of deep humiliation, to such as are innocent,
     that the righteous and holy God should permit them to be
     named in such pernicious and unheard-of practices, and not
     only so, but that he who cannot but do right should suffer
     the stain of suspected guilt to be, as it were, rubbed on
     and soaked in by many sore and amazing circumstances. And
     it is a matter of soul-abasement to all that are in the bond
     of God's holy covenant in this place, that Satan's seat
     should be amongst them, where he attempts to set up his
     kingdom in opposition to Christ's kingdom, and to take some
     of the visible subjects of our Lord Jesus, and use at least
     their shapes and appearances, instrumentally, to afflict and
     torture other visible subjects of the same kingdom. Surely
     his design is that Christ's kingdom may be divided against
     itself, that, being thereby weakened, he may the better take
     opportunity to set up his own accursed powers and dominions.
     It calls aloud then to all in this place in the name of the
     blessed Jesus, and words of his holy apostle (1 Peter v. 6),
     'Humble yourselves under the mighty hand of God.'

     "It is matter of terror, amazement, and astonishment, to all
     such wretched souls (if there be any here in the
     congregation; and God, of his infinite mercy, grant that
     none of you may ever be found such!) as have given up their
     names and souls to the Devil; who by covenant, explicit or
     implicit, have bound themselves to be his slaves and
     drudges, consenting to be instruments in whose shapes he may
     torment and afflict their fellow-creatures (even of their
     own kind) to the amazing and astonishing of the standers-by.
     I would hope I might have spared this use, but I desire (by
     divine assistance) to declare the whole counsel of God; and
     if it come not as conviction where it is so, it may serve
     for warning, that it may never be so. For it is a most
     dreadful thing to consider that any should change the
     service of God for the service of the Devil, the worship of
     the blessed God for the worship of the cursed enemy of God
     and man. But, oh! (which is yet a thousand times worse) how
     shall I name it? if any that are in the visible covenant of
     God should break that covenant, and make a league with
     Satan; if any that have sat down and eat at Christ's Table,
     should so lift up their heel against him as to have
     fellowship at the table of devils, and (as it hath been
     represented to some of the afflicted) eat of the bread and
     drink of the wine that Satan hath mingled. Surely, if this
     be so, the poet is in the right, "Audax omnia perpeti. Gens
     humana ruit per vetitum nefas:" audacious mortals are grown
     to a fearful height of impiety; and we must cry out in
     Scripture language, and that emphatical apostrophe of the
     Prophet Jeremy (chap. ii. 12), 'Be astonished, O ye heavens,
     at this, and be horribly afraid: be ye very desolate, saith
     the Lord.'... If you are in covenant with the Devil, the
     intercession of the blessed Jesus is against you. His prayer
     is for the subduing of Satan's power and kingdom, and the
     utter confounding of all his instruments. If it be so, then
     the great God is set against you. The omnipotent Jehovah,
     one God in three Persons; Father, Son, and Holy Ghost, in
     their several distinct operations and all their divine
     attributes,--are engaged against you. Therefore KNOW
     YE that are guilty of such monstrous iniquity, that He
     that made you will not save you, and that He that formed you
     will show you no favor (Isa. xxvii. 11). Be assured, that,
     although you should now evade the condemnation of man's
     judgment, and escape a violent death by the hand of justice;
     yet, unless God shall give you repentance (which we heartily
     pray for), there is a day coming when the secrets of all
     hearts shall be revealed by Jesus Christ (Rom. ii. 16).
     Then, then, your sin will find you out; and you shall be
     punished with everlasting destruction from the presence of
     the Lord, and doomed to those endless, easeless, and
     remediless torments prepared for the Devil and his angels
     (Matt. xxv. 41).... If you have been guilty of such
     impiety, the prayers of the people of God are against you on
     that account. It is their duty to pray daily, that Satan's
     kingdom may be suppressed, weakened, brought down, and at
     last totally destroyed; hence that all abettors, subjects,
     defenders, and promoters thereof, may be utterly crushed and
     confounded. They are constrained to suppress that kindness
     and compassion that in their sacred addresses they once bare
     unto you (as those of their own kind, and framed out of the
     same mould), praying with one consent, as the royal prophet
     did against his malicious enemies, the instruments of Satan
     (Ps. cix. 6), 'Set thou a wicked man over him, and let Satan
     stand at his right hand' (i.e.), to withstand all that is
     for his good, and promote all that is for his hurt; and
     (verse 7) 'When he is judged, let him be condemned, and let
     his prayer become sin.'

     "Be we exhorted and directed to exercise true spiritual
     sympathy with, and compassion towards, those poor, afflicted
     persons that are by divine permission under the direful
     influence of Satan's malice. There is a divine precept
     enjoining the practice of such duty: Heb. xiii. 3, 'Remember
     them that suffer adversity, as being yourselves also in the
     body.' Let us, then, be deeply sensible, and, as the elect
     of God, put on bowels of mercy towards those in misery (Col.
     iii. 12). Oh, pity, pity them! for the hand of the Lord hath
     touched them, and the malice of devils hath fallen upon
     them.

     "Let us be sure to take unto us and put on the whole armor
     of God, and every piece of it; let none be wanting. Let us
     labor to be in the exercise and practice of the whole
     company of sanctifying graces and religious duties. This
     important duty is pressed, and the particular pieces of that
     armor recited Eph. vi. 11 and 13 to 18. Satan is
     representing his infernal forces; and the devils seem to
     come armed, mustering amongst us. I am this day commanded to
     call and cry an alarm unto you: ARM, ARM, ARM!
     handle your arms, see that you are fixed and in a readiness,
     as faithful soldiers under the Captain of our salvation,
     that, by the shield of faith, ye and we all may resist the
     fiery darts of the wicked; and may be faithful unto death in
     our spiritual warfare; so shall we assuredly receive the
     crown of life (Rev. ii. 10). Let us admit no parley, give no
     quarter: let none of Satan's forces or furies be more
     vigilant to hurt us than we are to resist and repress them,
     in the name, and by the spirit, grace, and strength of our
     Lord Jesus Christ. Let us ply the throne of grace, in the
     name and merit of our Blessed Mediator, taking all possible
     opportunities, public, private, and secret, to pour out our
     supplications to the God of our salvation. Prayer is the
     most proper and potent antidote against the old Serpent's
     venomous operations. When legions of devils do come down
     among us, multitudes of prayers should go up to God. Satan,
     the worst of all our enemies, is called in Scripture a
     dragon, to note his malice; a serpent, to note his subtilty;
     a lion, to note his strength. But none of all these can
     stand before prayer. The most inveterate malice (as that of
     Haman) sinks under the prayer of Esther (chap. iv. 16). The
     deepest policy (the counsel of Achitophel) withers before
     the prayer of David (2 Sam. xv. 31); and the vastest army
     (an host of a thousand thousand Ethiopians) ran away, like
     so many cowards, before the prayer of Asa (2 Chron. xiv. 9
     to 15).

     "What therefore I say unto one I say unto all, in this
     important case, PRAY, PRAY, PRAY.

     "To our honored magistrates, here present this day, to
     inquire into these things, give me leave, much honored, to
     offer one word to your consideration. Do all that in you
     lies to check and rebuke Satan; endeavoring, by all ways and
     means that are according to the rule of God, to discover his
     instruments in these horrid operations. You are concerned in
     the civil government of this people, being invested with
     power by their Sacred Majesties, under this glorious Jesus
     (the King and Governor of his church), for the supporting of
     Christ's kingdom against all oppositions of Satan's kingdom
     and his instruments. Being ordained of God to such a station
     (Rom. xiii. 1), we entreat you, bear not the sword in vain,
     as ver. 4; but approve yourselves a terror of and punishment
     to evil-doers, and a praise to them that do well (1 Peter
     ii. 14); ever remembering that ye judge not for men, but for
     the Lord (2 Chron. xix. 6); and, as his promise is, so our
     prayer shall be for you, without ceasing, that he would be
     with you in the judgment, as he that can and will direct,
     assist, and reward you. Follow the example of the upright
     Job (chap. xxix. 16): Be a father to the poor; to these poor
     afflicted persons, in pitiful and painful endeavors to help
     them; and the cause that seems to be so dark, as you know
     not how to determine it, do your utmost, in the use of all
     regular means, to search it out.

     "There is comfort in considering that the Lord Jesus, the
     Captain of our salvation, hath already overcome the Devil.
     Christ, that blessed seed of the woman, hath given this
     cursed old serpent called the Devil and Satan a mortal and
     incurable bruise on the head (Gen. iii. 15). He was too much
     for him in a single conflict (Matt. iv.). He opposed his
     power and kingdom in the possessed. He suffered not the
     devils to speak, because they knew him (Mark i. 34). He
     completed his victory by his death on the cross, and
     destroyed his dominion (Heb. ii. 14), that through death he
     might destroy death, and him that had the powers of death,
     that is the Devil; and by and after his resurrection made
     show openly unto the world, that he had spoiled
     principalities and powers, triumphing over them (Col. ii.
     15). Hence, if we are by faith united to him, his victory is
     an earnest and prelibation of our conquest at last. All
     Satan's strugglings now are but those of a conquered enemy.
     It is no small comfort to consider, that Job's exercise of
     patience had its beginning from the Devil; but we have seen
     the end to be from the Lord (James v. 11). That we also may
     find by experience the same blessed issue of our present
     distresses by Satan's malice, let us repent of every sin
     that hath been committed, and labor to practise every duty
     which hath been neglected. Then we shall assuredly and
     speedily find that the kingly power of our Lord and Saviour
     shall be magnified, in delivering his poor sheep and lambs
     out of the jaws and paws of the roaring lion."

[Illustration: _Eng'd at J. Andrews's by R. Babson._

WILLIAM STOUGHTON.]

These extended extracts are given from Lawson's discourse, partly to
enable every one to estimate the effect it must have produced, under
the circumstances of the occasion, but mainly because they present a
living picture of the sentiments, notions, modes of thinking and
reasoning, and convictions, then prevalent. No description given by a
person looking back from our point of view, not having experienced the
delusions of that age, no matter who might attempt the task, could
adequately paint the scene. The foregoing extracts show better, I
think, than any documents that have come down to us, how the subject
lay in the minds of men at that time. They bring before us directly,
without the intervention of any secondary agency, the thoughts,
associations, sentiments, of that generation, in breathing reality.
They carry us back to the hour and to the spot. Deodat Lawson rises
from his unknown grave, comes forth from the impenetrable cloud which
enveloped the closing scenes of his mortal career, and we listen to
his voice, as it spoke to the multitudes that gathered in and around
the meeting-house in Salem Village, on Lecture-day, March 24, 1692. He
lays bare his whole mind to our immediate inspection. In and through
him, we behold the mind and heart, the forms of language and thought,
the feelings and passions, of the people of that day. We mingle with
the crowd that hang upon his lips; we behold their countenances,
discern the passions that glowed upon their features, and enter into
the excitement that moved and tossed them like a tempest. We are thus
prepared, as we could be in no other way, to comprehend our story.

The sermon answered its end. It re-enforced the powers that had begun
their work. It spread out the whole doctrine of witchcraft in a
methodical, elaborate, and most impressive form. It justified and
commended every thing that had been done, and every thing that
remained to be done; every step in the proceedings; every process in
the examinations; every kind of accusation and evidence that had been
adduced; every phase of the popular belief, however wild and
monstrous; every pretension of the afflicted children to
preternatural experiences and communications, and every tale of
apparitions of departed spirits and the ghosts of murdered men, women,
and children, which, engendered in morbid and maniac imaginations, had
been employed to fill him and others with horror, inspire revenge, and
drive on the general delirium. And it fortified every point by the law
and the testimony, by passages and scraps of Scripture, studiously and
skilfully culled out, and ingeniously applied. It gave form to what
had been vague, and authority to what had floated in blind and
baseless dreams of fancy. It crystallized the disordered vagaries,
that had been seething in turbulent confusion in the public mind, into
a fixed, organized, and permanent shape.

Its publication was forthwith called for. The manuscript was submitted
to Increase and Cotton Mather of the North, James Allen and John
Bailey of the First, Samuel Willard of the Old South, churches in
Boston, and Charles Morton of the church in Charlestown. It was
printed with a strong, unqualified indorsement of approval, signed by
the names severally of these the most eminent divines of the country.
The discourse was dedicated to the "worshipful and worthily honored
Bartholomew Gedney, John Hathorne, Jonathan Corwin, Esqrs., together
with the reverend Mr. John Higginson, pastor, and Mr. Nicholas Noyes,
teacher, of the Church of Christ at Salem," with a preface, addressed
to all his "Christian friends and acquaintance, the inhabitants of
Salem Village." It was republished in London in 1704, under the
immediate direction of its author. The subject is described as
"Christ's Fidelity, the only Shield against Satan's Malignity;" and
the titlepage is enforced by passages of Scripture (Rev. xii. 12, and
Rom. xvi. 20). The interest of the volume is highly increased by an
appendix, giving the substance of notes taken by Lawson on the spot,
during the examinations and trials. They are invaluable, as proceeding
from a chief actor in the scenes, who was wholly carried away by the
delusion. They describe, in marvellous colors, the wonderful
manifestations of diabolical agency in, upon, and through the
afflicted children; resembling, in many respects, reports of spiritual
communications prevalent in our day, although not quite coming up to
them. These statements, and the preface to the discourse, are given in
the Appendix to this volume. In a much briefer form, it was printed by
Benjamin Harris, at Boston, in 1692; and soon after by John Dunton, in
London.

Before dismissing Mr. Lawson's famous sermon, our attention is
demanded to a remarkable paragraph in it. His strong faculties could
not be wholly bereft of reason; and he had sense enough left to see,
what does not appear to have occurred to others, that there might be a
re-action in the popular passions, and that some might be called to
account by an indignant public, if not before a stern tribunal of
justice, for the course of cruelty and outrage they were pursuing,
with so high a hand, against accused persons. He was not entirely
satisfied that the appeal he made in his discourse to the people to
suppress and crush out all vestiges of human feeling, and to stifle
compassion and pity in their breasts, would prevail. He foresaw that
the friends and families of innocent and murdered victims might one
day call for vengeance; and he attempts to provide, beforehand, a
defence that is truly ingenious:--

     "Give no place to the Devil by rash censuring of others,
     without sufficient grounds, or false accusing any willingly.
     This is indeed to be like the Devil, who hath the title,
     [Greek: Diabolos], in the Greek, because he is the
     calumniator or false accuser. Hence, when we read of such
     accusers in the latter days, they are, in the original,
     called [Greek: Diaboloi], _calumniatores_ (2 Tim. iii. 3).
     It is a time of temptation amongst you, such as never was
     before: let me entreat you not to be lavish or severe in
     reflecting on the malice or envy of your neighbors, by whom
     any of you have been accused, lest, whilst you falsely
     charge one another,--viz., the relations of the afflicted
     and relations of the accused,--the grand accuser (who loves
     to fish in troubled waters) should take advantage upon you.
     Look at sin, the procuring cause; God in justice, the
     sovereign efficient; and Satan, the enemy, the principal
     instrument, both in afflicting some and accusing others.
     And, if innocent persons be suspected, it is to be ascribed
     to God's pleasure, supremely permitting, and Satan's malice
     subordinately troubling, by representation of such to the
     afflicting of others, even of such as have, all the while,
     we have reason to believe (especially some of them), no kind
     of ill-will or disrespect unto those that have been
     complained of by them. This giving place to the Devil avoid;
     for it will have uncomfortable and pernicious influence
     upon the affairs of this place, by letting out peace, and
     bringing in confusion and every evil work, which we heartily
     pray God, in mercy, to prevent."

This artifice of statement, speciously covered,--while it outrages
every sentiment of natural justice, and breaks every bond of social
responsibility,--is found, upon close inspection, to be a shocking
imputation against the divine administration. It represents the Deity,
under the phrases "sovereign efficient" and "supremely permitting" in
a view which affords equal shelter to every other class of criminals,
even of the deepest dye, as well as those who were ready and eager to
bring upon their neighbors the charge of confederacy with Satan.

The next Sunday--March 27--was the regular communion-day of the
village church; and Mr. Parris prepared duly to improve the occasion
to advance the movement then so strongly under way, and to deepen
still more the impression made by the events of the week, especially
by Mr. Lawson's sermon. He accordingly composed an elaborate and
effective discourse of his own; and a scene was arranged to follow the
regular service, which could not but produce important results. An
unexpected occurrence--a part not in the programme--took place, which
created a sensation for the moment; but it tended, upon the whole, to
heighten the public excitement, and, without much disturbing the
order, only precipitated a little the progress of events.

It may well be supposed, that the congregation assembled that day with
minds awfully solemnized, and altogether in a condition to be deeply
affected by the services. A respectable person always prominently
noticeable for her devout participation in the worship of the
sanctuary, and a member of the church, had, on Monday, after a public
examination, been committed to prison, and was there in irons, waiting
to be tried for her life for the blackest of crimes,--a confederacy
with the enemy of the souls of men, the archtraitor and rebel against
the throne of God. On Thursday, another venerable, and ever before
considered pious, matron of a large and influential family, a
participant in their worship, and a member of the mother-church, had
been consigned to the same fate, to be tried for the same horrible
crime. A little child had been proved to have also joined in the
infernal league. No one could tell to what extent Satan had lengthened
his chain, or who, whether old or young, were in league with him.
Every soul was still alive to the impressions made by Mr. Lawson's
great discourse, and by the throngs of excited people, including
magistrates and ministers, that had been gathered in the village.

The character and spirit of Mr. Parris's sermon are indicated in a
prefatory note in the manuscript, "occasioned by dreadful witchcraft
broke out here a few weeks past; and one member of this church, and
another of Salem, upon public examination by civil authority,
vehemently suspected for she-witches." The running title is, "Christ
knows how many devils there are in his church, and who they are;" and
the text is John vi. 70, 71, "Jesus answered them, Have not I chosen
you twelve, and one of you is a devil? He spake of Judas Iscariot, the
son of Simon; for he it was that should betray him, being one of the
twelve."

Peter Cloyse was born May 27, 1639. He came to Salem from York, in
Maine, and was one of the original members of the village church. He
appears to have been a person of the greatest respectability and
strength of character. He married Sarah, sister of Rebecca Nurse, and
widow of Edmund Bridges. She was admitted to the village church, Jan.
12, 1690, being then about forty-eight years of age. It may well be
supposed that she and her family were overwhelmed with affliction and
horror by the proceedings against her sister. But, as she and her
husband were both communicants, and it was sacrament-day, it was
thought best for them to summon resolution to attend the service.
After much persuasion, she was induced to go. She was a very sensitive
person, and it must have required a great effort of fortitude. Her
mind was undoubtedly much harrowed by the allusions made to the events
of the week; and, when Mr. Parris announced his text, and opened his
discourse in the spirit his language indicates, she could bear it no
longer, but rose, and left the meeting. A fresh wind blowing at the
time caused the door to slam after her. The congregation was probably
startled; but Parris was not long embarrassed by the interruption,
and she was attended to in due season. At the close of the service,
the following scene occurred. I give it as Parris describes it in his
church-record book:--

     "After the common auditory was dismissed, and before the
     church's communion at the Lord's Table, the following
     testimony against the error of our Sister Mary Sibley, who
     had given direction to my Indian man in an unwarrantable way
     to find out witches, was read by the pastor:--

     "It is altogether undeniable that our great and blessed God,
     for wise and holy ends, hath suffered many persons, in
     several families, of this little village, to be grievously
     vexed and tortured in body, and to be deeply tempted, to the
     endangering of the destruction of their souls; and all these
     amazing feats (well known to many of us) to be done by
     witchcraft and diabolical operations. It is also well known,
     that, when these calamities first began, which was in my own
     family, the affliction was several weeks before such hellish
     operations as witchcraft were suspected. Nay, it was not
     brought forth to any considerable light, until diabolical
     means were used by the making of a cake by my Indian man,
     who had his direction from this our sister, Mary Sibley;
     since which, apparitions have been plenty, and exceeding
     much mischief hath followed. But, by these means (it seems),
     the Devil hath been raised amongst us, and his rage is
     vehement and terrible; and, when he shall be silenced, the
     Lord only knows. But now that this our sister should be
     instrumental to such distress is a great grief to myself,
     and our godly honored and reverend neighbors, who have had
     the knowledge of it. Nevertheless, I do truly hope and
     believe, that this our sister doth truly fear the Lord; and
     I am well satisfied from her, that, what she did, she did it
     ignorantly, from what she had heard of this nature from
     other ignorant or worse persons. Yet we are in duty bound to
     protest against such actions, as being indeed a going to the
     Devil for help against the Devil: we having no such
     directions from nature, or God's word, it must therefore be,
     and is, accounted, by godly Protestants who write or speak
     of such matters, as diabolical; and therefore calls this our
     sister to deep humiliation for what she has done, and all of
     us to be watchful against Satan's wiles and devices.

     "Therefore, as we, in duty as a church of Christ, are deeply
     bound to protest against it, as most directly contrary to
     the gospel, yet, inasmuch as this our sister did it in
     ignorance as she professeth and we believe, we can continue
     her in our holy fellowship, upon her serious promise of
     future better advisedness and caution, and acknowledging
     that she is indeed sorrowful for her rashness herein.

     "Brethren, if this be your mind, that this iniquity should
     be thus borne witness against, manifest it by your usual
     sign of lifting up your hands.--The brethren voted
     generally, or universally: none made any exceptions.

     "Sister Sibley, if you are convinced that you herein did
     sinfully, and are sorry for it, let us hear it from your own
     mouth.--She did manifest to satisfaction her error and grief
     for it.

     "Brethren, if herein you have received satisfaction, testify
     it by lifting up your hands.--A general vote passed; no
     exception made.

     "NOTE.--25th March, 1692. I discoursed said sister in my
     study about her grand error aforesaid, and also then read to
     her what I had written as above to be read to the church;
     and said Sister Sibley assented to the same with tears and
     sorrowful confession."

This proceeding was of more importance than appears, perhaps, at first
view. It was one of Mr. Parris's most skilful moves. The course,
pursued by the "afflicted" persons had, thus far, in reference to
those engaged in the prosecutions, been in the right direction. But it
was manifest, after the exhibitions they had given, that they wielded
a fearful power, too fearful to be left without control. They could
cry out upon whomsoever they pleased; and against their accusations,
armed as they were with the power to fix the charge of guilt upon any
one by giving ocular demonstration that he or she was the author of
their sufferings, there could be no defence. They might turn, at any
moment, and cry out upon Parris or Lawson, or either or both of the
deacons. Nothing could withstand the evidence of their fits,
convulsions, and tortures. It was necessary to have and keep them
under safe control, and, to this end, to prevent any outsiders, or any
injudicious or intermeddling people, from holding intimacy with them.
Parris saw this, and, with his characteristic boldness of action and
fertility of resources, at once put a stop to all trouble, and closed
the door against danger, from this quarter.

Samuel Sibley was a member of the church, and a near neighbor of Mr.
Parris. He was about thirty-six years of age. His wife Mary was
thirty-two years of age, and also a member of the church. They were
persons of respectable standing and good repute. Nothing is known to
her disadvantage, but her foolish connection with the mystical
operations going on in Mr. Parris's family; and of this she was
heartily ashamed. Her penitent sensibility is quite touchingly
described by Mr. Parris. It is true that what she had done was a
trifle in comparison with what was going on every day in the families
of Mr. Parris and Thomas Putnam: but she had acted "rashly," without
"advisedness" from the right quarter, under the lead of "ignorant
persons;" and therefore it was necessary to make a great ado about it,
and hold her up as a warning to prevent other persons from meddling in
such matters. Her husband was an uncle of Mary Walcot, one of the
afflicted children; and it was particularly important to keep their
relatives, and members of their immediate families, from taking any
part or action in connection with them, except under due
"advisedness," and the direction of persons learned in such deep
matters. The family connections of the Sibleys were extensive, and a
blow struck at that point would be felt everywhere. The procedure was
undoubtedly effectual. After Mary Sibley had been thus awfully rebuked
and distressingly exposed for dealing with "John Indian," it is not
likely that any one else ever ventured to intermeddle with the
"afflicted," or have any connection, except as outside spectators,
with the marvellous phenomena of "diabolical operations." It will be
noticed, that, while Mr. Parris thus waved the sword of disciplinary
vengeance against any who should dare to intrude upon the forbidden
ground, he occupied it himself without disguise, and maintained his
hold upon it. He asserts the reality of the "amazing feats" practised
by diabolical power in their midst, and enforces in the strongest
language the then prevalent views and pending proceedings.

The operations of the week, including the solemn censure of Mary
Sibley, had all worked favorably for the prosecutors and managers of
the business. The magistrates, ministers, and whole body of the
people, had become committed; the accusing girls had proved themselves
apt and competent to their work; the public reason was prostrated, and
natural sensibility stunned. All resisting forces were powerless, and
all collateral dangers avoided and provided against. The movement was
fully in hand. The next step was maturely considered, and, as we shall
see, skilfully taken.

It is to be observed, that there was, at this time, a break in the
regular government of Massachusetts. In the spring of 1689, the people
had risen, seized the royal governor, Sir Edmund Andros, and put him
in prison. They summoned their old charter governor, Simon Bradstreet,
then living in Salem, eighty-seven years of age, to the chair of
state; called the assistants of 1686 back to their seats, who provided
for an election of representatives by the people of the towns; and the
government thus created conducted affairs until the arrival of Sir
William Phipps, in May, 1692, when Massachusetts ceased to be a
colony, and was thenceforth, until 1774, a royal province. During
these three years, from May, 1689, to May, 1692, the government was
based upon an uprising of the people. It was a period of pure and
absolute independence of the crown or parliament of England. Although
Bradstreet's faculties were unimpaired and his spirit true and firm,
his age prevented his doing much more than to give his loved and
venerated name to the daring movement, and to the official service, of
the people. The executive functions were, for the most part, exercised
by the deputy-governor, Thomas Danforth, who was a person of great
ability and public spirit. Unfortunately, at this time he was
zealously in favor of the witchcraft prosecutions. Bradstreet was
throughout opposed to them. Had time held off its hand, and his
physical energies not been impaired, he would undoubtedly have
resisted and prevented them. Danforth, it is said by Brattle, came to
disapprove of them finally: but he began them by arrests in other
towns, months before any thing of the kind was thought of in Salem
Village; and he contributed, prominently, to give destructive and
wide-spread power, in an early stage of its development, to the
witchcraft delusion here.

After the lapse of a week, preparations were completed to renew
operations, and a higher and more commanding character given to them.
On Monday, April 4, Captain Jonathan Walcot and Lieutenant Nathaniel
Ingersoll went to the town, and, "for themselves and several of their
neighbors," exhibited to the assistants residing there, John Hathorne
and Jonathan Corwin, complaints against "Sarah Cloyse, the wife of
Peter Cloyse of Salem Village, and Elizabeth Procter of Salem Farms,
for high suspicion of sundry acts of witchcraft." There the plan of
proceedings in reference to the above-said parties was agreed upon. It
was the result of consultation; communications probably passing with
the deputy-governor in Boston, or at his residence in Cambridge. On
the 8th of April, warrants were duly issued, ordering the marshal to
bring in the prisoners "on Monday morning next, being the eleventh day
of this instant April, about eleven of the clock, in the public
meeting-house in the town." It had been arranged, that the examination
should not be, as before, in the ordinary way, before the two local
magistrates, but, in an extraordinary way, before the highest tribunal
in the colony, or a representation of it. For a preliminary hearing,
with a view merely to commitment for trial, this surely may justly be
characterized as an extraordinary, wholly irregular, and, in all
points of view, reprehensible procedure. When the day came, the
meeting-house, which was much more capacious than that at the village,
was crowded; and the old town filled with excited throngs. Upon
opening proceedings, lo and behold, instead of the two magistrates,
the government of the colony was present, in the highest character it
then had as "a council"! The record says,--

     "Salem, April 11, 1692.--At a Council held at Salem, and
     present Thomas Danforth, Esq., deputy-governor; James
     Russell, John Hathorne, Isaac Addington, Major Samuel
     Appleton, Captain Samuel Sewall, Jonathan Corwin, Esquires."

Russell was of Charlestown, Addington and Sewall of Boston, and
Appleton of Ipswich. Mr. Parris, "being desired and appointed to write
the examination, did take the same, and also read it before the
council in public." This document has not come down to us; but
Hutchinson had access to it, and the substance of it is preserved in
his "History of Massachusetts."

The marshal (Herrick) brought in Sarah Cloyse and Elizabeth Procter,
and delivered them "before the honorable council:" and the examination
was begun.

The deputy-governor first called to the stand John Indian, and plied
him, as was the course pursued on all these occasions, with leading
questions:--

     "John, who hurt you?--Goody Procter first, and then Goody
     Cloyse.

     "What did she do to you?--She brought the book to me.

     "John, tell the truth: who hurts you? Have you been
     hurt?--The first was a gentlewoman I saw.

     "Who next?--Goody Cloyse.

     "But who hurt you next?--Goody Procter.

     "What did she do to you?--She choked me, and brought the
     book.

     "How oft did she come to torment you?--A good many times,
     she and Goody Cloyse.

     "Do they come to you in the night, as well as the day?--They
     come most in the day.

     "Who?--Goody Cloyse and Goody Procter.

     "Where did she take hold of you?--Upon my throat, to stop my
     breath.

     "Do you know Goody Cloyse and Goody Procter?--Yes: here is
     Goody Cloyse."

We may well suppose that these two respectable women must have been
filled with indignation, shocked, and amazed at the statements made by
the Indian, following the leading interrogatories of the Court. Sarah
Cloyse broke out, "When did I hurt thee?" He answered, "A great many
times." She exclaimed, "Oh, you are a grievous liar!" The Court
proceeded with their questions:--

     "What did this Goody Cloyse do to you?--She pinched and bit
     me till the blood came.

     "How long since this woman came and hurt you?--Yesterday, at
     meeting.

     "At any time before?--Yes: a great many times."

Having drawn out John Indian, the Court turned to the other afflicted
ones:--

     "Mary Walcot, who hurts you?--Goody Cloyse.

     "What did she do to you?--She hurt me.

     "Did she bring the book?--Yes.

     "What was you to do with it?--To touch it, and be well.

     "(Then she fell into a fit.)"

This put a stop to the examination for a time; but it was generally
quite easy to bring witnesses out of a fit, and restore entire
calmness of mind. All that was necessary was to lift them up, and
carry them to the accused person, the touch of any part of whose body
would, in an instant, relieve the sufferer. This having been done, the
examination proceeded:--

     "Doth she come alone?--Sometimes alone, and sometimes in
     company with Goody Nurse and Goody Corey, and a great many I
     do not know.

     "(Then she fell into a fit again.)"

She was, probably, restored in the same way as before; but, her part
being finished for that stage of the proceeding, another of the
afflicted children took the stand:--

     "Abigail Williams, did you see a company at Mr. Parris's
     house eat and drink?--Yes, sir: that was in the sacrament."

I would call attention to the form of the foregoing questions.
Hutchinson says that "Mr. Parris was over-officious: most of the
examinations, although in the presence of one or more magistrates,
were taken by him." He put the questions. They show, on this occasion,
a minute knowledge beforehand of what the witnesses are to say, which
it cannot be supposed Danforth, Russell, Addington, Appleton, and
Sewall, strangers, as they were, to the place and the details of the
affair, could have had. The examination proceeded:--

     "How many were there?--About forty, and Goody Cloyse and
     Goody Good were their deacons.

     "What was it?--They said it was our blood, and they had it
     twice that day."

The interrogator again turned to Mary Walcot, and inquired,--

     "Have you seen a white man?--Yes, sir: a great many times.

     "What sort of a man was he?--A fine grave man; and, when he
     came, he made all the witches to tremble.

     "(Abigail Williams confirmed the same, and that they had
     such a sight at Deacon Ingersoll's.)

     "Who was at Deacon Ingersoll's then?--Goody Cloyse, Goody
     Nurse, Goody Corey, and Goody Good.

     "(Then Sarah Cloyse asked for water, and sat down, as one
     seized with a dying, fainting fit; and several of the
     afflicted fell into fits, and some of them cried out, 'Oh!
     her spirit has gone to prison to her sister Nurse.')"

The audacious lying of the witnesses; the horrid monstrousness of
their charges against Sarah Cloyse, of having bitten the flesh of the
Indian brute, and drank herself and distributed to others, as deacon,
at an infernal sacrament, the blood of the wicked creatures making
these foul and devilish declarations, known by her to be utterly and
wickedly false; and the fact that they were believed by the deputy,
the council, and the assembly,--were more than she could bear. Her
soul sickened at such unimaginable depravity and wrong; her nervous
system gave way; she fainted, and sunk to the floor. The manner in
which the girls turned the incident against her shows how they were
hardened to all human feeling, and the cunning art which, on all
occasions, characterized their proceedings. That such an insolent
interruption and disturbance, on their part, was permitted, without
rebuke from the Court, is a perpetual dishonor to every member of it.
The scene exhibited at this moment, in the meeting-house, is worthy of
an attempt to imagine. The most terrible sensation was naturally
produced, by the swooning of the prisoner, the loudly uttered and
savage mockery of the girls, and their going simultaneously into fits,
screaming at the top of their voices, twisting into all possible
attitudes, stiffened as in death, or gasping with convulsive spasms of
agony, and crying out, at intervals, "There is the black man
whispering in Cloyse's ear," "There is a yellow-bird flying round her
head." John Indian, on such occasions, used to confine his
achievements to tumbling, and rolling his ugly body about the floor.
The deepest commiseration was felt by all for the "afflicted," and men
and women rushed to hold and soothe them. There was, no doubt, much
loud screeching, and some miscellaneous faintings, through the whole
crowd. At length, by bringing the sufferers into contact with Goody
Cloyse, the diabolical fluid passed back into her, they were all
relieved, and the examination was resumed. Elizabeth Procter was now
brought forward.

In the account given, in the First Part, of the population of Salem
Village and the contiguous farms, her husband, John Procter, was
introduced to our acquaintance. From what we then saw of him, we are
well assured that he would not shrink from the protection and defence
of his wife. He accompanied her from her arrest to her arraignment,
and stood by her side, a strong, brave, and resolute guardian, trying
to support her under the terrible trials of her situation, and ready
to comfort and aid her to the extent of his power, disregardful of all
consequences to himself. The examination proceeded:--

     "Elizabeth Procter, you understand whereof you are charged;
     viz., to be guilty of sundry acts of witchcraft. What say
     you to it? Speak the truth; and so you that are afflicted,
     you must speak the truth, as you will answer it before God
     another day. Mary Walcot, doth this woman hurt you?--I never
     saw her so as to be hurt by her.

     "Mercy Lewis, does she hurt you?

     "(Her mouth was stopped.)

     "Ann Putnam, does she hurt you?

     "(She could not speak.)

     "Abigail Williams, does she hurt you?

     "(Her hand was thrust in her own mouth.)

     "John, does she hurt you?--This is the woman that came in
     her shift, and choked me.

     "Did she ever bring the book?--Yes, sir.

     "What to do?--To write.

     "What? this woman?--Yes, sir.

     "Are you sure of it?--Yes, sir.

     "(Again Abigail Williams and Ann Putnam were spoke to by the
     Court; but neither of them could make any answer, by reason
     of dumbness or other fits.)

     "What do you say, Goody Procter, to these things?--I take
     God in heaven to be my witness, that I know nothing of it,
     no more than the child unborn.

     "Ann Putnam, doth this woman hurt you?--Yes, sir: a great
     many times.

     "(Then the accused looked upon them, and they fell into
     fits.)

     "She does not bring the book to you, does she?--Yes, sir,
     often; and saith she hath made her maid set her hand to it.

     "Abigail Williams, does this woman hurt you?--Yes, sir,
     often.

     "Does she bring the book to you?--Yes.

     "What would she have you do with it?--To write in it, and I
     shall be well."

Turning to the accused, Abigail said, "Did not you tell me that your
maid had written?" Goody Procter seems to have been utterly amazed at
the conduct and charges of the girls. She knew, of course, that what
they said was false; but perhaps she thought them crazy, and therefore
objects of pity and compassion, and felt disposed to treat them
kindly, and see whether they could not be recalled to their senses,
and restored to their better nature: for Parris, in his account, says
that at this point she answered the question thus put to her by
Abigail thus: "Dear child, it is not so. There is another judgment,
dear child." But kindness was thrown away upon them; for Parris says
that immediately "Abigail and Ann had fits." After coming out of them,
"they cried out, 'Look you! there is Goody Procter upon the beam.'"
Instantly, as we may well suppose, the whole audience looked where
they pointed. Their manner gave assurance that they saw her "on the
beam," among the rafters of the meeting-house; but she was invisible
to all other eyes. The people, no doubt, were filled with amazement at
such supernaturalism. But John Procter, her husband, did not believe a
word of it: and it is not to be doubted that he expressed his
indignation at the nonsense and the outrage in his usual bold, strong,
and unguarded language, which brought down the vengeance of the girls
at once on his own head; for Parris, in his report, goes on to say:--

     "(By and by, both of them cried out of Goodman Procter
     himself, and said he was a wizard. Immediately, many if not
     all of the bewitched had grievous fits.)

     "Ann Putnam, who hurt you?--Goodman Procter, and his wife
     too.

     "(Afterwards, some of the afflicted cried, 'There is Procter
     going to take up Mrs. Pope's feet!' and her feet were
     immediately taken up.)

     "What do you say, Goodman Procter, to these things?--I know
     not. I am innocent.

     "(Abigail Williams cried out, 'There is Goodman Procter
     going to Mrs. Pope!' and immediately said Pope fell into a
     fit.)"

At this point, the deputy, or some member of the Court interposed, if
I interpret rightly Parris's report, which is here obscurely
expressed, inasmuch as he does not say who spoke; but the import of
the words indicates that they proceeded from some member of the Court,
who was perfectly deceived:--

     "You see, the Devil will deceive you: the children could see
     what you was going to do before the woman was hurt. I would
     advise you to repentance, for the Devil is bringing you out.

     "(Abigail Williams cried out again, 'There is Goodman
     Procter going to hurt Goody Bibber!' and immediately Goody
     Bibber fell into a fit. There was the like of Mary Walcot,
     and divers others. Benjamin Gould gave in his testimony,
     that he had seen Goodman Corey and his wife, Procter and his
     wife, Goody Cloyse, Goody Nurse, and Goody Griggs in his
     chamber last Thursday night. Elizabeth Hubbard was in a
     trance during the whole examination. During the examination
     of Elizabeth Procter, Abigail Williams and Ann Putnam both
     made offer to strike at said Procter; but, when Abigail's
     hand came near, it opened,--whereas it was made up into a
     fist before,--and came down exceeding lightly as it drew
     near to said Procter, and at length, with open and extended
     fingers, touched Procter's hood very lightly. Immediately,
     Abigail cried out, her fingers, her fingers, her fingers
     burned; and Ann Putnam took on most grievously of her head,
     and sunk down.)"

Hutchinson, after giving Parris's account of this examination,
expresses himself thus: "No wonder the whole country was in a
consternation, when persons of sober lives and unblemished characters
were committed to prison upon such sort of evidence. Nobody was safe."
All things considered, it may perhaps be said, that, filled as the
witchcraft proceedings were throughout with folly and outrage, there
was nothing worse than this examination, conducted by the
deputy-governor and council, on the 11th of April, 1692, in the great
meeting-house of the First Church in Salem. It must have been a scene
of the wildest disorder, particularly in the latter part of it. No
wonder that the people in general were deluded, when the most learned
councillors of the colony countenanced, participated in, and gave
effect to, such disorderly procedures in a house of worship, in the
presence of a high judicial tribunal, and of the then supreme
government of the colony!

Benjamin Gould gave his volunteer testimony without "advisedness," and
quite incontinently. He brought out Goodman Corey before the managers
were quite ready to fall upon him; and he antedated, by a considerable
length of time, any such imputation upon Goody Griggs. It was well for
Elizabeth Hubbard to have been in a trance, so that she could not hear
the mention of her aunt's name. The council seems to have adjourned to
the next day, at the same place, when Mr. Parris "gave further
information against said John Procter," which, unfortunately, has not
come down to us. The result was, that Sarah Cloyse, John Procter, and
Elizabeth his wife, were all committed for trial, and, with Rebecca
Nurse, Martha Corey, and Dorcas Good, were sent to the jail in Boston,
in the custody of Marshal Herrick.

The proceedings of the 11th and 12th of April produced a great effect
in driving on the general infatuation. Judge Sewall, who was present
as one of the council, in his diary at this date, says, "Went to
Salem, where, in the meeting-house, the persons accused of witchcraft
were examined; was a very great assembly; 'twas awful to see how the
afflicted persons were agitated." In the margin is written,
apparently some time afterwards, the interjection "_Væ!_" thrice
repeated,--"Alas, alas, alas!" What perfectly deluded him and
Danforth, and everybody else, were the exhibitions made by the
"afflicted children." This is the grand phenomenon of the witchcraft
proceedings here in 1692. It, and it alone, carried them through.
Those girls, by long practice in "the circle," and day by day, before
astonished and wondering neighbors gathered to witness their
distresses, and especially on the more public occasions of the
examinations, had acquired consummate boldness and tact. In simulation
of passions, sufferings, and physical affections; in sleight of hand,
and in the management of voice and feature and attitude,--no
necromancers have surpassed them. There has seldom been better acting
in a theatre than they displayed in the presence of the astonished and
horror-stricken rulers, magistrates, ministers, judges, jurors,
spectators, and prisoners. No one seems to have dreamed that their
actings and sufferings could have been the result of cunning or
imposture. Deodat Lawson was a man of talents, had seen much of the
world, and was by no means a simpleton, recluse, or novice; but he was
wholly deluded by them. The prisoners, although conscious of their own
innocence, were utterly confounded by the acting of the girls. The
austere principles of that generation forbade, with the utmost
severity, all theatrical shows and performances. But at Salem Village
and the old town, in the respective meeting-houses, and at Deacon
Nathaniel Ingersoll's, some of the best playing ever got up in this
country was practised; and patronized, for weeks and months, at the
very centre and heart of Puritanism, by "the most straitest sect" of
that solemn order of men. Pastors, deacons, church-members, doctors of
divinity, college professors, officers of state, crowded, day after
day, to behold feats which have never been surpassed on the boards of
any theatre; which rivalled the most memorable achievements of
pantomimists, thaumaturgists, and stage-players; and made considerable
approaches towards the best performances of ancient sorcerers and
magicians, or modern jugglers and mesmerizers.

The meeting of the council at Salem, on the 11th of April, 1692,
changed in one sense the whole character of the transaction. Before,
it had been a Salem affair. After this, it was a Massachusetts affair.
The colonial government at Boston had obtruded itself upon the ground,
and, of its own will and seeking, irregularly, and without call or
justification, had taken the whole thing out of the hands of the local
authorities into its own management. Neither the town nor the village
of Salem is responsible, as a principal actor, for what subsequently
took place. To that meeting of the deputy-governor and his associates
in the colonial administration, at an early period of the transaction,
the calamities, outrages, and shame that followed must in justice be
ascribed. Had it not taken place, the delusion, as in former instances
and other places here and in the mother-country, would have remained
within its original local limits, and soon disappeared. That meeting,
and the proceedings then had, gave to the fanaticism the momentum that
drove it on, and extended its destructive influence far and wide.

The next step in the proceedings is one of the most remarkable
features in the case. It is, in some points of view, more suggestive
of suspicion, that there was, behind the whole, a skilful and cunning
management, ingeniously contriving schemes to mislead the public mind,
than almost any other part of the transaction. Mary Warren, as has
been said, was a servant in the family of John Procter. She was a
member of the "circle" that had so long met at Mr. Parris's house or
Thomas Putnam's. She was a constant attendant at its meetings, and a
leading spirit among the girls. She did not take an open part against
her master or mistress at their examination, although she acted with
avidity and malignity against them as an accusing witness at their
trials, two months afterwards. It is to be noticed, that Ann Putnam
and Abigail Williams, at the examination of Elizabeth Procter, April
11, accused her of having induced or compelled "her maid to set her
hand to the book."

On the 18th of April, warrants were got out against Giles Corey and
Mary Warren, both of Salem Farms; Abigail Hobbs, daughter of William
Hobbs, of Topsfield; and Bridget Bishop, wife of Edward Bishop, of
Salem,--to be brought in the next forenoon, at about eight o'clock, at
the house of Lieutenant Nathaniel Ingersoll, of Salem Village. How
Mary Warren became transformed from an accuser to an accused, from an
afflicted person to an afflicter, is the question. It is not easy to
fathom the conduct of these girls. They appear to have acted upon a
plan deliberately formed, and to have had an understanding with each
other. At the same time, occasionally, they had or pretended to have a
falling-out, and came into contradiction. This was perhaps a mere
blind, to prevent the suspicion of collusion. The accounts given of
Mary Warren seem to render it quite certain that she acted with
deliberate cunning, and was a guilty conspirator with the other
accusers in carrying on the plot from the beginning. No doubt, it
frequently occurred to those concerned in it, that suspicions might
possibly get into currency that they were acting a part in concert. It
was necessary, by all means, to guard against such an idea. This may
be the key to interpret the arrest and proceedings against Mary
Warren. If it is, the affair, it must be confessed, was managed with
great shrewdness and skill. She conducted the stratagem most
dexterously. All at once she fell away from the circle, and began to
talk against the "afflicted children," and went so far as to say, that
they "did but dissemble." Immediately, they cried out upon her,
charged her with witchcraft, and had her apprehended. After being
carried to prison, she spoke in strong language against the
proceedings. Four persons of unquestionable truthfulness, in prison
with her, on the same charge, prepared a deposition to this effect:
"We heard Mary Warren several times say that the magistrates might as
well examine Keysar's daughter that had been distracted many years,
and take notice of what she said, as well as any of the afflicted
persons. 'For,' said Mary Warren, 'when I was afflicted, I thought I
saw the apparitions of a hundred persons;' for she said her head was
distempered that she could not tell what she said. And the said Mary
told us, that, when she was well again, she could not say that she saw
any of the apparitions at the time aforesaid." I will now give the
substance of her examination, which commenced on the 19th of April.
Mr. Parris was, as usual, requested to take minutes of the
proceedings, which have been preserved:--

     "_Examination of Mary Warren, at a Court held at Salem
     Village, by John Hathorne and Jonathan Corwin, Esqrs._

     "(As soon as she was coming towards the bar, the afflicted
     fell into fits.)

     "Mary Warren, you stand here charged with sundry acts of
     witchcraft. What do you say for yourself? Are you guilty or
     not?--I am innocent.

     "Hath she hurt you? (Speaking to the sufferers.)

     "(Some were dumb. Betty Hubbard testified against her, and
     then said Hubbard fell into a violent fit.)

     "You were, a little while ago, an afflicted person; now you
     are an afflicter. How comes this to pass?--I look up to God,
     and take it to be a great mercy of God.

     "What! do you take it to be a great mercy to afflict others?

     "(Now they were all but John Indian grievously afflicted,
     and Mrs. Pope also, who was not afflicted before hitherto
     this day; and, after a few moments, John Indian fell into a
     violent fit also.)"

"Well, here" (Mr. Parris, the reporter, goes on to say) "was one that
just now was a tormenter in her apparition, and she owns that she had
made a league with the Devil." The marvel was, that, having before
been a sufferer, as one of the afflicted accusers, she had then, at
that moment, appeared in the opposite character, and owned herself to
have become a confederate with the Evil One. Having established this
conviction in the minds of the magistrates and spectators, the point
was reached at which she completed the delusion by appearing to break
away from her bondage to Satan, assume the functions of a confessing
and abjuring witch, and retake her place, with tenfold effect, among
the accusing witnesses. The manner in which she rescued herself from
the power of Satan exhibits a specimen of acting seldom surpassed. The
account proceeds thus:--

     "Now Mary Warren fell into a fit, and some of the afflicted
     cried out that she was going to confess; but Goody Corey,
     and Procter and his wife, came in, _in their apparition_,
     and struck her down, and said she should tell nothing."

What is given here in _Italics_, as an "_apparition_," was of course
based upon the declarations of the accusing witnesses. It was an art
they often practised in offering their testimony. They would cry out,
that the Devil, generally in the shape of a black man, appeared to
them at the time, whispering in the ear of the accused, or sitting on
the beams of the meeting-house in which the examinations were
generally conducted. On this occasion, they declared that three of the
persons, then in jail in some other place, came in their apparitions,
forbade Mary Warren's confession, and struck her down. To give full
effect to their statement, she went through the process of tumbling
down. Although nothing was seen by any other person present, the
deception was perfect. The Rev. Mr. Parris wrote it all down as having
actually occurred. His record of the transaction goes on as follows:--

     "Mary Warren continued a good space in a fit, that she did
     neither see nor hear nor speak.

     "Afterwards she started up, and said, 'I will speak,' and
     cried out, 'Oh, I am sorry for it, I am sorry for it!' and
     wringed her hands, and fell a little while into a fit again,
     and then came to speak, but immediately her teeth were set;
     and then she fell into a violent fit, and cried out, 'O
     Lord, help me! O good Lord, save me!'

     "And then afterwards cried again, 'I will tell, I will
     tell!' and then fell into a dead fit again.

     "And afterwards cried, 'I will tell, they did, they did,
     they did;' and then fell into a violent fit again.

     "After a little recovery, she cried, 'I will tell, I will
     tell. They brought me to it;' and then fell into a fit
     again, which fits continuing, she was ordered to be led out,
     and the next to be brought in, viz., Bridget Bishop.

     "Some time afterwards, she was called in again, but
     immediately taken with fits for a while.

     "'Have you signed the Devil's book?--No.'

     "'Have you not touched it?--No.'

     "Then she fell into fits again, and was sent forth for air.

     "After a considerable space of time, she was brought in
     again, but could not give account of things by reason of
     fits, and so sent forth.

     "Mary Warren called in afterwards in private, before
     magistrates and ministers.

     "She said, 'I shall not speak a word: but I will, I will
     speak, Satan! She saith she will kill me. Oh! she saith she
     owes me a spite, and will claw me off. Avoid Satan, for the
     name of God, avoid!' and then fell into fits again, and
     cried, 'Will ye? I will prevent ye, in the name of God.'"

The magistrate inquired earnestly:--

     "'Tell us how far have you yielded?'

     "A fit interrupts her again.

     "'What did they say you should do, and you should be well?'

     "Then her lips were bit, so that she could not speak: so she
     was sent away."

Mr. Parris, the reporter of the case, adds:--

     "Note that not one of the sufferers was afflicted during her
     examination, after once she began to confess, though they
     were tormented before."

She was subsequently examined in the prison several times, falling
occasionally into fits, and exhibiting the appearance of a
long-continued conflict with Satan, who was supposed to be resisting
her inclination to confess, and holding her with violence to the
contract she had made with him. The magistrates and ministers beheld
with amazement and awe what they believed to be precisely a similar
scene to that described by the evangelists when the Devil strove
against the power of the Saviour and his disciples, and would not quit
his hold upon the young man, but "threw him down, and tare him." At
length, as in that case, Satan was overcome. After a protracted, most
violent, and terrible contest, Mary Warren got released from his
clutches, and made a full and circumstantial confession.

Whoever studies carefully the account of Mary Warren's successive
examinations can hardly question, I think, that she acted a part, and
acted it with wonderful cunning, skill, and effect.

This examination, beginning on Tuesday, the 19th of April, continued
after she was committed to prison in Salem, at the jail there, for
several days, and was renewed at intervals until the middle of May.
After she had thoroughly broken away from Satan, she revealed all that
she had seen and heard while associating with him and his confederate
subjects: her testimony was implicitly received, and it dealt death
and destruction in all directions. It is a circumstance strongly
confirming this view, that Mary Warren was soon released from
confinement. It was the general practice to keep those, who confessed,
in prison, to retain in that way power over them, and prevent their
recanting their confessions. She is found, by the papers on file, to
have acted afterwards, as a capital witness, against ten persons, all
of whom were convicted, and seven executed. Besides these, she
testified, with the appearance of animosity and vindictiveness,
against her master John Procter, and her mistress his wife; thus
contributing to secure the conviction of both, and the death of the
former. In how many more cases she figured in the same character and
to the same effect is unknown, as the papers in reference to only a
very small proportion of them have come down to us. The interpretation
I give to the course of Mary Warren exhibits her guilt, and that of
those participating in the stratagem, as of the deepest and blackest
dye. But it seems to be the only one which a scrutiny of the details
of her examinations, and of the facts of the case, allows us to
receive. The effect was most decisive. The course of the accusing
children in crying out against one of their own number satisfied the
public, and convinced still more the magistrates, that they were
truthful, honest, and upright. They had before given evidence that
they paid no regard to family influence or eminent reputation. They
had now proved that they had no partiality and no favoritism, but were
equally ready to bring to light and to justice any of their own circle
who might fall into the snare of the Evil One, and become confederate
with him. No dramatic artist, no cunning impostor, ever contrived a
more ingenious plot; and no actors ever carried one out better than
Mary Warren and the afflicted children.

Giles Corey incurred hostility, perhaps, because his deposition
relating to his wife did not come up to the mark required. It is also
highly probable, that, though incensed at her conduct at the time,
reflection had brought him to his senses; and that the circumstances
of her examination and commitment to prison produced a re-action in
his mind. If so, he would have been apt to express himself very
freely. His examination took place April 19th, in the meeting-house at
the Village. The girls acted their usual part, charging him, one by
one, with having afflicted them, and proving it on the spot by
tortures and sufferings. After they had severally got through, they
all joined at once in their demonstrations. The report made by Parris
says, "All the afflicted were seized now with fits, and troubled with
pinches. Then the Court ordered his hands to be tied." The magistrates
lost all control of themselves, and flew into a passion, exclaiming,
"What! is it not enough to act witchcraft at other times, but must you
do it now, in face of authority?" He seems to have been profoundly
affected by the marvellousness of the accusations, and the exhibition
of what to him was inexplicable in the sufferings of the girls; and
all he could say was, "I am a poor creature, and cannot help
it."--"Upon the motion of his head again, they had their heads and
necks afflicted." The magistrates, not having recovered their
composure, continued to pour their wrath upon him, "Why do you tell
such wicked lies against witnesses?"--"One of his hands was let go,
and several were afflicted. He held his head on one side, and then
the heads of several of the afflicted were held on one side. He drew
in his cheeks, and the cheeks of some of the afflicted were sucked
in." Goody Bibber was on hand, and played her accompaniment. She also
uttered malignant charges against him, and "was suddenly seized with a
violent fit." One of Bibber's statements was that he had called her
husband "damned devilish rogue." Through all this outrage, Corey was
firm in asserting his innocence. His language and manner were serious,
and solemnized by a sense of the helplessness of his situation and the
wicked falsehoods heaped upon him. His disagreement with his wife
about the witchcraft proceedings being well known, the accusers
endeavored to make it out that they had often quarrelled. But he
insisted that the only difference which had before existed between
them was a conflict of opinion on one point. In his family devotions,
he used this expression, "living to God and dying to sin." She "found
fault" with the language, and criticised it. He thought it was all
right! The characteristic spirit of the old man was roused most
strikingly by one of the charges. Bibber and others testified that
Corey had said he had seen the Devil in the shape of a black hog and
was very much frightened. He could not stand under the imputation of
cowardice, and lost sight of every other element in the accusation but
that. The magistrate asked, "What did you see in the cow-house? Why do
you deny it?"--"I saw nothing but my cattle."--"(Divers witnessed that
he told them he was frighted.)"--"Well, what do you say to these
witnesses? What was it frighted you?"--"I do not know that ever I
spoke the word in my life."

But while his character retained its manliness, and his soul was truly
insensible to fear, he was very much oppressed and distressed by his
situation. The share he had, with two of his sons-in-law, in bringing
his wife into her awful condition, and in driving on the public
infatuation at the beginning, was more than he could endure to think
of, and he was charged with having meditated suicide. Perhaps he had
already formed the purpose afterwards carried into effect, and may
have dropped expressions, under that thought, which to others might
appear to indicate a design of self-destruction. He was accused of
having said that "he would make away with himself, and charge his
death upon his son." His sons-in-law, Crosby and Parker, were acting
with the crowd that were pursuing him to his death. Little did it
enter the imagination of any one then, that there was a method by
which he could "make away with himself," leaving the entire act of the
destruction of his life upon his persecutors, and the sin to be
apportioned between him and them by the All-wise and All-just.

Abigail Hobbs had been a reckless vagrant creature, wandering through
the woods at night like a half-deranged person; but she had wit enough
to see that there was safety in confession. She pretended to have
committed, by witchcraft, crimes enough to have hanged her a dozen
times. If she had stood to her confession, we should have heard of her
no more.

Bridget Bishop's examination filled the intervals of time while Mary
Warren was being carried out of the meeting-house to recover from her
fits. Both Parris and Ezekiel Cheever took minutes of it, from which
the substance is gathered as follows:--

On her coming in, the afflicted persons, at the same moment, severally
fell into fits, and were dreadfully tormented. Hathorne addressed her,
calling upon her to give an account of the witchcrafts she was
"conversant in." She replied, "I take all this people to witness that
I am clear." He then asked the children, "Hath this woman hurt you?"
They all cried out that she had. The magistrate continued, "You are
here accused by four or five: what do you say to it?"--"I never saw
these persons before, nor I never[A] was in this place before. I never
did hurt them in my life."

[Footnote A: The double negative, as often used, merely intensified
the negation. See "Measure for Measure," act i. scene 1.]

At a meeting of the afflicted children and others, some one declared
that Bridget Bishop was present "in her shape" or apparition, and,
pointing to a particular spot, said, "There, there she is!" Young
Jonathan Walcot, exasperated by his sister's sufferings, struck at the
spot with his sword; whereupon Mary cried out, "You have hit her, you
have torn her coat, and I heard it tear." This story had been brought
to Hathorne's ears; and abruptly, as if to take her off her guard, he
said, "Is not your coat cut?" She answered, "No." They then examined
the coat, and found what they regarded as having been "cut or torn two
ways." It was probably the fashion in which the garment was made; for
she was in the habit of dressing more artistically than the women of
the Village. At any rate, it did not appear like a direct cut of a
sword; but Jonathan got over the difficulty by saying that "the sword
that he struck at Goody Bishop was not naked, but was within the
scabbard." This explained the whole matter, so that Cheever says, in
his report, that "the rent may very probably be the very same that
Mary Walcot did tell that she had in her coat, by Jonathan's striking
at her appearance"! Parris says, with more caution, more indeed than
was usual with him, "Upon some search in the Court, a rent, that seems
to answer what was alleged, was found."

Hathorne, having heard the scandals they had circulated against her,
proceeded: "They say you bewitched your first husband to death."--"If
it please Your Worship, I know nothing of it."--"What do you say of
these murders you are charged with?"--"I hope I am not guilty of
murder." As she said this, she turned up her eyes, probably to give
solemnity to her declaration. At the opening of the examination, she
looked round upon the people, and called them to witness her
innocence. She had found out by this time, that no justice could be
expected from them; and feeling, with Rebecca Nurse on a recent
similar occasion, "I have got nobody to look to but God," she turned
her eyes heavenward. Instantly, the eyeballs of all the girls were
rolled up in their sockets, and fixed. The effect was awful, and still
more increased as they went, after a moment or two, into dreadful
torments. Hathorne could no longer contain himself, but broke out, "Do
you not see how they are tormented? You are acting witchcraft before
us! What do you say to this? Why have you not a heart to confess the
truth?" She calmly replied, "I am innocent. I know nothing of it. I am
no witch. I know not what a witch is." The "afflicted children"
charged her with having tried to persuade them to sign the Devil's
book. As she had never before seen one of them, she was indignant at
this barefaced falsehood, and, as Cheever says, "shook her head" in
her resentment; which, as he further says, put them all into great
torments. Parris represents that in every motion of her head they were
tortured. Marshal Herrick, as usual, put in his oar, and volunteered
charges against her. She bore herself well through the shocking scene,
and did not shrink, at its close, from expressing her unbelief of the
whole thing: "I do not know whether there be any witches or no." When
she was removed from the place of examination, the accusers all had
fits, and broke forth in outcries of agony. After being taken out, one
of the constables in charge of her asked her if she was not troubled
to see the afflicted persons so tormented; and she replied, "No." In
answer to further questions, she indicated that she could not tell
what to think of them, and did not concern herself about them at all.

Giles Corey, Bridget Bishop, Abigail Hobbs, together with Mary Warren,
were duly committed to prison.

Two days after, April 21, warrants were issued "against William Hobbs,
husbandman, and Deliverance his wife; Nehemiah Abbot, Jr., weaver;
Mary Easty, the wife of Isaac Easty; and Sarah Wilds, the wife of John
Wilds,--all of the town of Topsfield, or Ipswich; and Edward Bishop,
husbandman, and Sarah his wife, of Salem Village; and Mary Black, a
negro of Lieutenant Nathaniel Putnam's, of Salem Village also; and
Mary English, the wife of Philip English, merchant in Salem." All of
them were to be delivered to the magistrates for examination at the
house of Lieutenant Nathaniel Ingersoll, at about ten o'clock the next
morning, in Salem Village; and were brought in accordingly.

What the papers on file enable us to glean of these nine persons is
substantially as follows: William Hobbs was about fifty years of age,
and one of the earliest settlers of the Village, although his
residence was on the territory afterwards included in Topsfield. His
daughter Abigail, of whom I have just spoken, appears from all the
accounts to have acted at this stage of the transaction a most wicked
part, ready to do all the mischief in her power, and allowing herself
to be used to any extent to fasten the imputation of witchcraft upon
others. Several persons testified that, long before, she had boasted
that she was not afraid of any thing, "for she had sold herself body
and soul to the Old Boy;" one witness testified, that, "some time last
winter, I was discoursing with Abigail Hobbs about her wicked
carriages and disobedience to her father and mother, and she told me
she did not care what anybody said to her, for she had seen the Devil,
and had made a covenant or bargain with him;" another, Margaret
Knight, testified, that, about a year before, "Abigail Hobbs and her
mother were at my father's house, and Abigail Hobbs said to me,
'Margaret, are you baptized?' And I said, 'Yes.' Then said she, 'My
mother is not baptized, but I will baptize her;' and immediately took
water, and sprinkled in her mother's face, and said she did baptize
her 'in the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost.'"

She was arrested, and brought to the Village, on the 19th of April.
The next day, she began her operations by declaring that "Judah White,
a Jersey maid" that lived with Joseph Ingersoll at Casco, "but now
lives at Boston," appeared to her "in apparition" the day before, and
advised her to "fly, and not to go to be examined," but, if she did
go, "not to confess any thing:" she described the dress of this
"apparition,"--she "came to her in fine clothes, in a sad-colored silk
mantle, with a top-knot and a hood."--"She confesseth further, that
the Devil in the shape of a man came to her," and charged her to
afflict the girls; bringing images made of wood in their likeness with
thorns for her to prick into the images, which she did: whereupon the
girls cried out that they were hurt by her. She further confessed,
that, "she was at the great meeting in Mr. Parris's pasture, when they
administered the sacrament, and did eat of the red bread and drink of
the red wine, at the same time." This confession established her
credibility at once; and, the next day, the warrants were issued for
the nine persons above mentioned, against whom they had secured in her
an effective witness. She had resided for some time at Casco Bay; and
we shall soon see how matters began in a few days to work in that
direction. There are two indictments against this Abigail Hobbs: one
charging her with having made a covenant with "the Evil Spirit, the
Devil," at Casco Bay, in 1688; the other with having exercised the
arts of witchcraft upon the afflicted girls, at Salem Village, in
1692.

When her unhappy father was brought to examination, he found that his
daughter was playing into the hands of the accusers; and that his
wife, overwhelmed by the horrors of the situation, although for a time
protesting her innocence and lamenting that she had been the mother of
such a daughter, had broken down and confessed, saying whatever might
be put in her mouth by the magistrates, the girls, or the crowd. Under
these circumstances, he was brought forward for examination. Parris
took minutes of it. It is to be regretted, that the paper is much
dilapidated, and portions of the lines wholly lost. What is left shows
that the mind of William Hobbs rose superior to the terrors and
powers arrayed against it. The magistrate commenced proceedings by
inquiring of the girls, pointing to the prisoner, "Hath this man hurt
you?" Several of them answered "Yes." Goody Bibber, who seems
generally to have been a very zealous volunteer backer of the girls,
on this occasion, for a wonder, answered "No." The magistrate,
addressing the prisoner, "What say you? Are you guilty or
not?"--Answer: "I can speak in the presence of God safely, as I must
look to give account another day, that I am as clear as a new-born
babe."--"Clear of what?"--"Of witchcraft."--"Have you never hurt
these?"--"No." Abigail Williams cried out that he "was going to Mercy
Lewis!" Whereupon Mercy was seized with a fit. Then Abigail cried out
again, "He is coming to Mary Walcot!" and Mary went into her fit. The
magistrate, in consternation, appealed to him: "How can you be clear,"
when your appearance is thus seen producing such effects before our
eyes? Then the children went into fits all together, and "hallooed" at
the top of their voices, and "shouted greatly." The magistrate then
brought up the confession of his wife against him, and expostulated
with him for not confessing; the afflicted, in the mean while,
bringing the whole machinery of their convulsions, shrieks, and uproar
to bear against him: but he calmly, and in brief terms, denied it.

The circle of accusing girls seems to have been a receptacle, into
which all the scandal, gossip, and defamation of the surrounding
country was emptied. Some one had told them that William Hobbs was not
a regular attendant at meeting. They passed it on to the magistrate,
and he put this question to the accused: "When were you at any public
religious meeting?" He replied, "Not a pretty while."--"Why
so?"--"Because I was not well: I had a distemper that none knows." The
magistrate said, "Can you act witchcraft here, and, by casting your
eyes, turn folks into fits?"--"You may judge your pleasure. My soul is
clear."--"Do you not see you hurt these by your look?"--"No: I do not
know it." After another display of awful sufferings, caused, as they
protested, by the mere look of Hobbs, the magistrate, with triumphant
confidence, again put it home to him, "Can you now deny it?" He
answered, "I can deny it to my dying day." The magistrate inquired of
him for what reason he withdrew from the room whenever the Scriptures
were read in his family. He plumply denied it. Nathaniel Ingersoll and
Thomas Haynes testified that his daughter had told them so. The
confessions of his wife and daughter were over and over again brought
up against him, but to no effect. "Who do you worship?" said the
magistrate. "I hope I worship God only."--"Where?"--"In my heart." The
examination failed to confound or embarrass him in the least. He could
not be drawn into the expression of any of the feelings which the
conduct of his graceless and depraved daughter or his weak and
wretched wife must have excited. He quietly protested that he knew
nothing about witchcraft; and, towards the close, with solemn
earnestness of utterance, declared that his innocence was known to the
"great God in heaven."

He was committed for trial. All that the documents in existence inform
us further, in relation to William Hobbs, is that he remained in
prison until the 14th of the next December, when two of his neighbors,
John Nichols and Joseph Towne, in some way succeeded in getting him
bailed out; they giving bonds in the sum of two hundred pounds for his
appearance at the sessions of the Court the next month. But it was
not, even then, thought wholly safe to have him come in; and the fine
was incurred. He appeared at the term in May, the fine was remitted,
and he discharged by proclamation. On the 26th of March, 1714, he gave
evidence in a case of commonage rights. He was then seventy-two years
of age. Of his wife and daughter, I shall again have occasion to
speak.

For all that is known of the case of Nehemiah Abbot, we are indebted
to Hutchinson, who had Parris's minutes of the examination before him.
Hutchinson says, that, of "near an hundred" whose examinations he had
seen, he was the only one who, having been brought before the
magistrates, was finally dismissed by them. Perhaps even this case was
not an exception: for a document on file shows that a person named
Abbot of the same locality was subsequently arrested and imprisoned;
but unfortunately the Christian name has been obliterated, or from
some cause is wanting. It seems, from Hutchinson's minutes, that he
protested his innocence in manly and firm declarations. Mary Walcot
testified that she had seen his shape. Ann Putnam cried out that she
saw him "upon the beam." The magistrates told him that his guilt was
certainly proved, and that, if he would find mercy of God, he must
confess. "I speak before God," he answered, "that I am clear from this
accusation."--"What, in all respects?"--"Yes, in all respects." The
girls were struck with dumbness; and Ann Putnam, re-affirming that he
was the man that hurt her, "was taken with a fit." Mary Walcot began
to waver in her confidence, and Mercy Lewis said, "It is not the man."
This unprecedented variance in the testimony of the girls brought
matters to a stand; and he was sent out for a time, while others were
examined:--

     "When he was brought in again, by reason of much people, and
     many in the windows, so that the accusers could not have a
     clear view of him, he was ordered to be abroad, and the
     accusers to go forth to him, and view him in the light,
     which they did in the presence of the magistrates and many
     others, discoursed quietly with him, one and all acquitting
     him; but yet said he was like that man, but he had not the
     wen they saw in his apparition. Note, he was a hilly-faced
     man, and stood shaded by reason of his own hair; so that for
     a time he seemed to some bystanders and observers to be
     considerably like the person the afflicted did describe."

Such is Parris's statement, as quoted by Hutchinson. What was the real
cause or motive of this discrepancy among the witnesses does not
appear. The facts, that at first they went into fits in beholding him,
were all struck dumb for a while, and Ann Putnam saw him on the beam,
were likely to have an unfavorable effect upon the minds of the
people, and threatened to explode the delusion. But Ann, with a
quickness of wit that never failed to meet any emergency, when Mercy
Lewis said it was not the man, cried out in a fit, "Did you put a mist
before my eyes?" She conveyed the idea that the power of Satan blinded
her, and caused her to mistake the man. This answered the purpose;
and, although Abbot got clear, for the time at least, all were more
than ever convinced that the Evil One, in misleading Ann, had shown
his hand on the occasion.

The examination of Sarah Wildes had no peculiar features. The
afflicted children and Goody Bibber saw her apparition sitting on the
beam while she was bodily present at the bar, and went through their
usual fits and evolutions. She maintained her innocence with dignity
and firmness; and the magistrate, prejudging the case against her,
rebuked her obstinacy in not confessing, in his accustomed manner.

No account has come down of the examinations of Edward Bishop, or
Sarah his wife. He was the third of that name, probably the son of the
"Sawyer." His wife Sarah was a daughter of William Wildes of Ipswich,
and, it would seem, a sister of John Wildes, the examination of whose
wife has just been mentioned. Some of the evidence indicates that she
was a niece of Rebecca Nurse. They all belonged to that class of
persons who, under the general appellation of "the Topsfield men," had
been in such frequent collision with the people of the Village. Edward
Bishop was forty-four years of age, and his wife forty-one. They had a
family, at the time of their imprisonment, of twelve children. Sarah
Bishop had been dismissed from the church at the Village, and
recommended to that at Topsfield, May 25, 1690. They had land in
Topsfield, as well as in the Village, and were more intimately
connected in social relations with the former than the latter place.
They effected their escape from prison, and survived the storm. Mary,
the wife of Philip English, was committed to prison. We have no record
of her examination.

Mary Black, the negro woman, belonged to Nathaniel Putnam, but lived
in the family of his son Benjamin. Her examination shows that she was
an ignorant but an innocent person. She knew nothing about the matter,
and had no idea what it all meant. To the questions with which the
magistrate pressed her, her answers were, "I do not know," "I cannot
tell." The only fact brought out against her besides the actings of
the girls was this: "Her master saith a man sat down upon the form
with her about a twelvemonth ago." Parris, in his minutes, gives this
piece of evidence, but does not enlighten us as to its import. The
magistrate asked her, "What did the man say to you?" Her answer was:
"He said nothing." This is all they got out of her; and it is all the
light we have on the mysterious fact, that a man was once seated, at
some time within twelve months, on the same form or bench with poor
Mary Black. The magistrate asked the girls, "Doth this negro hurt
you?" They said "Yes."--"Why do you hurt them?"--"I did not hurt
them." This question was put to her, "Do you prick sticks?" perhaps
the meaning was, Do you prick the afflicted children with sticks? The
simple creature evidently did not know what they were driving at, and
answered, "No: I pin my neckcloth." The examiner asked her, "Will you
take out the pin, and pin it again?" She did so, and several of the
afflicted cried out that they were pricked. Mary Walcot was pricked in
the arm till the blood came, Abigail Williams was pricked in the
stomach, and Mercy Lewis was pricked in the foot. It is probable,
that, in this case, the girls, as they often appear to have done,
provided themselves by concert beforehand with pins ready to be stuck
into the assigned parts of their bodies, and managed to get the queer
and unusual question put. The whole thing has the appearance of being
pre-arranged; and it answered the purpose, filling the crowd with
amazement, and excluding all possible doubt from the minds of the
magistrates. Mary was committed to prison, where she remained until
discharged, in May, 1693, by proclamation from the governor.

Mary Easty, wife of Isaac Easty, and sister of Rebecca Nurse and
Sarah Cloyse, was about fifty-eight years of age, and the mother of
seven children. Her husband owned and lived upon a large and valuable
farm, which not many years since was the property and country
residence of the late Hon. B.W. Crowninshield, and is now in the
possession of Thomas Pierce, Esq. Her examination was accompanied by
the usual circumstances. The girls had fits, and were speechless at
times: the magistrate expostulated with her for not confessing her
guilt, which he regarded as demonstrated, beyond a question, by the
sufferings of the afflicted. "Would you have me accuse myself?"--"How
far," he continued, "have you complied with Satan?"--"Sir, I never
complied, but prayed against him all my days. What would you have me
do?"--"Confess, if you be guilty."--"I will say it, if it was my last
time, I am clear of this sin." The magistrate, apparently affected by
her manner and bearing, inquired of the girls, "Are you certain this
is the woman?" They all went into fits; and presently Ann Putnam,
coming to herself, said "that was the woman, it was like her, and she
told me her name." The accused clasped her hands together, and Mercy
Lewis's hands were clenched; she separated her hands, and Mercy's were
released; she inclined her head, and the girls screamed out, "Put up
her head; for, while her head is bowed, the necks of these are
broken." The magistrate again asked, "Is this the woman?" They made
signs that they could not speak; but afterwards Ann Putnam and others
cried out: "O Goody Easty, Goody Easty, you are the woman, you are the
woman!"--"What do you say to this?"--"Why, God will know."--"Nay, God
knows now."--"I know he does."--"What did you think of the actions of
others before your sisters came out? did you think it was
witchcraft?"--"I cannot tell."--"Why do you not think it is
witchcraft?"--"It is an evil spirit; but whether it be witchcraft I do
not know." She was committed to prison.

It will be noticed that seven out of the nine examined at this time
either lived in Topsfield or were intimately connected with the church
and people there. The accusing girls had heard them angrily spoken of
by the people around them, and availed themselves, as at all times, of
existing prejudices, to guide them in the selection of their victim.

The escape of Abbot, and the wavering, in his case and that of Easty,
indicated by the magistrates on this occasion, alarmed the
prosecutors; and they felt that something must be done to stiffen
Hathorne and Corwin to their previous rigid method of procedure. The
following letter was accordingly written to them that very day,
immediately after the close of the examinations:--

     "_These to the Honored John Hathorne and Jonathan Corwin,
     Esqrs., living at Salem, present._

     "SALEM VILLAGE, this 21st of April, 1692.

     "MUCH HONORED,--After most humble and hearty thanks presented
     to Your Honors for the great care and pains you have already
     taken for us,--for which you know we are never able to make
     you recompense, and we believe you do not expect it of us;
     therefore a full reward will be given you of the Lord God of
     Israel, whose cause and interest you have espoused (and we
     trust this shall add to your crown of glory in the day of the
     Lord Jesus): and we--beholding continually the tremendous
     works of Divine Providence, not only every day, but every
     hour--thought it our duty to inform Your Honors of what we
     conceive you have not heard, which are high and dreadful,--of
     a wheel within a wheel, at which our ears do tingle. Humbly
     craving continually your prayers and help in this distressed
     case,--so, praying Almighty God continually to prepare you,
     that you may be a terror to evil-doers and a praise to them
     that do well, we remain yours to serve in what we are able,

     "THOMAS PUTNAM."

What was meant by the "wheel within a wheel," the "high and dreadful"
things which were making their ears to tingle, but had not yet been
disclosed to the magistrates, we shall presently see. On the 30th of
April, Captain Jonathan Walcot and Sergeant Thomas Putnam (the writer
of the foregoing letter) got out a warrant against Philip English, of
Salem, merchant; Sarah Morrel, of Beverly; and Dorcas Hoar, of the
same place, widow. Morrel and Hoar were delivered by Marshal Herrick,
according to the tenor of the warrant, at 11, A.M., May 2, at
the house of Lieutenant Nathaniel Ingersoll, in Salem Village. The
warrant has an indorsement in these words: "Mr. Philip English not
being to be found. G.H." As the records of the examinations of Philip
English and his wife have not been preserved, and only a few
fragments of the testimony relating to their case are to be found, all
that can be said is that the girls and their accomplices made their
usual charges against them. There are two depositions in existence,
however, which afford some explanation of the causes that exposed Mr.
English to hostility, and indicate the kind of evidence that was
brought against him. Having many landed estates, in various places,
and extensive business transactions, he was liable to frequent
questions of litigation. He was involved, at one time, in a lawsuit
about the bounds of a piece of land in Marblehead. A person named
William Beale, of that town, had taken great interest in it adversely
to the claims of English; and some harsh words passed between them. A
year or two after the affair, Beale states, "that, as I lay in my bed,
in the morning, presently after it was fair light abroad in the room,"
"I saw a dark shade," &c. To his vision it soon assumed the shape of
Philip English. On a previous occasion, when riding through Lynn to
get testimony against English in the aforesaid boundary case, he says,
"My nose gushed out bleeding in a most extraordinary manner, so that
it bloodied a handkerchief of considerable bigness, and also ran down
upon my clothes and upon my horse's mane." He charged it upon English.
These depositions were sworn to in Court, in August, 1692, and
January, 1693. How they got there does not appear, as English was
never brought to trial. All that relates to Mr. English and his wife
may be despatched at this point. On the 6th of May, a warrant was
procured at Boston, "To the marshal-general, or his lawful deputy," to
apprehend Philip English wherever found within the jurisdiction, and
convey him to the "custody of the marshal of Essex." Jacob Manning, a
deputy-marshal, delivered him to the marshal of Essex on the 30th of
May; and he was brought before the magistrates on the next day, and,
after examination, committed to prison. He and his wife effected their
escape from jail, and found refuge in New York until the proceedings
were terminated, when they returned to Salem, and continued to reside
here. She survived the shock given by the accusation, the danger to
which she had been exposed, and the sufferings of imprisonment, but a
short time. They occupied the highest social position. He was a
merchant, conducting an extensive business, and had a large estate;
owning fourteen buildings in the town, a wharf, and twenty-one sail of
vessels. His dwelling-house, represented in the frontispiece of this
volume, stood until a recent period, and is remembered by many of us.
Its site was on the southern side of Essex Street, near its
termination; comprising the area between English and Webb Streets. It
must have been a beautiful situation; commanding at that time a full,
unobstructed view of the Beverly and Marblehead shores, and all the
waters and points of land between them. The mansion was spacious in
its dimensions, and bore the marks of having been constructed in the
best style of elegance, strength, and finish. It was indeed a curious
and venerable specimen of the domestic architecture of its day. A
first-class house then; in its proportions, arrangements, and
attachments, it would compare well with first-class houses now. Mrs.
English was a lady of eminent character and culture. Traditions to
this effect have come down with singular uniformity through all the
old families of the place. She was the only child of Richard
Hollingsworth, and inherited his large property. The Rev. William
Bentley, D.D., in his "Description of Salem," and whose daily life
made him conversant with all that relates to the locality of Mrs.
English's residence, says that the officer came to apprehend her in
the evening, after she had retired to rest. He was admitted by the
servants, and read his warrant in her bedchamber. Guards were placed
around the house. To be accused by the afflicted children was then
regarded as certain death. "In the morning," says Bentley, "she
attended the devotions of her family, kissed her children with great
composure, proposed her plan for their education, took leave of them,
and then told the officer she was ready to die." Dr. Bentley suggests
that unfriendly feelings may have existed against Mr. English in
consequence of some controversies he had been engaged in with the town
about the title to lands; that the superior style in which his family
lived had subjected them to vulgar prejudice; that the existence of
this feeling becoming known to the "afflicted girls" led them to cry
out against him and his wife. It may be so. They availed themselves of
every such advantage; and particularly liked to strike high, so as the
more to astound and overawe the public mind.

I find no further mention of Sarah Morrel. She doubtless shared the
fate of those escaping death,--a long imprisonment. When Dorcas Hoar
was brought in, there was a general commotion among the afflicted,
falling into fits all around. After coming out of them, they vied with
each other in heaping all sorts of accusations upon the prisoner;
Abigail Williams and Ann Putnam charging her with having choked a
woman in Boston; Elizabeth Hubbard crying out that she was pinching
her, "and showing the marks to the standers by. The marshal said she
pinched her fingers at the time." The magistrate, indignantly
believing the whole, said, "Dorcas Hoar, why do you hurt these?"--"I
never hurt any child in my life." The girls then charged her with
having killed her husband, and with various other crimes. Mary Walcot,
Susanna Sheldon, and Abigail Williams said they saw a black man
whispering in her ear. The spirit of the prisoner was raised; and she
said, "Oh, you are liars, and God will stop the mouth of liars!" The
anger of the magistrates was roused by this bold outbreak. "You are
not to speak after this manner in the Court."--"I will speak the truth
as long as I live," she fearlessly replied. Parris says, at the close
of his account, "The afflicted were much distressed during her
examination." Of course, she was sent to prison.

Susanna Martin of Amesbury, a widow, was arrested on a warrant dated
April 30, and examined at the Village church May 2. She is described
as a short active woman, wearing a hood and scarf, plump and well
developed in her figure, of remarkable personal neatness. One of the
items of the evidence against her was, that, "in an extraordinary
dirty season, when it was not fit for any person to travel, she came
on foot" to a house at Newbury. The woman of the house, the substance
of whose testimony I am giving, having asked, "whether she came from
Amesbury afoot," expressed her surprise at her having ventured abroad
in such bad walking, and bid her children make way for her to come to
the fire to dry herself. She replied "she was as dry as I was," and
turned her coats aside; "and I could not perceive that the soles of
her shoes were wet. I was startled at it, that she should come so dry;
and told her that I should have been wet up to my knees, if I should
have come so far on foot." She replied that "she scorned to have a
drabbled tail." The good woman who treated Susanna Martin on this
occasion with such hospitable kindness received the impression, as
appears by the import of her deposition, that, because Martin came
into the house so wonderfully dry, she was therefore a witch. The only
inference we are likely to draw is, that she was a particularly neat
person; careful to pick her way; and did not wear skirts of the
dimensions of our times.

The language reported by this witness to have been used by Susanna
Martin created in her, at the time, visible mortification, as well as
resentment. A writer at the period, not by any means inclined to give
a representation favorable to the prisoners, reports her expression
thus: "She scorned to be drabbled." She was undoubtedly a woman who
spoke her mind freely, and with strength of expression, as the
magistrates found. From this cause, perhaps, she had shocked the
prejudices and violated the conventional scrupulosities then
prevalent, to such a degree as to incur much comment, if not scandal.
There had been a good deal of gossip about her; and, some time before,
she had been proceeded against as a witch. But there was no ground for
any serious charges against her character. Like Mrs. Ann Hibbens,
perhaps the head and front of her offending was that she had more wit
than her neighbors. She certainly was a strong-minded woman, as her
examination shows. Two reports of it, each in the handwriting of
Parris, have come down to us. They are almost identical, and in
substance as follows:--

On the appearance of the accused, many of the witnesses against her
instantly fell into fits. The magistrate inquired of them,--

     "Hath this woman hurt you?"

     "(Abigail Williams declared that she had hurt her often.
     'Ann Putnam threw her glove at her in a fit,' and the rest
     were struck dumb at her presence.)

     "What! do you laugh at it? said the magistrate.--Well I may
     at such folly.

     "Is this folly to see these so hurt?--I never hurt man,
     woman, or child.

     "(Mercy Lewis cried out, 'She hath hurt me a great many
     times, and plucks me down.' Then Martin laughed again.
     Several others cried out upon her, and the magistrate again
     addressed her.)

     "What do you say to this?--I have no hand in witchcraft.

     "What did you do? did you consent these should be hurt?--No,
     never in my life.

     "What ails these people?--I do not know.

     "But what do you think ails them?--I do not desire to spend
     my judgment upon it.

     "Do you think they are bewitched?--No: I do not think they
     are.

     "Well, tell us your thoughts about them.--My thoughts are
     mine own when they are in; but, when they are out, they are
     another's.

     "Who do you think is their master?--If they be dealing in
     the black art, you may know as well as I.

     "What have you done towards the hurt of these?--I have done
     nothing.

     "Why, it is you, or your appearance.--I cannot help it.

     "How comes your appearance just now to hurt these?--How do I
     know?

     "Are you not willing to tell the truth?--I cannot tell. He
     that appeared in Samuel's shape can appear in any one's
     shape.

     "Do you believe these afflicted persons do not say
     true?--They may lie, for aught I know.

     "May not you lie?--I dare not tell a lie, if it would save
     my life."

At this point, the marshal declared that "she pinched her hands, and
Elizabeth Hubbard was immediately afflicted. Several of the afflicted
cried out that they saw her upon the beam" of the meeting-house over
their heads; and there was, no doubt, a scene of frightful excitement.
The magistrate, in the depth of his awe and distress, earnestly
appealed to the accused, "Pray God discover you, if you be guilty."
Nothing daunted, she replied, "Amen, amen. A false tongue will never
make a guilty person." A great uproar then arose. The accusers fell
into dreadful convulsions, among the rest John Indian, who cried out,
"She bites, she bites!" The magistrate, overcome by the sight of these
sufferings, again appealed to her, "Have not you compassion for these
afflicted?" She calmly and firmly answered, "No: I have none." The
uproar rose higher. The accusers all declared that they saw the "black
man," Satan himself, standing by her side. They pretended to try to
approach her, but were suddenly deprived of the power of locomotion.
John Indian attempted to rush upon her, but fell sprawling upon the
floor. The magistrate again appealed to her: "What is the reason these
cannot come near you?"--"I cannot tell. It may be the Devil bears me
more malice than another."--"Do you not see God evidently discovering
you?"--"No, not a bit for that."--"All the congregation besides think
so."--"Let them think what they will."--"What is the reason these
cannot come to you?"--"I do not know but they can, if they will; or
else, if you please, I will come to them."--"What was that the black
man whispered to you?"--"There was none whispered to me." She was
committed to prison.

In the mean while, preparations had been going on to bring upon the
stage a more striking character, and give to the excited public mind a
greater shock than had yet been experienced. Intimations had been
thrown out that higher culprits than had been so far brought to light
were in reserve, and would, in due time, be unmasked. It was hinted
that a minister had joined the standard of the Arch-enemy, and was
leading the devilish confederacy. In the accounts given of the
diabolical sacraments, a man in black had been described, but no name
yet given. As Charles the Second, while they were hanging the
regicides, at the Restoration, was looking about for a preacher to
hang, and used Hugh Peters for the occasion; so the "afflicted
children," or those acting behind them, wanted a minister to complete
the _dramatis personæ_ of their tragedy. His connection with the
society and its controversies, and the animosities which had thus
become attached to him, naturally suggested Mr. Burroughs. He was then
pursuing, as usual, a laborious, humble, self-sacrificing ministry, in
the midst of perils and privations, away down in the frontier
settlements on the coast of Maine, and little dreamed of what was
brewing, for his ruin and destruction, in his former parish at the
village. This is what Thomas Putnam had in his mind when he spoke of a
"wheel within a wheel," and "the high and dreadful" things not then
disclosed that were to make "ears tingle."

It was necessary to be at once cautious and rapid in their movements,
to prevent the public from getting information which, by reaching the
ears of Burroughs, might put him on his guard. It was no easy thing to
secure him at the great distance of his place of residence. If he
should become apprised of what was going on, his escape into remoter
and inaccessible settlements would have baffled the whole scheme.
Nothing therefore was done at the village, but the steps to arrest him
originated at Boston. Elisha Hutchinson, a magistrate there, issued
the proper order, addressed to John Partridge of Portsmouth,
Field-marshal of the provinces of New Hampshire and Maine, dated April
30, 1692, to arrest George Burroughs, "preacher at Wells;" he being
"suspected of a confederacy with the Devil." Partridge was directed to
deliver him to the custody of the marshal of Essex, or, not meeting
him, was requested to bring him to Salem, and hand him over to the
magistrates there. The "afflicted children" had begun, shortly before,
to use his name. Abigail Hobbs had resided some years before at Casco;
and from her they obtained all the scandal she had heard there, or
chose to fabricate to suit the purpose of the prosecutors. The way in
which the minds of the deluded people were worked up against Mr.
Burroughs is illustrated in a deposition subsequently made to this
effect:--

Benjamin Hutchinson testified, that, on the 21st of April, 1692, about
eleven o'clock in the forenoon, Abigail Williams told him that she saw
a person whom she described as Mr. George Burroughs, "a little black
minister that lived at Casco Bay." Mr. Burroughs was of small stature
and dark complexion. She gave an account of his wonderful feats of
strength, said that he was a wizard; and that he "had killed three
wives, two for himself and one for Mr. Lawson." She affirmed that she
saw him then. Mr. Burroughs, it will be borne in mind, was at this
time a hundred miles away, at his home in Maine. Hutchinson asked her
where she saw him. She said "There," pointing to a rut in the road
made by a cart-wheel. He had an iron fork in his hand, and threw it
where she said Burroughs was standing. Instantly she fell into a fit;
and, when she came out of it, said, "'You have torn his coat, for I
heard it tear.'--'Whereabouts?' said I. 'On one side,' said she. Then
we came into the house of Lieutenant Ingersoll; and I went into the
great room, and Abigail came in and said, 'There he stands.' I said,
'Where? where?' and presently drew my rapier." Then Abigail said, he
has gone, but "'there is a gray cat.' Then I said, 'Whereabouts?'
'There!' said she, 'there!' Then I struck with my rapier, and she fell
into a fit; and, when it was over, she said, 'You killed her.'" Poor
Hutchinson could not see the cat he had killed any more than
Burroughs's coat he had torn. Abigail explained the mystery to his
satisfaction, by saying that the spectre of Sarah Good had come in at
the moment, and carried away the dead cat. This was all in broad
daylight; it being, as Hutchinson testified, "about twelve o'clock."
The same day, "after lecture, in said Ingersoll's chamber," Abigail
Williams and Mary Walcot were present. They said that "Goody Hobbs, of
Topsfield, had bit Mary Walcot by the foot." Then both fell into a
fit; and on coming out, "they saw William Hobbs and his wife go both
of them along the table." Hutchinson instantly stabbed, with his
rapier, "Goody Hobbs on her side," as the two girls declared. They
further said that the room was "full of them," that is of witches, in
their apparitions; then Hutchinson and Eleazer Putnam "stabbed with
their rapiers at a venture." The girls cried out, that they "had
killed a great black woman of Stonington, and an Indian who had come
with her:" the girls said further, "The floor is all covered with
blood;" and, rushing to the window, declared that they saw a great
company of witches on a hill, and that three of them "lay dead"
there,--"the black woman, the Indian, and one more that they knew
not." This was about four o'clock in the afternoon. This evidence was
given and received in court. It shows the audacity with which the
girls imposed upon the credulity of a people wrought up by their arts
to the highest pitch of insane infatuation; and illustrates a
condition of things, at that time and place, that is truly
astonishing.

On the evening before Hutchinson was imposed upon, as just described,
by Abigail Williams and Mary Walcot, Ann Putnam had made most
astonishing disclosures, at her father's house, in his presence and
that of Peter Prescott, Robert Morrel, and Ezekiel Cheever. An account
of the affair was drawn up by her father, and sworn to by her, in
these words:--

     "THE DEPOSITION OF ANN PUTNAM, who testifieth and saith, on
     the 20th of April, 1692, at evening, she saw the apparition
     of a minister, at which she was grievously affrighted, and
     cried out, 'Oh, dreadful, dreadful! here is a minister come!
     What! are ministers witches too? Whence came you, and what is
     your name? for I will complain of you, though you be a
     minister, if you be a wizard.' Immediately I was tortured by
     him, being racked and almost choked by him. And he tempted me
     to write in his book, which I refused with loud outcries, and
     said I would not write in his book though he tore me all to
     pieces, but told him it was a dreadful thing that he, which
     was a minister, that should teach children to fear God,
     should come to persuade poor creatures to give their souls to
     the Devil. 'Oh, dreadful, dreadful! Tell me your name, that I
     may know who you are.' Then again he tortured me, and urged
     me to write in his book, which I refused. And then,
     presently, he told me that his name was George Burroughs, and
     that he had had three wives, and that he had bewitched the
     two first of them to death; and that he killed Mrs. Lawson,
     because she was so unwilling to go from the Village, and also
     killed Mr. Lawson's child because he went to the eastward
     with Sir Edmon, and preached so to the soldiers; and that he
     had bewitched a great many soldiers to death at the eastward
     when Sir Edmon was there; and that he had made Abigail Hobbs
     a witch, and several witches more. And he has continued ever
     since, by times, tempting me to write in his book, and
     grievously torturing me by beating, pinching, and almost
     choking me several times a day. He also told me that he was
     above a witch. He was a conjurer."

Her father and the other persons present made oath that they saw and
heard all this at the time; that "they beheld her tortures and
perceived her hellish temptations by her loud outcries, 'I will not, I
will not write, though you torment me all the days of my life.'" It
will be observed that this was the evening before Thomas Putnam wrote
his letter to the magistrates, preparing them for something "high and
dreadful" that was soon to be brought to light.

A similar scene took place not long afterwards, in the presence of her
father and her uncle Edward, to which they also testify. It was thus
described by her under oath:--

     "THE DEPOSITION OF ANN PUTNAM, who testifieth and saith,
     that, on the 8th of May, at evening, I saw the apparition of
     Mr. George Burroughs, who grievously tortured me, and urged
     me to write in his book, which I refused. He then told me
     that his two first wives would appear to me presently, and
     tell me a great many lies, but I should not believe them.
     Then immediately appeared to me the forms of two women in
     winding-sheets, and napkins about their heads, at which I
     was greatly affrighted; and they turned their faces towards
     Mr. Burroughs, and looked very red and angry, and told him
     that he had been a cruel man to them, and that their blood
     did cry for vengeance against him; and also told him that
     they should be clothed with white robes in heaven, when he
     should be cast into hell: and immediately he vanished away.
     And, as soon as he was gone, the two women turned their faces
     towards me, and looked as pale as a white wall; and told me
     that they were Mr. Burroughs's two first wives, and that he
     had murdered them. And one of them told me that she was his
     first wife, and he stabbed her under the left arm, and put a
     piece of sealing-wax on the wound. And she pulled aside the
     winding-sheet, and showed me the place; and also told me,
     that she was in the house where Mr. Parris now lives, when it
     was done. And the other told me, that Mr. Burroughs and that
     wife which he hath now, killed her in the vessel, as she was
     coming to see her friends, because they would have one
     another. And they both charged me that I should tell these
     things to the magistrates before Mr. Burroughs' face; and, if
     he did not own them, they did not know but they should appear
     there. This morning, also, Mrs. Lawson and her daughter Ann
     appeared to me, whom I knew, and told me Mr. Burroughs
     murdered them. This morning also appeared to me another woman
     in a winding-sheet, and told me that she was Goodman Fuller's
     first wife, and Mr. Burroughs killed her because there was
     some difference between her husband and him."

This was indeed most extraordinary language and imagery to have been
used by a child of twelve years of age. It is not strange, that, upon
a community, whose fancies and fears had been so long wrought upon,
holding their views, the effect was awfully great. The very fact that
it was a child that spoke made her declarations seem supernatural.
Then, again, they were accompanied with such ocular demonstration, in
her terrible bodily sufferings, that none remained in doubt of the
truthfulness and reality of what they listened to and beheld. It did
not enter their imaginations, for a moment, that there was any
deception or imposture, or even delusion, on her part. Her case is
truly a problem not easily solved even now. While we are filled with
horror and indignation at the thought that she figures as a capital
and fatal witness in all the trials, it is impossible not to feel that
a wisdom greater than ours is necessary to fathom the dark mystery of
the phenomena presented by her and her mother and other accusers, in
this monstrous and terrible affair.

These occurrences, happening just before Mr. Burroughs was brought to
the village as a prisoner, were bruited from house to house, from
mouth to mouth, and worked the people to a state of horrified
exasperation against him; and he was met with execration, when, on the
4th of May, Field-marshal Partridge appeared with him at Salem, and
delivered him to the jailer there. When we consider the distance and
the circumstances of travel at that time, it is evident that the
officers charged with the service acted with the greatest promptitude,
celerity, and energy. The tradition is, that they found Mr. Burroughs
in his humble home, partaking of his frugal meal; that he was
snatched from the table without a moment's opportunity to provide for
his family, or prepare himself for the journey, and hurried on his way
roughly, and without the least explanation of what it all meant. As
soon as it was known that he was in jail in Salem, arrangements were
commenced for his examination. The public mind was highly excited; and
it was determined to make the occasion as impressive, effective, and
awe-striking as possible. Another "field-day" was to be had. On the
9th of May, a special session of the Magistracy was held,--William
Stoughton coming from Dorchester, and Samuel Sewall from Boston, to
sit with Hathorne and Corwin, and give greater solemnity and severity
to the proceedings. Stoughton presided. The first step in the
proceedings was to have a private hearing, in the presence of the
magistrates and ministers only; and the report of what passed there
gives proof of what is indicated more or less clearly in several
passages in the accounts that have come down to us in reference to Mr.
Burroughs,--that he was regarded as not wholly sound in doctrine on
points not connected with witchcraft, was treated with special
severity on that account, and made the victim of bigoted prejudice
among his brethren and in the churches. In this secret inquisition, he
was called to account for not attending the communion service on one
or two occasions; he being a member of the church at Roxbury. It was
also brought against him, that none of his children but the eldest had
been baptized. What the facts, in these respects, were, it is
impossible to say; as we know of them only through the charges of his
enemies. After this, he was carried to the place of public meeting;
and, as he entered the room, "many, if not all, the bewitched were
grievously tortured." After the confusion had subsided, Susanna
Sheldon testified that Burroughs' two wives had appeared to her "in
their winding-sheets," and said, "That man killed them." He was
ordered to look on the witness; and, as he turned to do so, he
"knocked down," as the reporter affirms, "all (or most) of the
afflicted that stood behind him." Ann Putnam, and the several other
"afflicted children," bore their testimony in a similar strain against
him, interspersing at intervals, all their various convulsions,
outcries, and tumblings. Mercy Lewis had "a dreadful and tedious fit."
Walcot, Hubbard, and Sheldon were cast into torments simultaneously.
At length, they were "so tortured" that "authority ordered them" to be
removed. Their sufferings were greater than the magistrates and people
could longer endure to look upon. The question was put to Burroughs,
"what he thought of these things." He answered, "it was an amazing and
humbling providence, but he understood nothing of it." Throwing aside
all the foolish and ridiculous gossip and all the monstrous fables
that belong to the accusations against him, and looking at the only
known facts in his history, it appears that Mr. Burroughs was a man of
ingenuous nature, free from guile, unsuspicious of guile in others; a
disinterested, humble, patient, and generous person. He had suffered
much wrong, and endured great hardships in life; but they had not
impaired his readiness to labor and suffer for others. There was no
combativeness or vindictiveness in his disposition. Even in the midst
of the unspeakable outrages he was experiencing on this occasion, he
does not appear to be incensed or irritated, but simply "amazed." To
have such horrid crimes laid to him, instead of rousing a violent
spirit within him, impressed him with a humbling sense of an
inscrutable Providence. There is a remarkable similarity in the manner
in which Rebecca Nurse and George Burroughs received the dreadful
accusations brought against them. "Surely," she said, "what sin hath
God found out in me unrepented of that he should lay such an
affliction upon me in my old age?" His words are, "It is an humbling
providence of God." The more we reflect upon this language, and go to
the depths of the spirit that suggested it, the more we realize, that,
in each case, it arose from a sanctified Christian heart, and is an
attestation in vindication and in honor of the sufferers from whose
lips it fell, that outweighs all passions and prejudices, reverses all
verdicts, and commands the conviction of all fair and honest minds.

After the "afflicted" had been sent out of the room, there was
testimony to show that Mr. Burroughs had given proof of physical
strength, which, in a man of his small stature, was sure evidence that
he was in league with the Devil. Many marvellous statements were made
to this effect, some of the most extravagant of which he denied. He
undoubtedly was a person of great strength. He had cultivated muscular
exercise and development while an undergraduate at Cambridge, and was
early celebrated as a gymnast. After a while, the accusers and
afflicted were again brought in. Abigail Hobbs testified that she was
present at a "witch meeting, in the field near Mr. Parris's house," in
which Mr. Burroughs acted a conspicuous part. Mary Warren swore that
"Mr. Burroughs had a trumpet which he blew to summon the witches to
their feasts" and other meetings "near Mr. Parris's house." This
trumpet had a sound that reached over the country far and wide,
sending its blasts to Andover, and wakening its echoes along the
Merrimack, to Cape Ann, and the uttermost settlements everywhere; so
that the witches, hearing it, would mount their brooms, and alight, in
a moment, in Mr. Parris's orchard, just to the north and west of the
parsonage; but its sound was not heard by any other ears than those of
confederates with Satan. While the girls were giving their testimony,
every once in a while they would be dreadfully choked, appearing to be
in the last stages of suffocation and strangulation; and, coming to,
at intervals, would charge it upon Burroughs or other witches, calling
them by name; generally, however, confining their selection to persons
already apprehended, and not bringing in others until measures were
matured. Mr. Burroughs was committed for trial.

The examination of Mr. Burroughs presented a spectacle, all things
considered, of rare interest and curiosity,--the grave dignity of the
magistrates; the plain, dark figure of the prisoner; the half-crazed,
half-demoniac aspect of the girls; the wild, excited crowd; the
horror, rage, and pallid exasperation of Lawson, Goodman Fuller and
others, also of the relatives and friends of Burroughs's two former
wives, as the deep damnation of their taking off and the secrets of
their bloody graves were being brought to light; and the child on the
stand telling her awful tale of ghosts in winding-sheets, with napkins
round their heads, pointing to their death-wounds, and saying that
"their blood did cry for vengeance" upon their murderer. The prisoner
stands alone: all were raving around him, while he is amazed;
astounded at such folly and wrong in others, and humbly sensible of
his own unworthiness; bowed down under the mysterious Providence, that
permitted such things for a season, yet strong and steadfast in
conscious innocence and uprightness.

To complete the proceedings against Burroughs at this time, and raise
to the highest point the public abhorrence of him, effective use was
made of Deliverance Hobbs, the wife of William Hobbs, of whom I have
spoken before. She was first examined April 22. During the earlier
part of the proceedings, she maintained her integrity and protested
her innocence in a manner which shows that her self-possession held
good. But the examination was protracted; her strength was exhausted;
the declarations of the accusers, their dreadful sufferings, the
prejudgment of the case against her by the magistrates, and the
combined influences of all the circumstances around her, broke her
down. Her firmness, courage, and truth fled; and she began to confess
all that was laid to her charge. The record is interesting as showing
how gradually she was overwhelmed and overcome. But while mentioning
the names of others whom she pretended to have been associated with as
witches, she did not speak of Burroughs. She referred to those who had
been brought out before that date, but not to him. The intended
movement against him had not then been divulged. On the 3d of May, the
day before he arrived, after it was known that officers had been sent
to arrest him, she was examined again. On this occasion, she charged
Burroughs with having been present, and taken a leading part in
witch-meetings, which she had described in detail, at her first
examination, without mentioning him at all. This proves that the
confessing prisoners were apprised of what it was desired they should
say, and that their testimony was prepared for them by the managers of
the affair. The following is one of the confessions made by this
woman, subsequent to her public examination. I give it partly to show
what a flood of falsehood was poured upon Burroughs, and partly
because it will serve as a specimen of the stuff of which the
confessions were composed:--

     "_The First Examination of Deliverance Hobbs in Prison._--She
     continued in the free acknowledging herself to be a covenant
     witch: and further confesseth she was warned to a meeting
     yesterday morning, and that there was present Procter and his
     wife, Goody Nurse, Giles Corey and his wife, Goody Bishop
     alias Oliver; and Mr. Burroughs was their preacher, and
     pressed them to bewitch all in the village, telling them they
     should do it gradually, and not all at once, assuring them
     they should prevail. He administered the sacrament unto them
     at the same time, with red bread and red wine like blood. She
     affirms she saw Osburn, Sarah Good, Goody Wilds, Goody Nurse:
     and Goody Wilds distributed the bread and wine; and a man in
     a long-crowned white hat sat next the minister, and they sat
     seemingly at a table, and they filled out the wine in
     tankards. The notice of this meeting was given her by Goody
     Wilds. She, herself affirms, did not nor would not eat nor
     drink, but all the rest did, who were there present;
     therefore they threatened to torment her. The meeting was in
     the pasture by Mr. Parris's house, and she saw when Abigail
     Williams ran out to speak with them; but, by that time
     Abigail was come a little distance from the house, this
     examinant was struck blind, so that she saw not with whom
     Abigail spake. She further saith, that Goody Wilds, to
     prevail with her to sign, told her, that, if she would put
     her hand to the book, she would give her some clothes, and
     would not afflict her any more. Her daughter, Abigail Hobbs,
     being brought in at the same time, while her mother was
     present, was immediately taken with a dreadful fit; and her
     mother, being asked who it was that hurt her daughter,
     answered it was Goodman Corey, and she saw him and the
     gentlewoman of Boston striving to break her daughter's neck."

On the next day, warrants were procured against George Jacobs, Sr.,
and his grand-daughter, Margaret Jacobs. They were forthwith seized
and brought in by Constable Joseph Neal, of Salem, whose return is as
follows: "May 10, 1692. Then I apprehended the bodies of George
Jacobs, Sr., and Margaret, daughter of George Jacobs, Jr., according
to the tenor of the above warrant." The examinations, on this
occasion, were held at the house of Thomas Beadle, in the town of
Salem. All the preliminary examinations, so far as existing documents
show, were either in the meeting-house at the village or that of the
town; or at the house of Nathaniel Ingersoll at the village, or Thomas
Beadle in the town,--both being inns, or places of public
entertainment. Beadle's house was on the south side of Essex Street,
on land now occupied by Nos. 63 and 65. The eastern boundary of the
lot was forty-nine feet from Ingersoll's Lane, now Daniels Street. Its
front on Essex Street was about sixty feet, and its depth about one
hundred and forty-five feet. What is now No. 65 is on the very spot
where Beadle's tavern stood; and with the exception of six feet built,
as an addition, on the eastern side, subsequently to 1733, is probably
the identical house. The ground now occupied by No. 63 was then an
open space. It appears by bills of expenses brought "against the
country," that the inn of Samuel Beadle, a brother of Thomas, was also
sometimes used for purposes connected with the prosecutions. Thomas
Beadle's bill amounted to £58. 11_s._ 5_d._; that of Samuel to £21.
The latter, being near the jail, was probably used for the
entertainment of constables and the keeping of their horses, as well
as other incidental purposes connected with the transportation of
prisoners.

A tradition has long prevailed, that the house, still standing, of
Judge Jonathan Corwin, at the western corner of North and Essex
Streets, was used at these examinations. One form in which this
tradition has come down is probably correct. The grand jury was often
in session while the jury for trials was hearing cases in the
Court-house. There may not have been suitable accommodations for both
in that building. The confused sounds and commotions incident to the
trials would have been annoying to the grand jury. The tradition is,
that a place was provided and used temporarily by that body, in the
Corwin house, supposed to have been the spacious room at the
southeastern corner. As the investigations of the grand jury were not
open to the public, its occasional sittings would not be seriously
incompatible with the convenience of a family, or detrimental to the
grounds or apartments of a handsome private residence. Indeed, it
would hardly have been allowable or practicable to have had the
examinations before the magistrates in any other than a public house.
They were always frequented by a promiscuous crowd, and generally
scenes of tumultuary disorder.

George Jacobs, Sr., was an aged man. He is represented in the evidence
as "very gray-headed;" and he must have been quite infirm, for he
walked with two staffs. His hair was in long, thin, white locks; and,
as he was uncommonly tall of stature, he must have had a venerable
aspect. Perhaps he was the "man in a long-crowned white hat," referred
to by Deliverance Hobbs. The examination shows that his faculties were
vigorous, his bearing fearless, and his utterances strong and decided.
The magistrates began: "Here are them that accuse you of acts of
witchcraft."--"Well, let us hear who are they and what are they." When
Abigail Williams testified against him, going through undoubtedly her
usual operations, he could not refrain from expressing his contempt
for the whole thing by a laugh; explaining it by saying, "Because I am
falsely accused--your worships all of you, do you think this is true?"
They answered, "Nay: what do you think?" "I never did it."--"Who did
it?"--"Don't ask me." The magistrates always took it for granted that
the pretensions and sufferings of the girls were real, and threw upon
the accused the responsibility of explaining them. They continued:
"Why should we not ask you? Sarah Churchill accuseth you. There she
is." Jacobs was of opinion that it was not for him to explain the
actions of the girls, but for the prosecuting party to prove his
guilt. "If you can prove that I am guilty, I will lie under it." Then
Sarah Churchill, who was a servant in his family, said, "Last night, I
was afflicted at Deacon Ingersoll's; and Mary Walcot said it was a man
with two staves: it was my master." It seems, that, after the
proceedings against Burroughs were over, a meeting of "the circle"
took place in the evening, at Deacon Ingersoll's, at which there was
a repetition of the actings of the girls; and that Mary Walcot
suggested to Churchill to accuse her master. This shows the way in
which the delusion was kept up. Probably, such meetings were held at
one house or another in the village, and fresh accusations brought
forward, continually. Jacobs appealed to the magistrates, trying to
recall them to a sense of fairness. "Pray, do not accuse me: I am as
clear as your worships. You must do right judgment." Sarah Churchill
charged him with having hurt her; and the magistrates, pushing her on
to make further charges, said to her, "Did he not appear on the other
side of the river, and hurt you? Did not you see him?" She answered,
"Yes, he did." Then, turning to him, the magistrates said, "There, she
accuseth you to your face: she chargeth you that you hurt her
twice."--"It is not true. What would you have me say? I never wronged
no man in word nor deed."--"Is it no harm to afflict these?"--"I never
did it."--"But how comes it to be in your appearance?"--"The Devil can
take any likeness."--"Not without their consent." Jacobs rejected the
imputation. "You tax me for a wizard: you may as well tax me for a
buzzard. I have done no harm." Churchill said, "I know you lived a
wicked life." Jacobs, turning to the magistrates, said, "Let her make
it out." The magistrates asked her, "Doth he ever pray in his family?"
She replied, "Not unless by himself." The magistrates, addressing him:
"Why do you not pray in your family?"--"I cannot read."--"Well, but
you may pray for all that. Can you say the Lord's Prayer? Let us hear
you." The reporter, Mr. Parris, says, "He missed in several parts of
it, and could not repeat it right after many trials." The magistrates,
addressing her, said, "Were you not frighted, Sarah Churchill, when
the representation of your master came to you?"--"Yes." Jacobs
exclaimed, "Well, burn me or hang me, I will stand in the truth of
Christ: I know nothing of it." In answer to an inquiry from the
magistrates, he denied having done any thing to get his son George or
grand-daughter Margaret to "sign the book."

The appearance of the old man, his intrepid bearing, and the stamp of
conscious innocence on all he said, probably produced some impression
on the magistrates, as they did not come to any decision, but
adjourned the examination to the next day. The girls then came down
from the village in full force, determined to put him through. When he
was brought in, they accordingly, all at once, "fell into the most
grievous fits and screechings." When they sufficiently came to, the
magistrates turned to the girls: "Is this the man that hurts you?"
They severally answered,--Abigail Williams: "This is the man," and
fell into a violent fit. Ann Putnam: "This is the man. He hurts me,
and brings the book to me, and would have me write in the book, and
said, if I would write in it, I should be as well as his
grand-daughter." Mercy Lewis, after much interruptions by fits: "This
is the man: he almost kills me." Elizabeth Hubbard: "He never hurt me
till to-day, when he came upon the table." Mary Walcot, after much
interruption by fits: "This is the man: he used to come with two
staves, and beat me with one of them." After all this, the
magistrates, thinking he could deny it no longer, turn to him, "What
do you say? Are you not a witch?" "No: I know it not, if I were to die
presently." Mercy Lewis advanced towards him, but, as soon as she got
near, "fell into great fits."--"What do you say to this?" cried the
magistrates. "Why, it is false. I know not of it any more than the
child that was born to-night." The reporter says, "Ann Putnam and
Abigail Williams had each of them a pin stuck in their hands, and they
said it was this old Jacobs." He was committed to prison.

The following piece of evidence is among the loose papers on file in
the clerk's office:--

     "THE DEPOSITION OF SARAH INGERSOLL, aged about thirty
     years.--Saith, that, seeing Sarah Churchill after her
     examination, she came to me crying and wringing her hands,
     seemingly to be much troubled in spirit. I asked her what she
     ailed. She answered, she had undone herself. I asked her in
     what. She said, in belying herself and others in saying she
     had set her hand to the Devil's book, whereas, she said, she
     never did. I told her I believed she had set her hand to the
     book. She answered, crying, and said, 'No, no, no: I never, I
     never did.' I asked her then what made her say she did. She
     answered, because they threatened her, and told her they
     would put her into the dungeon, and put her along with Mr.
     Burroughs; and thus several times she followed me up and
     down, telling me that she had undone herself, in belying
     herself and others. I asked her why she did not deny she
     wrote it. She told me, because she had stood out so long in
     it, that now she durst not. She said also, that, if she told
     Mr. Noyes but once she had set her hand to the book, he would
     believe her; but, if she told the truth, and said she had not
     set her hand to the book a hundred times, he would not
     believe her.

     "SARAH INGERSOLL."

This paper has also the signature of "Ann Andrews."

This incident probably occurred during the examination of George
Jacobs; and the bitter compunction of Churchill was in consequence of
the false and malignant course she had been pursuing against her old
master. It is a relief to our feelings, so far as she is regarded, to
suppose so. Bad as her conduct was as one of the accusers, on other
occasions after I am sorry to say as well as before, it shows that she
was not entirely dead to humanity, but realized the iniquity of which
she had been guilty towards him. It is the only instance of which we
find notice of any such a remnant of conscience showing itself, at the
time, among those perverted and depraved young persons. The reason,
why it is probable that this exhibition of Churchill's penitential
tears and agonies of remorse occurred immediately after the first day
of Jacobs's examination, is this. It was one of the first, if not the
first, held at the house of Thomas Beadle. Sarah Ingersoll would not
have been likely to have fallen in with her elsewhere. It is evident,
from the tenor and purport of the document, that the deponent was not
entirely carried away by the prevalent delusion, and probably did not
follow up the proceedings generally. But it was quite natural that her
attention should have been called to proceedings of interest at
Beadle's house, particularly on that first occasion. She lived in the
immediate vicinity. The indorsement by Ann Andrews, the daughter of
Jacobs, increases the probability that the occurrence was at his
examination.

The representatives of the family of John Ingersoll,--a brother of
Deacon Nathaniel Ingersoll,--in 1692, occupied a series of houses on
the west side of Daniels Street, leading from Essex Street to the
harbor. The widow of John's son Nathaniel lived at the corner of Essex
and Daniels Streets; the next in order was the widow of his son John;
the next, his daughter Ruth, wife of Richard Rose; the next, the widow
of his son Richard; the last, his son Samuel, whose house lot extended
to the water. Sarah, the witness in this case, was the wife of Samuel,
and afterwards became the second wife of Philip English. One of her
children appears to have married a son of Beadle. Their immediate
proximity to the Beadle house, and consequent intimacy with his
family, led them to become conversant with what occurred there; and
Sarah Ingersoll was, in that way, likely to meet Churchill, and to
have the conversation with her to which she deposes.

This brief deposition of Sarah Ingersoll is, in many particulars, an
important and instructive paper. It exhibits incidentally the means
employed to keep the accusing girls and confessing witnesses from
falling back, and, by overawing them, to prevent their acknowledging
the falseness of their testimony. It shows how difficult it was to
obtain a hearing, if they were disposed to recant. It presents Mr.
Noyes--as all along there is too much evidence compelling us to
admit--acting a part as bad as that of Parris; and it discloses the
fact, that Mr. Burroughs, although not yet brought to trial, was
immured in a dungeon.

No papers are on file, or have been obtained, in reference to the
examination of Margaret Jacobs, which was at the same time and place
with that of her grandfather. We shall hear of her in subsequent
stages of the transaction.

On the same day--May 10--that George and Margaret Jacobs were
apprehended and examined, a warrant was issued against John Willard,
"husbandman," to be brought to Thomas Beadle's house in Salem. On the
12th, John Putnam, Jr., constable, made return that he had been to
"the house of the usual abode of John Willard, and made search for
him, and in several other houses and places, but could not find him;"
and that "his relations and friends" said, "that, to their best
knowledge, he was fled." On the 15th, a warrant was issued to the
marshal of Essex, and the constables of Salem, "or any other marshal,
or marshal's constable or constables within this their majesty's
colony or territory of the Massachusetts, in New England," requiring
them to apprehend said Willard, "if he may be found in your
precincts, who stands charged with sundry acts of witchcraft, by him
done or committed on the bodies of Bray Wilkins, and Samuel Wilkins,
the son of Henry Wilkins," and others, upon complaint made "by Thomas
Fuller, Jr., and Benjamin Wilkins, Sr., yeomen; who, being found, you
are to convey from town to town, from constable to constable, ... to
be prosecuted according to the direction of Constable John Putnam, of
Salem Village, who goes with the same." On the 18th of May, Constable
Putnam brought in Willard, and delivered him to the magistrates. He
was seized in Groton. There is no record of his examination; but we
gather, from the papers on file, the following facts relating to this
interesting case:--

It is said that Willard had been called upon to aid in the arrest,
custody, and bringing-in of persons accused, acting as a
deputy-constable; and, from his observation of the deportment of the
prisoners, and from all he heard and saw, his sympathies became
excited in their behalf: and he expressed, in more or less unguarded
terms, his disapprobation of the proceedings. He seems to have
considered all hands concerned in the business--accusers, accused,
magistrates, and people--as alike bewitched. One of the witnesses
against him deposed, that he said, in a "discourse" at the house of a
relative, "Hang them: they are all witches." In consequence of this
kind of talk, in which he indulged as early as April, he incurred the
ill-will of the parties engaged in the prosecutions; and it was
whispered about that he was himself in the diabolical confederacy. He
was a grandson of Bray Wilkins; and the mind of the old man became
prejudiced against him, and most of his family connections and
neighbors partook of the feeling. When Willard discovered that such
rumors were in circulation against him, he went to his grandfather for
counsel and the aid of his prayers. He met with a cold reception, as
appears by the deposition of the old man as follows:--

     "When John Willard was first complained of by the afflicted
     persons for afflicting of them, he came to my house, greatly
     troubled, desiring me, with some other neighbors, to pray
     for him. I told him I was then going from home, and could
     not stay; but, if I could come home before night, I should
     not be unwilling. But it was near night before I came home,
     and so I did not answer his desire; but I heard no more of
     him upon that account. Whether my not answering his desire
     did not offend him, I cannot tell; but I was jealous,
     afterwards, that it did."

Willard soon after made an engagement to go to Boston, on
election-week, with Henry Wilkins, Jr. A son of said Henry Wilkins,
named Daniel,--a youth of seventeen years of age, who had heard the
stories against Willard, and believed them all, remonstrated with his
father against going to Boston with Willard, and seemed much
distressed at the thought, saying, among other things, "It were well
if the said Willard were hanged."

Old Bray Wilkins must go to election too; and so started off on
horseback,--the only mode of travel then practicable from Will's Hill
to Winnesimit Ferry,--with his wife on a pillion behind him. He was
eighty-two years of age, and she probably not much less; for she had
been the wife of his youth. The old couple undoubtedly had an active
time that week in Boston. It was a great occasion, and the whole
country flocked in to partake in the ceremonies and services of the
anniversary. On Election-day, with his wife, he rode out to
Dorchester, to dine at the house of his "brother, Lieutenant Richard
Way." Deodat Lawson and his new wife, and several more, joined them at
table. Before sitting down, Henry Wilkins and John Willard also came
in. Willard, perhaps, did not feel very agreeably towards his
grandfather, at the time, for having shown an unwillingness to pray
with him. The old man either saw, or imagined he saw, a very
unpleasant expression in Willard's countenance. "To my apprehension,
he looked after such a sort upon me as I never before discerned in
any." The long and hard travel, the fatigues and excitements of
election-week, were too much for the old man, tough and rugged as he
was; and a severe attack of a complaint, to which persons of his age
are often subject, came on. He experienced great sufferings, and, as
he expressed it, "was like a man on a rack."

     "I told my wife immediately that I was afraid that Willard
     had done me wrong; my pain continuing, and finding no
     relief, my jealousy continued. Mr. Lawson and others there
     were all amazed, and knew not what to do for me. There was
     a woman accounted skilful came hoping to help me, and after
     she had used means, she asked me whether none of those evil
     persons had done me damage. I said, I could not say they
     had, but I was sore afraid they had. She answered, she did
     fear so too.... As near as I remember. I lay in this case
     three or four days at Boston, and afterward, with the
     jeopardy of my life (as I thought), I came home."

On his return, he found his grandson, the same Daniel who had warned
Henry Wilkins against going to Boston with John Willard, on his
death-bed, in great suffering. Another attack of his own malady came
on. There was great consternation in the neighborhood, and throughout
the village. The Devil and his confederates, it was thought, were
making an awful onslaught upon the people at Will's Hill. Parris and
others rushed to the scene. Mercy Lewis and Mary Walcot were carried
up to tell who it was that was bewitching old Bray, and young Daniel,
and others of the Wilkinses who had caught the contagion, and were
experiencing or imagining all sorts of bodily ails. They were taken to
the room where Daniel was approaching his death-agonies; and they both
affirmed, that they saw the spectres of old Mrs. Buckley and John
Willard "upon his throat and upon his breast, and pressed him and
choked him;" and the cruel operation, they insisted upon it, continued
until the boy died. The girls were carried to the bedroom of the old
man, who was in great suffering; and, when they entered, the question
was put by the anxious and excited friends in the chamber to Mercy
Lewis, whether she saw any thing. She said, "Yes: they are looking
for John Willard." Presently she pretended to have caught sight of his
apparition, and exclaimed, "There he is upon his grandfather's belly."
This was thought wonderful indeed; for, as the old man says in a
deposition he drew up afterwards, "At that time I was in grievous pain
in the small of my belly."

Mrs. Ann Putnam had her story to tell about John Willard. Its
substance is seen in a deposition drawn up about the time, and is in
the same vein as her testimony in other cases; presenting a problem to
be solved by those who can draw the line between semi-insane
hallucination and downright fabrication. Her deposition is as
follows:--

     "That the shape of Samuel Fuller and Lydia Wilkins this day
     told me at my own house by the bedside, who appeared in
     winding-sheets, that, if I did not go and tell Mr. Hathorne
     that John Willard had murdered them, they would tear me to
     pieces. I knew them when they were living, and it was
     exactly their resemblance and shape. And, at the same time,
     the apparition of John Willard told me that he had killed
     Samuel Fuller, Lydia Wilkins, Goody Shaw, and Fuller's
     second wife, and Aaron Way's child, and Ben Fuller's child;
     and this deponent's child Sarah, six weeks old; and Philip
     Knight's child, with the help of William Hobbs; and Jonathan
     Knight's child and two of Ezekiel Cheever's children with
     the help of William Hobbs; Anne Eliot and Isaac Nichols with
     the help of William Hobbs; and that if Mr. Hathorne would
     not believe them,--that is, Samuel Fuller and Lydia
     Wilkins,--perhaps they would appear to the magistrates.
     Joseph Fuller's apparition the same day also came to me, and
     told me that Goody Corey had killed him. The spectre
     aforesaid told me, that vengeance, vengeance, was cried by
     said Fuller. This relation is true.

     "ANN PUTNAM."

It appears by such papers as are to be found relating to Willard's
case, that a coroner's jury was held over the body of Daniel Wilkins,
of which Nathaniel Putnam was foreman. It is much to be regretted that
the finding of that jury is lost. It would be a real curiosity. That
it was very decisive to the point, affirmed by Mercy Lewis and Mary
Walcot, that Daniel was choked and strangled by the spectres of John
Willard and Goody Buckley, is apparent from the manner in which Bray
Wilkins speaks of it. In an argument between him and some persons who
were expressing their confidence that John Willard was an innocent
man, he sought to relieve himself from responsibility for Willard's
conviction by saying, "It was not I, nor my son Benjamin Wilkins, but
the testimony of the afflicted persons, and the jury concerning the
murder of my grandson, Daniel Wilkins, that would take away his life,
if any thing did." Mr. Parris, of course, was in the midst of these
proceedings at Will's Hill; attended the visits of the afflicted girls
when they went to ascertain who were the witches murdering young
Daniel and torturing the old man; was present, no doubt, at the solemn
examinations and investigations of the sages who sat as a jury of
inquest over the former, and, in all likelihood, made, as usual, a
written report of the same. As soon as he got back to his house, he
discharged his mind, and indorsed the verdict of the coroner's jury by
this characteristic insertion in his church-records: "Dan: Wilkins.
Bewitched to death." The very next entry relates to a case of which
this obituary line, in Mr. Parris's church-book, is the only
intimation that has come down to us, "Daughter to Ann Douglas. By
witchcraft, I doubt not." Willard's examination was at Beadle's, on
the 18th. With this deluge of accusations and tempest of indignation
beating upon him, he had but little chance, and was committed.

While the marshals and constables were in pursuit of Willard, the time
was well improved by the prosecutors. On the 12th of May, warrants
were issued to apprehend, and bring "forthwith" before the magistrates
sitting at Beadle's, "Alice Parker, the wife of John Parker of Salem;
and Ann Pudeator of Salem, widow." Alice, commonly called Elsie,
Parker was the wife of a mariner. We know but little of her. We have a
deposition of one woman, Martha Dutch, as follows:--

     "This deponent testified and saith, that, about two years
     last past, John Jarman, of Salem, coming in from sea, I
     (this deponent and Alice Parker, of Salem, both of us
     standing together) said unto her, 'What a great mercy it
     was, for to see them come home well; and through mercy,' I
     said, 'my husband had gone, and come home well, many times.'
     And I, this deponent, did say unto the said Parker, that 'I
     did hope he would come home this voyage well also.' And the
     said Parker made answer unto me, and said, 'No: never more
     in this world.' The which came to pass as she then told me;
     for he died abroad, as I certainly hear."

Perhaps Parker had information which had not reached the ears of
Dutch, or she may have been prone to take melancholy views of the
dangers to which seafaring people are exposed. It was a strange kind
of evidence to be admitted against a person in a trial for witchcraft.

Samuel Shattuck, who has been mentioned (vol. i. p. 193) in connection
with Bridget Bishop, had a long story to tell about Alice Parker. He
seems to have been very active in getting up charges of witchcraft
against persons in his neighborhood, and on the most absurd and
frivolous grounds. Parker had made a friendly call upon his wife; and,
not long after, one of his children fell sick, and he undertook to
suspect that it was "under an evil hand." In similar circumstances, he
took the same grudge against Bridget Bishop. Alice Parker, hearing
that he had been circulating suspicions to that effect against her,
went to his house to remonstrate; an angry altercation took place
between them; and he gave his version of the affair in evidence. There
was no one to present the other side. But the whole thing has, not
only a one-sided, but an irrelevant character, in no wise bearing upon
the point of witchcraft. All the gossip, scandal, and tittle-tattle of
the neighborhood for twenty years back, in this case as in others,
was raked up, and allowed to be adduced, however utterly remote from
the questions belonging to the trial.

The following singular piece of testimony against Alice Parker may be
mentioned. John Westgate was at Samuel Beadle's tavern one night with
boon companions; among them John Parker, the husband of Alice. She
disapproved of her husband's spending his evenings in such company,
and in a bar-room; and felt it necessary to put a stop to it, if she
could. Westgate says that she "came into the company, and scolded at
and called her husband all to nought; whereupon I, the said deponent,
took her husband's part, telling her it was an unbeseeming thing for
her to come after him to the tavern, and rail after that rate. With
that she came up to me, and called me rogue, and bid me mind my own
business, and told me I had better have said nothing." He goes on to
state, that, returning home one night some time afterwards, he
experienced an awful fright. "Going from the house of Mr. Daniel King,
when I came over against John Robinson's house, I heard a great noise;
... and there appeared a black hog running towards me with open mouth,
as though he would have devoured me at that instant time." In the
extremity of his terror, he tried to run away from the awful monster;
but, as might have been expected under the circumstances, he tumbled
to the ground. "I fell down upon my hip, and my knife run into my hip
up to the haft. When I came home, my knife was in my sheath. When I
drew it out of the sheath, then immediately the sheath fell all to
pieces." And further this deponent testifieth, that, after he got up
from his fall, his stocking and shoe was full of blood, and that he
was forced to crawl along by the fence all the way home; and the hog
followed him, and never left him till he came home. He further stated
that he was accompanied all the way by his "stout dog," which
ordinarily was much inclined to attack and "worry hogs," but, on this
occasion, "ran away from him, leaping over the fence and crying much."
In view of all these things, Westgate concludes his testimony thus:
"Which hog I then apprehended was either the Devil or some evil thing,
not a real hog; and did then really judge, or determine in my mind,
that it was either Goody Parker or by her means and procuring, fearing
that she is a witch." The facts were probably these: The sheath was
broken by his fall, his skin bruised, and some blood got into his
stocking and shoe. The knife was never out of the sheath until he drew
it; there was no mystery or witchcraft in it. Nothing was ever more
natural than the conduct of the dog. When he saw Westgate frightened
out of his wits at nothing, trying to run as for dear life when there
was no pursuer, staggering and pitching along in a zigzag direction
with very eccentric motions, falling heels over head, and then
crawling along, holding himself up by the fence, and all the time
looking back with terror, and perhaps attempting to express his
consternation, the dog could not tell what to make of it; and ran off,
as a dog would be likely to have done, jumping over the fences,
barking, and uttering the usual canine ejaculations. Dogs sympathize
with their masters, and, if there is a frolic or other acting going
on, are fond of joining in it. The whole thing was in consequence of
Westgate's not having profited by Alice Parker's rebuke, and
discontinued his visits by night to Beadle's bar-room. The only reason
why he saw the "black hog with the open mouth," and the dog did not
see it, and therefore failed to come to his protection, was because he
had been drinking and the dog had not.

We find among the papers relating to these transactions many other
instances of this kind of testimony; sounds heard and sights seen by
persons going home at night through woods, after having spent the
evening under the bewildering influences of talk about witches, Satan,
ghosts, and spectres; sometimes, as in this case, stimulated by other
causes of excitement.

Perhaps some persons may be curious to know the route by which
Westgate made out to reach his home, while pursued by the horrors of
that midnight experience. He seems to have frequented Samuel Beadle's
bar-room. That old Narragansett soldier owned a lot on the west side
of St. Peter's Street, occupying the southern corner of what is now
Church Street, which was opened ten years afterwards, that is, in
1702, by the name of Epps's Lane. On that lot his tavern stood. He
also owned one-third of an acre at the present corner of Brown and St.
Peter's Streets, on which he had a stable and barn; so that his
grounds were on both sides of St. Peter's Street,--one parcel on the
west, nearly opposite the present front of the church; the other on
the east side of St. Peter's Street, opposite the south side of the
church. From this locality Westgate started. He probably did not go
down Brown Street, for that was then a dark, unfrequented lane, but
thought it safest to get into Essex Street. He made his way along that
street, passing the Common, the southern side of which, at that time,
with the exception of some house-lots on and contiguous to the site of
the Franklin Building, bordered on Essex Street. The casualty of his
fall; the catastrophe to his hip, stocking, and shoe; and the witchery
practised upon his knife and its sheath,--occurred "over against John
Robinson's house," which was on the eastern corner of Pleasant and
Essex Streets. Christopher Babbage's house, from which he thought the
"great noise" came, was next beyond Robinson's. He crawled along the
fences and the sides of the houses until he reached the passage-way on
the western side of Thomas Beadle's house, and through that managed to
get to his own house, which was directly south of said Beadle's lot,
between it and the harbor.

There is one item in reference to Alice Parker, which indicates that
the zeal of the prosecutors in her case, as in that of Mr. Burroughs,
and perhaps others, was aggravated by a suspicion that she was
heretical on some points of the prevalent creed of the day. Parris
says that "Mr. Noyes, at the time of her examination, affirmed to her
face, that, he being with her at a time of sickness, discoursing with
her about witchcraft, whether she were not guilty, she answered, 'if
she was as free from other sins as from witchcraft, she would not ask
of the Lord mercy.'" The manner of expression in this passage shows
that it was thought that there was something very shocking in her
answer. Mr. Noyes "affirmed to her face." No doubt it was thought that
she denied the doctrine of original and transmitted, or imputed sin.

Ann Pudeator (pronounced Pud-e-tor) was the widow of Jacob Pudeator,
and probably about seventy years of age. The name is spelt variously,
and was originally, as it is sometimes found, Poindexter. She was a
woman of property, owning two estates on the north line of the Common;
that on which she lived comprised what is between Oliver and Winter
Streets. She was arrested and brought to examination on the 12th of
May. There is ground to conclude, from the tenor of the documents,
that she was then discharged. Some people in the town were determined
to gratify their spleen against her, and procured her re-arrest. The
examination took place on the 2d of July, and she was then committed.
The evidence was, if possible, more frivolous and absurd than in other
cases. The girls acted their usual parts, giving, on this occasion, a
particularly striking exhibition of the transmission of the diabolical
virus out of themselves back into the witch by a touch of her body.
"Ann Putnam fell into a fit, and said Pudeator was commanded to take
her by the wrist, and did; and said Putnam was well presently. Mary
Warren fell into two fits quickly, after one another; and both times
was helped by said Pudeator's taking her by the wrist."

When well acted, this must have been one of the most impressive and
effective of all the methods employed in these performances. To see a
young woman or girl suddenly struck down, speechless, pallid as in
death; with muscles rigid, eyeballs fixed or rolled back in their
sockets; the stiffened frame either wholly prostrate or drawn up into
contorted attitudes and shapes, or vehemently convulsed with racking
pains, or dropping with relaxed muscles into a lifeless lump; and to
hear dread shrieks of delirious ravings,--must have produced a truly
frightful effect upon an excited and deluded assembly. The constables
and their assistants would go to the rescue, lift the body of the
sufferer, and bear it in their arms towards the prisoner. The
magistrates and the crowd, hushed in the deepest silence, would watch
with breathless awe the result of the experiment, while the officers
slowly approached the accused, who, when they came near, would, in
obedience to the order of the magistrates, hold out a hand, and touch
the flesh of the afflicted one. Instantly the spasms cease, the eyes
open, color returns to the countenance, the limbs resume their
position and functions, and life and intelligence are wholly restored.
The sufferer comes to herself, walks back, and takes her seat as well
as ever. The effect upon the accused person must have been
confounding. It is a wonder that it did not oftener break them down.
It sometimes did. Poor Deliverance Hobbs, when the process was tried
upon her, was wholly overcome, and passed from conscious and calmly
asserted innocence to a helpless abandonment of reason, conscience,
and herself, exclaiming, "I am amazed! I am amazed!" and assented
afterwards to every charge brought against her, and said whatever she
was told, or supposed they wished her to say.

On the 14th of May, warrants were issued against Daniel Andrew; George
Jacobs, Jr.; his wife, Rebecca Jacobs; Sarah Buckley, wife of William
Buckley; and Mary Whittredge, daughter of said Buckley,--all of Salem
Village; Elizabeth Hart, wife of Isaac Hart, of Lynn; Thomas Farrar,
Sr., also of Lynn; Elizabeth Colson, of Reading; and Bethiah Carter,
of Woburn. There is nothing of special interest among the few papers
that are on file relating to Hart, Colson, or Carter. The constable
made return that he had searched the houses of Daniel Andrew and
George Jacobs, Jr., but could not find them. He brought in forthwith
the bodies of Sarah Buckley, Mary Whittredge, and Rebecca Jacobs.
Farrar and the rest were brought in shortly afterwards.

Daniel Andrew was one of the leading men of the village, and the
warrant against him was proof that soon none would be too high to be
reached by the prosecutors. He felt that it was in vain to attempt to
resist their destructive power; and, getting notice in some way of the
approach of the constable, with his near neighbor, friend, and
connection, George Jacobs, Jr., effected his escape, and found refuge
in a foreign country.

Rebecca, the wife of George Jacobs, Jr., was the victim of a partial
derangement. Her daughter Margaret was already in jail. Her husband
had escaped by a hurried flight, and his father was in prison awaiting
his trial. She was left in a lonely and unprotected condition, in a
country but thinly settled, in the midst of woods. The constable came
with his warrant for her. She was driven to desperation, and was
inclined to resist; but he persuaded her to go with him by holding out
the inducement that she would soon be permitted to return. Four young
children, one of them an infant, were left in the house; but those who
were old enough to walk followed after, crying, endeavoring to
overtake her. Some of the neighbors took them into their houses. The
imprisonment of a woman in her situation and mental condition was an
outrage; but she was kept in irons, as they all were, for eight
months. Her mother addressed an humble but earnest and touching
petition to the chief-justice of the court at Salem, setting forth her
daughter's condition; but it was of no avail. Afterwards, she
addressed a similar memorial to "His Excellency Sir William Phips,
Knight, Governor, and the Honorable Council sitting at Boston," in the
following terms:--

     "_The Humble Petition of Rebecca Fox, of Cambridge,
     showeth_, that, whereas Rebecca Jacobs (daughter of your
     humble petitioner) has, a long time,--even many months,--now
     lain in prison for witchcraft, and is well known to be a
     person crazed, distracted, and broken in mind, your humble
     petitioner does most humbly and earnestly seek unto Your
     Excellency and to Your Honors for relief in this case.

     "Your petitioner,--who knows well the condition of her poor
     daughter,--together with several others of good repute and
     credit, are ready to offer their oaths, that the said Jacobs
     is a woman crazed, distracted, and broken in her mind; and
     that she has been so these twelve years and upwards.

     "However, for (I think) above this half-year, the said
     Jacobs has lain in prison, and yet remains there, attended
     with many sore difficulties.

     "Christianity and nature do each of them oblige your
     petitioner to be very solicitous in this matter; and,
     although many weighty cases do exercise your thoughts, yet
     your petitioner can have no rest in her mind till such time
     as she has offered this her address on behalf of her
     daughter.

     "Some have died already in prison, and others have been
     dangerously sick; and how soon others, and, among them, my
     poor child, by the difficulties of this confinement may be
     sick and die, God only knows.

     "She is uncapable of making that shift for herself that
     others can do; and such are her circumstances, on other
     accounts, that your petitioner, who is her tender mother,
     has many great sorrows, and almost overcoming burdens, on
     her mind upon her account; but, in the midst of all her
     perplexities and troubles (next to supplicating to a good
     and merciful God), your petitioner has no way for help but
     to make this her afflicted condition known unto you. So, not
     doubting but Your Excellency and Your Honors will readily
     hear the cries and groans of a poor distressed woman, and
     grant what help and enlargement you may, your petitioner
     heartily begs God's gracious presence with you; and
     subscribes herself, in all humble manner, your sorrowful and
     distressed petitioner,

     REBECCA FOX."

No heed was paid to this petition; and the unfortunate woman remained
in jail until--after the delusion had passed from the minds of the
people--a grand jury found a bill against her, on which she was
brought to trial, Jan. 3, 1693, and acquitted. There is no more
disgraceful feature in all the proceedings than the long imprisonment
of this woman, her being brought to trial, and the obdurate deafness
to humanity and reason of the chief-justice, the governor, and the
council.

No papers are found relating to the examination of Thomas Farrar; but
the following deposition shows the manner in which prosecutions were
got up:--

     "THE DEPOSITION OF ANN PUTNAM, who testifieth and saith,
     that, on the 8th of May, 1692, there appeared to me the
     apparition of an old, gray-headed man, with a great nose,
     which tortured me, and almost choked me, and urged me to
     write in his book; and I asked him what was his name, and
     from whence he came, for I would complain of him; and he told
     me he came from Lynn, and people do call him 'old Father
     Pharaoh;' and he said he was my grandfather, for my father
     used to call him father: but I told him I would not call him
     grandfather; for he was a wizard, and I would complain of
     him. And, ever since, he hath afflicted me by times, beating
     me and pinching me and almost choking me, and urging me
     continually to write in his book."

     "We, whose names are underwritten, having been conversant
     with Ann Putnam, have heard her declare what is above
     written,--what she said she saw and heard from the
     apparition of old Pharaoh,--and also have seen her tortures,
     and perceived her hellish temptations, by her loud outcries,
     'I will not write, old Pharaoh,--I will not write in your
     book.'

     THOMAS PUTNAM,
     ROBERT MORRELL."

She had heard this person spoken of as "old Father Pharaoh," with his
"great nose;" and, from a mere spirit of mischief,--for the fun of the
thing,--cried out upon him. Many of the documents exhibit a levity of
spirit among these girls, which show how hardened and reckless they
had become. The following depositions are illustrative of this state
of mind among them:--

     "THE DEPOSITION OF CLEMENT COLDUM, aged sixty years, or
     thereabout.--Saith that, on the 29th of May, 1692, being at
     Salem Village, carrying home Elizabeth Hubbard from the
     meeting behind me, she desired me to ride faster. I asked her
     why. She said the woods were full of devils, and said,
     'There!' and 'There they be!' but I could see none. Then I
     put on my horse; and, after I had ridden a while, she told me
     I might ride softer, for we had outridden them. I asked her
     if she was not afraid of the Devil. She answered me, 'No: she
     could discourse with the Devil as well as with me,' and
     further saith not. This I am ready to testify on oath, if
     called thereto, as witness my hand.

     "CLEMENT COLDUM."

     "THE TESTIMONY OF DANIEL ELLIOT, aged twenty-seven years or
     thereabouts, who testifieth and saith, that I, being at the
     house of Lieutenant Ingersoll, on the 28th of March, in the
     year 1692, there being present one of the afflicted persons,
     who cried out and said, 'There's Goody Procter.' William
     Raymond, Jr., being there present, told the girl he believed
     she lied, for he saw nothing. Then Goody Ingersoll told the
     girl she told a lie, for there was nothing. Then the girl
     said she did it for sport,--they must have some sport."

Sarah Buckley was examined May 18, and her daughter Mary Whittredge
probably on the same day. We have Parris's report of the proceedings
in reference to the former. The only witnesses against her were the
afflicted children. They performed their grand operation of going into
fits, and being carried to the accused and subjected to her touch; Ann
Putnam, Susanna Sheldon, and Mary Warren enacting the part in
succession. Sheldon cried out, "There is the black man whispering in
her ear!" The magistrates and all beholders were convinced. She was
committed to prison, and remained in irons for eight months before a
trial, which resulted in her acquittal. So eminently excellent was the
character of Goodwife Buckley, that her arrest and imprisonment led to
expressions in her favor as honorable to those who had the courage to
utter them as to her. The following certificates were given, previous
to her trial, by ministers in the neighborhood:--

     "These are to certify whom it may or shall concern, that I
     have known Sarah, the wife of William Buckley, of Salem
     Village, more or less, ever since she was brought out of
     England, which is above fifty years ago; and, during all
     that time, I never knew nor heard of any evil in her
     carriage, or conversation unbecoming a Christian: likewise,
     she was bred up by Christian parents all the time she lived
     here at Ipswich. I further testify, that the said Sarah was
     admitted as a member into the church of Ipswich above forty
     years since; and that I never heard from others, or observed
     by myself, any thing of her that was inconsistent with her
     profession or unsuitable to Christianity, either in word,
     deed, or conversation, and am strangely surprised that any
     person should speak or think of her as one worthy to be
     suspected of any such crime that she is now charged with. In
     testimony hereof I have here set my hand this 20th of June,
     1692.

     WILLIAM HUBBARD."

     "Being desired by Goodman Buckley to give my testimony to
     his wife's conversation before this great calamity befell
     her, I cannot refuse to bear witness to the truth; viz.,
     that, during the time of her living in Salem for many years
     in communion with this church, having occasionally frequent
     converse and discourse with her, I have never observed
     myself, nor heard from any other, any thing that was
     unsuitable to a conversation becoming the gospel, and have
     always looked upon her as a serious, Godly woman.

     "JOHN HIGGINSON."

     "Marblehead, Jan. 2, 1692/3.--Upon the same request, having
     had the like opportunity by her residence many years at
     Marblehead, I can do no less than give the alike testimony
     for her pious conversation during her abode in this place
     and communion with us.

     SAMUEL CHEEVER."

William Hubbard was the venerable minister of Ipswich, described by
Hutchinson as "a man of learning, and of a candid and benevolent
mind, accompanied with a good degree of catholicism." He is described
by another writer as "a man of singular modesty, learned without
ostentation." He will be remembered with honor for his long and
devoted service in the Christian ministry, and as the historian of New
England and of the Indian wars.

John Higginson was worthy of the title of the "Nestor of the
New-England clergy." He was at this time seventy-six years old, and
had been a preacher of the gospel fifty-five years. For thirty-three
years he had been pastor of the First Church in Salem, of which his
father was the first preacher. No character, in all our annals, shines
with a purer lustre. John Dunton visited him in 1686, and thus speaks
of him: "All men look to him as a common father; and old age, for his
sake, is a reverend thing. He is eminent for all the graces that adorn
a minister. His very presence puts vice out of countenance; his
conversation is a glimpse of heaven." The fact, that, while his
colleague, Nicholas Noyes, took so active and disastrous a part in the
prosecutions, he, at an early stage, discountenanced them, shows that
he was a person of discrimination and integrity. That he did not
conceal his disapprobation of the proceedings is demonstrated, not
only by the tenor of his attestation in behalf of Goodwife Buckley,
but by the decisive circumstance that the "afflicted children" cried
out against his daughter Anna, the wife of Captain William Dolliver,
of Gloucester; got a warrant to apprehend her; and had her brought to
the Salem jail, and committed as a witch. They never struck at
friends, but were sure to punish all who were suspected to disapprove
of the proceedings. How long Mrs. Dolliver remained in prison we are
not informed. But it was impossible to break down the influence or
independence of Mr. Higginson. It is not improbable that he believed
in witchcraft, with all the other divines of his day; but he feared
not to bear testimony to personal worth, and could not be brought to
co-operate in violence, or fall in with the spirit of persecution. The
weight of his character compelled the deference of the most heated
zealots, and even Cotton Mather himself was eager to pay him homage.
Four years afterwards, he thus writes of him: "This good old man is
yet alive; and he that, from a child, knew the Holy Scriptures, does,
at those years wherein men use to be twice children, continue
preaching them with such a manly, pertinent, and judicious vigor, and
with so little decay of his intellectual abilities, as is indeed a
matter of just admiration."

Samuel Cheever was a clergyman of the highest standing, and held in
universal esteem through a long life.

From passages incidentally given, it has appeared that it was quite
common, in those times, to attribute accidents, injuries, pains, and
diseases of all kinds, to an "evil hand." It was not confined to this
locality. When, however, the public mind had become excited to so
extraordinary a degree by circumstances connected with the
prosecutions in 1692, this tendency of the popular credulity was very
much strengthened. Believing that the sufferer or patient was the
victim of the malignity of Satan, and it also being a doctrine of the
established belief that he could not act upon human beings or affairs
except through the instrumental agency of some other human beings in
confederacy with him, the question naturally arose, in every specific
instance, Who is the person in this diabolical league, and doing the
will of the Devil in this case? Who is the witch? It may well be
supposed, that the suffering person, and all surrounding friends,
would be most earnest and anxious in pressing this question and
seeking its solution. The accusing girls at the village were thought
to possess the power to answer it. This gave them great importance,
gratified their vanity and pride, and exalted them to the character of
prophetesses. They were ready to meet the calls made upon them in this
capacity; would be carried to the room of a sick person; and, on
entering it, would exclaim, on the first return of pain, or difficulty
of respiration, or restless motion of the patient, "There she is!"
There is such a one's appearance, choking or otherwise tormenting him
or her. If the minds of the accusing girls had been led towards a new
victim, his or her name would be used, and a warrant issued for his
apprehension. If not, then the name of some one already in confinement
would be used on the occasion. It was also a received opinion, that,
while ordinary fastenings would not prevent a witch from going
abroad, "in her apparition," to any distance to afflict persons, a
redoubling of them might. Whenever one of the accusing girls pretended
to see the spectres of persons already in jail afflicting any one,
orders would forthwith be given to have them more heavily chained.
Every once in a while, a wretched prisoner, already suffering from
bonds and handcuffs, would be subjected to additional manacles and
chains. This was one of the most cruel features in these proceedings.
It is illustrated by the following document:--

     "THE DEPOSITION OF BENJAMIN HUTCHINSON, who testifieth and
     saith, that my wife was much afflicted, presently after the
     last execution, with violent pains in her head and teeth, and
     all parts of her body; but, on sabbath day was fortnight in
     the morning, she being in such excessive misery that she said
     she believed that she had an evil hand upon her: whereupon I
     went to Mary Walcot, one of our next neighbors, to come and
     look to see if she could see anybody upon her; and, as soon
     as she came into the house, she said that our two next
     neighbors, Sarah Buckley and Mary Whittredge, were upon my
     wife. And immediately my wife had ease, and Mary Walcot was
     tormented. Whereupon I went down to the sheriff, and desired
     him to take some course with those women, that they might not
     have such power to torment: and presently he ordered them to
     be fettered, and, ever since that, my wife has been tolerable
     well; and I believe, in my heart, that Sarah Buckley and Mary
     Whittredge have hurt my wife and several others by acts of
     witchcraft.

     "Benjamin Hutchinson owned the above-written evidence to be
     the truth, upon oath, before the grand inquest, 15-7, 1692."

The evidence is quite conclusive, from considerations suggested by the
foregoing document, and indications scattered through the papers
generally, that all persons committed on the charge of witchcraft were
kept heavily ironed, and otherwise strongly fastened. Only a few of
the bills of expenses incurred are preserved. Among them we find the
following: For mending and putting on Rachel Clenton's fetters; one
pair of fetters for John Howard; a pair of fetters each for John
Jackson, Sr., and John Jackson, Jr.; eighteen pounds of iron for
fetters; for making four pair of iron fetters and two pair of
handcuffs, and putting them on the legs and hands of Goodwife Cloyse,
Easty, Bromidg, and Green; chains for Sarah Good and Sarah Osburn;
shackles for ten prisoners; and one pair of irons for Mary Cox. When
we reflect upon the character of the prisoners generally,--many of
them delicate and infirm, several venerable for their virtues as well
as years,--and that they were kept in this cruelly painful condition
from early spring to the middle of the next January, and the larger
part to the May of 1693, in the extremes of heat and cold, exposed to
the most distressing severities of both, crowded in narrow, dark, and
noisome jails under an accumulation of all their discomforts,
restraints, privations, exposures, and abominations, our wonder is,
not that many of them died, but that all did not break down in body
and mind.

Sarah Buckley and her daughter were not brought to trial until after
the power of the prosecution to pursue to the death had ceased. They
were acquitted in January, 1692. Their goods and chattels had all been
seized by the officers, as was the usual practice, at the time of
their arrest. In humble circumstances before, it took their last
shilling to meet the charges of their imprisonment. They, as all
others, were required to provide their own maintenance while in
prison; and, after trial and acquittal, were not discharged until all
costs were paid. Five pounds had to be raised, to satisfy the claims
of the officers of the court and of the jails, for each of them. The
result was, the family was utterly impoverished. The poor old woman,
with her aged husband, suffered much, there is reason to fear, from
absolute want during all the rest of their days. Their truly Christian
virtues dignified their poverty, and secured the respect and esteem of
all good men. The Rev. Joseph Green has this entry in his diary: "Jan.
2, 1702.--Old William Buckley died this evening. He was at meeting the
last sabbath, and died with the cold, I fear, for want of comforts and
good tending. Lord forgive! He was about eighty years old. I visited
him and prayed with him on Monday, and also the evening before he
died. He was very poor; but, I hope, had not his portion in this
life." The ejaculation, "Lord forgive!" expresses the deep sense Mr.
Green had, of which his whole ministry gave evidence, of the
inexpressible sufferings and wrongs brought upon families by the
witchcraft prosecutions. The case of Sarah Buckley, her husband and
family, was but one of many. The humble, harmless, innocent people who
experienced that fearful and pitiless persecution had to drink of as
bitter a cup as ever was permitted by an inscrutable Providence to be
presented to human lips. In reference to them, we feel as an
assurance, what good Mr. Green humbly hoped, that "they had not their
portion in this life." Those who went firmly, patiently, and calmly
through that great trial without losing love or faith, are crowned
with glory and honor.

The examination and commitment of Mary Easty, on the 21st of April,
have already been described. For some reason, and in a way of which we
have no information, she was discharged from prison on the 18th of
May, and wholly released. This seems to have been very distasteful to
the accusing girls. They were determined not to let it rest so; and
put into operation their utmost energies to get her back to
imprisonment. On the 20th of May, Mercy Lewis, being then at the house
of John Putnam, Jr., was taken with fits, and experienced tortures of
unprecedented severity. The particular circumstances on this occasion,
as gathered from various depositions, illustrate very strikingly the
skilful manner in which the girls managed to produce the desired
effect upon the public mind.

Samuel Abbey, a neighbor, whether sent for or not we are not informed,
went to John Putnam's house that morning, about nine o'clock. He found
Mercy in a terrible condition, crying out with piteous tones of
anguish, "Dear Lord, receive my soul."--"Lord, let them not kill me
quite."--"Pray for the salvation of my soul, for they will kill me
outright." He was desired to go to Thomas Putnam's house to bring his
daughter Ann, "to see if she could see who it was that hurt Mercy
Lewis." He found Abigail Williams with Ann, and they accompanied him
back to John Putnam's. On the way, they both cried out that they saw
the apparition of Goody Easty afflicting Mercy Lewis. When they
reached the scene, they exclaimed, "There is Goody Easty and John
Willard and Mary Whittredge afflicting the body of Mercy Lewis;" Mercy
at the time laboring for breath, and appearing as choked and
strangled, convulsed, and apparently at the last gasp. "Thus," says
Abbey, "she continued the greatest part of the day, in such tortures
as no tongue can express." Mary Walcot was sent for. Upon coming in,
she cried out, "There is the apparition of Goody Easty choking Mercy
Lewis, pressing upon her breasts with both her hands, and putting a
chain about her neck." A message was then despatched for Elizabeth
Hubbard. She, too, saw the shape of Goody Easty, "the very same woman
that was sent home the other day," aided in her diabolical operations
by Willard and Whittredge, "torturing Mercy in a most dreadful
manner." Intelligence of the shocking sufferings of Mercy was
circulated far and wide, and people hurried to the spot from all
directions. Jonathan Putnam, James Darling, Benjamin Hutchinson, and
Samuel Braybrook reached the house during the evening, and found Mercy
"in a case as if death would have quickly followed." Occasionally,
Mercy would have a respite; and, at such intervals, Elizabeth Hubbard
would fill the gap. "These two fell into fits by turns; the one being
well while the other was ill." Each of them continued, all the while,
crying out against Goody Easty, uttering in their trances vehement
remonstrances against her cruel operations, representing her as
bringing their winding-sheets and coffins, and threatening to kill
them "if they would not sign to her book." Their acting was so
complete that the bystanders seem to have thought that they heard the
words of Easty, as well as the responses of the girls; and that they
saw the "winding-sheet, coffin," and "the book." In the general
consternation, Marshal Herrick was sent for. What he saw, heard,
thought, and did, appears from the following:--

     "May 20, 1692.--THE TESTIMONY OF GEORGE HERRICK, aged
     thirty-four or thereabouts, and JOHN PUTNAM, JR., of Salem
     Village, aged thirty-five years or thereabouts.--Testifieth
     and saith, that, being at the house of the above-said John
     Putnam, both saw Mercy Lewis in a very dreadful and solemn
     condition, so that to our apprehension she could not continue
     long in this world without a mitigation of those torments we
     saw her in, which caused us to expedite a hasty despatch to
     apprehend Mary Easty, in hopes, if possible, it might save
     her life; and, returning the same night to said John Putnam's
     house about midnight, we found the said Mercy Lewis in a
     dreadful fit, but her reason was then returned. Again she
     said, 'What! have you brought me the winding-sheet, Goodwife
     Easty? Well, I had rather go into the winding-sheet than set
     my hand to the book;' but, after that, her fits were weaker
     and weaker, but still complaining that she was very sick of
     her stomach. About break of day, she fell asleep, but still
     continues extremely sick, and was taken with a dreadful fit
     just as we left her; so that we perceived life in her, and
     that was all."

Edward Putnam, after stating that the grievous afflictions and
tortures of Mercy Lewis were charged, by her and the other four girls,
upon Mary Easty, deposes as follows:--

     "I myself, being there present with several others, looked
     for nothing else but present death for almost the space of
     two days and a night. She was choked almost to death,
     insomuch we thought sometimes she had been dead; her mouth
     and teeth shut; and all this very often until such time as
     we understood Mary Easty was laid in irons."

Mercy's fits did not cease immediately upon Easty's being apprehended,
but on her being committed to prison and chains by the magistrate in
Salem.

An examination of distances, with the map before us, will show the
rapidity with which business was despatched on this occasion. Abbey
went to John Putnam, Jr.'s house at nine o'clock in the morning of May
20. He was sent to Thomas Putnam's house for Ann, and brought her and
Abigail Williams back with him. Mary Walcot was sent for to the house
of her father, Captain Jonathan Walcot, and went up at one o'clock,
"about an hour by sun." Then Elizabeth Hubbard, who lived at the house
of Dr. Griggs, "was carried up to Constable John Putnam's house:"
Jonathan Putnam, James Darling, Benjamin Hutchinson, and Samuel
Braybrook got there in the evening, as they say, "between eight and
eleven o'clock." In the mean time, Marshal Herrick had arrived. Steps
were taken to get out a warrant. John Putnam and Benjamin Hutchinson
went to Salem to Hathorne for the purpose. They must have started soon
after eight. Hathorne issued the warrant forthwith. It is dated May
20. Herrick went with it to the house of Isaac Easty, made the arrest,
sent his prisoner to the jail in Salem, and returned himself to John
Putnam's house "about midnight;" staid to witness the apparently
mortal sufferings of Mercy until "about break of day;" returned to
Salem; had the examination before Hathorne, at Thomas Beadle's: the
whole thing was finished, Mary Easty in irons, information of the
result carried to John Putnam's, and Mercy's agonies ceased that
afternoon, as Edward Putnam testifies.

I have given this particular account of the circumstances that led to
and attended Mary Easty's second arrest, because the papers belonging
to the case afford, in some respects, a better insight of the state of
things than others, and because they enable us to realize the power
which the accusing girls exercised. The continuance of their
convulsions and spasms for such a length of time, the large number of
persons who witnessed and watched them in the broad daylight, and the
perfect success of their operations, show how thoroughly they had
become trained in their arts. I have presented the occurrences in the
order of time, so that, by estimating the distances traversed and the
period within which they took place, an idea can be formed of the
vehement earnestness with which men acted in the "hurrying
distractions of amazing afflictions" and overwhelming terrors. This
instance also gives us a view of the horrible state of things, when
any one, however respectable and worthy, was liable, at any moment, to
be seized, maligned, and destroyed.

Mary Easty had previously experienced the malice of the persecutors.
For two months she had suffered the miseries of imprisonment, had just
been released, and for two days enjoyed the restoration of liberty,
the comforts of her home, and a re-union with her family. She and
they, no doubt, considered themselves safe from any further outrage.
After midnight, she was roused from sleep by the unfeeling marshal,
torn from her husband and children, carried back to prison, loaded
with chains, and finally consigned to a dreadful and most cruel death.
She was an excellent and pious matron. Her husband, referring to the
transaction nearly twenty years afterwards, justly expressed what all
must feel, that it was "a hellish molestation."

One of the most malignant witnesses against Mary Easty was "Goodwife
Bibber." She obtruded herself in many of the cases, acting as a sort
of outside member of the "accusing circle," volunteering her aid in
carrying on the persecutions. It was an outrage for the magistrates or
judges to have countenanced such a false defamer. There are, among the
papers, documents which show that she ought to have been punished as a
calumniator, rather than be called to utter, under oath, lies against
respectable people. The following deposition was sworn to in Court:--

     "THE TESTIMONY OF JOSEPH FOWLER, who testifieth that Goodman
     Bibber and his wife lived at my house; and I did observe and
     take notice that Goodwife Bibber was a woman who was very
     idle in her calling, and very much given to tattling and
     tale-bearing, making mischief amongst her neighbors, and very
     much given to speak bad words, and would call her husband bad
     names, and was a woman of a very turbulent, unruly spirit."

Joseph Fowler lived in Wenham, and was a person of respectability and
influence. His brother Philip was also a leading man; was employed as
attorney by the Village Parish in its lawsuit with Mr. Parris; and
married a sister of Joseph Herrick. They were the grandsons of the
first Philip, who was an early emigrant from Wales, settling in
Ipswich, where he had large landed estates. Henry Fowler and his two
brothers, now of Danvers, are the descendants of this family: one of
them, Augustus, distinguished as a naturalist, especially in the
department of ornithology; the other, Samuel Page Fowler, as an
explorer of our early annals and local antiquities. In 1692, one of
the Fowlers conducted the proceedings in Court against the head and
front of the witchcraft prosecution; and the other had the courage, in
the most fearful hour of the delusion, to give open testimony in the
defence of its victims. It is an interesting circumstance, that one of
the same name and descent, in his reprint of the papers of Calef and
in other publications, has done as much as any other person of our day
to bring that whole transaction under the light of truth and justice.

John Porter, who was a grandson of the original John Porter and the
original William Dodge and a man of property and family, with his wife
Lydia; Thomas Jacobs and Mary his wife; and Richard Walker,--all of
Wenham, and for a long time neighbors of this Bibber,--testify, in
corroboration of the statement of Fowler, that she was a woman of an
unruly, turbulent spirit, double-tongued, much given to tattling and
tale-bearing, making mischief amongst her neighbors, very much given
to speak bad words, often speaking against one and another, telling
lies and uttering malicious wishes against people. It was abundantly
proved that she had long been known to be able to fall into fits at
any time. One witness said "she would often fall into strange fits
when she was crossed of her humor;" and another, "that she could fall
into fits as often as she pleased."

On the 21st of May, warrants were issued against the wife of William
Basset, of Lynn; Susanna Roots, of Beverly; and Sarah, daughter of
John Procter of Salem Farms; a few days after, against Benjamin, a son
of said John Procter; Mary Derich, wife of Michael Derich, and
daughter of William Basset of Lynn; and the wife of Robert Pease of
Salem. Such papers as relate to these persons vary in no particular
worthy of notice from those already presented.

On the 28th of May, warrants were issued against Martha Carrier, of
Andover; Elizabeth Fosdick, of Malden; Wilmot Read, of Marblehead;
Sarah Rice, of Reading; Elizabeth How, of Topsfield; Captain John
Alden, of Boston; William Procter, of Salem Farms; Captain John Flood,
of Rumney Marsh; ---- Toothaker and her daughter, of Billerica; and
---- Abbot, between Topsfield and Wenham line. On the 30th, a warrant
was issued against Elizabeth, wife of Stephen Paine, of Charlestown;
on the 4th of June, against Mary, wife of Benjamin Ireson, of Lynn.
Besides these, there are notices of complaints made and warrants
issued against a great number of people in all parts of the country:
Mary Bradbury, of Salisbury; Lydia and Sarah Dustin, of Reading; Ann
Sears, of Woburn; Job Tookey, of Beverly; Abigail Somes, of
Gloucester; Elizabeth Carey, of Charlestown; Candy, a negro woman; and
many others. Some of them have points of interest, demanding
particular notice.

The case of Martha Carrier has some remarkable features. It has been
shown, by passages already adduced, that every idle rumor; every thing
that the gossip of the credulous or the fertile imaginations of the
malignant could produce; every thing, gleaned from the memory or the
fancy, that could have an unfavorable bearing upon an accused person,
however foreign or irrelevant it might be to the charge, was allowed
to be brought in evidence before the magistrates, and received at the
trials. We have seen that a child under five years of age was
arrested, and put into prison. Children were not only permitted, but
induced, to become witnesses against their parents, and parents
against their children. Husbands and wives were made to criminate each
other as witnesses in court. When Martha Carrier was arrested, four of
her children were also taken into custody. An indictment against one
of them is among the papers. Under the terrors brought to bear upon
them, they were prevailed on to be confessors. The following shows how
these children were trained to tell their story:--

     "It was asked Sarah Carrier by the magistrates,--

     "How long hast thou been a witch?--Ever since I was six
     years old.

     "How old are you now?--Near eight years old: brother Richard
     says I shall be eight years old in November next.

     "Who made you a witch?--My mother: she made me set my hand
     to a book.

     "How did you set your hand to it?--I touched it with my
     fingers, and the book was red: the paper of it was white.

     "She said she never had seen the black man: the place where
     she did it was in Andrew Foster's pasture, and Elizabeth
     Johnson, Jr., was there. Being asked who was there besides,
     she answered, her aunt Toothaker and her cousin. Being
     asked when it was, she said, when she was baptized.

     "What did they promise to give you?--A black dog.

     "Did the dog ever come to you?--No.

     "But you said you saw a cat once: what did that say to
     you?--It said it would tear me in pieces, if I would not set
     my hand to the book.

     "She said her mother baptized her, and the Devil, or black
     man, was not there, as she saw; and her mother said, when
     she baptized her, 'Thou art mine for ever and ever. Amen.'

     "How did you afflict folks?--I pinched them.

     "And she said she had no puppets, but she went to them that
     she afflicted. Being asked whether she went in her body or
     her spirit, she said in her spirit. She said her mother
     carried her thither to afflict.

     "How did your mother carry you when she was in prison?--She
     came like a black cat.

     "How did you know it was your mother?--The cat told me so,
     that she was my mother. She said she afflicted Phelps's
     child last Saturday, and Elizabeth Johnson joined with her
     to do it. She had a wooden spear, about as long as her
     finger, of Elizabeth Johnson; and she had it of the Devil.
     She would not own that she had ever been at the
     witch-meeting at the village. This is the substance.

     "SIMON WILLARD."

The confession of another of her children is among the papers. It runs
thus:--

     "Have you been in the Devil's snare?--Yes.

     "Is your brother Andrew ensnared by the Devil's
     snare?--Yes.

     "How long has your brother been a witch?--Near a month.

     "How long have you been a witch?--Not long.

     "Have you joined in afflicting the afflicted persons?--Yes.

     "You helped to hurt Timothy Swan, did you?--Yes.

     "How long have you been a witch?--About five weeks.

     "Who was in company when you covenanted with the
     Devil?--Mrs. Bradbury.

     "Did she help you afflict?--Yes.

     "Who was at the village meeting when you were
     there?--Goodwife How, Goodwife Nurse, Goodwife Wildes,
     Procter and his wife, Mrs. Bradbury, and Corey's wife.

     "What did they do there?--Eat, and drank wine.

     "Was there a minister there?--No, not as I know of.

     "From whence had you your wine?--From Salem, I think, it
     was.

     "Goodwife Oliver there?--Yes: I knew her."

In concluding his report of the trial of this wretched woman, whose
children were thus made to become the instruments for procuring her
death, Dr. Cotton Mather expresses himself in the following
language:--

     "This rampant hag (Martha Carrier) was the person of whom
     the confessions of the witches, and of her own children
     among the rest, agreed that the Devil had promised her that
     she should be queen of Hell."

It is quite evident that this "rampant hag" had no better opinion of
the dignitaries and divines who managed matters at the time than they
had of her. The record of her examination shows that she was not
afraid to speak her mind, and in plain terms too. When brought before
the magistrates, the following were their questions and her answers.
The accusing witnesses having severally made their charges against
her, declaring that she had tormented them in various ways, and
threatened to cut their throats if they would not sign the Devil's
book, which, they said, she had presented to them, the magistrates
addressed her in these words: "What do you say to this you are charged
with?" She answered, "I have not done it." One of the accusers cried
out that she was, at that moment, sticking pins into her. Another
declared that she was then looking upon "the black man,"--the shape in
which they pretended the Devil appeared. The magistrate asked the
accused, "What black man is that?" Her answer was, "I know none." The
accusers cried out that the black man was present, and visible to
them. The magistrate asked her, "What black man did you see?" Her
answer was, "I saw no black man but your own presence." Whenever she
looked upon the accusers, they were knocked down. The magistrate,
entirely deluded by their practised acting, said to her, "Can you look
upon these, and not knock them down?" Her answer was, "They will
dissemble, if I look upon them." He continued: "You see, you look upon
them, and they fall down." She broke out, "It is false: the Devil is a
liar. I looked upon none since I came into the room but you." Susanna
Sheldon cried out, in a trance, "I wonder what could you murder
thirteen persons for." At this, her spirit became aroused: the
accusers fell into the most intolerable outcries and agonies. The
accused rebuked the magistrate, charging him with unfairness in not
paying any regard to what she said, and receiving every thing that the
accusers said. "It is a shameful thing, that you should mind these
folks that are out of their wits;" and, turning to those who were
bringing these false and ridiculous charges against her, she said,
"You lie: I am wronged." The energy and courage of the prisoner threw
the accusers, magistrates, and the whole crowd into confusion and
uproar. The record closes the description of the scene in these words:
"The tortures of the afflicted were so great that there was no
enduring of it, so that she was ordered away, and to be bound hand and
foot with all expedition; the afflicted, in the mean while, almost
killed, to the great trouble of all spectators, magistrates, and
others."

Parris closes his report of this examination as follows:--

     "NOTE.--As soon as she was well bound, they all had strange
     and sudden ease. Mary Walcot told the magistrates that this
     woman told her she had been a witch this forty years."

This shows the sort of communications the girls were allowed to hold
with the magistrates, exciting their prejudices against accused
persons, and filling their ears with all sorts of exaggerated and
false stories. However much she may have been maligned by her
neighbors, some of whom had long been in the habit of circulating
slanders against her, the whole tenor of the papers relating to her
shows that she always indignantly repelled the charge of being a
witch, and was the last person in the world to have volunteered such a
statement as Mary Walcot reported.

The examination of Martha Carrier must have been one of the most
striking scenes of the whole drama of the witchcraft proceedings. The
village meeting-house presented a truly wild and exciting spectacle.
The fearful and horrible superstition which darkened the minds of the
people was displayed in their aspect and movements. Their belief,
that, then and there, they were witnessing the great struggle between
the kingdoms of God and of the Evil One, and that every thing was at
stake on the issue, gave an awe-struck intensity to their expression.
The blind, unquestioning confidence of the magistrates, clergy, and
all concerned in the prosecutions, in the evidence of the accusers;
the loud outcries of their pretended sufferings; their contortions,
swoonings, and tumblings, excited the usual consternation in the
assembly. In addition to this, there was the more than ordinary bold
and defiant bearing of the prisoner, stung to desperation by the
outrage upon human nature in the abuse practised upon her poor
children; her firm and unshrinking courage, facing the tempest that
was raised to overwhelm her, sternly rebuking the magistrates,--"It is
a shameful thing that you should mind these folks that are out of
their wits;"--her whole demeanor, proclaiming her conscious innocence,
and proving that she chose chains, the dungeon, and the scaffold,
rather than to belie herself. Seldom has a scene in real life, or a
picture wrought by the inspiration of genius and the hand of art, in
its individual characters or its general grouping, surpassed that
presented on this occasion.

Hutchinson has preserved the record of another examination of a
different character. An ignorant negro slave-woman was brought before
the magistrates. She was cunning enough, not only to confess, but to
cover herself with the cloak of having been led into the difficulty by
her mistress.

     "Candy, are you a witch?--Candy no witch in her country.
     Candy's mother no witch. Candy no witch, Barbados. This
     country, mistress give Candy witch.

     "Did your mistress make you a witch in this country?--Yes:
     in this country, mistress give Candy witch.

     "What did your mistress do to make you witch?--Mistress
     bring book and pen and ink; make Candy write in it."

Upon being asked what she wrote, she took a pen and ink, and made a
mark. Upon being asked how she afflicted people, and where were the
puppets she did it with, she said, that, if they would let her go out
for a moment, she would show them how. They allowed her to go out, and
she presently returned with two pieces of cloth or linen,--one with
two knots, the other with one tied in it. Immediately on seeing these
articles, the "afflicted children" were "greatly affrighted," and
fell into violent fits. When they came to, they declared that the
"black man," Mrs. Hawkes, and the negro, stood by the puppets of rags,
and pinched them. Whereupon they fell into fits again. "A bit of one
of the rags being set on fire," they all shrieked that they were
burned, and "cried out dreadfully." Some pieces being dipped in water,
they went into the convulsions and struggles of drowning persons; and
one of them rushed out of the room, and raced down towards the river.

Candy and the girls having played their parts so well, there was no
escape for poor Mrs. Hawkes but in confession, which she forthwith
made. They were both committed to prison. Fortunately, it was not
convenient to bring them to trial until the next January, when, the
delusion having blown over, they were acquitted.

Besides those already mentioned, there were others, among the victims
of this delusion, whose cases excite our tenderest sensibility, and
deepen our horror in the contemplation of the scene. It seems, that,
some time before the transactions took place in Salem Village, a
difficulty arose between two families on the borders of Topsfield and
Ipswich, such as often occur among neighbors, about some small matter
of property, fences, or boundaries. Their names were Perley and How. A
daughter of Perley, about ten years of age, hearing, probably, strong
expressions by her parents, became excited against the Hows, and
charged the wife of How with bewitching her. She acted much after the
manner of the "afflicted girls" in Salem Village, which was near the
place of her residence. Very soon the idea became current that Mrs.
How was a witch; and every thing that happened amiss to any one was
laid at her door. She was cried out against by the "afflicted
children" in Salem Village, and carried before the magistrates for
examination on the 31st of May, 1692. Upon being brought into her
presence, the accusers fell into their usual fits and convulsions, and
charged her with tormenting them. To the question, put by the
magistrates, "What say you to this charge?" her answer was, "If it was
the last moment I was to live, God knows I am innocent of any thing in
this nature." The papers connected with her trial bear abundant
testimony to the excellent character of this pious and amiable woman.
A person, who had lived near her twenty-four years, states, in her
deposition, "that she had found her a neighborly woman, conscientious
in her dealing, faithful to her promises, and Christianlike in her
conversation." Several others join in a deposition to this effect:
"For our own parts, we have been well acquainted with her for above
twenty years. We never saw but that she carried it very well, and that
both her words and actions were always such as well became a good
Christian."

The following passages illustrate the wicked arts sometimes used to
bring accusations upon innocent persons, and give affecting proof of
the excellence of the character and heart of Elizabeth How:--

     "THE TESTIMONY OF SAMUEL PHILLIPS, aged about sixty-seven,
     minister of the word of God in Rowley, who saith that Mr.
     Payson (minister of God's word also in Rowley) and myself
     went, being desired, to Samuel Perly, of Ipswich, to see
     their young daughter, who was visited with strange fits; and,
     in her fits (as her father and mother affirmed), did mention
     Goodwife How, the wife of James How, Jr., of Ipswich, as if
     she was in the house, and did afflict her. When we were in
     the house, the child had one of her fits, but made no mention
     of Goodwife How; and, when the fit was over, and she came to
     herself, Goodwife How went to the child, and took her by the
     hand, and asked her whether she had ever done her any hurt;
     and she answered, 'No, never; and, if I did complain of you
     in my fits, I knew not that I did so.' I further can affirm,
     upon oath, that young Samuel Perley, brother to the afflicted
     girl, looked out of a chamber window (I and the afflicted
     child being without doors together), and said to his sister,
     'Say Goodwife How is a witch,--say she is a witch;' and the
     child spake not a word that way. But I looked up to the
     window where the youth stood, and rebuked him for his
     boldness to stir up his sister to accuse the said Goodwife
     How; whereas she had cleared her from doing any hurt to his
     sister in both our hearing; and I added, 'No wonder that the
     child, in her fits, did mention Goodwife How, when her
     nearest relations were so frequent in expressing their
     suspicions, in the child's hearing, when she was out of her
     fits, that the said Goodwife How was an instrument of
     mischief to the child.'"

Mr. Payson, in reference to the same occasion, deposed as follows:--

     "Being in Perley's house some considerable time before the
     said Goodwife How came in, their afflicted daughter, upon
     something that her mother spake to her with tartness,
     presently fell into one of her usual strange fits, during
     which she made no mention (as I observed) of the abovesaid
     How her name, or any thing relating to her. Some time after,
     the said How came in, when said girl had recovered her
     capacity, her fit being over. Said How took said girl by the
     hand, and asked her whether she had ever done her any hurt.
     The child answered, 'No; never,' with several expressions to
     that purpose."

The bearing of Elizabeth How, under accusations so cruelly and
shamefully fabricated and circulated against her, exhibits one of the
most beautiful pictures of a truly forgiving spirit and of Christlike
love anywhere to be found. Several witnesses say, "We often spoke to
her of some things that were reported of her, that gave some suspicion
of that she is now charged with; and she, always professing her
innocency, often desired our prayers to God for her, that God would
keep her in his fear, and support her under her burden. We have often
heard her speaking of those persons that raised those reports of her,
and we never heard her speak badly of them for the same; but, in our
hearing, hath often said that she desired God that he would sanctify
that affliction, as well as others, for her spiritual good." Others
testified to the same effect. Simon Chapman, and Mary, his wife, say
that "they had been acquainted with the wife of James How, Jr., as a
neighbor, for this nine or ten years;" that they had resided in the
same house with her "by the fortnight together;" that they never knew
any thing but what was good in her. They "found, at all times, by her
discourse, she was a woman of affliction, and mourning for sin in
herself and others; and, when she met with any affliction, she seemed
to justify God and say that it was all better than she deserved,
though it was by false accusations from men. She used to bless God
that she got good by affliction; for it made her examine her own
heart. We never heard her revile any person that hath accused her with
witchcraft, but pitied them, and said, 'I pray God forgive them; for
they harm themselves more than me. Though I am a great sinner, I am
clear of that; and such kind of affliction doth but set me to
examining my own heart, and I find God wonderfully supporting me and
comforting me by his word and promises.'"

Joseph Knowlton and his wife Mary, who had lived near her, and
sometimes in the same family with her, testified, that, having heard
the stories told about her, they were led to--

     "take special notice of her life and conversation ever
     since. And I have asked her if she could freely forgive them
     that raised such reports of her. She told me yes, with all
     her heart, desiring that God would give her a heart to be
     more humble under such a providence; and, further, she said
     she was willing to do any good she could to those who had
     done unneighborly by her. Also this I have taken notice,
     that she would deny herself to do a neighbor a good turn."

The father of her husband,--James How, Sr., aged about ninety-four
years,--in a communication addressed to the Court, declared that--

     "he, living by her for about thirty years, hath taken notice
     that she hath carried it well becoming her place, as a
     daughter, as a wife, in all relations, setting aside human
     infirmities, as becometh a Christian; with respect to myself
     as a father, very dutifully; and as a wife to my son, very
     careful, loving, obedient, and kind,--considering his want
     of eyesight, tenderly leading him about by the hand.
     Desiring God may guide your honors, ... I rest yours to
     serve."

The only evidence against this good woman--beyond the outcries and
fits of the "afflicted children," enacted in their usual skilful and
artful style--consisted of the most wretched gossip ever circulated in
an ignorant and benighted community. It came from people in the back
settlements of Ipswich and Topsfield, and disclosed a depth of absurd
and brutal superstition, which it is difficult to believe ever existed
in New England. So far as those living in secluded and remote
localities are regarded, this was the most benighted period of our
history. Except where, as in Salem Village, special circumstances had
kept up the general intelligence, there was much darkness on the
popular mind. The education that came over with the first emigrants
from the mother-country had gone with them to their graves. The system
of common schools had not begun to produce its fruit in the thinly
peopled outer settlements. There is no more disgraceful page in our
annals than that which details the testimony given at the trial, and
records the conviction and execution, of Elizabeth How.

But the dark shadows of that day of folly, cruelty, and crime, served
to bring into a brighter and purer light virtues exhibited by many
persons. We meet affecting instances, all along, of family fidelity
and true Christian benevolence. James How, as has been stated, was
stricken with blindness. He had two daughters, Mary and Abigail.
Although their farm was out of the line of the public-roads, travel
very difficult, and they must have encountered many hardships,
annoyances, and, it is to be feared, sometimes unfeeling treatment by
the way, one of them accompanied their father, twice every week, to
visit their mother in her prison-walls. They came on horseback; she
managing the bridle, and guiding him by the hand after alighting.
Their humble means were exhausted in these offices of reverence and
affection. One of the noble girls made her way to Boston, sought out
the Governor, and implored a reprieve for her mother; but in vain. The
sight of these young women, leading their blind father to comfort and
provide for their "honored mother,--as innocent," as they declared her
to be, "of the crime charged, as any person in the world,"--so
faithful and constant in their filial love and duty, relieved the
horrors of the scene; and it ought to be held in perpetual
remembrance. The shame of that day is not, and will not be, forgotten;
neither should its beauty and glory.

The name of Elizabeth How, before marriage, was Jackson. Among the
accounts rendered against the country for expenses incurred in the
witchcraft prosecutions are these two items: "For John Jackson, Sr.,
one pair of fetters, five shillings; for John Jackson, Jr., one pair
of fetters, five shillings." There is also an item for carrying "the
two Jacksons" from one jail to another, and back again. No other
reference to them is found among the papers. They were, perhaps, a
brother and nephew of Elizabeth How. There is reason to suppose that
her husband, James How, Jr., was a nephew of the Rev. Francis Dane, of
Andover.

The examination of Job Tookey, of Beverly, presents some points worthy
of notice. He is described as a "laborer," but was evidently a person,
although perhaps inconsiderate of speech, of more than common
discrimination, and not wholly deluded by the fanaticism of the times.
He is charged with having said that he "would take Mr. Burroughs's
part;" "that he was not the Devil's servant, but the Devil was his."
When the girls testified that they saw his shape afflicting persons,
he answered, like a sensible man, if they really saw any such thing,
"it was not he, but the Devil in his shape, that hurts the people."
Susanna Sheldon, Mary Warren, and Ann Putnam, all declared, that, at
that very moment while the examination was going on, two men and two
women and one child "rose from the dead, and cried, 'Vengeance!
vengeance!'" Nobody else saw or heard any thing: but the girls
suddenly became dumb; their eyes were fixed on vacancy, all looking
towards the same spot; and their whole appearance gave assurance of
the truth of what they said. In a short time, Mary Warren recovered
the use of her vocal organs, and exclaimed, "There are three men, and
three women, and two children. They are all in their winding-sheets:
they look pale upon us, but red upon Tookey,--red as blood." Again,
she exclaimed, in a startled and affrighted manner, "There is a young
child under the table, crying out for vengeance." Elizabeth Booth,
pointing to the same place, was struck speechless. In this way, the
murder of about every one who had died at Royal Side, for a year or
two past, was put upon Tookey. Some of them were called by name; the
others, the girls pretended not to recognize. The wrath and horror of
the whole community were excited against him, and he was committed to
jail, by the order of the magistrates,--Bartholomew Gedney, Jonathan
Corwin, and John Hathorne.

No character, indeed, however blameless lovely or venerable, was safe.
The malignant accusers struck at the highest marks, and the consuming
fire of popular frenzy was kindled and attracted towards the most
commanding objects. Mary Bradbury is described, in the indictment
against her, as the "wife of Captain Thomas Bradbury, of Salisbury, in
the county of Essex, gentleman." A few of the documents that are
preserved, belonging to her case, will give some idea what sort of a
person she was:--

     "_The Answer of Mary Bradbury to the Charge of Witchcraft, or
     Familiarity with the Devil._

     "I do plead 'Not guilty.' I am wholly innocent of any such
     wickedness, through the goodness of God that have kept me
     hitherto. I am the servant of Jesus Christ, and have given
     myself up to him as my only Lord and Saviour, and to the
     diligent attendance upon him in all his holy ordinances, in
     utter contempt and defiance of the Devil and all his works,
     as horrid and detestable, and, accordingly, have endeavored
     to frame my life and conversation according to the rules of
     his holy word; and, in that faith and practice, resolve, by
     the help and assistance of God, to continue to my life's
     end.

     "For the truth of what I say, as to matter of practice, I
     humbly refer myself to my brethren and neighbors that know
     me, and unto the Searcher of all hearts, for the truth and
     uprightness of my heart therein (human frailties and
     unavoidable infirmities excepted, of which I bitterly
     complain every day).

     MARY BRADBURY."

     "July 28, 1692.--Concerning my beloved wife, Mary Bradbury,
     this is what I have to say: We have been married fifty-five
     years, and she hath been a loving and faithful wife to me.
     Unto this day, she hath been wonderful laborious, diligent,
     and industrious, in her place and employment, about the
     bringing-up of our family (which have been eleven children
     of our own, and four grandchildren). She was both prudent
     and provident, of a cheerful spirit, liberal and charitable.
     She being now very aged and weak, and grieved under her
     affliction, may not be able to speak much for herself, not
     being so free of speech as some others may be. I hope her
     life and conversation have been such amongst her neighbors
     as gives a better and more real testimony of her than can be
     expressed by words.

     "Owned by me,

     THO. BRADBURY."

The Rev. James Allin made oath before Robert Pike, an assistant and
magistrate, as follows:--

     "I, having lived nine years at Salisbury in the work of the
     ministry, and now four years in the office of a pastor, to
     my best notice and observation of Mrs. Bradbury, she hath
     lived according to the rules of the gospel amongst us; was a
     constant attender upon the ministry of the word, and all the
     ordinances of the gospel; full of works of charity and mercy
     to the sick and poor: neither have I seen or heard any thing
     of her unbecoming the profession of the gospel."

Robert Pike also affirmed to the truth of Mr. Allin's statement, from
"upwards of fifty years' experience," as did John Pike also: they both
declared themselves ready and desirous to give their testimony before
the Court.

One hundred and seventeen of her neighbors--the larger part of them
heads of families, and embracing the most respectable people of that
vicinity--signed their names to a paper, of which the following is a
copy:--

     "Concerning Mrs. Bradbury's life and conversation, we, the
     subscribers, do testify, that it was such as became the
     gospel: she was a lover of the ministry, in all appearance,
     and a diligent attender upon God's holy ordinances, being of
     a courteous and peaceable disposition and carriage. Neither
     did any of us (some of whom have lived in the town with her
     above fifty years) ever hear or ever know that she ever had
     any difference or falling-out with any of her
     neighbors,--man, woman, or child,--but was always ready and
     willing to do for them what lay in her power night and day,
     though with hazard of her health, or other danger. More
     might be spoken in her commendation, but this for the
     present."

Although this aged matron and excellent Christian lady was convicted
and sentenced to death, it is most satisfactory to find that she
escaped from prison, and her life was saved.

The following facts show the weight which ought to have been attached
to these statements. The position, as well as character and age, of
Mary [Perkins] Bradbury entitled her to the highest consideration, in
the structure of society at that time. This is recognized in the title
"Mrs.," uniformly given her. She had been noted, through life, for
business capacity, energy, and influence; and, in 1692, was probably
seventy-five years of age, and somewhat infirm in health. Her husband,
Thomas Bradbury, had been a prominent character in the colony for more
than fifty years. In 1641, he was appointed, by the General Court,
Clerk of the Writs for Salisbury, with the functions of a magistrate,
to execute all sorts of legal processes in that place. He was a deputy
in 1651 and many subsequent years; a commissioner for Salisbury in
1657, empowered to act in all criminal cases, and bind over offenders,
where it was proper, to higher courts, to take testimonies upon oath,
and to join persons in marriage. He was required to keep a record of
all his doings. If the parties agreed to that effect, he was
authorized to hear and determine cases of every kind and degree,
without the intervention of a jury. The towns north of the Merrimac,
and all beyond now within the limits of New Hampshire, constituted the
County of Norfolk; and Thomas Bradbury, for a long series of years,
was one of its commissioners and associate judges. From the first, he
was conspicuous in military matters; having been commissioned by the
General Court, in 1648, Ensign of the trainband in Salisbury. He rose
to its command; and, in the latter portion of his life, was
universally spoken of as "Captain Bradbury." All along, the records of
the General Court, for half a century, demonstrate the estimation in
which he was held; various important trusts and special services
requiring integrity and ability being from time to time committed to
him. His family was influentially connected. His son William married
the widow of Samuel Maverick, Jr., who was the son of one of the
King's Commissioners in 1664: she was the daughter of the Rev. John
Wheelwright, a man of great note, intimately related to the celebrated
Anne Hutchinson, and united with her by sympathy in sentiment and
participation in exile.

Robert Pike, born in 1616, was a magistrate in 1644. He was deputy
from Salisbury in 1648, and many times after; Associate Justice for
Norfolk in 1650; and Assistant in 1682, holding that high station, by
annual elections, to the close of the first charter, and during the
whole period of the intervening and insurgent government. He was
named as one of the council that succeeded to the House of Assistants,
when, under the new charter, Massachusetts became a royal province. He
was always at the head of military affairs, having been commissioned,
by the General Court, Lieutenant of the Salisbury trainband in 1648;
and, in the later years of his life, he held the rank and title of
major. John Pike, probably his son, resided in Hampton in 1691, and
was minister of Dover at his death in 1710.

Surely, the attestations of such men as the Pikes, father and son, and
the Rev. James Allin, to the Christian excellence of Mary Bradbury,
must be allowed to corroborate fully the declarations of her
neighbors, her husband, and herself.

The motives and influences that led to her arrest and condemnation in
1692 demand an explanation. The question arises, Why should the
attention of the accusing girls have been led to this aged and most
respectable woman, living at such a distance, beyond the Merrimac? A
critical scrutiny of the papers in the case affords a clew leading to
the true answer.

The wife of Sergeant Thomas Putnam, as has been stated (vol. i. p.
253), was Ann Carr of Salisbury. Her father, George Carr, was an early
settler in that place, and appears to have been an enterprising and
prosperous person. The ferry for the main travel of the country across
the Merrimac was from points of land owned by him, and always under
his charge. He was engaged in ship-building,--employing, and having
in his family, young men; among them a son of Zerubabel Endicott,
bearing the same name.

Among the papers in the case is the following:--

     "THE DEPOSITION OF RICHARD CARR, who testifieth and saith,
     that, about thirteen years ago, presently after some
     difference that happened to be between my honored father, Mr.
     George Carr, and Mrs. Bradbury, the prisoner at the bar, upon
     a sabbath at noon, as we were riding home, by the house of
     Captain Tho: Bradbury, I saw Mrs. Bradbury go into her gate,
     turn the corner of, and immediately there darted out of her
     gate a blue boar, and darted at my father's horse's legs,
     which made him stumble; but I saw it no more. And my father
     said, 'Boys, what do you see?' We both answered, 'A blue
     boar.'

     "ZERUBABEL ENDICOTT testifieth and saith, that I lived at Mr.
     George Carr, now deceased, at the time above mentioned, and
     was present with Mr. George Carr and Mr. Richard Carr. And I
     also saw a blue boar dart out of Mr. Bradbury's gate to Mr.
     George Carr's horse's legs, which made him stumble after a
     strange manner. And I also saw the blue boar dart from Mr.
     Carr's horse's legs in at Mrs. Bradbury's window. And Mr.
     Carr immediately said, 'Boys, what did you see?' And we both
     said, 'A blue boar.' Then said he, 'From whence came it?' And
     we said, 'Out of Mr. Bradbury's gate.' Then said he, 'I am
     glad you see it as well as I.' _Jurat in Curia_, Sept. 9,
     '92."

Stephen Sewall, the clerk of the courts, with his usual eagerness to
make the most of the testimony against persons accused, adds to the
deposition the following:--

     "And they both further say, on their oaths, that Mr. Carr
     discoursed with them, as they went home, about what had
     happened, and they all concluded that it was Mrs. Bradbury
     that so appeared as a blue boar."

At the date of this occurrence, Richard Carr was twenty years of age,
and Zerubabel Endicott a lad of of fifteen.

It is not to be wondered at that there was "some difference between"
George Carr and Mrs. Bradbury, if he was in the habit of indulging in
such talk about her as he took the leading part in on this occasion.
He evidently encouraged in his "boys" the absurd imaginations with
which their credulity had been stimulated. They were prepared by
preconceived notions to witness something preternatural about the
premises of Mrs. Bradbury; and, in their jaundiced vision, any animal,
moving in and out of the gate, might naturally assume the likeness of
a "blue boar." Such ideas circulating in the family, and among the
apprentices of Carr, would soon be widely spread. No doubt, Zerubabel,
on his visits to his home, told wondrous stories about Mrs. Bradbury.
His brother Samuel, then a youth of eighteen, had his imagination
filled with them; and some time after, on a voyage to "Barbadoes and
Saltitudos," in which severe storms and various disasters were
experienced, attributed them all to Mrs. Bradbury; and, "in a bright
moonshining night, sitting upon the windlass, to which he had been
sent forward to look out for land," the wild fancies of his excited
imagination took effect. He heard "a rumbling noise," and thought he
saw the legs of some person. "Presently he was shook, and looked over
his shoulder, and saw the appearance of a woman, from her middle
upwards, having a white cap and white neckcloth on her, which then
affrighted him very much; and, as he was turning of the windlass, he
saw the aforesaid two legs." Such superstitious phantasms seem to be
natural to the experiences of sailor-life, and perhaps still linger in
the forecastle and at the night-watch.

The habit of maligning Mrs. Bradbury as a witch dated back in the Carr
family more than thirteen years, as the following deposition proves. I
give it precisely as it is in the original. As in a few other
instances in this work, the spelling and punctuation are preserved as
curiosities. Like all the papers in the case, with one exception,
presented in court against Mrs. Bradbury, it is in the handwriting of
Sergeant Thomas Putnam:--

[Transcriber's Note: Spelling and punctuation in the passage below is
as in original.]

     "THE DEPOSISTION OF JAMES CARR. who testifieth and saith that
     about 20 years agoe one day as I was accidently att the house
     of mr wheleright and his daughter the widdow maverick then
     liued there: and she then did most curtuously invite me to
     com oftener to the house and wondered I was grown such a
     stranger. and with in a few days affter one evening I went
     thether againe: and when I came thether againe: william
     Bradbery was yr who was then a suter to the said widdow but I
     did not know it tell affterwards: affter I came in the widdow
     did so corsely treat the sd william Bradbery that he went
     away semeing to be angury: presently affter this I was taken
     affter a strange maner as if liueing creaturs did run about
     euery part of my body redy to tare me to peaces and so I
     continewed for about 3 qurters of a year by times & I applyed
     myself to doctor Crosbe who gave me a grate deal of visek but
     could make non work tho he steept tobacco in bosit drink he
     could make non to work where upon he tould me that he beleved
     I was behaged: and I tould him I had thought so a good while:
     and he asked me by hom I tould him I did not care for spaking
     for one was counted an honest woman: but he uging I tould him
     and he said he did beleve that mis Bradbery was a grat deal
     worss then goody martin: then presently affter this one night
     I being a bed & brod awake there came sumthing to me which I
     thought was a catt and went to strick it ofe the bed and was
     sezed fast that I could not stir hedd nor foot. but by and
     coming to my strenth I herd sumthing a coming to me againe
     and I prepared my self to strick it: and it coming upon the
     bed I did strick at it and I beleve I hit it: and after that
     visek would work on me and I beleve in my hart that mis
     Bradbery the prisoner att the barr has often afflected me by
     acts of wicthcraft.

     "_Jurat in Curia_ Sep'mr. 9. 92."[A]

[Footnote A: In the innumerable depositions written by Thomas Putnam,
he is not so careful to be correct, in his chirography and
construction, as in his parish-records. But, if the reader is inclined
to make the experiment, he will find, that, if the above document
should be properly pointed and spelled, according to our fashion at
the present day, it would read well, and is clearly and forcibly put
together. Spelling, at that time, was phonetic, and it enables us to
ascertain the then prevalent pronunciation of words. "Corsely," no
doubt, shows how the word was then spoken. "Angury" was, with a large
class of words now dissyllables, then a trisyllable. "Tould,"
"spaking," and many other words above, are spelled just as they were
then pronounced. "Wicthcraft" is always, I believe, spelled this way
by Thomas Putnam. He had not got rid of the old Anglo-Saxon sound of
the word "witch," brought by his father from Buckinghamshire, sixty
years before,--"wicca."

The condition of medical science and practice, at that period, is
curiously illustrated in this paper. It is plain that the distemper of
James Carr was purely in the realm of the sensibilities and fancy; and
"doctor Crosbe" is not wholly to blame because his "visek" did not
"work." A good smart nightmare, with a feeling that he had given a
thorough basting to the spectre, in the form of a cat, of the supposed
author of his woful and aggravated disappointment in love, was what he
needed; and it cured him. "A posset of sack" was Falstaff's refuge,
from the plight into which he had been led by "building upon a foolish
woman's promise," when he emerged from the Thames and the
"buck-basket." Many others, no doubt, in drowning sorrow and
mortification, have found it "the sovereignest thing on earth." But,
as administered by physicians of the Dr. Crosby school, with tobacco
steeped in it, it must have been a "villanous compound."]

But the whole of George Carr's family did not sympathize in this
morbid state of prejudice, or cherish such foolish and malignant
fancies, against Mrs. Bradbury. One of the sons, William, had married,
Aug. 20, 1672, Elizabeth, daughter of Robert Pike. It appears, by the
following deposition, which is in the handwriting of Major Pike, that
there had been another love affair between the families, leading to a
melancholy result, inflaming still more the morbid and malign
prejudice against Mrs. Bradbury; but William repudiated it utterly:--

     "THE TESTIMONY OF WILLIAM CARR, aged forty-one, or
     thereabouts, is that my brother John Carr, when he was young,
     was a man of as good capacity as most men of his age; but
     falling in love with Jane True (now wife of Captain John
     March), and my father being persuaded by [----] of the family
     (which I shall not name) not to let him marry so young, my
     father would not give him a portion, whereupon the match
     broke off, which my brother laid so much to heart that he
     grew melancholy, and by degrees much crazed, not being the
     man, that he was before, to his dying day.

     "I do further testify that my said brother was sick about a
     fortnight or three weeks, and then died; and I was present
     with him when he died. And I do affirm that he died
     peaceably and quietly, never manifesting the least trouble
     in the world about anybody, nor did not say any thing of
     Mrs. Bradbury nor anybody else doing him hurt; and yet I was
     with him till the breath and life were out of his body."

The usual form, _jurat in curia_, is written at the foot of this
deposition, but evidently by a much later hand; and this leads me to
mention the improbability that any testimony in favor of the accused
ever reached the Court at the trials. They had no counsel: the
attorney-general had prejudged all the cases; and his mind and those
of the judges repudiated utterly any thing like an investigation.
Every friendly voice was silenced. The doors were closed against the
defence. Robert Pike, an assistant under the old and a councillor
under the new government, endeavored in vain to enter them.

William Carr was a person of great respectability, and bore the
appointment, by the General Court, of land-surveyor for the towns in
the northern part of the present county of Essex.

The member of the family who--as stated in the foregoing
deposition--prevented the match, all the circumstances seem to
indicate, was Mrs. Ann Putnam. She perhaps had experienced the effects
of a too early marriage, bringing the burden of life upon the
constitution and the character before they are mature enough to bear
it. She may have attributed to this cause the troubles and trials with
which her cup had been so bitterly filled, and the blasting of the
happiness of her youth. Half deranged, as perpetual excitement from
the parish quarrels in reference to Mr. Bayley had made her, she may
have become morbidly opposed to the equally early marriage of a
brother. Added to this was the fact that Henry True had married one of
Mrs. Bradbury's daughters, and that Jane True was his sister. It
cannot be doubted that she entertained the same ideas about Mrs.
Bradbury as her father and brothers, James and Richard; and, for this
reason, also opposed the match of her brother John. Wishing to be
relieved from the self-reproach of having caused his derangement and
death, when the witchcraft delusion broke out at Salem Village and she
became wholly absorbed by it, as all other deaths and misfortunes were
ascribed to it, she avowed and maintained the belief, as some had
suspected at the time, that the happiness, health, reason, and life of
her brother had been destroyed by diabolical agency, practised by Mrs.
Bradbury.

In the state of things long subsisting between the Bradbury and Carr
families, we find an explanation of the movement made against Mrs.
Bradbury. Young Ann Putnam may have often heard her unpleasantly
spoken of by her mother, and it was natural that she should have
"cried out against her."

The family of Mrs. Ann Putnam seem to have had constitutional traits
that illustrate and explain her own character and conduct. They were
excitable and sensitive to an extraordinary degree. Their judgment,
reason, and physical systems, were subject to the power of their
fancies and affections. One of her brothers, in consequence of being
badly coquetted with and jilted by a young widow, was thrown into an
awful condition of body and mind "for about three-quarters of a year."
The reason, health, and heart of another were broken; and he sunk into
an early grave, in consequence of having been crossed in love. The
death of her sister Bayley may have been caused by the unhappy
controversies in the village parish. We have seen, and shall see, the
all but maniac condition to which excitement brought her own mind. At
last, the heaviest blow that can fall upon a fond wife suddenly
snapped the brittle cord of her life. These considerations must be
borne in mind, while we attempt to explain her conduct, and should
throw the weight of pity and charity into the scales, if mortal
judgment ventures to estimate her guilt. They are known to the
Infinite Mind, and never overlooked by divine mercy.

I have introduced these singular private details to illustrate what
the documents all along show,--that the proceedings against persons
charged with witchcraft, in 1692, were instigated by all sorts of
personal grudges and private piques, many of them of long standing,
fomented and kept alive by an unhappy indulgence of unworthy feelings,
always ready to mix themselves with popular excitements, and leading
all concerned headlong to the utmost extent of mischief and wrong.

The case of Mary Bradbury has been allowed to occupy so large a space,
because I desire to disabuse the public mind of a great error on this
subject. It has been too much supposed, that the sufferers in the
witchcraft delusion were generally of the inferior classes of society,
and particularly ignorant and benighted. They were the very reverse.
They mostly belonged to families in the better conditions of life,
and, many of them, to the highest social level. They were all persons
of great moral firmness and rectitude, as was demonstrated by their
bearing under persecutions and outrage, and when confronting the
terrors of death. Their names do not deserve reproach, and their
memories ought to be held in honor.

The following account of the examination of Elizabeth Cary of
Charlestown, given by her husband, Captain Cary, a shipmaster, has the
highest interest, as written at the time by one who was an
eye-witness, and participated in the sufferings of the occasion:--

     "May 24.--I having heard, some days, that my wife was
     accused of witchcraft; being much disturbed at it, by advice
     went to Salem Village, to see if the afflicted knew her: we
     arrived there on the 24th of May. It happened to be a day
     appointed for examination; accordingly, soon after our
     arrival, Mr. Hathorne and Mr. Corwin, &c., went to the
     meeting-house, which was the place appointed for that work.
     The minister began with prayer; and, having taken care to
     get a convenient place, I observed that the afflicted were
     two girls of about ten years old, and about two or three
     others of about eighteen: one of the girls talked most, and
     could discern more than the rest.

     "The prisoners were called in one by one, and, as they came
     in, were cried out at, &c. The prisoners were placed about
     seven or eight feet from the justices, and the accusers
     between the justices and them. The prisoners were ordered to
     stand right before the justices, with an officer appointed
     to hold each hand, lest they should therewith afflict them:
     and the prisoners' eyes must be constantly on the justices;
     for, if they looked on the afflicted, they would either fall
     into fits, or cry out of being hurt by them. After an
     examination of the prisoners, who it was afflicted these
     girls, &c., they were put upon saying the Lord's Prayer, as
     a trial of their guilt. After the afflicted seemed to be out
     of their fits, they would look steadfastly on some one
     person, and frequently not speak; and then the justices said
     they were struck dumb, and after a little time would speak
     again: then the justices said to the accusers, 'Which of you
     will go and touch the prisoner at the bar?' Then the most
     courageous would adventure, but, before they had made three
     steps, would ordinarily fall down as in a fit: the justices
     ordered that they should be taken up and carried to the
     prisoner, that she might touch them; and as soon as they
     were touched by the accused, the justices would say, 'They
     are well,' before I could discern any alteration,--by which
     I observed that the justices understood the manner of it.
     Thus far I was only as a spectator: my wife also was there
     part of the time, but no notice was taken of her by the
     afflicted, except once or twice they came to her, and asked
     her name. But I, having an opportunity to discourse Mr. Hale
     (with whom I had formerly acquaintance), I took his advice
     what I had best do, and desired of him that I might have an
     opportunity to speak with her that accused my wife; which he
     promised should be, I acquainting him that I reposed my
     trust in him. Accordingly, he came to me after the
     examination was over, and told me I had now an opportunity
     to speak with the said accuser, Abigail Williams, a girl
     eleven or twelve years old; but that we could not be in
     private at Mr. Parris's house, as he had promised me: we
     went therefore into the alehouse, where an Indian man
     attended us, who, it seems, was one of the afflicted; to him
     we gave some cider: he showed several scars, that seemed as
     if they had been long there, and showed them as done by
     witchcraft, and acquainted us that his wife, who also was a
     slave, was imprisoned for witchcraft. And now, instead of
     one accuser, they all came in, and began to tumble down like
     swine; and then three women were called in to attend them.
     We in the room were all at a stand to see who they would cry
     out of; but in a short time they cried out 'Cary;' and,
     immediately after, a warrant was sent from the justices to
     bring my wife before them, who were sitting in a chamber
     near by, waiting for this. Being brought before the
     justices, her chief accusers were two girls. My wife
     declared to the justices, that she never had any knowledge
     of them before that day. She was forced to stand with her
     arms stretched out. I requested that I might hold one of her
     hands, but it was denied me: then she desired me to wipe the
     tears from her eyes, and the sweat from her face, which I
     did; then she desired she might lean herself on me, saying
     she should faint. Justice Hathorne replied she had strength
     enough to torment these persons, and she should have
     strength enough to stand. I speaking something against their
     cruel proceedings, they commanded me to be silent, or else I
     should be turned out of the room. The Indian before
     mentioned was also brought in, to be one of her accusers;
     being come in, he now (when before the justices) fell down,
     and tumbled about like a hog, but said nothing. The justices
     asked the girls who afflicted the Indian: they answered she
     (meaning my wife), and that she now lay upon him. The
     justices ordered her to touch him, in order to his cure, but
     her head must be turned another way, lest, instead of
     curing, she should make him worse by her looking on him, her
     hand being guided to take hold of his; but the Indian took
     hold of her hand, and pulled her down on the floor in a
     barbarous manner: then his hand was taken off, and her hand
     put on his, and the cure was quickly wrought. I being
     extremely troubled at their inhuman dealings, uttered a
     hasty speech, 'That God would take vengeance on them, and
     desired that God would deliver us out of the hands of
     unmerciful men.' Then her _mittimus_ was writ. I did with
     difficulty and charge obtain the liberty of a room, but no
     beds in it; if there had been, could have taken but little
     rest that night. She was committed to Boston prison; but I
     obtained a _habeas corpus_ to remove her to Cambridge
     prison, which is in our county of Middlesex. Having been
     there one night, next morning the jailer put irons on her
     legs (having received such a command); the weight of them
     was about eight pounds: these irons and her other
     afflictions soon brought her into convulsion fits, so that
     I thought she would have died that night. I sent to entreat
     that the irons might be taken off; but all entreaties were
     in vain, if it would have saved her life, so that in this
     condition she must continue. The trials at Salem coming on,
     I went thither to see how things were managed: and finding
     that the spectre evidence was there received, together with
     idle, if not malicious stories, against people's lives, I
     did easily perceive which way the rest would go; for the
     same evidence that served for one would serve for all the
     rest. I acquainted her with her danger; and that, if she
     were carried to Salem to be tried, I feared she would never
     return. I did my utmost that she might have her trial in our
     own county; I with several others petitioning the judge for
     it, and were put in hopes of it: but I soon saw so much,
     that I understood thereby it was not intended; which put me
     upon consulting the means of her escape, which, through the
     goodness of God, was effected, and she got to Rhode Island,
     but soon found herself not safe when there, by reason of the
     pursuit after her; from thence she went to New York, along
     with some others that had escaped their cruel hands, where
     we found his Excellency Benjamin Fletcher, Esq., Governor,
     who was very courteous to us. After this, some of my goods
     were seized in a friend's hands, with whom I had left them,
     and myself imprisoned by the sheriff, and kept in custody
     half a day, and then dismissed; but to speak of their usage
     of the prisoners, and the inhumanity shown to them at the
     time of their execution, no sober Christian could bear. They
     had also trials of cruel mockings, which is the more,
     considering what a people for religion, I mean the
     profession of it, we have been; those that suffered being
     many of them church members, and most of them unspotted in
     their conversation, till their adversary the Devil took up
     this method for accusing them.

     JONATHAN CARY."

The only account we have, written by one who had actually experienced,
in his own person, what it was to fall into the hands of those who got
up and carried on the prosecutions, is the following. Captain Alden
had probably been from an early stage in their operations in the eye
of the accusing girls. He was meant, perhaps, by what often fell from
them about "the tall man in Boston." We are left entirely to
conjecture as to the reason why they singled him out, as not one of
them, we may be quite sure, had ever seen him. It may be that some
person who had experienced discipline under his orders as a naval
commander bore him a grudge, and took pains to suggest his name to the
girls, and provided them with the coarse, vulgar, and ridiculous
scandal they so recklessly poured out upon him:--

     "_An Account how John Alden, Sr., was dealt with at Salem
     Village._

     "John Alden, Sr., of Boston, in the county of Suffolk,
     mariner, on the twenty-eighth day of May, 1692, was sent for
     by the magistrates of Salem, in the county of Essex, upon
     the accusation of a company of poor distracted or possessed
     creatures or witches; and, being sent by Mr. Stoughton,
     arrived there on the 31st of May, and appeared at Salem
     Village before Mr. Gedney, Mr. Hathorne, and Mr. Corwin.

     "Those wenches being present who played their juggling
     tricks, falling down, crying out, and staring in people's
     faces, the magistrates demanded of them several times, who
     it was, of all the people in the room, that hurt them. One
     of these accusers pointed several times at one Captain Hill,
     there present, but spake nothing. The same accuser had a man
     standing at her back to hold her up. He stooped down to her
     ear: then she cried out, 'Alden, Alden afflicted her.' One
     of the magistrates asked her if she had ever seen Alden. She
     answered, 'No.' He asked her how she knew it was Alden. She
     said the man told her so.

     "Then all were ordered to go down into the street, where a
     ring was made; and the same accuser cried out, 'There stands
     Alden, a bold fellow, with his hat on before the judges: he
     sells powder and shot to the Indians and French, and lies
     with the Indian squaws, and has Indian papooses.' Then was
     Alden committed to the marshal's custody, and his sword
     taken from him; for they said he afflicted them with his
     sword. After some hours, Alden was sent for to the
     meeting-house in the Village, before the magistrates, who
     required Alden to stand upon a chair, to the open view of
     all the people.

     "The accusers cried out that Alden pinched them then, when
     he stood upon the chair, in the sight of all the people, a
     good way distant from them. One of the magistrates bid the
     marshal to hold open Alden's hands, that he might not pinch
     those creatures. Alden asked them why they should think that
     he should come to that village to afflict those persons that
     he never knew or saw before. Mr. Gedney bid Alden to
     confess, and give glory to God. Alden said he hoped he
     should give glory to God, and hoped he should never gratify
     the Devil: but appealed to all that ever knew him, if they
     ever suspected him to be such a person; and challenged any
     one that could bring in any thing on their own knowledge,
     that might give suspicion of his being such an one. Mr.
     Gedney said he had known Alden many years, and had been at
     sea with him, and always looked upon him to be an honest
     man; but now he saw cause to alter his judgment. Alden
     answered, he was sorry for that, but he hoped God would
     clear up his innocency, that he would recall that judgment
     again; and added, that he hoped that he should, with Job,
     maintain his integrity till he died. They bid Alden look
     upon the accusers, which he did, and then they fell down.
     Alden asked Mr. Gedney what reason there could be given why
     Alden's looking upon _him_ did not strike _him_ down as
     well; but no reason was given that I heard. But the accusers
     were brought to Alden to touch them; and this touch, they
     said, made them well. Alden began to speak of the providence
     of God in suffering these creatures to accuse innocent
     persons. Mr. Noyes asked Alden why he should offer to speak
     of the providence of God: God, by his providence (said Mr.
     Noyes), governs the world, and keeps it in peace; and so
     went on with discourse, and stopped Alden's mouth as to
     that. Alden told Mr. Gedney that he could assure him that
     there was a lying spirit in them; for I can assure you that
     there is not a word of truth in all these say of me. But
     Alden was again committed to the marshal, and his _mittimus_
     written.

     "To Boston Alden was carried by a constable: no bail would
     be taken for him, but was delivered to the prison-keeper,
     where he remained fifteen weeks; and then, observing the
     manner of trials, and evidence then taken, was at length
     prevailed with to make his escape.

     "Per JOHN ALDEN."

Alden made his escape about the middle of September, at the bloodiest
crisis of the tragedy, and just before the execution of nine of the
victims, including that of Giles Corey. He is understood to have fled
to Duxbury, where his relatives secreted him. He made his appearance
among them late at night; and, on their asking an explanation of his
unexpected visit at that hour, replied that he was flying from the
Devil, and the Devil was after him. After a while, when the delusion
had abated, and people were coming to their senses, he delivered
himself up, and was bound over to the Superior Court at Boston, the
last Tuesday in April, 1693, when, no one appearing to prosecute, he,
with some hundred and fifty others, was discharged by proclamation,
and all judicial proceedings brought to a close. It is to be feared,
that ever after, to his dying day, when the subject of his experience
on the 31st of May, 1692, was referred to, the old sailor indulged in
rather strong expressions in relating his reminiscences of Rev. "Mr.
Nicholas Noyes," "Mr. Bartholomew Gedney," and the "wenches" of Salem
Village.

Captain John Alden was a son of John Alden, ever memorable as one of
the first founders of Plymouth Colony. He had been for more than
thirty years a resident of Boston, a member of the church, and in all
respects a leading and distinguished man. For some time, he had been
commander of the armed vessel belonging to the colony, and was a brave
and efficient officer and an able and experienced mariner. He had
seen service in French and Indian wars, had acted two years before,
that is in 1690, as commissioner in conducting negotiations with the
native tribes, and, at a later period, was charged with important
trusts as a naval commander. He was a man of large property, and
seventy years of age. He was, as well he might be, utterly confounded
and amazed in finding himself charged as a principal culprit in the
Salem witchcraft. The accusing girls were evidently delighted to get
hold of such a notable and doughty character; and their tongues were
released, on the occasion, from all restraints of decorum and decency.
When the ring was formed around him "in the street," in front of
Deacon Ingersoll's door, his sword unbuckled from his side, and such
foul and vulgar aspersions cast upon his good name, he felt, no doubt,
that it would have been better to have fallen into the hands of
savages of the wilderness or pirates on the sea, than of the crowd of
audacious girls that hustled him about in Salem Village. It was a
relief to his wounded honor, and gave leisure for the workings of his
indignant resentment, to escape from them into Boston jail. Not only
his old shipmate, Bartholomew Gedney, but, as will be seen, the
learned attorney-general, who was present, and witnessed the whole
affair, was fully convinced of his guilt.

The wife of an honest and worthy man in Andover was sick of a fever.
After all the usual means had failed to check the symptoms of her
disease, the idea became prevalent that she was suffering under an
"evil hand." The husband, pursuant of the advice of friends, posted
down to Salem Village to ascertain from the afflicted girls who was
bewitching his wife. Two of them returned with him to Andover. Never
did a place receive such fatal visitors. The Grecian horse did not
bring greater consternation to ancient Ilium. Immediately after their
arrival, they succeeded in getting more than fifty of the inhabitants
into prison, several of whom were hanged. A perfect panic swept like a
hurricane over the place. The idea seized all minds, as Hutchinson
expresses it, that the only "way to prevent an accusation was to
become an accuser."--"The number of the afflicted increased every day,
and the number of the accused in proportion." In this state of things,
such a great accession being made to the ranks of the confessing
witches, the power of the delusion became irresistibly strengthened.
Mr. Dudley Bradstreet, the magistrate of the place, after having
committed about forty persons to jail, concluded he had done enough,
and declined to arrest any more. The consequence was that he and his
wife were cried out upon, and they had to fly for their lives. They
accused his brother, John Bradstreet, with having "afflicted" a dog.
Bradstreet escaped by flight. The dog was executed. The number of
persons who had publicly confessed that they had entered into a league
with Satan, and exercised the diabolical power thus acquired, to the
injury, torment, and death of innocent parties, produced a profound
effect upon the public mind. At the same time, the accusers had
everywhere increased in number, owing to the inflamed state of
imagination universally prevalent which ascribed all ailments or
diseases to the agency of witches, to a mere love of notoriety and a
passion for general sympathy, to a desire to be secure against the
charge of bewitching others, or to a malicious disposition to wreak
vengeance upon enemies. The prisons in Salem, Ipswich, Boston, and
Cambridge, were crowded. All the securities of society were dissolved.
Every man's life was at the mercy of every other man. Fear sat on
every countenance, terror and distress were in all hearts, silence
pervaded the streets; all who could, quit the country; business was at
a stand; a conviction sunk into the minds of men, that a dark and
infernal confederacy had got foot-hold in the land, threatening to
overthrow and extirpate religion and morality, and establish the
kingdom of the Prince of darkness in a country which had been
dedicated, by the prayers and tears and sufferings of its pious
fathers, to the Church of Christ and the service and worship of the
true God. The feeling, dismal and horrible indeed, became general,
that the providence of God was removed from them; that Satan was let
loose, and he and his confederates had free and unrestrained power to
go to and fro, torturing and destroying whomever he willed. We cannot,
by any extent of research or power of imagination, enter fully into
the ideas of the people of that day; and it is therefore absolutely
impossible to appreciate the awful condition of the community at the
point of time to which our narrative has led us.

In the midst of this state of things, the old colony of Massachusetts
was transformed into a royal province, and a new government organized.
Sir William Phips, the governor, arrived at Boston, with the new
charter, on the evening of the 14th of May. William Stoughton, of
Dorchester, superseded Thomas Danforth as deputy-governor. In the
Council, which took the place of the Assistants, most of the former
body were retained. Bartholomew Gedney had a few years before been
dropped from the board of Assistants. He was now placed in the Council
with John Hathorne, Jonathan Corwin, Samuel Appleton, and Robert Pike,
of this county. The new government did not interfere with the
proceedings in progress relating to the witchcraft prosecutions, at
the moment. Examinations and commitments went on as before; only the
magistrates, acting on those occasions, were re-enforced by Mr.
Gedney, who presided at their sessions. The affair had become so
formidable, and the public infatuation had reached such a point, that
it was difficult to determine what ought to be done. Sir William
Phips, no doubt, felt that it was beyond his depth, and yielded
himself to the views of the leading men of his council. Stoughton was
in full sympathy with Cotton Mather, whose interest had been used in
procuring his appointment over Danforth. Through him, Mather acquired,
and held for some time, great ascendency with the governor. It was
concluded best to appoint a special court of Oyer and Terminer for the
witchcraft trials. Stoughton, the deputy-governor, was commissioned as
chief-justice. Nathaniel Saltonstall of Haverhill; Major John Richards
of Boston; Major Bartholomew Gedney of Salem; Mr. Wait Winthrop,
Captain Samuel Sewall, and Mr. Peter Sargent, all three of
Boston,--were made associate judges. Saltonstall early withdrew from
the service; and Jonathan Corwin, of Salem, succeeded to his place on
the bench of the special court. A majority of the judges were citizens
of Boston.

Jonathan Corwin had been associated with Hathorne in conducting the
examinations that have been described. He was a son of George Corwin,
who has been noticed in the account of Salem Village.

A shade of illegality rests upon the very existence of this special
court. There has always been a question whether the new charter gave
to the governor and council power to create it without the concurrence
of the House of Representatives. It has been held that such a court
could have no other lawful foundation than an act of the General
Court. Hutchinson was evidently of this opinion. This question was a
very serious one; for, as that considerate and able historian and
eminent judicial officer says, the tribunal that passed sentence in
the witchcraft prosecutions was "the most important court to the life
of the subject which was ever held in the province." The time required
to convene the popular branch of the government is itself, in all
cases, an element of safety. In this case, it would have carried the
country beyond the period of the delusion, and saved its annals from
their darkest and bloodiest page. The condition of things when he
arrived, had his counsellors been wise, would have led Sir William
Phips forthwith to issue writs of election of deputies, before taking
any action whatever. In a free republican government, the executive
department ought never to attempt to dispose of difficult matters of
vital importance without the joint deliberations and responsibility of
the representatives of the people.

So far as the composition of the court is considered, no objection can
be made. The justices were all members of the council, and belonged to
the highest order, not only of the magistracy, but of society
generally. They constituted as respectable a body of gentlemen as
could have been collected. Thomas Newton, of Boston, was commissioned
to act as attorney-general. The official title of marshal ceasing with
the new government, George Corwin was appointed sheriff of the county
of Essex. Herrick appears to have continued in the service as deputy.
Sheriff Corwin was twenty-six years of age. He was the grandson of the
original George Corwin, and the son of John. His mother was
grand-daughter of Governor Winthrop of Massachusetts, and daughter of
Governor Winthrop of Connecticut. His wife was a daughter of
Bartholomew Gedney; so that it appears that two of the judges were his
uncles, and one his father-in-law. These personal connections may be
borne in mind, as affording ground to believe, that, in the discharge
of his painful duties, he did not act without advice and suggestions
from the highest quarter.

The court-house in which the trials were held stood in the middle of
what is now Washington Street, near where Lynde and Church Streets,
which did not then exist, now enter it, fronting towards Essex Street.
The building was also used as a town-house; Washington Street being,
for this reason, then called "Town-house Lane." Off against the
court-house, on the west side of the lane, was the house of the Rev.
Nicholas Noyes, on the site of the residence of the late Robert
Brookhouse. Opposite to it was the estate of Edward Bishop, which
fronted westerly on "Town-house Lane" a little over a hundred feet,
including the present Jeffrey Court, and extending a few feet beyond
the corner of the house of Dr. S.M. Cate, over a portion of Church
Street. Its depth, towards St. Peter Street, was about three hundred
and forty-five feet. Edward Bishop held this estate in the right of
his wife Bridget, the widow of Thomas Oliver who had died about 1679.
Not long after this marriage, Bishop removed to his farm at Royal
Side. In 1685, the "old Oliver house" was either removed or rebuilt,
and a new one erected on the same premises, which was occupied by
tenants in 1692. These items are given because they will help to
illustrate the narrative, and enable us to understand points of
evidence in the approaching trial. It is a curious circumstance, that
the first public victim of the prosecutions, Bridget Bishop, had been
the nearest neighbor and lived directly opposite, to the person who,
more than any other inhabitant of the town, was responsible for the
blood that was shed,--Nicholas Noyes. The jail, at that time, was on
the western side of Prison Lane, now St. Peter Street, north of the
point where Federal Street now enters it. The meeting-house stood on
what has always been the site of the First Church. The "Ship Tavern"
was on ground the front of which is occupied, at present, by "West's
Block," nearly opposite the head of Central Street. It had long been
owned and kept by John Gedney, Sr. Two of his sons, John and
Bartholomew, had married Susanna and Hannah Clarke. John died in 1685.
His widow moved into the family of her father-in-law; and, after his
death in 1688, continued to keep the house. In 1698 she was married to
Deliverance Parkman, and died in 1728. The tavern, in 1692, was known
as the "Widow Gedney's." The estate had an extensive orchard in the
rear, contiguous, along its northern boundary, to the orchard of
Bridget Bishop, which occupied ground now covered by the Lyceum
building, and one or two others to the east of it.

The Court was opened at Salem in the first week of June, 1692. In the
mean time, the attorney-general, to prepare for the management of the
cases, came to Salem. He addressed the following letter to Isaac
Addington, Secretary of the province:--

     "SALEM, 31st May, 1692.

     "WORTHY SIR,--I have herewith sent you the names of the
     prisoners that are desired to be transmitted by _habeas
     corpus_; and have presumed to send you a copy thereof, being
     more, as I presume, accustomed to that practice than
     yourself, and beg pardon if I have infringed upon you
     therein. I fear we shall not this week try all that we have
     sent for; by reason the trials will be tedious, and the
     afflicted persons cannot readily give their testimonies,
     being struck dumb and senseless, for a season, at the name of
     the accused. I have been all this day at the Village, with
     the gentlemen of the council, at the examination of the
     persons, where I have beheld strange things, scarce credible
     but to the spectators, and too tedious here to relate; and,
     amongst the rest, Captain Alden and Mr. English have their
     _mittimus_. I must say, according to the present appearances
     of things, they are as deeply concerned as the rest; for the
     afflicted spare no person of what quality soever, neither
     conceal their crimes, though never so heinous. We pray that
     Tituba the Indian, and Mrs. Thacher's maid, may be
     transferred as evidence, but desire they may not come amongst
     the prisoners but rather by themselves; with the records in
     the Court of Assistants, 1679, against Bridget Oliver, and
     the records relating to the first persons committed, left in
     Mr. Webb's hands by the order of the council. I pray pardon
     that I cannot now further enlarge; and, with my cordial
     service, only add that I am, sir, your most humble servant,

     [Illustration: [signature]]

Hutchinson says that there was no colony or province law against
witchcraft in force when the trials began; and that the proceedings
were under an act of James the First, passed in 1603. By that act,
persons convicted were to be sentenced to "the pains and penalties of
death as felons." By the colonial law, conviction of capital crimes
did not incapacitate the party affected from disposing of property. In
this and other respects, there were points of difference, which caused
some inconvenience in carrying out the practice of the mother-country;
and the attorney-general had to supply the want of experience in the
local officers.

It may here be mentioned, that no record of the doings of this special
court are now to be found, and our only information respecting them is
obtained in brief and imperfect statements of writers of the time.
Perhaps Hutchinson had the use of the records. He gives the dates of
the several sessions of the courts, and of the conviction and
execution of the prisoners. Some of the depositions sworn to in court
are on file, but without giving in many instances the date when thus
offered in the trials. In some cases, they state when they were laid
before the grand jury. Only a small part of them are preserved. The
matter they contain was, to a considerable extent, brought forward at
the preliminary examinations, and has been already adduced. In the
following account of the trials, some further use will be made of
these depositions.

Bridget Bishop was the only person tried at the first session of the
Court. She was brought through Prison Lane, up Essex Street, by the
First Church, into Town-house Lane, to the Court-house. Cotton Mather
says,--

     "There was one strange thing with which the court was newly
     entertained. As this woman was under a guard, passing by the
     great and spacious meeting-house, she gave a look towards
     the house; and immediately a demon, invisibly entering the
     meeting-house, tore down a part of it: so that, though there
     was no person to be seen there, yet the people, at the
     noise, running in, found a board, which was strongly
     fastened with several nails, transported into another
     quarter of the house."

It is probable that the streets were thronged by crowds eager to get a
sight of the prisoner; and that the doors, fences, and house-tops were
occupied. Some, perhaps, got into the meeting-house; and, in
clambering up to the windows, a board may have been put in
requisition, and left misplaced. Incredible almost as it is, this
circumstance seems, from Mather's language,--"the court was
entertained,"--to have been brought in evidence at the trial, and
regarded as weighty and conclusive proof of Bridget's guilt.

One or two points in the evidence adduced against her, in addition to
those mentioned heretofore, deserve consideration. The position taken,
at her trial, by the Rev. John Hale of Beverly demands criticism. The
charge of witchcraft had been made against her on more than one
occasion before; particularly about the year 1687, when she resided
near the bounds of Beverly, at Royal Side. A woman in the
neighborhood, subject to fits of insanity, had, while passing into
one of them, brought the accusation against her; but, on the return of
her reason, solemnly recanted, and deeply lamented the aspersion. In a
violent recurrence of her malady, this woman committed suicide. Mr.
Hale had examined the case at the time, and exonerated Bridget Bishop,
who was a communicant in his church, from the charge made against her
by the unhappy lunatic. He was satisfied, as he states, that "Sister
Bishop" was innocent, and in no way deserved to be ill thought of. He
hoped "better of said Goody Bishop at that time." Without any pretence
of new evidence touching the facts of the case, he came into court in
1692, and related them, to the effect and with the intent to make them
bear against her. He described the appearance of the throat of the
woman, after death, as follows:--

     "As to the wounds she died of, I observed three deadly ones;
     a piece of her windpipe cut out, and another wound above
     that through the windpipe and gullet, and the vein they call
     jugular. So that I then judged and still do apprehend it
     impossible for her, with so short a pair of scissors, to
     mangle herself so without some extraordinary work of the
     Devil or witchcraft."

If this was his impression at the time, it is strange that he did not
then say so. But there is no appearance of any criminal proceedings
having been had, by the grand jury or otherwise, against "Sister
Bishop" on the occasion. On the contrary, Mr. Hale seems to have
acquiesced in the opinion, that the derangement of the woman was
aggravated, if not caused, by her being overmuch given to searching
and pondering upon the dark passages and mysterious imagery of
prophecy. The truth, in all probability, is, that Mr. Hale's suspicion
was an after-thought. The effect produced upon his mental condition by
the statements and actings of the "afflicted children" in 1692 was
unconsciously transferred to 1687. The delusion, in which he was then
fully participating, led him to put a different interpretation upon
the suicidal wounds and horrible end of the wretched maniac, five or
six years before.

A piece of evidence, which illustrates the state of opinion at that
time, relating to our subject, given in this case, is worthy of
notice. Samuel Shattuck was a hatter and dyer. His house was on the
south side of Essex Street, opposite the western entrance to the
grounds of the North Church. Before her removal to the village,
Bridget Bishop was in the habit of calling at Shattuck's to have
articles of dress dyed. He states that she treated him and his family
politely and kindly; or, as he characterized her deportment after his
mind had become jaundiced against her, "in a smooth and flattering
manner." He tells his story in a deposition written by him, and signed
and sworn to in Court by himself and wife, June 2, 1692. It is as
follows:--

     "Our eldest child, who promised as much health and
     understanding, both by countenance and actions, as any other
     children of his years, was taken in a very drooping
     condition; and, as she came oftener to the house, he grew
     worse and worse. As he would be standing at the door, would
     fall out, and bruise his face upon a great step-stone, as if
     he had been thrust out by an invisible hand; oftentimes
     falling, and hitting his face against the sides of the
     house, bruising his face in a very miserable manner.... This
     child taken in a terrible fit, his mouth and eyes drawn
     aside, and gasped in such a manner as if he was upon the
     point of death. After this, he grew worse in his fits, and,
     out of them, would be almost always crying. That, for many
     months, he would be crying till nature's strength was spent,
     and then would fall asleep, and then awake, and fall to
     crying and moaning; and that his very countenance did
     bespeak compassion. And at length, we perceived his
     understanding decayed: so that we feared (as it has since
     proved) that he would be quite bereft of his wits; for, ever
     since, he has been stupefied and void of reason, his fits
     still following of him. After he had been in this kind of
     sickness some time, he has gone into the garden, and has got
     upon a board of an inch thick, which lay flat upon the
     ground, and we have called him; he would come to the edge of
     the board, and hold out his hand, and make as if he would
     come, but could not till he was helped off the board.... My
     wife has offered him a cake and money to come to her; and he
     has held out his hand, and reached after it, but could not
     come till he had been helped off the board, by which I judge
     some enchantment kept him on.... Ever since, this child hath
     been followed with grievous fits, as if he would never
     recover more; his head and eyes drawn aside so as if they
     would never come to rights more; lying as if he were, in a
     manner, dead; falling anywhere, either into fire or water,
     if he be not constantly looked to; and, generally, in such
     an uneasy, restless frame, almost always running to and
     fro, acting so strange that I cannot judge otherwise but
     that he is bewitched: and, by these circumstances, do
     believe that the aforesaid Bridget Oliver--now called
     Bishop--is the cause of it: and it has been the judgment of
     doctors, such as lived here and foreigners, that he is under
     an evil hand of witchcraft."

The means used to give this direction to the suspicions of Shattuck
and his wife are described in the notice of Bridget Bishop, in the
First Part of this work.

Shattuck was a son of the sturdy Quaker of that name who, thirty years
before, had given the government of the colony so much trouble, and
seems to have inherited some of his notions. In his deposition, he
mentions, as corroborative proof of Bridget Bishop's being a witch,
that she used to bring to his dye-house "sundry pieces of lace," of
shapes and dimensions entirely outside of his conceptions of what
could be needed in the wardrobe, or for the toilet, of a plain and
honest woman. He evidently regarded fashionable and vain apparel as a
snare and sign of the Devil.

The imaginations of several persons in Shattuck's immediate
neighborhood seem to have been wrought up to a high point against
Bridget Bishop. John Cook lived on the south side of the street,
directly opposite the eastern entrance to the grounds of the North
Church, on its present site. John Bly's house was on a lot contiguous
to the rear of Cook's, fronting on Summer Street. One of Cook's sons
(John), aged eighteen, testified, that,--

     "About five or six years ago, one morning about sun-rising,
     as I was in bed, before I rose, I saw Goodwife Bishop,
     _alias_ Oliver, stand in the chamber by the window: and she
     looked on me and grinned on me, and presently struck me on
     the side of the head, which did very much hurt me; and then
     I saw her go out under the end window at a little crevice,
     about so big as I could thrust my hand into. I saw her again
     the same day,--which was the sabbath-day,--about noon, walk
     across the room; and having, at the time, an apple in my
     hand, it flew out of my hand into my mother's lap, who sat
     six or eight foot distance from me, and then she
     disappeared: and, though my mother and several others were
     in the same room, yet they affirmed they saw her not."

Bly and his wife Rebecca had a difficulty with Bishop in reference to
payment for a hog they had bought of her. The following is from their
testimony at her trial. After stating that she came to their house and
quarrelled with them about it, they go on to say that the animal--

     "was taken with strange fits, jumping up, and knocking her
     head against the fence, and seemed blind and deaf, and would
     not eat, neither let her pigs suck, but foamed at the mouth;
     which Goody Henderson, hearing of, said she believed she was
     overlooked, and that they had their cattle ill in such a
     manner at the Eastward, when they lived there, and used to
     cure them by giving of them red ochre and milk, which we
     also gave the sow. Quickly after eating of which, she grew
     better; and then, for the space of near two hours together,
     she, getting into the street, did set off, jumping and
     running between the house of said deponents and said
     Bishop's, as if she were stark mad, and, after that, was
     well again: and we did then apprehend or judge, and do
     still, that said Bishop had bewitched said sow."

William Stacey testified, that, as he was "agoing to mill," meeting
Bishop in the street, some conversation passed between them, and
that,--

     "being gone about six rods from her, the said Bishop, with a
     small load in his cart, suddenly the off-wheel slumped or
     sunk down into a hole upon plain ground; that this deponent
     was forced to get one to help him get the wheel out.
     Afterwards, this deponent went back to look for said hole
     where his wheel sunk in, but could not find any hole."

Stacey further deposed, that, on another occasion, he--

     "met the said Bishop by Isaac Stearns's brick-kiln. After he
     had passed by her, this deponent's horse stood still with a
     small load going up the hill; so that, the horse striving to
     draw, all his gears and tackling flew in pieces, and the
     cart fell down."

These mishaps and marvels occurred in Summer Street, near the foot of
Chestnut Street, where the ground was then much lower than it is now.
Stacey was ascending the street, on his way through High Street to his
father's mill, at the South River.

Stacey concluded his testimony as follows:--

     "This deponent hath met with several other of her pranks at
     several times, which would take up a great time to tell of.

     "This deponent doth verily believe that the said Bridget
     Bishop was instrumental to his daughter Priscilla's death.
     About two years ago, the child was a likely, thriving child;
     and suddenly screeched out, and so continued, in an unusual
     manner, for about a fortnight, and so died in that
     lamentable manner."

Many of the extraordinary "pranks," charged upon Bridget Bishop, had
their scene near to her dwelling-house. John Louder, a servant of John
Gedney, Sr., some years before, had a controversy with her about her
fowls, "that used to come into our orchard or garden." He swore as
follows:--

     "Some little time after which, I, going well to bed, about
     the dead of the night, felt a great weight upon my breast,
     and, awakening, looked; and, it being bright moonlight, did
     clearly see said Bridget Bishop, or her likeness, sitting
     upon my stomach; and, putting my arms off of the bed to free
     myself from the great oppression, she presently laid hold of
     my throat, and almost choked me, and I had no strength or
     power in my hands to resist, or help myself; and, in this
     condition, she held me to almost day. Some time after this,
     my mistress (Susannah Gedney) was in our orchard, and I was
     then with her; and said Bridget Bishop, being then in her
     orchard,--which was next adjoining to ours,--my mistress
     told said Bridget that I said or affirmed that she came, one
     night, and sat upon my breast, as aforesaid, which she
     denied, and I affirmed to her face to be true, and that I
     did plainly see her; upon which discourse with her, she
     threatened me. And, some time after that, I, being not very
     well, stayed at home on a Lord's Day; and, on the afternoon
     of said day, the doors being shut, I did see a black pig in
     the room coming towards me; so I went towards it to kick it,
     and it vanished away."

Louder goes on to say, that, immediately after this, on the same
occasion while he was staying at home from meeting, he saw a black
thing jump into the window, and it came and stood just before his face
"upon the bar." The body of it looked like a monkey, only the feet
were like a cock's feet with claws, and the face somewhat more like a
man's than a monkey's. He says that he was greatly affrighted, "not
being able to speak or help myself by reason of fear, I suppose;" and
that his mysterious visitor made quite a speech to him, representing
that it was a messenger sent to say, that, if he would "be ruled by
him, he should want for nothing in this world." The virtuous and
indignant Louder says that he answered, "You devil, I will kill you!"
and gave it a blow with his fist, but "could feel no substance; and it
jumped out of the window again." It immediately came in by the porch,
although the doors were shut, and said, "You had better take my
counsel." Hereupon Louder struck at it with a stick, hitting the
ground-sill and breaking the stick, but felt no substance. Louder
concludes his testimony as follows:--

     "The arm with which I struck was presently disenabled. Then
     it vanished away, and I opened the back-door and went out;
     and, going towards the house-end, I espied said Bridget
     Bishop in her orchard going towards her house, and, seeing
     her, had no power to set one foot forward, but returned in
     again: and, going to shut the door, I again did see that or
     the like creature, that I before did see within doors, in
     such a posture as it seemed to be agoing to fly at me; upon
     which I cried out, 'The whole armor of God be between me and
     you.' So it sprang back and flew over the apple-tree,
     flinging the dirt with its feet against my stomach, upon
     which I was struck dumb, and so continued for about three
     days' time; and also shook many of the apples off from the
     tree which it flew over."

Before removing to his farm, Edward and Bridget Bishop made the
alterations, before mentioned, on their town estate. John Bly, Sr.,
aged fifty-seven years, and William Bly, aged fifteen, were employed
in the operation of removing the cellar wall of "the ould house;" and
testified, that they found in holes and crevices of said cellar wall
"several puppets made up of rags and hogs' bristles, with headless
pins in them with the points outward."

Upon such evidence, Bridget Bishop was condemned, and executed the
next week. The death-warrants, in these trials, were collected
together in one envelope, marked as such. The envelope remains, but
its contents have all been abstracted. The death-warrant of Bridget
Bishop was probably overlooked when the others were gathered together.
The consequence is that it has been preserved, and is the only one
known to be in existence.

The sheriff seems to have proceeded, immediately after the execution,
to the clerk's office, and indorsed his return on the warrant. When he
wrote it, he added, after the word "dead,"--"and buried her on the
spot." On its occurring to him that the burying of the body was not
mentioned in the warrant, he drew his pen through the words; as
is seen in the photograph. This superfluous clause, thus partially
obliterated, is the only positive evidence we have of the disposal of
the bodies at the time. They were undoubtedly all thrown into pits dug
among the rocks, on the spot, and hastily covered by the officers
having in charge the details of the executions. There were no prayers
over their graves, except those uttered by themselves in their last
moments.

[Illustration: [death warrant]]

[Illustration: [return on warrant]]

The descendants of Bridget Bishop are very numerous in Salem;
embracing some of our oldest and most respectable families, and
branching widely from them. There is no evidence of issue by her first
marriage. Thomas Oliver, her second husband, had daughters by a former
wife, who were represented in the next generation under the names of
Hilliard, Hooper, and Jones. By his wife Bridget, he had but one
child,--a daughter, Christian, born May 8, 1667. She married Thomas
Mason, and died in 1693; leaving an only child, Susannah, born August
23, 1687. Edward Bishop was her guardian. She married John Becket in
1711, and by him had a son, John, and six daughters, as follows:
Susannah, married to David Felt, Elizabeth to William Peele, Sarah to
Nathaniel Silsbee, Rebecca to William Fairfield, Eunice to Thorndike
Deland, and Hannah to William Cloutman.

After the condemnation of Bridget Bishop, the Court took a recess, and
consulted the ministers of Boston and the neighborhood respecting the
prosecutions. The response of the reverend gentlemen, while urging,
in general terms, the importance of caution and circumspection in the
methods of examination, decidedly and earnestly recommended that the
proceedings should be vigorously carried on; and they were, indeed,
vigorously carried on.

Hutchinson says, that, "at the first trial, there was no colony or
provincial law against witchcraft in force. The statute of James the
First must therefore have been considered as in force in the province,
witchcraft not being an offence at common law. Before the adjournment,
the old colony law, which makes witchcraft a capital offence, was
revived with the other local laws, as they were called, and made a law
of the province." The General Court, which thus revived the law making
witchcraft a capital offence, met, June 8, two days before the
execution of Bridget Bishop. The proceedings that took place at Salem
were thus assumed as a provincial matter, for which the immediate
locality was not responsible, but the legislature, clergy, and people
of the country at large.

The Court met again on Wednesday, the 29th of June; and, after trial,
sentenced to death Sarah Good, Sarah Wildes, Elizabeth How, Susanna
Martin, and Rebecca Nurse, who were all executed on the 19th of July.

Calef says, that, at the trial of Sarah Good,--

     "One of the afflicted fell in a fit; and, after coming out
     of it, cried out of the prisoner for stabbing her in the
     breast with a knife, and that she had broken the knife in
     stabbing of her. Accordingly, a piece of the blade of a
     knife was found about her. Immediately, information being
     given to the Court, a young man was called, who produced a
     haft and part of the blade, which the Court, having viewed
     and compared, saw it to be the same; and, upon inquiry, the
     young man affirmed that yesterday he happened to break that
     knife, and that he cast away the upper part,--this afflicted
     person being then present. The young man was dismissed and
     she was bidden by the Court not to tell lies; and was
     improved after (as she had been before) to give evidence
     against the prisoners."

Hutchinson, in relating this circumstance, refers to a case tried
before Sir Matthew Hale, when a similar kind of falsehood was proved
against an "afflicted" witness; notwithstanding which he says the
person on trial was found guilty, "and the judge and all the court
were fully satisfied with the verdict."

Sarah Good appears to have been an unfortunate woman, having been
subject to poverty, and consequent sadness and melancholy. But she was
not wholly broken in spirit. Mr. Noyes, at the time of her execution,
urged her very strenuously to confess. Among other things, he told her
"she was a witch, and that she knew she was a witch." She was
conscious of her innocence, and felt that she was oppressed, outraged,
trampled upon, and about to be murdered, under the forms of law; and
her indignation was roused against her persecutors. She could not bear
in silence the cruel aspersion; and, although she was just about to be
launched into eternity, the torrent of her feelings could not be
restrained, but burst upon the head of him who uttered the false
accusation. "You are a liar," said she. "I am no more a witch than you
are a wizard; and, if you take away my life, God will give you blood
to drink." Hutchinson says that, in his day, there was a tradition
among the people of Salem, and it has descended to the present time,
that the manner of Mr. Noyes's death strangely verified the prediction
thus wrung from the incensed spirit of the dying woman. He was
exceedingly corpulent, of a plethoric habit, and died of an internal
hemorrhage, bleeding profusely at the mouth.

We have no information relating to the execution of Elizabeth How. Her
gentle, patient, humble, benignant, devout, and tender heart bore her,
no doubt, with a spirit of saint-like love and faith, through the
dreadful scenes. We cannot doubt, that, in death as in life, she
forgave, prayed for, and invoked blessing upon her persecutors.
Neither has any thing come down in reference to the deportment of
Sarah Wildes or Susanna Martin. We may take it for granted, that the
former was a patient and humble, but firm and faithful sufferer; and
that the latter displayed the great energy of spirit, and probably the
strength of language, for which she was remarkable. Of the case of
Rebecca Nurse we have more information.

The character, age, and position of this venerable matron created an
impression, which called, to the utmost, all the arts and efforts of
the prosecution to counteract. Many who had gone fully and earnestly
in support of the proceedings against others paused and hesitated in
reference to her; and large numbers who had been overawed into silence
before, bravely came forward in her defence. The character of
Nathaniel Putnam has been described. He was a man of extraordinary
strength and acuteness of mind, and in all his previous life had been
proof against popular excitement. The death of his brother Thomas,
seven years before, had left him the head and patriarch of his great
family: as such, he was known as "Landlord Putnam." Entire confidence
was felt by all in his judgment, and deservedly. But he was a strong
religionist, a life-long member of the Church, and extremely strenuous
and zealous in his ecclesiastical relations. He was getting to be an
old man; and Mr. Parris had wholly succeeded in obtaining, for the
time, possession of his feelings, sympathy, and zeal in the management
of the Church, and secured his full co-operation in the witchcraft
prosecutions. He had been led by Parris to take the very front in the
proceedings. But even Nathaniel Putnam could not stand by in silence,
and see Rebecca Nurse sacrificed. A curious paper, written by him, is
among those which have been preserved:--

     "NATHANIEL PUTNAM, Sr., being desired by Francis Nurse, Sr.,
     to give information of what I could say concerning his wife's
     life and conversation, I, the abovesaid, have known this said
     aforesaid woman forty years, and what I have observed of her,
     human frailties excepted, her life and conversation have been
     according to her profession; and she hath brought up a great
     family of children and educated them well, so that there is
     in some of them apparent savor of godliness. I have known her
     differ with her neighbors; but I never knew or heard of any
     that did accuse her of what she is now charged with."

A similar paper was signed by thirty-nine other persons of the village
and the immediate vicinity, all of the highest respectability. The men
and women who dared to do this act of justice must not be forgotten:--

     "We whose names are hereunto subscribed, being desired by
     Goodman Nurse to declare what we know concerning his wife's
     conversation for time past,--we can testify, to all whom it
     may concern, that we have known her for many years; and,
     according to our observation, her life and conversation were
     according to her profession, and we never had any cause or
     grounds to suspect her of any such thing as she is now
     accused of.

     "ISRAEL PORTER.            SAMUEL ABBEY.
     ELIZABETH PORTER.          HEPZIBAH REA.
     EDWARD BISHOP, Sr.         DANIEL ANDREW.
     HANNAH BISHOP.             SARAH ANDREW.
     JOSHUA REA.                DANIEL REA.
     SARAH REA.                 SARAH PUTNAM.
     SARAH LEACH.               JONATHAN PUTNAM.
     JOHN PUTNAM.               LYDIA PUTNAM.
     REBECCA PUTNAM.            WALTER PHILLIPS, Sr.
     JOSEPH HUTCHINSON, Sr.     NATHANIEL FELTON, Sr.
     LYDIA HUTCHINSON.          MARGARET PHILLIPS.
     WILLIAM OSBURN.            TABITHA PHILLIPS.
     HANNAH OSBURN.             JOSEPH HOULTON, Jr.
     JOSEPH HOLTON, Sr.         SAMUEL ENDICOTT.
     SARAH HOLTON.              ELIZABETH BUXTON.
     BENJAMIN PUTNAM.           SAMUEL ABORN, Sr.
     SARAH PUTNAM.              ISAAC COOK.
     JOB SWINNERTON.            ELIZABETH COOK.
     ESTHER SWINNERTON.         JOSEPH PUTNAM."
     JOSEPH HERRICK, Sr.

An examination of the foregoing names in connection with the history
of the Village will show conclusive proof, that, if the matter had
been left to the people there, it would never have reached the point
to which it was carried. It was the influence of the magistracy and
the government of the colony, and the public sentiment prevalent
elsewhere, overruling that of the immediate locality, that drove on
the storm.

Israel Porter was the head of a great and powerful family. His wife
Elizabeth was, as has been stated, a sister of Hathorne, the examining
magistrate. Edward and Hannah Bishop were the venerable heads and
founders of a large family. They lived in Beverly, and must each have
been about ninety years of age. The list contains the names of the
heads of the principal families in the village,--such as John and
Rebecca Putnam, the Hutchinsons, Reas, Leaches, Houltons, and
Herricks; and, in the neighborhood, such as the Feltons, Osbornes, and
Samuel Endicott. The most remarkable fact it discloses is that it
contains the name of one of the two complainants who procured the
warrant against Rebecca Nurse,--Jonathan Putnam, the eldest son of
John; and also of his wife Lydia. Subsequent reflection, and the
return of his better judgment, satisfied him that he had done a great
wrong to an innocent and worthy person; and he had the manliness to
come out in her favor. This document ought to have been effectual in
saving the life of Rebecca Nurse. It will for ever vindicate her
character, and reflect honor upon each and every name subscribed to
it.

One of the most cruel features in the prosecution of the witchcraft
trials, and which was practised in all countries where they took
place, was the examination of the bodies of the prisoners by a jury of
the same sex, under the direction and in the presence of a surgeon or
physician. The person was wholly exposed, and every part subjected to
the most searching scrutiny. The process was always an outrage upon
human nature; and in the cases of the victims on this occasion, many
of them of venerable years and delicate feelings, it was shocking to
every natural and instinctive sentiment. There is reason to fear that
it was often conducted in a rough, coarse, and brutal manner. Marshal
Herrick testifies, that, "by order of Their Majesties' justices," he,
accompanied by the jail-keeper Dounton, and Constable Joseph Neal,
made an examination of the body of George Jacobs. In persons of his
great age, there would, in all likelihood, be shrivelled, desiccated,
and callous places. They found one on the old man, under his right
shoulder. Herrick made oath that it was a veritable witch teat, and
his deposition describes it as follows: "About a quarter of an inch
long or better, with a sharp point drooping downwards, so that I took
a pin, and run it through the said teat; but there was neither water,
blood, or corruption, nor any other matter." As proof positive that
this was "the Devil's mark," Herrick and the turnkey testify that "the
said Jacobs was not in the least sensible of what had been done"!

The mind loathes the thought of handling in this way refined and
sensitive females of matronly character, or persons of either sex,
with infirmities of body rendered sacred by years. The results of the
examination were reduced to written reports, going into details, and,
among other evidences in the trials, spread before the Court and
jury.[A]

[Footnote A: A few days before her trial, Rebecca Nurse was subjected
to this inspection and exploration; and the jury of women found the
witch-mark upon her. On the 28th of June, two days before the meeting
of the Court, she addressed to that body the following
communication:--

     "_To the Honored Court of Oyer and Terminer, now sitting in
     Salem, this 28th of June, Anno 1692._

     "The humble petition of Rebecca Nurse, of Salem Village,
     humbly showeth: That whereas some women did search your
     petitioner at Salem, as I did then conceive for some
     supernatural mark; and then one of the said women, which is
     known to be the most ancient, skilful, prudent person of
     them all as to any such concern, did express herself to be
     of a contrary opinion from the rest, and did then declare
     that she saw nothing in or about Your Honor's poor
     petitioner but what might arise from a natural cause,--I
     there rendered the said persons a sufficient known reason as
     to myself of the moving cause thereof, which was by
     exceeding weaknesses, descending partly from an overture of
     nature, and difficult exigencies that hath befallen me in
     the times of my travails. And therefore your petitioner
     humbly prays that Your Honors would be pleased to admit of
     some other women to inquire into this great concern, those
     that are most grave, wise, and skilful; namely, Mrs.
     Higginson, Sr., Mrs. Buxton, Mrs. Woodbury,--two of them
     being midwives, Mrs. Porter, together with such others as
     may be chosen on that account, before I am brought to my
     trial. All which I hope your honors will take into your
     prudent consideration, and find it requisite so to do; for
     my life lies now in your hands, under God. And, being
     conscious of my own innocency, I humbly beg that I may have
     liberty to manifest it to the world partly by the means
     abovesaid.

     "And your poor petitioner shall evermore pray, as in duty
     bound, &c."

Her daughters--Rebecca, wife of Thomas Preston; and Mary, wife of John
Tarbell--presented the following statement:--

     "We whose names are underwritten--can testify, if called to
     it, that Goody Nurse hath been troubled with an infirmity of
     body for many years, which the jury of women seem to be
     afraid it should be something else."

There is no intimation, in any of the papers, that the petition of the
mother or the deposition of her daughters received the least attention
from the Court.]

The evidence in the case of Rebecca Nurse was made up of the usual
representations and actings of the "afflicted children." Mary Walcot
and Abigail Williams charged her with having committed several
murders; mentioning particularly Benjamin Houlton, John Harwood, and
Rebecca Shepard, and averring that she was aided therein by her sister
Cloyse. Mr. Parris, too, gave in a deposition against her; from which
it appears, that, a certain person being sick, Mercy Lewis was sent
for. She was struck dumb on entering the chamber. She was asked to
hold up her hand, if she saw any of the witches afflicting the
patient. Presently she held up her hand, then fell into a trance; and
after a while, coming to herself, said that she saw the spectres of
Goody Nurse and Goody Carrier having hold of the head of the sick man.
Mr. Parris swore to this statement with the utmost confidence in
Mercy's declarations.

The testimony of three persons particularly is required to be given,
as illustrating the extraordinary extent to which the minds of those
involved in the affair were under infatuation or hallucination.

Mrs. Ann Putnam was about thirty years of age. For six months she had
been constantly absorbed in what was then, as now, regarded as
spiritualism. Her house had been the scene of a perpetual series of
wonders supposed to be disclosures and manifestations of a
supernatural character. Apparitions, spectral shapes of living
witches, ghosts of their murdered victims, and demons generally, were
of daily and hourly occurrence. The dread secrets of the world unknown
had been revealed to her in waking fancies and dreams by night. An
originally sensitive and imaginative nature had been wrought into a
condition in which her mental faculties were at once enfeebled and
exalted. Besides all this, there were the trials to which her
constitution had been subjected by the experiences of maternity so
early begun, and the pressure upon her mind and heart of the anxieties
and cares incident to a large family of young children. An
accumulation of disappointments, vexations, and consuming griefs,
spread like a dark cloud over her life,--the deaths of her own
children, and of her sister Bayley and her children, and of her sister
Baker's children; and, finally, the long-continued, and constantly
recurring sufferings, tortures, convulsions, fits, and trances of her
daughter Ann, and her servant-woman Mercy Lewis, under, as she fully
believed, a diabolical hand.--These things must have given to her
countenance and tones of voice a wonderful impressiveness to all who
looked upon or listened to them. Her eminent social position, her
general reputation,--for Lawson, who knew her well, calls her "a very
sober and pious woman," so far as he could judge,--the stamp of
profound earnestness marked on all her language, the glow which
morbid excitement long experienced gave to her expression, must have
arrested, to a high degree, the attention of the assembled multitude.
An air of sadness, in the wild ravings of imagination, pervades her
testimony. I present her deposition in full, as one of the phenomena
of this strange transaction:--

     "THE DEPOSITION OF ANN PUTNAM, the wife of Thomas Putnam,
     aged about thirty years, who testifieth and saith, that, on
     the 18th March, 1692, I being wearied out in helping to tend
     my poor afflicted child and maid, about the middle of the
     afternoon I lay me down on the bed to take a little rest; and
     immediately I was almost pressed and choked to death, that,
     had it not been for the mercy of a gracious God and the help
     of those that were with me, I could not have lived many
     moments: and presently I saw the apparition of Martha Corey,
     who did torture me so as I cannot express, ready to tear me
     all to pieces, and then departed from me a little while; but,
     before I could recover strength or well take breath, the
     apparition of Martha Corey fell upon me again with dreadful
     tortures, and hellish temptation to go along with her. And
     she also brought to me a little red book in her hand and a
     black pen, urging me vehemently to write in her book; and
     several times that day she did most grievously torture me,
     almost ready to kill me. And, on the 19th March, Martha Corey
     again appeared to me; and also Rebecca Nurse, the wife of
     Francis Nurse, Sr.: and they both did torture me a great many
     times this day with such tortures as no tongue can express,
     because I would not yield to their hellish temptations, that,
     had I not been upheld by an Almighty arm, I could not have
     lived while night. The 20th March, being sabbath-day, I had
     a great deal of respite between my fits. 21st March, being
     the day of the examination of Martha Corey, I had not many
     fits, though I was very weak; my strength being, as I
     thought, almost gone: but, on the 22d March, 1692, the
     apparition of Rebecca Nurse did again set upon me in a most
     dreadful manner, very early in the morning, as soon as it was
     well light. And now she appeared to me only in her shift, and
     brought a little red book in her hand, urging me vehemently
     to write in her book; and, because I would not yield to her
     hellish temptations, she threatened to tear my soul out of my
     body, blasphemously denying the blessed God, and the power of
     the Lord Jesus Christ to save my soul; and denying several
     places of Scripture which I told her of, to repel her hellish
     temptations. And for near two hours together, at this time,
     the apparition of Rebecca Nurse did tempt and torture me, and
     also the greater part of this day, with but very little
     respite. 23d March, am again afflicted by the apparitions of
     Rebecca Nurse and Martha Corey, but chiefly by Rebecca Nurse.
     24th March, being the day of the examination of Rebecca
     Nurse, I was several times afflicted in the morning by the
     apparition of Rebecca Nurse, but most dreadfully tortured by
     her in the time of her examination, insomuch that the honored
     magistrates gave my husband leave to carry me out of the
     meeting-house; and, as soon as I was carried out of the
     meeting-house doors, it pleased Almighty God, for his free
     grace and mercy's sake, to deliver me out of the paws of
     those roaring lions, and jaws of those tearing bears, that,
     ever since that time, they have not had power so to afflict
     me until this 31st May, 1692. At the same moment that I was
     hearing my evidence read by the honored magistrates, to take
     my oath, I was again re-assaulted and tortured by my
     before-mentioned tormentor, Rebecca Nurse."

     "THE TESTIMONY OF ANN PUTNAM, Jr., witnesseth and saith,
     that, being in the room when her mother was afflicted, she
     saw Martha Corey, Sarah Cloyse, and Rebecca Nurse, or their
     apparition, upon her mother."

Mrs. Ann Putnam made another deposition under oath, at the same trial,
which shows that she was determined to overwhelm the prisoner by the
multitude of her charges. She says that Rebecca Nurse's apparition
declared to her that "she had killed Benjamin Houlton, John Fuller,
and Rebecca Shepard;" and that she and her sister Cloyse, and Edward
Bishop's wife, had killed young John Putnam's child; and she further
deposed as followeth:--

     "Immediately there did appear to me six children in
     winding-sheets, which called me aunt, which did most
     grievously affright me; and they told me that they were my
     sister Baker's children of Boston; and that Goody Nurse, and
     Mistress Carey of Charlestown, and an old deaf woman at
     Boston, had murdered them, and charged me to go and tell
     these things to the magistrates, or else they would tear me
     to pieces, for their blood did cry for vengeance. Also there
     appeared to me my own sister Bayley and three of her
     children in winding-sheets, and told me that Goody Nurse had
     murdered them."

There is in this deposition a passage which illustrates one of the
doctrines held at the time on the subject of witchcraft. Mrs. Ann
Putnam "testifieth and saith, that, on the first day of June, 1692,
the apparition of Rebecca Nurse did again fall upon me, and almost
choke me; and she told me, that, now she was come out of prison, she
had power to afflict me, and that now she would afflict me all this
day long." The reference here is probably to the fact, that, on the
1st of June, she with many other prisoners was transferred from the
jail in Boston to that in Salem; and that, "all that day long" being
outside of prison walls, she had greater power to afflict than when
chained in a cell. This was undoubtedly the received opinion, and it
is curiously illustrated in the foregoing passage.

The only breath of disparagement against the character of Goodwife
Nurse that can be found in any of the papers is in the following
deposition:--

     "THE DEPOSITION OF SARAH HOULTON, relict of Benjamin Houlton,
     deceased, who testifieth and saith, that, about this time
     three years, my dear and loving husband, Benjamin Houlton,
     deceased, was as well as ever I knew him in my life till one
     Saturday morning, that Rebecca Nurse, who now stands charged
     for witchcraft, came to our house, and fell a railing at him
     because our pigs got into her field. Though our pigs were
     sufficiently yoked, and their fence was down in several
     places, yet all we could say to her could no ways pacify her;
     but she continued railing and scolding a great while
     together, calling to her son Benj. Nurse to go and get a gun
     and kill our pigs, and let none of them go out of the field,
     though my poor husband gave her never a misbeholding word.
     And, within a short time after this, my poor husband going
     out very early in the morning, as he was coming in again, he
     was taken with a strange fit in the entry; being struck blind
     and stricken down two or three times, so that, when he came
     to himself, he told me he thought he should never have come
     into the house any more. And, all summer after, he continued
     in a languishing condition, being much pained at his stomach,
     and often struck blind: but, about a fortnight before he
     died, he was taken with strange and violent fits, acting much
     like to our poor bewitched persons when we thought they would
     have died; and the doctor that was with him could not find
     what his distemper was. And, the day before he died, he was
     very cheerly; but, about midnight, he was again most
     violently seized upon with violent fits, till the next night,
     about midnight, he departed this life by a cruel death.

     "_Jurat in Curia._"

In explanation of the import of this testimony, it is to be observed,
that the estate of Benjamin Houlton was contiguous to that of Francis
Nurse. They were separated by a fence, which, as in such cases, was
required for half its length to be kept in order by one party, the
remaining half by the other. What the exact facts were cannot be
ascertained, as we have the story of one side only. The widow Houlton
appears to have been a tender-hearted, and, for aught we know, good
woman. Some years afterwards, she was married, as his second wife, to
Benjamin Putnam,--a very respectable person, and, on the death of his
father Nathaniel, the head of that branch of the family. He was, for
many years, deacon of the church. But she was, it must be conceded, a
prejudiced witness; and her judgment for the time was wholly
beclouded by the prevalent superstitions. The garden had been, from
the days of Townsend Bishop, a choice portion of the Nurse estate. In
all farms, it was a most important and valuable item; and was
generally under the special care and management of the wife,
daughters, and younger lads of the husbandman. Rebecca Nurse was an
efficient helpmeet; contributing her whole share to the success of the
great enterprise of clearing the estate, as well as in bringing up and
educating a large family. It was, no doubt, very provoking to her, as
it would be to any one, to have vegetable and flower beds devastated
by the ravages of a neighbor's stray pigs. To what extent her "railing
and scolding" went, she was not allowed to contribute her statement,
to enable us to judge. The affair probably produced considerable
gossip, and seems to be alluded to in Nathaniel Putnam's certificate
in behalf of Rebecca Nurse. There is reason to believe that the widow
Houlton was one of the first to realize what great injustice had been
done by her and others to the good name of Rebecca Nurse.

Notwithstanding this evidence, so deeply were the jury impressed with
the eminent virtue and true Christian excellence of this venerable
woman, that, in spite of the clamors of the outside crowd, the
monstrous statements of accusing witnesses, and the strong leaning of
the Court against her, the jury brought in a verdict of "Not guilty."
Calef, and Hutchinson after him, describe the effect, and what
followed:--

     "Immediately, all the accusers in the Court, and, suddenly
     after, all the afflicted out of Court, made an hideous
     outcry; to the amazement, not only of the spectators, but
     the Court also seemed strangely surprised. One of the judges
     expressed himself not satisfied: another of them, as he was
     going off the bench, said they would have her indicted anew.
     The chief-justice said he would not impose on the jury, but
     intimated as if they had not well considered one expression
     of the prisoner when she was upon trial; viz., that when one
     Hobbs, who had confessed herself to be a witch, was brought
     into Court to witness against her, the prisoner, turning her
     head to her, said, 'What! do you bring her? She is one of
     us;' or words to that effect. This, together with the
     clamors of the accusers, induced the jury to go out again,
     after their verdict, 'Not guilty.'"

The foreman of the jury, Thomas Fisk, made this statement on the 4th
of July, a few days after the trial:--

     "After the honored Court had manifested their
     dissatisfaction of the verdict, several of the jury declared
     themselves desirous to go out again, and thereupon the Court
     gave leave; but, when we came to consider the case, I could
     not tell how to take her words as an evidence against her,
     till she had a further opportunity to put her sense upon
     them, if she would take it. And then, going into Court, I
     mentioned the words aforesaid, which by one of the Court
     were affirmed to have been spoken by her, she being then at
     the bar, but made no reply nor interpretation of them;
     whereupon these words were to me a principal evidence
     against her."

Upon being informed of the use made of her words, the prisoner put in
the following declaration:--

     "These presents do humbly show to the honored Court and
     jury, that I being informed that the jury brought me in
     guilty upon my saying that Goodwife Hobbs and her daughter
     were of our company; but I intended no otherwise than as
     they were prisoners with us, and therefore did then, and yet
     do, judge them not legal evidence against their
     fellow-prisoners. And I being something hard of hearing and
     full of grief, none informing me how the Court took up my
     words, and therefore had no opportunity to declare what I
     intended when I said they were of our company."

It was perfectly natural for her to have spoken of them as "of our
company," not only from the fact that they had long been crowded
together in the same jails, but as they had accompanied each other in
the transferrence from one jail to another, from time to time. A few
days before, a large party, of which she was one, had been brought
from Boston, spending the whole day together on the route. Sarah Good,
John Procter and wife, Susanna Martin, Bridget Bishop, and Alice
Parker happen to be mentioned as belonging to it. Calef further
states:--

     "After her condemnation, the governor saw cause to grant a
     reprieve, which, when known (and some say immediately upon
     granting), the accusers renewed their dismal outcries
     against her; insomuch that the governor was by some Salem
     gentlemen prevailed with to recall the reprieve, and she was
     executed with the rest.

     "The testimonials of her Christian behavior, both in the
     course of her life and at her death, and her extraordinary
     care in educating her children, and setting them a good
     example, under the hands of so many, are so numerous, that
     for brevity they are here omitted."

The extraordinary conduct of "the Salem gentlemen," in preventing the
intended exercise of executive discretion and clemency on this
occasion, is explained, it is probable, by the fact, stated by Neal in
his "History of New England," that there was an organized association
of private individuals, a committee of vigilance, in Salem, during the
continuance of the delusion, who had undertaken to ferret out and
prosecute all suspected persons. He says that many were arrested and
thrown into prison by their influence and interference. It is hardly
to be doubted, that the persons who busied themselves to prevent the
reprieve of Rebecca Nurse acted under the authority and by the
direction of this self-constituted body of inquisitors. The agency of
such unauthorized and irresponsible combinations is always of
questionable expediency. When acting in the same line with an excited
populace, they are extremely dangerous.

There is no more disgraceful record in the judicial annals of the
country, than that which relates the trial of this excellent woman.
The wave of popular fury made a clear breach over the judgment-seat.
The loud and malignant outcry of an infatuated mob, inside and outside
of the Court-house, instead of being yielded to, ought to have been,
not only sternly rebuked, but visited with prompt and exemplary
punishment. The judges were not only overcome and intimidated from the
faithful discharge of their sacred duty by a clamoring crowd, but they
played into their hands. Hutchinson justly remarks, that their conduct
was in violation of that rule to execute "law and justice in mercy,"
which ought always to be written on their hearts. "In a capital case,
the Court often refuses a verdict of 'Guilty;' but rarely, if ever,
sends a jury out again upon one of 'Not guilty.'" The statement made
by the foreman of the jury, with the subsequent explanation of the
prisoner, taken in connection with the ground on which the
chief-justice sent the jury out again after rendering their verdict of
"Not guilty," made it the duty of the Court and the executive to give
to her the benefit of that verdict.

At the trial of her mother, Sarah Nurse--aged twenty-eight years or
thereabouts--offered this piece of testimony: that, "being in the
Court, this 29th of June, 1692, I saw Goodwife Bibber pull pins out of
her clothes, and held them between her fingers, and clasped her hands
round her knee; and then she cried out, and said, Goody Nurse pinched
her." In all these trials, Mercy Lewis was a principal witness and
actor; yet we find, among the papers, testimony from the most
respectable and reliable persons, that she was not to be trusted.
There was also testimony which ought to have broken the force of the
depositions of Ann Putnam and her mother. Four days after the
examination and commitment of Rebecca Nurse, John Tarbell and Samuel
Nurse went to the house of Thomas Putnam to find out in what way their
mother had been made the object of such shocking accusations. They
were men whose credibility was never brought in question. Their
declarations, on this occasion, were not disputed, and, if not true,
might have been overthrown; for there were many witnesses of the facts
they stated. Tarbell swore as follows: "Upon discourse of many things,
I asked whether the girl that was afflicted did first speak of Goody
Nurse, before others mentioned her to her. They said she told them she
saw the apparition of a pale-faced woman that sat in her grandmother's
seat, but did not know her name. Then I replied and said, 'But who was
it that told her that it was Goody Nurse?' Mercy Lewis said it was
Goody Putnam that said it was Goody Nurse. Goody Putnam said that it
was Mercy Lewis that told her. Thus they turned it upon one another,
saying, 'It was you,' and 'It was you that told her.'" Samuel Nurse
testified to the same.

There was another piece of evidence, which, though brought against
Rebecca Nurse, bears harder, as we read it now, upon Ann Putnam than
any one else, and makes it more difficult to palliate her conduct on
the supposition of partial insanity. It is, all along, one of the
obscure problems of our subject to determine how far delusion may have
been accompanied by fraud and imposture. Edward Putnam testified, that
"Ann Putnam, Jr., was bitten by Rebecca Nurse, as she said, about two
of the clock of the day" after Rebecca Nurse had been committed to
jail, and while she was several miles distant, in Salem; and the said
Nurse also struck said Ann Putnam with her spectral chain, leaving a
mark, "being in a kind of a round ring, and three streaks across the
ring: she had six blows with a chain in the space of half an hour; and
she had one remarkable one, with six streaks across her arm." Edward
Putnam swears, "I saw the mark, both of bite and chains." The Court,
no doubt, were solemnly impressed by this amazing evidence; but it is
hard to avoid the conclusion that Ann Putnam was guilty of elaborate
falsehood and a studied trick.

In the trials at this session, one of the "afflicted children" cried
out against the Rev. Samuel Willard, of the Old South Church, in
Boston. "She was sent out of Court, and it was told about that she was
mistaken in the person." There was surely evidence enough against the
honesty and credibility of the accusers to leave the judges without
excuse, and justly meriting perpetual condemnation for not paying heed
to it.

The case of Rebecca Nurse proves that a verdict could not have been
obtained against a person of her character charged with witchcraft in
this county, had not the most extraordinary efforts been made by the
prosecuting officer, aided by the whole influence of the Court and
provincial authorities. The odium of the proceedings at the trials and
at the executions cannot fairly be laid upon Salem, or the people of
this vicinity.

But nothing can extenuate the infamy that must for ever rest upon the
names of certain parties to the proceedings. Not to attempt here to
measure the guilt of the accusing witnesses, it may be mentioned that
it was the deliberate conviction of the family of Rebecca Nurse, that
Mr. Parris, more than all other persons, was responsible for her
execution; whether by his officious activity in driving on the
prosecution, or in preventing her reprieve, cannot be known. Of the
prominent part taken by Mr. Noyes in the cruel treatment of this
woman, there is no room for doubt. The records of the First Church in
Salem are darkened by the following entry:--

     "1692, July 3.--After sacrament, the elders propounded to
     the church,--and it was, by an unanimous vote, consented
     to,--that our sister Nurse, being a convicted witch by the
     Court, and condemned to die, should be excommunicated; which
     was accordingly done in the afternoon, she being present."

The scene presented on this occasion must have been truly impressive
at the time, as it is shocking to us in the retrospect. The action of
the church, at the close of the morning service, of course became
universally known; and the "great and spacious meeting-house" was
thronged by a crowd that filled every nook and corner of its floor,
galleries, and windows. The sheriff and his subordinates brought in
the prisoner, manacled, and the chains clanking from her aged form.
She was placed in the broad aisle. Mr. Higginson and Mr. Noyes--the
elders, as the clergy were then called--were in the pulpit. The two
ruling elders--who were lay officers--and the two deacons were in
their proper seats, directly below and in front of the pulpit. Mr.
Noyes pronounced the dread sentence, which, for such a crime, was then
believed to be not merely an expulsion from the church on earth, but
an exclusion from the church in heaven. It was meant to be understood
as an eternal doom. As it had been proved, in his estimation, beyond a
question, that she had given her soul to the Devil, he delivered her
over to the great adversary of God and man.

From the dismal cell, which, for but a few days longer, was to hold
her body, he proclaimed the transferrence of her soul to--

    "A dungeon horrible on all sides round,
    As one great furnace flamed; yet from those flames
    No light, but rather darkness visible;
    Regions of sorrow, doleful shades, where peace
    And rest can never dwell; hope never comes
    That comes to all; but torture without end,
    As far removed from God, and light of heaven,
    As from the centre thrice to the utmost pole."

Language and imagery, exhausting the resources of the divine genius of
the greatest of poets, fail to give expression to what was felt to be
the import of this fearful sentence. It sunk the recipient of it below
the reach of human sympathy. She was regarded, by that blinded
multitude, with a horror that cast out pity, and was full of hate. But
in our view now, and, as we believe, in the view of God and angels
then, she occupied an infinite height above her persecutors. Her mind
was serenely fixed upon higher scenes, and filled with a peace which
the world could not take away, or its cruel wrongs disturb. She went
back to her prison walls, and then to the scaffold, with a pious and
humble faith which has not failed to be recorded among men, as it has
been rewarded where the wicked cease from troubling, and the weary are
at rest.

Calef, as already quoted, gives the impression produced by her
demeanor at her death. Hutchinson expresses in the following words the
judgment of history and the sense of all coming times:--

     "Mr. Noyes, the minister of Salem, a zealous prosecutor,
     excommunicated the poor old woman, and delivered her to
     Satan, to whom he supposed she had formally given herself up
     many years before; but her life and conversation had been
     such, that the remembrance thereof, in a short time after,
     wiped off all the reproach occasioned by the civil or
     ecclesiastical sentence against her."

It is impossible to close the story of the lot assigned to this good
woman by an inscrutable Providence, without again contemplating it in
a condensed recapitulation. In her old age, experiencing a full share
of all the delicate infirmities which the instincts of humanity
require to be treated with careful and reverent tenderness, she was
ruthlessly snatched from the bosom of a loving family reared by her
pious fidelity in all Christian graces, from the side of the devoted
companion of her long life, from a home that was endeared by every
grateful association and comfort; immured in the most wretched and
crowded jails; kept loaded with irons and bound with cords for months;
insulted and maligned at the preliminary examinations; outraged in her
person by rough and unfeeling handling and scrutiny; and in her
rights, by the most flagrant and detestable judicial oppression, by
which the benefit of a verdict, given in her favor, had been torn
away; carried to the meeting-house to receive the sentence of
excommunication in a manner devised to harrow her most sacred
sentiments; and finally carted through the streets by a route every
foot of which must have been distressing to her infirm and enfeebled
frame; made to ascend a rough and rocky path to the place of
execution, and there consigned to the hangman. Surely, there has
seldom been a harder fate.

Her body was probably thrown with the rest into a hole in the crevices
of the rock, and covered hastily and thinly over by the executioners.
It has been the constant tradition of the family, that, in some way,
it was recovered; and the spot is pointed out in the burial-place
belonging to the estate, where her ashes rest by the side of her
husband, and in the midst of her children. It is certain, that, at
least, one other body was thus exhumed, and taken to its own proper
place of burial. From the known character of Francis Nurse and his
sons and sons-in-law, we may be sure that what others could do they
did not suffer to remain undone. It is left to the imagination to
present the details of the sad and secret enterprise. In the darkness
of midnight, they found and identified the body, and bore it tenderly
in their arms along the silent roads and by-ways, across fields and
over fences, to the old home, where it was received by the assembled
family, mourned over, and cared for; and, during that or the ensuing
night, deposited, with tears and prayers, in their own consecrated
grounds. Her descendants of successive generations owned and
reverently guarded the spot. They own and guard it to-day. The
interesting reminiscences connected with the early history of the
Nurse house have been alluded to. It has witnessed an extraordinary
variety of the conditions of domestic vicissitude. Scenes rising
before the mind in contemplative retrospection, while gazing upon it,
present the extremest contrasts of human experience. On the evening of
the 25th of October, 1678, Mary and Elizabeth Nurse were married. Such
an occurrence was undoubtedly the occasion of the highest joy and
gladness in a happy household. The old mansion shone in light, and
echoed voices of cheer. How altered its aspect! What darkness and
silence brooded over and within it, while those same daughters waited,
watched, and listened, through the solemn hours of that night of woe
and horror, for the coming of their father, husbands, and brothers,
bearing to the home, from which she had been so cruelly torn, the
remains of their slaughtered mother!

The subsequent history of the house presents a circumstance of
singular interest in connection with our story. All the members of
the three branches of the Putnam family, with the exception of Joseph,
seem to have been carried away by the witchcraft delusion, in its
early stages, and were more or less active in pushing on the
prosecutions. We have seen how fierce was the maniac testimony of Mrs.
Ann Putnam and her daughter against Rebecca Nurse. The lapse of time,
by a Providence that wonderfully works its ends, has repaired the
breaches made by folly and wrong. The descendants of the numerous
family of Mrs. Ann Putnam have disappeared from the scene: none of
them bearing the name are in the village. The descendants of Deacon
Edward Putnam have also scattered in emigration to other places.
Nathaniel and John, the heads of the other two branches of the family,
although involved in the witchcraft delusion, each signed papers in
favor of Rebecca Nurse; their descendants, as well as those of Joseph,
are still numerous in the village, hold their old position of
respectability and influence, and many of them occupy the lands of
their ancestors. Stephen, the grandson of Nathaniel, married Miriam,
the grand-daughter of John. Their son Phinehas, in 1784, bought the
Nurse homestead from Benjamin Nurse, the great-grandson of Rebecca.
Orin Putnam, the great-grandson of Phinehas, to whom the estate
descends, married in 1836 the daughter of Allen Nurse, a direct
descendant of Rebecca, and placed her at the head of her old ancestral
homestead. The children of that marriage, with their father and
grandfather, constitute the family that dwell in and own the
venerable mansion. This singular restoration, suggesting such pleasing
sentiments, adds another to the remarkable elements of interest
belonging to the history of the Townsend-Bishop House.

The descendants of Francis and Rebecca Nurse are numerous, and have
honorably perpetuated the name. Among them may be mentioned the Rev.
Peter Nurse, a graduate of Harvard College in 1802, for some years
librarian of that institution, an excellent scholar, and long
universally respected as a clergyman; and Amos Nurse, a graduate of
the same college in 1812,--an eminent physician connected with the
medical faculty of Bowdoin College, a man of distinguished talent and
influence in public affairs, and senator in Congress from the State of
Maine.

The Court met again on the 5th of August, and tried George Burroughs;
John Procter and Elizabeth, his wife; George Jacobs, Sr.; John
Willard; and Martha Carrier. They were all condemned, and, with the
exception of Elizabeth Procter, executed on the 19th of the same
month.

Hutchinson describes the trial of Burroughs. After speaking of the
evidence of the "afflicted persons" and the confessing witches, he
mentions other circumstances which were thought to corroborate it:
"One was, that, being a little man, he had performed feats beyond the
strength of a giant; viz., had held out a gun of seven feet barrel
with one hand, and had carried a barrel full of cider from a canoe to
the shore." Burroughs said that an Indian present at the time did the
same. Instantly, the accusers said it was "the black man, or the
Devil, who," they swore, "looks like an Indian." Another piece of
evidence was, that he went from one place to another, on a certain
occasion, in a shorter time than was possible had not the Devil helped
him. He said, in answer, that another man accompanied him. Their reply
to this was, that it was the Devil, using the appearance of another
man. So whatever he said was turned against him. Hutchinson says,
"Upon the whole, he was confounded, and used many twistings and
turnings, which, I think, we cannot wonder at." This fair and
judicious writer, like Brattle, appears in the foregoing remark to
have adopted the common scandal, put in circulation by parties
interested to disparage Mr. Burroughs. The papers in this case, that
have come down to us, are more numerous than in reference to many
others among the sufferers; and they do not bear such an impression.
Mr. Burroughs was astounded at the monstrous folly and falsehood with
which he was surrounded. He was a man without guile, and incapable of
appreciating such wickedness. He tried, in simplicity and
ingenuousness, to explain what was brought against him; and this,
probably, was all the "twisting and turning" he exhibited.

Hutchinson had the benefit of consulting all the papers belonging to
this and other trials; but neither he nor Calef seems to have noticed
one remarkable fact: many of the depositions, how many we cannot
tell, were procured after the trials were over, and surreptitiously
foisted in among the papers to bolster up the proceedings. We find,
for instance, the following deposition:--

     "THOMAS GREENSLITT, aged about forty years, being deposed,
     testifieth that, about the first breaking-out of this last
     Indian war, being at the house of Captain Joshua Scotto at
     Black Point, he saw Mr. George Burrows, who was lately
     executed at Salem, lift a gun of six-foot barrel or
     thereabouts, putting the forefinger of his right hand into
     the muzzle of said gun, and that he held it out at arms' end,
     only with that finger: and further this deponent testifieth,
     that, at the same time, he saw the said Burrows take up a
     full barrel of molasses with but two of the fingers of one of
     his hands in the bung, and carry it from the stage head to
     the door at the end of the stage, without letting it down;
     and that Lieutenant Richard Hunniwell and John Greenslitt
     were then present, and some others that are dead. Sept. 15,
     '92."

Not only the date to this deposition, but its express language, proves
that it could not have been used at the trial. There is another, to
the same effect and of the same date, that is, nearly a month after
Burroughs was thrown into his grave. There are others of the same
kind. This stamps the management of the prosecutions, and of those
concerned in the charge of the papers, with an irregularity of the
grossest kind, which partakes strongly of the character of fraud and
falsehood.

When it was found that there was beginning to grow up a want of
confidence in "spectre evidence" and the testimony of the afflicted
children, those concerned in the prosecutions became alarmed lest a
re-action of public sentiment might take place. The persons who had
brought Mr. Burroughs to his death concluded that their best escape
from public indignation was to accumulate evidence against him after
he was in his grave, particularly on the point of his superhuman
strength; and they got up these depositions, and caused them to be put
among the papers on file. Great stress was laid, by those who were
interested in damaging his character and suppressing sympathy in his
fate, upon this particular proof of his having been in confederacy
with the Devil. Increase Mather said, that, in his judgment, it was
conclusive evidence that he "had the Devil to be his familiar," and
that, had he been on the jury, he could not, on this account, have
concurred in a verdict of acquittal; and Cotton Mather, feeling the
importance of making the most of Mr. Burroughs's extraordinary
strength, gives way to his tendency to indulge in the marvellous, as
follows:--

     "God had been pleased so to leave this George Burroughs,
     that he had ensnared himself by several instances which he
     had formerly given of preternatural strength, and which were
     now produced against him. He was a very puny man, yet he had
     often done things beyond the strength of a giant. A gun of
     about seven-foot barrel, and so heavy that strong men could
     not steadily hold it out with both hands,--there were
     several testimonies given in by persons of credit and honor,
     that he made nothing of taking up such a gun behind the lock
     with but one hand, and holding it out, like a pistol, at
     arms' end. Yea, there were two testimonies, that George
     Burroughs, with only putting the forefinger of his right
     hand into the muzzle of a heavy gun, a fowling-piece of
     about six or seven foot barrel, did lift up the gun, and
     hold it out at arms' end,--a gun which the deponents thought
     strong men could not with both hands lift up, and hold at
     the butt end, as is usual."

It is further observable, in reference to the foregoing deposition
from Greenslitt, that it was given six days after the condemnation of
his mother, Ann Pudeator, and a week before her execution. Cotton
Mather says that he "was overpersuaded by others to be out of the way
upon George Burroughs's trial," six weeks before. He did not fail,
however, to come to Salem to be with his mother at her trial and until
her death, and being here was compelled to give his deposition. His
mother's life was at the mercy of the prosecutors; and he was tempted,
in the vain hope of conciliating that mercy, to gratify them by making
the statement about Burroughs a month after his execution, and whom it
could not then harm. What he said was probably no more than the truth.
It has been found that the power of the human muscles can be
cultivated to a surprising extent; and the feats ascribed to
Burroughs, without making much allowance for a natural degree of
exaggeration, have been fully equalled in our day.

Calef gives the following account of his execution:--

     "Mr. Burroughs was carried in a cart with the others,
     through the streets of Salem, to execution. When he was upon
     the ladder, he made a speech for the clearing of his
     innocency, with such solemn and serious expressions as were
     to the admiration of all present. His prayer (which he
     concluded by repeating the Lord's Prayer) was so well
     worded, and uttered with such composedness and such (at
     least seeming) fervency of spirit, as was very affecting,
     and drew tears from many, so that it seemed to some that the
     spectators would hinder the execution. The accusers said the
     black man stood and dictated to him. As soon as he was
     turned off, Mr. Cotton Mather, being mounted upon a horse,
     addressed himself to the people, partly to declare that he
     (Mr. Burroughs) was no ordained minister, and partly to
     possess the people of his guilt, saying that the Devil often
     had been transformed into an angel of light; and this
     somewhat appeased the people, and the executions went on.
     When he was cut down, he was dragged by a halter to a hole,
     or grave, between the rocks, about two feet deep; his shirt
     and breeches being pulled off, and an old pair of trousers
     of one executed put on his lower parts: he was so put in,
     together with Willard and Carrier, that one of his hands,
     and his chin, and a foot of one of them, was left
     uncovered."

Cotton Mather, not satisfied with this display of animosity, at a
moment when every human heart, however imbittered by prejudice, is
hushed for the time in solemn silence, attempts, in an account
afterwards given of Mr. Burroughs's trial, to blacken his character by
an elaborate dressing-up of the absurd stories told by the accusers,
and a perverse misrepresentation of the demeanor of the accused. He
relates with apparent glee what was regarded as a wonderful
achievement of adroitness on the part of Chief-justice Stoughton in
trapping Mr. Burroughs, and putting the laugh upon him in Court.

     "It cost the Court a wonderful deal of trouble to hear the
     testimonies of the sufferers; for, when they were going to
     give in their depositions, they would for a long while be
     taken with fits, that made them quite uncapable of saying
     any thing. The chief judge asked the prisoner, who he
     thought hindered these witnesses from giving their
     testimonies; and he answered, he supposed it was the Devil.
     The honorable person then replied, 'How comes the Devil so
     loath to have any testimony borne against you?' Which cast
     him into very great confusion."

From what fell from him, at the preliminary examination, it is evident
that it did not occur to him as a possibility that human nature could
be capable of the guilt of such a wilful fabrication and imposture on
the part of the "afflicted children." He beheld their sufferings, and
he knew his own innocence. He felt, whatever his theological creed
might have been, that a Devil was required to explain the mystery. The
apparent sufferings of the accusing witnesses convinced Court, jury,
and all, of the guilt of the accused. The logic of the chief-justice
was perfectly absurd. For, if the Devil caused the sufferings, he was
an adverse party to the prisoner. This, however, overthrows the whole
theory of the prosecution, which was that the prisoner and the Devil
were in league with each other. But the judge, jury, and people, all
equally blinded and stupefied by the delusion, did not see it; and
they chuckled over the alleged confusion of the prisoner. All
thoughtful persons will concur in Mr. Burroughs's opinion, that, if
ever a diabolical power had possession of human beings, it was in the
case of the wretched creatures who enacted the part of the accusing
girls in the witchcraft proceedings. In his account of the trial,
Mather makes statements which show that he was privy to the fact, that
testimony, subsequently taken, was lodged with the evidence belonging
to the case. The documents prove that it was done to an extent beyond
what he acknowledges.

Considering that none dared to show the least sympathy with the
persons on trial, that they had none to counsel or stand by them, that
the public passions were incensed against them as against no other
persons ever charged with crime,--it being vastly more flagrant than
any other crime, a rebellion against heaven and earth, God and man; a
deliberate selling of the soul to the Arch-enemy of souls for the ruin
of all other souls,--in view of all these things, it is truly
astonishing, that, by the documents themselves, proceeding, as in
almost all cases they do, from hostile and imbittered sources, we are
compelled to the conviction, that, in their imprisonments, trials, and
deaths, the victims of this savage delusion manifested--in most cases
eminently, and in all substantially--the marks, not only of innocent,
but of elevated and heroic minds. A review of what can be gleaned in
reference to Mr. Burroughs at Casco Bay and Salem Village, and a
considerate survey and scrutiny of all that has reached us from the
day of his arrest to the moment of his death, have left a decided
impression, that he was an able, intelligent, true-minded man;
ingenuous, sincere, humble in his spirit; faithful and devoted as a
minister; and active, generous, and disinterested as a citizen. His
descendants, under his own name and the names of Newman, Fowle,
Holbrook, Fox, Thomas, and others, have been numerous and respectable.
The late Isaiah Thomas, LL.D., was one of them.

From the account given of John Procter, in the First Part, it is
apparent that he was a person of decided character, and, although
impulsive and liable to be imprudent, of a manly spirit, honest,
earnest, and bold in word and deed. He saw through the whole thing,
and was convinced that it was the result of a conspiracy, deliberate
and criminal, on the part of the accusers. He gave free utterance to
his indignation at their conduct, and it cost him his life.

A few days before his trial, he made his will. There is no reference
in it to his particular situation. His signature to the document is
accurately represented among the autographs given in this work. It was
written while the manacles were on him. Notwithstanding the danger to
which any one was exposed who expressed sympathy for convicted or
accused persons, or doubt of their guilt, a large number had the
manliness to try to save this worthy and honest citizen. John Wise,
one of the ministers of Ipswich, heads the list of petitioners from
that place. The document is in his handwriting. Thirty-one others
joined in the act, many of them among the most respectable citizens of
that town. Mr. Wise was a learned, able, and enlightened man. He had a
free spirit, and was perhaps the only minister in the neighborhood or
country, who was discerning enough to see the erroneousness of the
proceedings from the beginning. The petition is as follows:--

     "_The Humble and Sincere Declaration of us, Subscribers,
     Inhabitants in Ipswich, on the Behalf of our Neighbors, John
     Procter and his Wife, now in Trouble and under Suspicion of
     Witchcraft._

     "TO THE HONORABLE COURT OF ASSISTANTS NOW SITTING IN BOSTON.

     "_Honored and Right Worshipful_,--The aforesaid John Procter
     may have great reason to justify the Divine Sovereignty of
     God under these severe remarks of Providence upon his peace
     and honor, under a due reflection upon his life past; and so
     the best of us have reason to adore the great pity and
     indulgence of God's providence, that we are not exposed to
     the utmost shame that the Devil can invent, under the
     permissions of sovereignty, though not for that sin
     forenamed, yet for our many transgressions. For we do at
     present suppose, that it may be a method within the severer
     but just transactions of the infinite majesty of God, that
     he sometimes may permit Sathan to personate, dissemble, and
     thereby abuse innocents and such as do, in the fear of God,
     defy the Devil and all his works. The great rage he is
     permitted to attempt holy Job with; the abuse he does the
     famous Samuel in disquieting his silent dust, by shadowing
     his venerable person in answer to the charms of witchcraft;
     and other instances from good hands,--may be arguments.
     Besides the unsearchable footsteps of God's judgments, that
     are brought to light every morning, that astonish our
     weaker reasons; to teach us adoration, trembling,
     dependence, &c. But we must not trouble Your Honors by being
     tedious. Therefore, being smitten with the notice of what
     hath happened, we reckon it within the duties of our
     charity, that teacheth us to do as we would be done by, to
     offer thus much for the clearing of our neighbors'
     innocency; viz., that we never had the least knowledge of
     such a nefandous wickedness in our said neighbors, since
     they have been within our acquaintance. Neither do we
     remember any such thoughts in us concerning them, or any
     action by them or either of them, directly tending that way,
     no more than might be in the lives of any other persons of
     the clearest reputation as to any such evils. What God may
     have left them to, we cannot go into God's pavilion clothed
     with clouds of darkness round about; but, as to what we have
     ever seen or heard of them, upon our consciences we judge
     them innocent of the crime objected. His breeding hath been
     amongst us, and was of religious parents in our place, and,
     by reason of relations and properties within our town, hath
     had constant intercourse with us. We speak upon our personal
     acquaintance and observation; and so leave our neighbors,
     and this our testimony on their behalf, to the wise thoughts
     of Your Honors.

     JNO. WISE.            NATHANILL PERKINS.   BENJAMIN MARSHALL.
     WILLIAM STORY Senr.   THOMAS LOVKINE.      JOHN ANDREWS Jur.
     REINALLD FOSTER.      WILLIAM COGSWELL.    WILLIAM BUTLER.
     THOS. CHOTE.          THOMAS VARNY.        WILLIAM ANDREWS.
     JOHN BURNUM Sr.       JOHN FELLOWS.        JOHN ANDREWS.
     WILLIAM THOMSONN.     WM. COGSWELL Jur.    JOHN CHOTE Ser.
     THO. LOW Senr.        JONATHAN COGSWELL.   JOSEPH PROCTER.
     ISAAC FOSTER.         JOHN COGSWELL Ju.    SAMUEL GIDDING.
     JOHN BURNUM junr.     JOHN COGSWELL.       JOSEPH EVLETH.
     WILLIAM GOODHEW.      THOMAS ANDREWS.      JAMES WHITE.
     ISAAC PERKINS.        JOSEPH ANDREWS."

I have given the names of the men who signed this paper, as copied
from the original. It is due to their memory; and their descendants
may well be gratified by the testimony thus borne to their courage and
justice.

Their neighbors living near the bounds of the village presented the
following paper, in the handwriting of Felton, the first signer. From
the appearance of the document, it seems that a portion of it,
probably containing an equal number of names, has been cut out by
scissors.

     "We whose names are underwritten, having several years known
     John Procter and his wife, do testify that we never heard or
     understood that they were ever suspected to be guilty of the
     crime now charged upon them; and several of us, being their
     near neighbors, do testify, that, to our apprehension, they
     lived Christian-like in their family, and were ever ready to
     help such as stood in need of their help.

     "NATHANIEL FELTON, Sr., and MARY his wife.
     SAMUEL MARSH, and PRISCILLA his wife.
     JAMES HOULTON, and RUTH his wife.
     JOHN FELTON.
     NATHANIEL FELTON, Jr.
     SAMUEL FRAYLL, and AN his wife.
     ZACHARIAH MARSH, and MARY his wife.
     SAMUEL ENDECOTT, and HANAH his wife.
     SAMUEL STONE.
     GEORGE LOCKER.
     SAMUEL GASKIL, and PROVIDED his wife.
     GEORGE SMITH.
     EDWARD GASKIL."

In addition to this testimony in their favor, evidence was offered, at
their trial, that one of the accusing witnesses had denied, out of
Court, what she had sworn to in Court; and declared that she must, at
the time, have been "out of her head," and that she had never intended
to accuse them. It was further proved, that another of the accusing
witnesses acknowledged that she had sworn falsely, and tried to
explain away her testimony in Court, acknowledging that what the girls
said was "for sport. They must have some sport." But neither the
testimony in their favor from those who had known them through life,
nor the palpable and decisive manner in which the evidence against
them had been impeached and exposed, could open the eyes of the
infatuated Court and jury.

After his conviction, he requested, in vain, time enough to prepare
himself for death, and make the necessary arrangements of his business
and for the welfare of his family; and the statement has come down to
us, that Mr. Noyes refused to pray with him, unless he would confess
himself guilty. The following letter, addressed by him to the
ministers named, in behalf of himself and fellow-prisoners, gives a
truly shocking account of the outrages connected with the
prosecutions. It illustrates the courage of the writer in exposing
them, and is a sensible and manly appeal and remonstrance. There is
ground for supposing that the ministers addressed were known not to be
entirely carried away by the delusion. The fact that Mr.
Mather--meaning, of course, Increase Mather--is the first named,
corroborates other evidence that he was beginning to entertain doubts
about the propriety of the proceedings. Of the Rev. James Allen, much
has been said in connection with the Townsend-Bishop farm. He had been
a clergyman in England, and was silenced by the Act of Uniformity, in
1662. He came to New England; and, after officiating as an assistant
to the Rev. Mr. Davenport, in the First Church at Boston, for six
years, was ordained as its preacher in 1668. He was of independent
fortune, and subsequently took a leading part with those opposed to
the party that had favored the witchcraft prosecutions. He must have
known Rebecca Nurse quite intimately, and much of the influence used
in her favor, and which almost saved her, may be attributed to him;
there was a particular intimacy between him and Increase Mather, and
together they held Cotton Mather somewhat in check, occasionally at
least. The Rev. Joshua Moody had been settled in the ministry at
Portsmouth, New Hampshire. In the maintenance of the principles of
religious liberty he suffered a long imprisonment, and was afterwards
exiled by arbitrary power. He was then invited to the First Church in
Boston, where he preached from 1684 to 1693, when he returned to
Portsmouth. He died in 1697. By his active exertions, Mr. and Mrs.
English were enabled to escape from the jail at Boston. The Rev.
Samuel Willard, pastor of the Old South Church in Boston, was one of
the most revered and beloved ministers in the country. His
publications were numerous, learned, and valuable; consisting of
discourses, tracts, and volumes. His "Body of Divinity" is an
elaborate and systematic work, comprising two hundred and fifty
lectures on the Assembly's Catechism. That Procter was not in error in
supposing Mr. Willard open to reason on the subject is demonstrated by
the fact, that the "afflicted girls" were beginning to cry out against
this eminent divine. The Rev. John Bailey was one of the ejected
ministers who had here sought refuge from oppression in the
mother-country. He was a distinguished person, associated with Mr.
Allen and Mr. Moody in the ministry of the First Church at Boston.
Cotton Mather made him the subject of the strongest eulogium in his
"Magnalia." Procter addressed his letter to these persons because he
believed them to be superior in wisdom and candid in spirit. It cannot
be doubted that the good men did what they could in his behalf, but in
vain.

     "SALEM PRISON, July 23, 1692.

     "_Mr. Mather, Mr. Allen, Mr. Moody, Mr. Willard, and Mr.
     Bailey._

     "REVEREND GENTLEMEN,--The innocency of our case, with the
     enmity of our accusers and our judges and jury, whom nothing
     but our innocent blood will serve, having condemned us
     already before our trials, being so much incensed and enraged
     against us by the Devil, makes us bold to beg and implore
     your favorable assistance of this our humble petition to His
     Excellency, that if it be possible our innocent blood may be
     spared, which undoubtedly otherwise will be shed, if the Lord
     doth not mercifully step in; the magistrates, ministers,
     juries, and all the people in general, being so much enraged
     and incensed against us by the delusion of the Devil, which
     we can term no other, by reason we know, in our own
     consciences, we are all innocent persons. Here are five
     persons who have lately confessed themselves to be witches,
     and do accuse some of us of being along with them at a
     sacrament, since we were committed into close prison, which
     we know to be lies. Two of the five are (Carrier's sons)
     young men, who would not confess any thing till they tied
     them neck and heels, till the blood was ready to come out of
     their noses; and it is credibly believed and reported this
     was the occasion of making them confess what they never did,
     by reason they said one had been a witch a month, and another
     five weeks, and that their mother made them so, who has been
     confined here this nine weeks. My son, William Procter, when
     he was examined, because he would not confess that he was
     guilty, when he was innocent, they tied him neck and heels
     till the blood gushed out at his nose, and would have kept
     him so twenty-four hours, if one, more merciful than the
     rest, had not taken pity on him, and caused him to be
     unbound.

     "These actions are very like the Popish cruelties. They have
     already undone us in our estates, and that will not serve
     their turns without our innocent blood. If it cannot be
     granted that we can have our trials at Boston, we humbly beg
     that you would endeavor to have these magistrates changed,
     and others in their room; begging also and beseeching you,
     that you would be pleased to be here, if not all, some of
     you, at our trials, hoping thereby you may be the means of
     saving the shedding of our innocent blood. Desiring your
     prayers to the Lord in our behalf, we rest, your poor
     afflicted servants,

     "JOHN PROCTER [and others]."

The bitterness of the prosecutors against Procter was so vehement,
that they not only arrested, and tried to destroy, his wife and all
his family above the age of infancy, in Salem, but all her relatives
in Lynn, many of whom were thrown into prison. The helpless children
were left destitute, and the house swept of its provisions by the
sheriff. Procter's wife gave birth to a child, about a fortnight after
his execution. This indicates to what alone she owed her life.

John Procter had spoken so boldly against the proceedings, and all who
had part in them, that it was felt to be necessary to put him out of
the way. He had denounced the entire company of the accusers, and
their revenge demanded his sacrifice. They brought the whole power of
their cunning and audacious arts to bear against him, and pursued him
to the death with violence and rage. The manly and noble deportment
exhibited in his dying hour seems to have made a deep impression on
the minds of some, and gave an effectual blow to the delusion. The
descendants of John Procter have always understood that his remains
were recovered from the spot where the hangman deposited them, and
placed in his own grounds, where they rest to-day.

[Illustration: [signatures]]

[Illustration: [signatures]]

No account has come to us of the deportment of George Jacobs, Sr., at
his execution. As he was remarkable in life for the firmness of his
mind, so he probably was in death. He had made his will before the
delusion arose. It is dated Jan. 29, 1692; and shows that he, like
Procter, had a considerable estate. Bartholomew Gedney is one of
the attesting witnesses, and probably wrote the document. After his
conviction, on the 12th of August, he caused another to be written,
which, in its provisions, reflects light upon the state of mind
produced by the condition in which he found himself. In his infirm old
age, he had been condemned to die for a crime of which he knew himself
innocent, and which there is some reason to believe he did not think
any one capable of committing. He regarded the whole thing as a wicked
conspiracy and absurd fabrication. He had to end his long life upon a
scaffold in a week from that day. His house was desolated, and his
property sequestered. His only son, charged with the same crime, had
eluded the sheriff,--leaving his family, in the hurry of his flight,
unprovided for--and was an exile in foreign lands. The crazy wife of
that son was in prison and in chains, waiting trial on the same
charge; her little children, including an unweaned infant, left in a
deserted and destitute condition in the woods. The older children were
scattered, he knew not where, while one of them had completed the
bitterness of his lot by becoming a confessor, upon being arrested
with her mother as a witch. This grand-daughter, Margaret, overwhelmed
with fright and horror, bewildered by the statements of the accusers,
and controlled probably by the arguments and arbitrary methods of
address employed by her minister, Mr. Noyes,--whose peculiar function
in these proceedings seems to have been to drive persons accused to
make confession--had been betrayed into that position, and became a
confessor, and accuser of others. Under these circumstances, the old
man made a will, giving to his son George his estates, and securing
the succession of them to his male descendants. But, in the mean
while, without his then knowing it, Margaret had recalled her
confession, as appears from the following documents, which tell their
own story:--

     "_The Humble Declaration of Margaret Jacobs unto the Honored
     Court now sitting at Salem showeth_, that, whereas your poor
     and humble declarant, being closely confined here in Salem
     jail for the crime of witchcraft,--which crime, thanks be to
     the Lord! I am altogether ignorant of, as will appear at the
     great day of judgment,--may it please the honored Court, I
     was cried out upon by some of the possessed persons as
     afflicting them; whereupon I was brought to my examination;
     which persons at the sight of me fell down, which did very
     much startle and affright me. The Lord above knows I knew
     nothing in the least measure how or who afflicted them. They
     told me, without doubt I did, or else they would not fall
     down at me; they told me, if I would not confess, I should
     be put down into the dungeon, and would be hanged, but, if I
     would confess, I should have my life: the which did so
     affright me, with my own vile, wicked heart, to save my
     life, made me make the like confession I did, which
     confession, may it please the honored Court, is altogether
     false and untrue. The very first night after I had made
     confession, I was in such horror of conscience that I could
     not sleep, for fear the Devil should carry me away for
     telling such horrid lies. I was, may it please the honored
     Court, sworn to my confession, as I understand since; but
     then, at that time, was ignorant of it, not knowing what an
     oath did mean. The Lord, I hope, in whom I trust, out of the
     abundance of his mercy, will forgive me my false forswearing
     myself. What I said was altogether false against my
     grandfather and Mr. Burroughs, which I did to save my life,
     and to have my liberty: but the Lord, charging it to my
     conscience, made me in so much horror, that I could not
     contain myself before I had denied my confession, which I
     did, though I saw nothing but death before me; choosing
     rather death with a quiet conscience, than to live in such
     horror, which I could not suffer. Where, upon my denying my
     confession, I was committed to close prison, where I have
     enjoyed more felicity in spirit, a thousand times, than I
     did before in my enlargement. And now, may it please Your
     Honors, your declarant having in part given Your Honors a
     description of my condition, do leave it to Your Honors'
     pious and judicious discretions to take pity and compassion
     on my young and tender years, to act and do with me as the
     Lord above and Your Honors shall see good, having no friend
     but the Lord to plead my cause for me; not being guilty, in
     the least measure, of the crime of witchcraft, nor any other
     sin that deserves death from man. And your poor and humble
     declarant shall for ever pray, as she is bound in duty, for
     Your Honors' happiness in this life, and eternal felicity in
     the world to come. So prays Your Honors' declarant,

     MARGARET JACOBS."

The following letter was written by this same young person to her
father. Let it be observed that her grandfather had been executed the
day before, partly upon her false testimony.

     "_From the Dungeon in Salem Prison._

     "AUGUST 20, 1692.

     "HONORED FATHER,--After my humble duty remembered to you,
     hoping in the Lord of your good health, as, blessed be God! I
     enjoy, though in abundance of affliction, being close
     confined here in a loathsome dungeon: the Lord look down in
     mercy upon me, not knowing how soon I shall be put to death,
     by means of the afflicted persons; my grandfather having
     suffered already, and all his estate seized for the king. The
     reason of my confinement is this: I having, through the
     magistrates' threatenings, and my own vile and wretched
     heart, confessed several things contrary to my conscience and
     knowledge, though to the wounding of my own soul; (the Lord
     pardon me for it!) but, oh! the terrors of a wounded
     conscience who can bear? But, blessed be the Lord! he would
     not let me go on in my sins, but in mercy, I hope, to my
     soul, would not suffer me to keep it any longer: but I was
     forced to confess the truth of all before the magistrates,
     who would not believe me; but it is their pleasure to put me
     in here, and God knows how soon I shall be put to death. Dear
     father, let me beg your prayers to the Lord on my behalf, and
     send us a joyful and happy meeting in heaven. My mother, poor
     woman, is very crazy, and remembers her kind love to you, and
     to uncle; viz., D.A. So, leaving you to the protection of the
     Lord, I rest, your dutiful daughter,

     MARGARET JACOBS."

A temporary illness led to the postponement of her trial; and, before
the next sitting of the Court, the delusion had passed away.

The "uncle D.A.," referred to, was Daniel Andrew, their nearest
neighbor, who had escaped at the same time with her father. She calls
him "uncle." He was, it is probable, a brother of John Andrew who had
married Ann Jacobs, sister of her father. Words of relationship were
then used with a wide sense.

Margaret read the recantation of her confession before the Court, and
was, as she says, forthwith ordered by them into a dungeon. She
obtained permission to visit Mr. Burroughs the day before his
execution, acknowledged that she had belied him, and implored his
forgiveness. He freely forgave, and prayed with her and for her. It is
probable, that, at the same time, she obtained an interview with her
grandfather for the same purpose. At any rate, the old man heard of
her heroic conduct, and forthwith crowded into the space between two
paragraphs in his will, in small letters closely written (the jailer
probably being the amanuensis), a clause giving a legacy of "ten
pounds to be paid in silver" to his grand-daughter, Margaret Jacobs.
There is the usual declaration, that it "was inserted before sealing
and signing." This will having been made after conviction and sentence
to death, and having but two witnesses, one besides the jailer, was
not allowed in Probate, but remains among the files of that Court. As
a link in the foregoing story, it is an interesting relic. The legacy
clause, although not operative, was no doubt of inexpressible value to
the feelings of Margaret: and the circumstance seems to have touched
the heart even of the General Court, nearly twenty years afterwards;
for they took pains specifically to provide to have the same sum paid
to Margaret, out of the Province treasury.

She was not tried at the time appointed, in consequence, it is stated,
of "an imposthume in the head," and finally escaped the fate to which
she chose to consign herself, rather than remain under a violated
conscience. In judging of her, we cannot fail to make allowance for
her "young and tender years," and to sympathize in the sufferings
through which she passed. In making confession, and in accusing
others, she had done that which filled her heart with horror, in the
retrospect, so long as she lived. In recanting it, and giving her body
to the dungeon, and offering her life at the scaffold, she had secured
the forgiveness of Mr. Burroughs and her aged grandfather, and
deserves our forgiveness and admiration. Every human heart must
rejoice that this young girl was saved. She lived to be a worthy
matron and the founder of a numerous and respectable family.

George Jacobs, Sr., is the only one, among the victims of the
witchcraft prosecutions, the precise spot of whose burial is
absolutely ascertained.

[Illustration: THE JACOBS HOUSE.]

The tradition has descended through the family, that the body, after
having been obtained at the place of execution, was strapped by a
young grandson on the back of a horse, brought home to the farm, and
buried beneath the shade of his own trees. Two sunken and weather-worn
stones marked the spot. There the remains rested until 1864, when they
were exhumed. They were enclosed again, and reverently redeposited in
the same place. The skull was in a state of considerable preservation.
An examination of the jawbones showed that he was a very old man at
the time of his death, and had previously lost all his teeth. The
length of some parts of the skeleton showed that he was a very tall
man. These circumstances corresponded with the evidence, which was
that he was tall of stature; so infirm as to walk with two staffs;
with long, flowing white hair. The only article found, except the
bones, was a metallic pin, which might have been used as a breastpin,
or to hold together his aged locks. It is an observable fact, that he
rests in his own ground still. He had lived for a great length of time
on that spot; and it remains in his family and in his name to this
day, having come down by direct descent. It is a beautiful locality:
the land descends with a gradual and smooth declivity to the bank of
the river. It is not much more than a mile from the city of Salem, and
in full view from the main road.

John Willard appears to have been an honest and amiable person, an
industrious farmer, having a comfortable estate, with a wife and three
young children. He was a grandson of Old Bray Wilkins; whether by
blood or marriage, I have not been able to ascertain. The indications
are that he married a daughter of Thomas or Henry Wilkins, most
probably the former, with both of whom he was a joint possessor of
lands. He came from Groton; and it is for local antiquaries to
discover whether he was a relative of the Rev. Samuel Willard of
Boston. If so, the fact would shed much light upon our story. There
is but one piece of evidence among the papers relating to his trial
that deserves particular notice. It shows the horrid character of the
charges made by the girls against prisoners at the bar, from their
nature incapable of being refuted and which the prisoners knew to be
false, but the Court, jury, and crowd implicitly believed. It also
illustrates the completeness of the machinery got up by the "accusing
girls" to give effect to their evidence. In addition to the evil
gossip that could be scoured from all the country round, and to
spectres of witches and ghosts of the dead, they brought into the
scene angels and divine beings, and testified to what they were told
by them. "The shining man," or the white man, was meant, in the
following deposition, to be a spirit of this description:--

     "THE TESTIMONY OF SUSANNA SHELDON, aged eighteen years or
     thereabouts.--Testifieth and saith, that, the day of the date
     hereof (9th of May, 1692), I saw at Nathaniel Ingersoll's
     house the apparitions of these four persons,--William Shaw's
     first wife, the Widow Cook, Goodman Jones and his child; and
     among these came the apparition of John Willard, to whom
     these four said, 'You have murdered us.' These four having
     said thus to Willard, they turned as red as blood. And,
     turning about to look at me, they turned as pale as death.
     These four desired me to tell Mr. Hathorne. Willard, hearing
     them, pulled out a knife, saying, if I did, he would cut my
     throat."

The deponent goes on to say, that these several apparitions came
before her on another occasion, and the same language and actions took
place, and adds:--

     "There did appear to me a shining man, who said I should go
     and tell what I had heard and seen to Mr. Hathorne. This
     Willard, being there present, told me, if I did, he would
     cut my throat. At this time and place, this shining man told
     me, that if I did go to tell this to Mr. Hathorne, that I
     should be well, going and coming, but I should be afflicted
     there. Then said I to the shining man, 'Hunt Willard away,
     and I would believe what he said, that he might not choke
     me.' With that the shining man held up his hand, and Willard
     vanished away. About two hours after, the same appeared to
     me again, and the said Willard with them; and I asked them
     where their wounds were, and they said there would come an
     angel from heaven, and would show them. And forthwith the
     angel came. I asked what the man's name was that appeared to
     me last, and the angel told his name was Southwick. And the
     angel lifted up his winding-sheet, and out of his left side
     he pulled a pitchfork tine, and put it in again, and
     likewise he opened all the winding-sheets, and showed all
     their wounds. And the white man told me to tell Mr. Hathorne
     of it, and I told him to hunt Willard away, and I would; and
     he held up his hand, and he vanished away."

In the same deposition, this girl testifies that "she saw this Willard
suckle the apparitions of two black pigs on his breasts;" that Willard
told her he had been a witch twenty years; that she saw Willard and
other wizards kneel in prayer "to the black man with a long-crowned
hat, and then they vanished away."

Such was the kind of testimony which the Court received with
awe-struck and bewildered credulity, and which took away the lives of
valuable and blameless men. All we know of the manner of Willard's
death is a passage from Brattle, who states that a deep impression was
produced by the admirable deportment of the sufferers during the awful
scenes before and at their executions; giving every evidence of
conscious innocence and a Christian character and faith, on the part
especially of "Procter and Willard, whose whole management of
themselves from the jail to the gallows, and whilst at the gallows,
was very affecting, and melting to the hearts of some considerable
spectators whom I could mention to you: but they are executed, and so
I leave them."

On the 9th of September, the Court met again; and _Martha Corey_,
_Mary Easty_, _Alice Parker_, _Ann Pudeator_, Dorcas Hoar, and Mary
Bradbury were tried and condemned; and, on the 17th, _Margaret Scott_,
_Wilmot Reed_, _Samuel Wardwell_, _Mary Parker_, Abigail Faulkner,
Rebecca Eames, Mary Lacy, Ann Foster, and Abigail Hobbs received the
same sentence. Those in Italics were executed Sept. 22, 1692. Of the
circumstances in relation to them, in reference to their death and at
the time of their execution, but little information has reached us.
The following extract from Mr. Parris's church-records presents a
striking picture:--

     "11 September, Lord's Day.--Sister Martha Corey--taken into
     the church 27 April, 1690--was, after examination upon
     suspicion of witchcraft, 27 March, 1692, committed to prison
     for that fact, and was condemned to the gallows for the
     same yesterday; and was this day in public, by a general
     consent, voted to be excommunicated out of the church, and
     Lieutenant Nathaniel Putnam and the two deacons chosen to
     signify to her, with the pastor, the mind of the church
     herein. Accordingly, this 14 September, 1692, the three
     aforesaid brethren went with the pastor to her in Salem
     Prison; whom we found very obdurate, justifying herself, and
     condemning all that had done any thing to her just discovery
     or condemnation. Whereupon, after a little discourse (for
     her imperiousness would not suffer much), and after
     prayer,--which she was willing to decline,--the dreadful
     sentence of excommunication was pronounced against her."

Calef informs us, that "Martha Corey, protesting her innocency,
concluded her life with an eminent prayer upon the ladder."

Nothing has reached us particularly relating to the manner of death of
Alice or Mary Parker, Ann Pudeator, Margaret Scott, or Wilmot Reed.
They all asserted their innocence; and their deportment gave no ground
for any unfavorable comment by their persecutors, who were on the
watch to turn every act, word, or look of the sufferers to their
disparagement. Wilmot Reed probably adhered to the unresisting
demeanor which marked her examination. It was all a mystery to her;
and to every question she answered, "I know nothing about it." Of Mary
Easty it is grateful to have some account. Her own declarations in
vindication of her innocence are fortunately preserved; and her noble
record is complete in the following documents. The first appears to
have been addressed to the Special Court, and was presented
immediately before the trial of Mary Easty. No explanation has come
down to us why Sarah Cloyse was not then also brought to trial.
Circumstances to which we have no clew rescued her from the fate of
her sisters.

     "_The Humble Request of Mary Easty and Sarah Cloyse to the
     Honored Court humbly showeth_, that, whereas we two sisters,
     Mary Easty and Sarah Cloyse, stand now before the honored
     Court charged with the suspicion of witchcraft, our humble
     request is--First, that, seeing we are neither able to plead
     our own cause, nor is counsel allowed to those in our
     condition, that you who are our judges would please to be of
     counsel to us, to direct us wherein we may stand in need.
     Secondly, that, whereas we are not conscious to ourselves of
     any guilt in the least degree of that crime whereof we are
     now accused (in the presence of the living God we speak it,
     before whose awful tribunal we know we shall ere long
     appear), nor of any other scandalous evil or miscarriage
     inconsistent with Christianity, those who have had the
     longest and best knowledge of us, being persons of good
     report, may be suffered to testify upon oath what they know
     concerning each of us; viz., Mr. Capen, the pastor, and
     those of the town and church of Topsfield, who are ready to
     say something which we hope may be looked upon as very
     considerable in this matter, with the seven children of one
     of us; viz., Mary Easty: and it may be produced of like
     nature in reference to the wife of Peter Cloyse, her sister.
     Thirdly, that the testimony of witches, or such as are
     afflicted as is supposed by witches, may not be improved to
     condemn us without other legal evidence concurring. We hope
     the honored Court and jury will be so tender of the lives of
     such as we are, who have for many years lived under the
     unblemished reputation of Christianity, as not to condemn
     them without a fair and equal hearing of what may be said
     for us as well as against us. And your poor suppliants shall
     be bound always to pray, &c."

The following was presented by Mary Easty to the judges after she had
received sentence of death. It would be hard to find, in all the
records of human suffering and of Christian deportment under them, a
more affecting production. It is a most beautiful specimen of strong
good-sense, pious fortitude and faith, genuine dignity of soul, noble
benevolence, and the true eloquence of a pure heart; and was evidently
composed by her own hand. It may be said of her--and there can be no
higher eulogium--that she felt for others more than for herself.

     "_The Humble Petition of Mary Easty unto his Excellency Sir
     William Phips, and to the Honored Judge and Bench now
     sitting in Judicature in Salem, and the Reverend Ministers,
     humbly showeth_, that, whereas your poor and humble
     petitioner, being condemned to die, do humbly beg of you to
     take it in your judicious and pious consideration, that your
     poor and humble petitioner, knowing my own innocency,
     blessed be the Lord for it! and seeing plainly the wiles and
     subtilty of my accusers by myself, cannot but judge
     charitably of others that are going the same way of myself,
     if the Lord steps not mightily in. I was confined a whole
     month upon the same account that I am condemned now for,
     and then cleared by the afflicted persons, as some of Your
     Honors know. And in two days' time I was cried out upon
     them, and have been confined, and now am condemned to die.
     The Lord above knows my innocency then, and likewise does
     now, as at the great day will be known to men and angels. I
     petition to Your Honors not for my own life, for I know I
     must die, and my appointed time is set; but the Lord he
     knows it is that, if it be possible, no more innocent blood
     may be shed, which undoubtedly cannot be avoided in the way
     and course you go in. I question not but Your Honors do to
     the utmost of your powers in the discovery and detecting of
     witchcraft and witches, and would not be guilty of innocent
     blood for the world. But, by my own innocency, I know you
     are in the wrong way. The Lord in his infinite mercy direct
     you in this great work, if it be his blessed will that no
     more innocent blood be shed! I would humbly beg of you, that
     Your Honors would be pleased to examine these afflicted
     persons strictly, and keep them apart some time, and
     likewise to try some of these confessing witches; I being
     confident there is several of them, has belied themselves
     and others, as will appear, if not in this world, I am sure
     in the world to come, whither I am now agoing. I question
     not but you will see an alteration of these things. They say
     myself and others having made a league with the Devil, we
     cannot confess. I know, and the Lord knows, as will ...
     appear, they belie me, and so I question not but they do
     others. The Lord above, who is the Searcher of all hearts,
     knows, as I shall answer it at the tribunal seat, that I
     know not the least thing of witchcraft; therefore I cannot,
     I dare not, belie my own soul. I beg Your Honors not to deny
     this my humble petition from a poor, dying, innocent person.
     And I question not but the Lord will give a blessing to your
     endeavors."

The parting interview of this admirable woman with her husband,
children, and friends, as she was about proceeding to the place of
execution, is said to have been a most solemn, affecting, and truly
sublime scene. Calef says that her farewell communications, on this
occasion, were reported, by persons who listened to them, to have been
"as serious, religious, distinct, and affectionate as could well be
expressed, drawing tears from the eyes of almost all present."

Ann Pudeator had been formerly the wife of a person named Greenslitt,
who left her with five children. Her subsequent husband, Jacob
Pudeator, died in 1682, and by will gave her his whole estate, after
the payment of legacies, of five pounds each, to her Greenslitt
children, who appear to have been living in 1692 at Casco Bay. These
provisions, as well as the expressions used by Pudeator, indicate that
he regarded her with affection and esteem. The following document is
all that we know else of her character particularly, except that she
was a kind neighbor, and ever prompt in offices of charity and
sympathy.

     "_The Humble Petition of Ann Pudeator unto the Honored Judge
     and Bench now sitting in Judicature in Salem, humbly
     showeth_, that, whereas your poor and humble petitioner,
     being condemned to die, and knowing in my own conscience, as
     I shall shortly answer it before the great God of heaven,
     who is the Searcher and Knower of all hearts, that the
     evidence of Jno. Best, Sr., and Jno. Best, Jr., and Samuel
     Pickworth, which was given in against me in Court, were all
     of them altogether false and untrue, and, besides the
     abovesaid Jno. Best hath been formerly whipped and likewise
     is recorded for a liar. I would humbly beg of Your Honors to
     take it into your judicious and pious consideration, that my
     life may not be taken away by such false evidences and
     witnesses as these be; likewise, the evidence given in
     against me by Sarah Churchill and Mary Warren I am
     altogether ignorant of, and know nothing in the least
     measure about it, nor nothing else concerning the crime of
     witchcraft, for which I am condemned to die, as will be
     known to men and angels at the great day of judgment.
     Begging and imploring your prayers at the Throne of Grace in
     my behalf, and your poor and humble petitioner shall for
     ever pray, as she is bound in duty, for Your Honors' health
     and happiness in this life, and eternal felicity in the
     world to come."

Abigail, the wife of Francis Faulkner, and daughter of the Rev.
Francis Dane, of Andover, who was among those sentenced on the 17th of
September, had been examined, on the 11th of August, by Hathorne,
Corwin, and Captain John Higginson, sitting as magistrates. Upon the
prisoner's being brought in, the afflicted fell down, and went into
fits, as usual. The magistrates asked the prisoner what she had to
say. She replied, "I know nothing of it." The girls then renewed their
performances, declaring that her shape was at that moment torturing
them. The magistrates asked her if she did not see their sufferings.
She answered, "Yes; but it is the Devil does it in my shape." Ann
Putnam said that her spectre had afflicted her a few days before,
pulling her off her horse. Upon the touch of her person, the
sufferings of the afflicted would cease for a time. The prisoner held
a handkerchief in her hand. The girls would screech out, declaring
that, as she pressed the handkerchief, they were dreadfully squeezed.
She threw the handkerchief on the table; and they said, "There are the
shapes of Daniel Eames and Captain Floyd [two persons then in prison
on the charge of witchcraft] sitting on her handkerchief." Mary Warren
enacted the part of being dragged against her will under the table by
an invisible hand, from whose grasp she was at once released, upon the
prisoner's being made to touch her. Notwithstanding all this, she
protested her innocence, and was remanded to jail. On the 30th, she
was brought out again. In the mean while, six had been executed. The
usual means were employed to break her down; but all that was gained
was, that she owned she had expressed her indignation at the conduct
of the afflicted, and was much excited against them "for bringing her
kindred out, and she did wish them ill: and, her spirit being raised,
she did pinch her hands together, and she knew not but that the Devil
might take that advantage; but it was the Devil, and not she, that
afflicted them." This was the only concession she would make; and they
were puzzled to determine whether it was a confession, or not,--it
having rather the appearance of clearing herself from all implication
with the Devil, and leaving him on their hands--at any rate, they
concluded to regard it in the latter sense; and she was duly
convicted, and sentenced to death. Sir William Phips ordered a
reprieve; and, after she had been thirteen weeks in prison, he
directed her to be discharged on the ground of insufficient evidence.
This, I think, is the only instance of a special pardon granted during
the proceedings.

Samuel Wardwell, like most of the accused belonging to Andover, had
originally joined the crowd of the confessors; but he was too much of
a man to remain in that company. He took back his confession, and met
his death. While he was speaking to the people, at the gallows,
declaring his innocency, a puff of tobacco-smoke from the pipe of the
executioner, as Calef informs us, "coming in his face, interrupted his
discourse: those accusers said that the Devil did hinder him with
smoke." The wicked creatures followed their victims to the last with
their malignant outrages. The cart that carried the prisoners, on this
occasion, to the hill, "was for some time at a set: the afflicted and
others said that the Devil hindered it," &c.

The route by which they were conveyed from the jail, which was at the
north corner of Federal and St. Peter's Streets, to the gallows, must
have been a cruelly painful and fatiguing one, particularly to infirm
and delicate persons, as many of them were. It was through St.
Peter's, up the whole length of Essex, and thence probably along
Boston Street, far towards Aborn Street; for the hill could only be
ascended from that direction. It must have been a rough and jolting
operation; and it is not strange that the cart got "set." It seems
that the prisoners were carried in a single cart. It was a large one,
provided probably for the occasion; and it is not unlikely that the
reason why some who had been condemned were not executed, was that the
cart could not hold them all at once. They were executed, one in June,
five in July, five in August, and eight in September, with the
intention, no doubt, by taking them in instalments, to extend the acts
of the tragedy, from month to month, indefinitely.

It was necessary for the safety of the accusers and prosecutors to
prevent a revulsion of the public mind, or even the least diminution
of the popular violence against the supposed witches. As they all
protested their innocence to the moment of death, and exhibited a
remarkably Christian deportment throughout the dreadful scenes they
were called to encounter from their arrest to their execution, there
was reason to apprehend that the people would gradually be led to feel
a sympathy for them, if not to entertain doubts of their guilt. To
prevent this, and remove any impressions favorable to them that might
be made by the conduct and declarations of the convicts, the
prosecutors were on the alert. After the prisoners had been swung off,
on the 22d of September, "turning him to the bodies, Mr. Noyes said,
'What a sad thing it is to see eight firebrands of hell hanging
there!'" It was the last time his eyes were regaled by such a sight.
There were no more executions on Witch Hill.

Three days before, a life had been taken by the officers of the law in
a manner so extraordinary, and marked by features so shocking, that
they find no parallel in the annals of America, and will continue to
arrest for ever the notice of mankind. The history and character of
old Giles Corey have been given in preceding parts of this work. The
only papers relating to him, on file as having been sworn to before
the Grand Jury, are a few brief depositions. If he had been put on
trial, we might have had more. Elizabeth Woodwell testifies, that "she
saw Giles Corey at meeting at Salem on a lecture-day, since he has
been in prison. He or his apparition came in, and sat in the
middlemost seat of the men's seats, by the post. This was the
lecture-day before Bridget Bishop was hanged. And I saw him come out
with the rest of the people." Mary Walcot, of course, swore to the
same. And Mary Warren swore that Corey was hostile to her and
afflicted her, because he thought she "caused her master (John
Procter) to ask more for a piece of meadow than he (Corey) was willing
to give." She also charged him with "afflicting of her" by his spectre
while he was in prison, and "described him in all his garments, both
of hat, coat, and the color of them,--with a cord about his waist and
a white cap on his head, and in chains." There is reason to believe,
that, while in prison, he experienced great distress of mind. Although
he had been a rough character in earlier life, and given occasion to
much scandal by his disregard of public opinion, he always exhibited
symptoms of a generous and sensitive nature. His foolish conduct in
becoming so passionately engaged in the witchcraft proceedings, at
their earliest stage, as to be incensed against his wife because she
did not approve of or believe in them, and which led him to utter
sentiments and expressions that had been used against her; and so far
yielding to the accusers as to allow them to get from him the
deposition, which, while it failed to satisfy their demands, it was
shameful for him to have been persuaded to give,--all these things,
which after his own apprehension and imprisonment he had leisure to
ponder upon, preyed on his mind. He saw the awful character of the
delusion to which he had lent himself; that it had brought his
prayerful and excellent wife to the sentence of death, which had
already been executed upon many other devout and worthy persons. He
knew that he was innocent of the crime of witchcraft, and was now
satisfied that all others were. Besides his own unfriendly course
towards his wife, two of his four sons-in-law had turned against her.
One (Crosby) had testified, and another (Parker) had allowed his name
to be used, as an adverse witness. In view of all this, Corey made up
his mind, determined on his course, and stood to that determination.
He resolved to expiate his own folly by a fate that would satisfy the
demands of the sternest criticism upon his conduct; proclaim his
abhorrence of the prosecutions; and attest the strength of his
feelings towards those of his children who had been false, and those
who had been true, to his wife. He caused to be drawn up what has
been called a will, although it is in reality a deed, and was duly
recorded as such. Its phraseology is very strongly guarded, and made
to give it clear, full, and certain effect. It begins thus: "Know ye,
&c., that I, Giles Corey, lying under great trouble and affliction,
through which I am very weak in body, but in perfect memory,--knowing
not how soon I may depart this life; in consideration of which, and
for the fatherly love and affection which I have and do bear unto my
beloved son-in-law, William Cleeves, of the town of Beverly, and to my
son-in-law, John Moulton, of the town of Salem, as also for divers
other good causes and considerations me at the present especially
moving;" and proceeds to convey and confirm all his property--"lands,
meadow, housing, cattle, stock, movables and immovables, money,
apparel, ... and all other the aforesaid premises, with their
appurtenances"--to the said Cleeves and Moulton "for ever, freely and
quietly, without any manner of challenge, claim, or demand of me the
said Giles Corey, or of any other person or persons whatsoever for me
in my name, or by my cause, means, or procurement;" and, in the use of
all the language applicable to that end, he warrants and binds himself
to defend the aforesaid conveyance and grant to Cleeves and Moulton,
their heirs, executors, administrators, and assigns for ever. The
document was properly signed, sealed, and delivered in the presence of
competent witnesses, whose several signatures are indorsed to that
effect. It was duly acknowledged before "Thomas Wade, Justice of the
Peace in Essex," and recorded forthwith. This transaction took place
in the jail at Ipswich.

His whole property being thus securely conveyed to his faithful
sons-in-law, and placed beyond the reach of his own weakness or change
of purpose, Corey resolved on a course that would surely try to the
utmost the power of human endurance and firmness. He knew, that, if
brought to trial, his death was certain. He did not know but that
conviction and execution, through the attainder connected with it,
might invalidate all attempts of his to convey his property. But it
was certain, that, if he should not be brought to trial and
conviction, his deed would stand, and nothing could break it, or
defeat its effect. He accordingly made up his mind not to be tried.
When called into court to answer to the indictment found by the Grand
Jury, he did not plead "Guilty," or "Not guilty," but stood mute. How
often he was called forth, we are not informed; but nothing could
shake him. No power on earth could unseal his lips.

He knew that he could have no trial that would deserve the name. To
have pleaded "Not guilty" would have made him, by his own act, a party
to the proceeding, and have been, by implication, an assent to putting
his case to the decision of a blind, maddened, and utterly perverted
tribunal. He would not, by any act or utterance of his, leave his case
with "the country" represented by a jury that embodied the passions of
the deluded and infatuated multitude around him. He knew that the
gates of justice were closed, and that truth had fled from the scene.
He would have no part nor lot in the matter; refused to recognize the
court, made no response to its questions, and was dumb in its
presence. He stands alone in the resolute defiance of his attitude. He
knew the penalty of suffering and agony he would have to pay; but he
freely and fearlessly encountered it. All that was needed to carry his
point was an unconquerable firmness, and he had it. He rendered it
impossible to bring him to trial; and thereby, in spite of the power
and wrath of the whole country and its authorities, retained his right
to dispose of his property; and bore his testimony against the
wickedness and folly of the hour in tones that reached the whole
world, and will resound through all the ages.

When Corey took this ground, the Court found itself in a position of
no little difficulty, and was probably at a loss what to do. No
information has come to us of the details of the proceedings. If the
usages in England on such occasions were adopted, the prisoner was
three times brought before the Court, and called to plead; the
consequences of persisting in standing mute being solemnly announced
to him at each time. If he remained obdurate, the sentence of _peine
forte et dure_ was passed upon him; and, remanded to prison, he was
put into a low and dark apartment. He would there be laid on his back
on the bare floor, naked for the most part. A weight of iron would be
placed upon him, not quite enough to crush him. He would have no
sustenance, save only, on the first day, three morsels of the worst
bread; and, on the second day, three draughts of standing water that
should be nearest to the prison door: and, in this situation, such
would be alternately his daily diet till he died, or till he answered.
The object of this terrible punishment was to induce the prisoner to
plead to the indictment; upon doing which, he would be brought to
trial in the ordinary way. The motive that led prisoners to stand mute
in England is stated to have been, most generally, to save their
property from confiscation. The practice of putting weights upon them,
and gradually increasing them, was to force them, by the slowly
increasing torture, to yield.

How far the English practice was imitated in the case of Corey will
remain for ever among the dread secrets of his prison-house. The
tradition is, that the last act in the tragedy was in an open field
near the jail, somewhere between Howard-street Burial Ground and Brown
Street. It is said that Corey urged the executioners to increase the
weight which was crushing him, that he told them it was of no use to
expect him to yield, that there could be but one way of ending the
matter, and that they might as well pile on the rocks. Calef says,
that, as his body yielded to the pressure, his tongue protruded from
his mouth, and an official forced it back with his cane. Some persons
now living remember a popular superstition, lingering in the minds of
some of the more ignorant class, that Corey's ghost haunted the
grounds where this barbarous deed was done; and that boys, as they
sported in the vicinity, were in the habit of singing a ditty
beginning thus:--

    "'More weight! more weight!'
    Giles Corey he cried."

For a person of more than eighty-one years of age, this must be
allowed to have been a marvellous exhibition of prowess; illustrating,
as strongly as any thing in human history, the power of a resolute
will over the utmost pain and agony of body, and demonstrating that
Giles Corey was a man of heroic nerve, and of a spirit that could not
be subdued.

It produced a deep effect, as it was feared that it would. The bearing
of all the sufferers at all the stages of the proceedings, and at
their execution, had told in their favor; but the course of Giles
Corey profoundly affected the public mind. This must have been noticed
by the managers of the prosecutions; and they felt that some
extraordinary expedient was necessary to renew, and render more
intense than ever, the general infatuation. From the very beginning,
there had been great skill and adroitness in arranging the order of
incidents, and supplying the requisite excitements at the right
moments and the right points. Some persons--it can only be conjectured
who--had, all along, been behind the scenes, giving direction and
materials to the open actors. This unseen power was in the village;
and the movements it devised generally proceeded from Thomas Putnam's
house, or the parsonage. It was on hand to meet the contingency
created by Corey's having actually carried out to the last his
resolution to meet a form of death that would, if any thing could,
cause a re-action in the public mind; and the following stratagem was
contrived to turn the manner of his death into the means of more than
ever blinding and infatuating the people. It was the last and one of
the most artful strokes of policy by the prosecutors. On the day after
the death of Corey, and two days before the execution of his wife,
Mary Easty, and the six others, Judge Sewall, then in Salem, received
a letter from Thomas Putnam to this effect:--

     "Last night, my daughter Ann was grievously tormented by
     witches, threatening that she should be pressed to death
     before Giles Corey; but, through the goodness of a gracious
     God, she had at last a little respite. Whereupon there
     appeared unto her (she said) a man in a winding-sheet, who
     told her that Giles Corey had murdered him by pressing him
     to death with his feet; but that the Devil there appeared
     unto him, and covenanted with him, and promised him that he
     should not be hanged. The apparition said God hardened his
     heart, that he should not hearken to the advice of the
     Court, and so die an easy death; because, as it said, it
     must be done to him as he has done to me. The apparition
     also said that Giles Corey was carried to the Court for
     this, and that the jury had found the murder; and that her
     father knew the man, and the thing was done before she was
     born."

Cotton Mather represented this vision, made to Ann Putnam, as proof
positive of a divine communication to her, because, as he says, she
could not have received her information from a human source, as
everybody had forgotten the affair long ago; and that she never could
have heard of it, happening, as it did, before she was born. Bringing
up this old matter to meet the effect produced by Corey's death was
indeed a skilful move; and it answered its purpose probably to a
considerable extent. The man whom Corey was thus charged with having
murdered seventeen years before died in a manner causing some gossip
at the time; and a coroner's jury found that he had been "bruised to
death, having clodders of blood about the heart." Bringing the affair
back to the public mind, with the story of Ann Putnam's vision, was
well calculated to meet and check any sympathy that might threaten to
arise in favor of Corey. But the trick, however ingenious, will not
stand the test of scrutiny. Mather's statement that everybody had
forgotten the transaction, and that Ann could only have known of it
supernaturally, is wholly untenable; for it was precisely one of those
things that are never forgotten in a country village: it had always
been kept alive as a part of the gossip of the neighborhood in
connection with Corey; and her own father, as is unwittingly
acknowledged, knew the man, and all about it. Of course, the girl had
heard of it from him and others. The industry that had ransacked the
traditions and collected the scandal of the whole country, far and
near, for stories that were brought in evidence against all the
prisoners, had not failed to pick up this choice bit against Corey.
The only reason why it had not before been brought out was because he
had not been on trial. The man who died with "clodders of blood about
his heart," seventeen years before, was an unfortunate and worthless
person, who had incurred punishment for his misconduct while a servant
on Corey's farm, and afterwards at the hands of his own family: and he
does not appear to have mended his morals upon passing into the
spiritual world; for the statement of his ghost to Ann Putnam, that
the jury had found Corey guilty of murder, and that the Court was
hindered by some enchantment from proceeding against him, is disproved
by the record which is--as has been mentioned in the First Part, vol.
i. p. 185--that the man was carried back to his house by Corey's wife,
and died there some time after; and the Court did no more than fine
Corey for the punishment he had inflicted upon him while in his
service, and which the evidence showed was repeated by his parents
after his return to his own family.

Thomas Putnam's letter and Ann's vision were the last things of the
kind that occurred. The delusion was approaching its close, and the
people were beginning to be restored to their senses.

When it became known that Corey's resolution was likely to hold out,
and that no torments or cruelties of any kind could subdue his firm
and invincible spirit, Mr. Noyes hurried a special meeting of his
church on a week-day, and had the satisfaction of dealing the same
awful doom upon him as upon Rebecca Nurse. The entry in the record of
the First Church is as follows:--

     "Sept. 18, G. Corey was excommunicated: the cause of it was,
     that he being accused and indicted for the sin of
     witchcraft, he refused to plead, and so incurred the
     sentence and penalty of _pain fort dure_; being undoubtedly
     either guilty of the sin of witchcraft, or of throwing
     himself upon sudden and certain death, if he were otherwise
     innocent."

This attempt to introduce a form of argument into a church act of
excommunication is a slight but significant symptom of its having
become felt that the breath of reason had begun to raise a ripple upon
the surface of the public mind. It increased slowly, but steadily to a
gale that beat with severity upon Mr. Noyes and all his
fellow-persecutors to their dying day.

After the executions, on the 22d of September, the Court adjourned to
meet some weeks subsequently; and it was, no doubt, their expectation
to continue from month to month to hold sessions, and supply, each
time, new cart-loads of victims to the hangman. But a sudden collapse
took place in the machinery, and they met no more. The executive
authority intervened, and their functions ceased. The curtain fell
unexpectedly, and the tragedy ended. It is not known precisely what
caused this sudden change. It is probable, that a revolution had been
going on some time in the public mind, which was kept for a while from
notice, but at last became too apparent and too serious to be
disregarded. It has generally been attributed to the fact, that the
girls became over-confident, and struck too high. They had ventured,
as we have seen, to cry out against the Rev. Samuel Willard, but were
rebuked and silenced by the Court. Whoever began to waver in his
confidence of the correctness of the proceedings was in danger of
being attacked by them; and, as a general thing, when a person was
"cried out upon," it may be taken as proof that he had spoken against
them. Increase Mather, the president of Harvard College, called by
Eliot "the father of the New-England clergy," was understood not to go
so far as his son Cotton in sustaining the proceedings; and a member
of his family was accused. The wife of Sir William Phips sympathized
with those who suffered prosecution, and is said to have written an
order for the release of a prisoner from jail. She was cried out upon.
It may have been noticed, that, though Jonathan Corwin sat with
Hathorne as an examining magistrate and assistant, and signed the
commitments of the prisoners, he never took an active part, but was a
silent and passive agent in the scene. He was subsequently raised to
the bench; but there is reason to believe that his mind was not clear
as to the correctness of the proceedings. This probably became known
to the accusing girls; for they cried out repeatedly against his
wife's mother, a respectable and venerable lady in Boston. The
accusers, in aiming at such characters, overestimated their power; and
the tide began to turn against them. But what finally broke the spell
by which they had held the minds of the whole colony in bondage was
their accusation, in October, of Mrs. Hale, the wife of the minister
of the First Church in Beverly. Her genuine and distinguished virtues
had won for her a reputation, and secured in the hearts of the people
a confidence, which superstition itself could not sully nor shake. Mr.
Hale had been active in all the previous proceedings; but he knew the
innocence and piety of his wife, and he stood forth between her and
the storm he had helped to raise: although he had driven it on while
others were its victims, he turned and resisted it when it burst in
upon his own dwelling. The whole community became convinced that the
accusers in crying out upon Mrs. Hale, had perjured themselves, and
from that moment their power was destroyed; the awful delusion was
dispelled, and a close put to one of the most tremendous tragedies in
the history of real life. The wildest storm, perhaps, that ever raged
in the moral world, became a calm; the tide that had threatened to
overwhelm every thing in its fury, sunk back to its peaceful bed.
There are few, if any, other instances in history, of a revolution of
opinion and feeling so sudden, so rapid, and so complete. The images
and visions that had possessed the bewildered imaginations of the
people flitted away, and left them standing in the sunshine of reason
and their senses; and they could have exclaimed, as they witnessed
them passing off, in the language of the great master of the drama and
of human nature, but that their rigid Puritan principles would not, it
is presumed, have permitted them, even in that moment of rescue and
deliverance, to quote Shakspeare,--

    "The earth hath bubbles, as the water has,
    And these are of them. Whither are they vanished?
    Into the air; and what seemed corporal, melted
    As breath into the wind."

Sir William Phips well knew that the public sentiment demanded a stop
to be put to the prosecutions. Besides that many of the people had
lost all faith in the grounds on which they had been conducted, an
influence from the higher orders of society began to make itself felt.
Hutchinson says, "Although many such had suffered, yet there remained
in prison a number of women of as reputable families as any in the
towns where they lived, and several persons, of still superior rank,
were hinted at by the pretended bewitched, or by the confessing
witches. Some had been publicly named. Dudley Bradstreet, a justice of
peace, who had been appointed one of President Dudley's council, and
who was son to the worthy old governor, then living, found it
necessary to abscond. Having been remiss in prosecuting, he had been
charged by some of the afflicted as a confederate. His brother, John
Bradstreet, was forced to fly also."

The termination of the proceedings was probably effectually secured by
the spirited course of certain parties in Andover, who, at the first
moment of its appearing that the public sentiment was changing,
commenced actions for slander against the accusers.

The result of the whole matter was, that, while some of the judges,
magistrates, and ministers persisted in their fanatical zeal, the
great body of the people, high and low, were rescued from the
delusion.

While, in the course of our story, we have witnessed some shocking
instances of the violation of the most sacred affections and
obligations of life, in husbands and wives, parents and children,
testifying against each other, and exerting themselves for mutual
destruction, we must not overlook the many instances in which filial,
parental, and fraternal fidelity and love have shone conspicuously. It
was dangerous to befriend an accused person. Procter stood by his wife
to protect her, and it cost him his life. Children protested against
the treatment of their parents, and they were all thrown into prison.
Daniel Andrew, a citizen of high standing, who had been deputy to the
General Court, asserted, in the boldest language, his belief of
Rebecca Nurse's innocence; and he had to fly the country to save his
life. Many devoted sons and daughters clung to their parents, visited
them in prison in defiance of a bloodthirsty mob; kept by their side
on the way to execution; expressed their love, sympathy, and reverence
to the last; and, by brave and perilous enterprise, got possession of
their remains, and bore them back under the cover of midnight to their
own thresholds, and to graves kept consecrated by their prayers and
tears. One noble young man is said to have effected his mother's
escape from the jail, and secreted her in the woods until after the
delusion had passed away, provided food and clothing for her, erected
a wigwam for her shelter, and surrounded her with every comfort her
situation would admit of. The poor creature must, however, have
endured a great amount of suffering; for one of her larger limbs was
fractured in the all but desperate attempt to rescue her from the
prison-walls.

The Special Court being no longer suffered to meet, a permanent and
regular tribunal, called the Superior Court of Judicature, was
established, consisting of the Deputy-governor, William Stoughton,
Chief-justice; and Thomas Danforth, John Richards, Wait Winthrop, and
Samuel Sewall, associate justices. They held a Court at Salem, in
January, 1693. Hutchinson says that, on this occasion, the Grand Jury
found about fifty indictments. The following persons were brought to
trial: Rebecca Jacobs, Margaret Jacobs, Sarah Buckley, Job Tookey,
Hannah Tyler, Candy, Mary Marston, Elizabeth Johnson, Abigail Barker,
Mary Tyler, Sarah Hawkes, Mary Wardwell, Mary Bridges, Hannah Post,
Sarah Bridges, Mary Osgood, Mary Lacy, Jr., Sarah Wardwell, Elizabeth
Johnson, Jr., and Mary Post. The three last were condemned, but not
executed: all the rest were acquitted. Considering that the "spectral
evidence" was wholly thrown out at these trials, the facts that the
grand jury, under the advice of the Court, brought in so many
indictments, and that three were actually convicted, are as
discreditable to the regular Court as the convictions at the Special
Court are to that body. It has been said that the Special Court had
not an adequate representation of lawyers in its composition; and the
results of its proceedings have been ascribed to that circumstance. It
has been held up disparagingly in comparison with the regular Court
that succeeded it. But, in fact, the regular Court consisted of
persons all of whom sat in the Special Court, with the exception of
Danforth. But his proceedings in originating the arrests for
witchcraft in the fall of 1691, and his action when presiding at the
preliminary examination of John Procter, Elizabeth Procter, and Sarah
Cloyse, at Salem, April 11, 1692, show that, so far as the permission
of gross irregularities and the admission of absurd kinds of testimony
are concerned, the regular Court gained nothing by his sitting with
it, unless his views had been thoroughly changed in the mean time. The
truth is, that the judges, magistrates, and legislature were as much
to blame, in this whole business, as the ministers, and much more slow
to come to their senses, and make amends for their wrong-doing.

All the facts known to us, and all the statements that have come down
to us, require us to believe, that none who confessed, and stood to
their confession, were brought to trial. All who were condemned either
maintained their innocence from the first, or, if persuaded or
overcome into a confession, voluntarily took it back and disowned it
before trial. If this be so, then the name of every person condemned
ought to be held in lasting honor, as preferring to die rather than
lie, or stand to a lie. It required great strength of mind to take
back a confession; relinquish life and liberty; go down into a
dungeon, loaded with irons; and from thence to ascend the gallows. It
relieves the mind to think, that Abigail Hobbs, wicked and shocking
as her conduct had been towards Mr. Burroughs and others, came to
herself, and offered her life in atonement for her sin.

The Court continued the trials at successive sessions during the
spring, all resulting in acquittals, until in May, 1693, Sir William
Phips, by proclamation, discharged all. Hutchinson says, "Such a
jail-delivery has never been known in New England." The number then
released is stated to have been one hundred and fifty. How many had
been apprehended, during the whole affair, we have no means of
knowing. Twenty, counting Giles Corey, had been executed. Two at
least, Ann Foster and Sarah Osburn, had died in jail: it is not
improbable that others perished under the bodily and mental sufferings
there. We find frequent expressions indicating that many died in
prison. A considerable number of children, and some adults whose
friends were able to give the heavy bonds required and had influence
enough to secure the favor, had some time before been removed to
private custody. Quite a considerable number had succeeded in breaking
jail and eluding recapture. Upon the whole, there must have been
several hundreds committed. Even after acquittal by a jury, and the
Governor's proclamation, none were set at liberty until they had paid
all charges; including board for the whole time of their imprisonment,
jailer's fees, and fees of Court of all kinds. The families of many
had become utterly impoverished.

The sufferings of the prisoners and of their relatives and connections
are perhaps best illustrated by presenting the substance of a few of
the petitions for their release, found among the files. The friends of
the parties, in these cases, were not in a condition to give the
bonds, and they probably remained in jail until the general discharge;
and how long after, before the means could be raised to pay all dues,
we cannot know.[A]

[Footnote A: On the 19th of October, 1692, Thomas Hart, of Lynn,
presented a memorial to the General Court, stating that his mother,
Elizabeth Hart, had then been in Boston jail for nearly six months:
"Though, in all this time, nothing has appeared against her whereby to
render her deserving of imprisonment or death, ... being ancient, and
not able to undergo the hardship that is inflicted from lying in
misery, and death rather to be chosen than a life in her
circumstances." He says, that his father is "ancient and decrepit, and
wholly unable" to take any steps in her behalf; that he feels "obliged
by all Christian duty, as becomes a child to parents," to lay her case
before the General Court. "The petitioner having lived from his
childhood under the same roof with his mother, he dare presume to
affirm that he never saw nor knew any evil or sinful practice wherein
there was any show of impiety nor witchcraft by her; and, were it
otherwise, he would not, for the world and all the enjoyments thereof,
nourish or support any creature that he knew engaged in the drudgery
of Satan. It is well known to all the neighborhood, that the
petitioner's mother has lived a sober and godly life, always ready to
discharge the part of a good Christian, and never deserving of
afflictions from the hands of men for any thing of this nature." He
humbly prays "for the speedy enlargement of this person so much
abused." I present two more petitions. They help to fill up the
picture of the sufferings and hardships borne by individuals and
families.

     "_To the Honored General Court now sitting in Boston, the
     Humble Petition of Nicholas Rist, of Reading, showeth_, that
     whereas Sara Rist, wife of the petitioner, was taken into
     custody the first day of June last, and, ever since lain in
     Boston jail for witchcraft; though, in all this time,
     nothing has been made appear for which she deserved
     imprisonment or death: the petitioner has been a husband to
     the said woman above twenty years, in all which time he
     never had reason to accuse her for any impiety or
     witchcraft, but the contrary. She lived with him as a good,
     faithful, dutiful wife, and always had respect to the
     ordinances of God while her strength remained; and the
     petitioner, on that consideration, is obliged in conscience
     and justice to use all lawful means for the support and
     preservation of her life; and it is deplorable, that, in old
     age, the poor decrepit woman should lie under confinement so
     long in a stinking jail, when her circumstances rather
     require a nurse to attend her.

     "May it, therefore, please Your Honors to take this matter
     into your prudent consideration, and direct some speedy
     methods whereby this ancient decrepit person may not for
     ever lie in such misery, wherein her life is made more
     afflictive to her than death."

     "_The Humble Petition of Thomas Barrett, of Chelmsford, in
     New England, in behalf of his daughter Martha Sparkes, wife
     of Henry Sparkes, who is now a soldier in Their Majesties'
     Service at the Eastern Parts, and so hath been for a
     considerable time, humbly showeth_, That your petitioner's
     daughter hath lain in prison in Boston for the space of
     twelve months and five days, being committed by Thomas
     Danforth, Esq., the late deputy-governor, upon suspicion of
     witchcraft; since which no evidence hath appeared against
     her in any such matter, neither hath any given bond to
     prosecute her, nor doth any one at this day accuse her of
     any such thing, as your petitioner knows of. That your
     petitioner hath ever since kept two of her children; the one
     of five years, the other of two years old, which hath been a
     considerable trouble and charge to him in his poor and mean
     condition: besides, your petitioner hath a lame, ancient,
     and sick wife, who, for these five years and upwards past,
     hath been so afflicted as that she is altogether rendered
     uncapable of affording herself any help, which much augments
     his trouble. Your poor petitioner earnestly and humbly
     entreats Your Excellency and Honors to take his distressed
     condition into your consideration; and that you will please
     to order the releasement of his daughter from her
     confinement, whereby she may return home to her poor
     children to look after them, having nothing to pay the
     charge of her confinement.

     "And your petitioner, as in duty bound, shall ever pray.

     "Nov. 1, 1692."]

Margaret Jacobs had to remain in jail after the Governor's
proclamation had directed the release of all prisoners, because she
could not pay the fees and charges. Her grandfather had been executed,
and all his furniture, stock, and moveable property seized by the
marshal or sheriff. Her father escaped the warrant by a sudden flight
from his home under the cover of midnight, and was in exile "beyond
the seas;" her mother and herself taken at the time by the officers
serving the warrants against them; the younger children of the family,
left without protection, had dispersed, and been thrown upon the
charity of neighbors; the house had been stripped of its contents,
left open, and deserted. She had not a shilling in the world, and knew
not where to look for aid. She was taken back to prison, and remained
there for some time, until a person named Gammon, apparently a
stranger, happened to hear of her case, and, touched with compassion,
raised the money required, and released her. It was long before the
affairs of the Jacobs' family were so far retrieved as to enable them
to refund the money to the noble-hearted fisherman. How many others
lingered in prison, or how long, we have no means of ascertaining.

In reviewing the proceedings at the examinations and trials, it is
impossible to avoid being struck with the infatuation of the
magistrates and judges. They acted throughout in the character and
spirit of prosecuting officers, put leading and ensnaring questions to
the prisoners, adopted a browbeating deportment towards them, and
pursued them with undisguised hostility. They assumed their guilt from
the first, and endeavored to force them to confess; treating them as
obstinate culprits because they would not. Every kind of irregularity
was permitted. The marshal was encouraged in perpetual interference to
prejudice the persons on trial, watching and reporting aloud to the
Court every movement of their hands or heads or feet. Other persons
were allowed to speak out, from the body of the crowd, whatever they
chose to say adverse to the prisoner. Accusers were suffered to make
private communications to the magistrates and judges before or during
the hearings. The presiding officers showed off their smartness in
attempts to make the persons on trial before them appear at a
disadvantage. In some instances, as in the case of Sarah Good, the
magistrate endeavored to deceive the accused by representing falsely
the testimony given by another. The people in and around the
court-room were allowed to act the part of a noisy mob, by clamors and
threatening outcries; and juries were overawed to bring in verdicts of
conviction, and rebuked from the bench if they exercised their
rightful prerogative without regard to the public passions. The
chief-justice, in particular, appears to have been actuated by violent
prejudice against the prisoners, and to have conducted the trials, all
along, with a spirit that bears the aspect of animosity.

There is one point of view in which he must be held responsible for
the blood that was shed, and the infamy that, in consequence, attaches
to the proceedings. It may well be contended, that not a conviction
would have taken place, but for a notion of his which he arbitrarily
enforced as a rule of law. It was a part of the theory relating to
witchcraft, that the Devil made use of the spectres, or apparitions,
of some persons to afflict others. From this conceded postulate, a
division of opinion arose. Some maintained that the Devil could employ
only the spectres of persons in league with him; others affirmed, that
he could send upon his evil errands the spectres of innocent persons,
without their consent or knowledge. The chief-justice held the former
opinion, against the judgment of many others, arbitrarily established
it as a rule of Court, and peremptorily instructed juries to regard it
as binding upon them in making their verdicts. The consequence was
that a verdict of "Guilty" became inevitable. But few at that time
doubted the veracity of the "afflicted persons," which was thought to
be demonstrated to the very senses by their fits and sufferings, in
the presence of the Court, jury, and all beholders. When they swore
that they saw the shapes of Bridget Bishop, or Rebecca Nurse, or
George Burroughs, choking or otherwise torturing a person, the fact
was regarded as beyond question.

The prisoners took the ground, that the statements made by the
witnesses, even if admitted, were not proof against them; for the
Devil might employ the spectres of innocent persons, or of whomsoever
he chose, without the knowledge of the persons whose shapes were thus
used by him. When Mrs. Ann Putnam swore that she had seen the spectre
of Rebecca Nurse afflicting various persons; and that the said
spectre acknowledged to her, that "she had killed Benjamin Houlton,
and John Fuller, and Rebecca Shepard,"--the answer of the prisoner
was, "I cannot help it: the Devil may appear in my shape." When the
examining magistrate put the question to Susanna Martin, "How comes
your appearance to hurt these?" Martin replied, "I cannot tell. He
that appeared in Samuel's shape, a glorified saint, can appear in any
one's shape." The Rev. John Wise, in his noble appeal in favor of John
Procter, argued to the same point. But the chief-justice was
inexorably deaf to all reason; compelled the jury to receive, as
absolute law, that the Devil could not use the shape of an innocent
person; and, as the "afflicted" swore that they saw the shapes of the
prisoners actually engaged in the diabolical work, there was no room
left for question, and they must return a verdict of "Guilty."

In this way, innocent persons were slaughtered by a dogma in the mind
of an obstinate judge. Dogmas have perverted courts and governments in
all ages. A fabrication of fancy, an arbitrary verbal proposition, has
been exalted above reason, and made to extinguish common sense. The
world is full of such dogmas. They mislead the actions of men, and
confound the page of history. "The king cannot die" is one of them. It
is held as an axiom of political and constitutional truth. So an
entire dynasty, crowded with a more glorious life than any other, is
struck from the annals of an empire. In the public records of
England, the existence of the Commonwealth is ignored; and the traces
of its great events are erased from the archives of the government,
which, in all its formulas and official papers, proclaims a lie. A
hunted fugitive, wandering in disguise through foreign lands, without
a foot of ground on the globe that he could call his own, is declared
in all public acts, parliamentary and judicial, and even by those
assuming to utter the voice of history, to have actually reigned all
the time. In our country and in our day, we are perplexed, and our
public men bewildered, by a similar dogma. The merest fabric of human
contrivance, a particular form of political society, is impiously
clothed with an essential attribute of God alone; and ephemeral
politicians are announcing, as an eternal law of Providence, that "a
State cannot die." The mischiefs that result, in the management of
human affairs, from enthroning dogmas over reason, truth, and fact,
are, as they ever have been, incalculable.

Chief-justice Stoughton appears to have kept his mind chained to his
dogma to the last. It rendered him wholly incapable of opening his
eyes to the light of truth. He held on to spectral evidence, and his
corollary from it, when everybody else had abandoned both. He would
not admit that he, or any one concerned, had been in error. He never
could bear to hear any persons express penitence or regret for the
part they had taken in the proceedings. When the public delusion had
so far subsided that it became difficult to procure the execution of a
witch, he was disturbed and incensed to such a degree that he
abandoned his seat on the bench. During a session of the Court at
Charlestown, in January, 1692-3, "word was brought in, that a reprieve
was sent to Salem, and had prevented the execution of seven of those
that were there condemned, which so moved the chief judge that he said
to this effect: 'We were in a way to have cleared the land of them;
who it is that obstructs the cause of justice, I know not: the Lord be
merciful to the country!' and so went off the bench, and came no more
into that Court."

I have spoken of the judges as appearing to be infatuated, not on
account of the opinions they held on the subject of witchcraft, for
these were the opinions of their age; nor from the peculiar doctrine
their chief enforced upon them, for that was entertained by many, and,
as a mere theory, was perhaps as logically deducible from the
prevalent doctrines as any other. Their infatuation consisted in not
having eyes to see, or ears to hear, evidences continually occurring
of the untruthful arts and tricks of the afflicted children, of their
cunning evasions, and, in some instances, palpable falsehoods. Then,
further, there was solid and substantial evidence before them that
ought to have made them pause and consider, if not doubt and
disbelieve. We find the following paper among the files:--

     THE TESTIMONY OF JOHN PUTNAM, SR., AND REBECCA HIS WIFE,
     saith that our son-in-law John Fuller, and our daughter
     Rebecca Shepard, did both of them die a most violent death
     (and died acting very strangely at the time of their death);
     further saith, that we did judge then that they both died of
     a malignant fever, and had no suspicion of withcraft
     [Transcriber's Note: so in original] of any, neither can we
     accuse the prisoner at the bar of any such thing."

When we recall the testimony of Ann Putnam the mother, and find that
the afflicted generally charged the death of the above-named persons
upon the shape of Rebecca Nurse, we perceive how absolutely Captain
John Putnam and his wife discredit their testimony. The opinion of the
father and mother of Fuller and Shepard ought to have had weight with
the Court. They were persons of the highest standing, and of
recognized intelligence and judgment. They were old church-members,
and eminently orthodox in all their sentiments. They were the heads of
a great family. He had represented the town in the General Court the
year before. No man in this part of the country was more noted for
strong good sense than Captain John Putnam. This deposition is
honorable to their memory, and clears them from all responsibility for
the extent to which the afflicted persons were allowed to sway the
judgment of the Court. Taken in connection with the paper signed by so
large a portion of the best people of the village, in behalf of
Rebecca Nurse, it proves that the blame for the shocking proceedings
in the witchcraft prosecutions cannot be laid upon the local
population, but rests wholly upon the Court and the public
authorities.

The Special Court that condemned the persons charged with witchcraft
in 1692 is justly open to censure for the absence of all
discrimination of evidence, and for a prejudgment of the cases
submitted to them. In view of the then existing law and the practice
in the mother-country under it, they ought to have the benefit of the
admission that they did, in other respects than those mentioned, no
more and no worse than was to be expected. And Cotton Mather, in the
"Magnalia," vindicates them on this ground:--

     "They consulted the precedents of former times, and precepts
     laid down by learned writers about witchcraft; as, Keeble on
     the Common Law, chap. 'Conjuration' (an author approved by
     the twelve judges of our nation): also, Sir Matthew Hale's
     Trials of Witches, printed anno 1682; Glanvill's Collection
     of Sundry Trials in England and Ireland in the years 1658,
     '61, '63, '64, and '81; Bernard's Guide to Jury-men;
     Baxter's and R.B., their histories about Witches, and their
     Discoveries; Cotton Mather's Memorable Providences relating
     to Witchcraft, printed 1685."

So far as the medical profession at the time is concerned, it must be
admitted that they bear a full share of responsibility for the
proceedings. They gave countenance and currency to the idea of
witchcraft in the public mind, and were very generally in the habit,
when a patient did not do well under their prescriptions, of getting
rid of all difficulty by saying that "an evil hand" was upon him.
Their opinion to this effect is cited throughout, and appears in a
large number of the documents. There were coroners' juries in cases
where it was suspected that a person died of witchcraft. It is much
to be regretted that none of their verdicts have been preserved. Drawn
up by an attending "chirurgeon," they would illustrate the state of
professional science at that day, by informing us of the marks,
indications, and conditions of the bodily organization by which the
traces of the Devil's hand were believed to be discoverable. All we
know is that, in particular cases, as that of Bray Wilkins's grandson
Daniel, the jury found decisive proof that he had died by "an evil
hand."

It is not to be denied or concealed, that the clergy were instrumental
in bringing on the witchcraft delusion in 1692. As the supposed agents
of the mischief belonged to the supernatural and spiritual world,
which has ever been considered their peculiar province, it was thought
that the advice and co-operation of ministers were particularly
appropriate and necessary. Opposition to prevailing vices and attempts
to reform society were considered at that time in the light of a
conflict with Satan himself; and he was thought to be the ablest
minister who had the greatest power over the invisible enemy, and
could most easily and effectively avert his blows, and counteract his
baleful influence. This gave the clergy the front in the battle
against the hosts of Belial. They were proud of the position, and were
stimulated to distinguish themselves in the conflict. Cotton Mather
represents that ministers were honored by the special hostility of the
great enemy of souls, "more dogged by the Devil than any other men,"
just as, according to his philosophy, the lightning struck the
steeples of churches more frequently than other buildings because the
Prince of the Power of the Air particularly hated the places where the
sound of the gospel was heard. There were, moreover, it is to be
feared, ministers whose ambition to acquire influence and power had
been allowed to become a ruling principle, and who favored the
delusion because thereby their object could be most surely achieved by
carrying the people to the greatest extremes of credulity,
superstition, and fanatical blindness.

But justice requires it to be said that the ministers, as a general
thing, did not take the lead after the proceedings had assumed their
most violent aspect, and the disastrous effects been fully brought to
view. It may be said, on the contrary, that they took the lead, as a
class, in checking the delusion, and rescuing the public mind from its
control. Prior to the time when they were called upon to give their
advice to the government, they probably followed Cotton Mather: after
that, they seemed to have freed themselves generally from his
influence. The names of Dane and Barnard of Andover, Higginson of
Salem, Cheever of Marblehead, Hubbard and Wise of Ipswich, Payson and
Phillips of Rowley, Allin of Salisbury, and Capen of Topsfield, appear
in behalf of persons accused. To come forward in their defence shows
courage, and proves that their influence was in the right direction,
even while the proceedings were at their height. Mr. Hale, of Beverly,
abandoned the prosecutions, and expressed his disapprobation of them,
before the government or the Court relaxed the vigor of their
operations, as is sufficiently proved by the fact that the "afflicted
children" cried out against his wife. Willard, and James Allen, and
Moody, and John Bailey, and even Increase Mather, of Boston, openly
discountenanced the course things were taking. The latter circulated a
letter from his London correspondent, a person whose opinion was
entitled to weight, condemning in the strongest terms the doctrine of
the chief-justice, as follows: "All that I speak with much wonder that
any man, much less a man of such abilities, learning, and experience
as Mr. Stoughton, should take up a persuasion that the Devil cannot
assume the likeness of an innocent, to afflict another person. In my
opinion, it is a persuasion utterly destitute of any solid reason to
render it so much as probable." The ministers may have been among the
first to bring on the delusion; but the foregoing facts prove, that,
as a profession, they were the first to attempt to check and
discountenance the prosecutions. While we are required, in all
fairness, to give this credit to the clergy in general, it would be
false to the obligations of historical truth and justice to attempt to
palliate the conduct of some of them. Whoever considers all that Mr.
Parris, according to his own account, said and did, cannot but shrink
from the necessity of passing judgment upon him, and find relief in
leaving him to that tribunal which alone can measure the extent of
human responsibility, and sound the depths of the heart. Lawson threw
into the conflagration all the combustible materials his eloquence and
talents, heated, it is to be feared, by resentment, could contribute.
Dr. Bentley, in his "Description and History of Salem" (Mass. Hist.
Coll., 1st series, vol. vi.) says, "Mr. Noyes came out and publicly
confessed his error, never concealed a circumstance, never excused
himself; visited, loved, blessed, the survivors whom he had injured;
asked forgiveness always, and consecrated the residue of his life to
bless mankind." It is to be hoped that the statement is correct. There
were several points of agreement between Noyes and Bentley. Both were
men of ability and learning. Like Bentley, Noyes lived and died a
bachelor; and, like him, was a man of lively and active temperament,
and, in the general tenor of his life, benevolent and disinterested.
Perhaps congeniality in these points led Bentley to make the
statement, just quoted, a little too strong. He wrote more than a
century after the witchcraft proceedings; just at that point when
tradition had become inflated by all manner of current talk, of fable
mixed with fact, before the correcting and expunging hand of a severe
scrutiny of records and documents had commenced its work. The drag-net
of time had drawn along with it every thing that anybody had said; but
the process of sifting and discrimination had not begun. His kindly
and ingenuous nature led him to believe, and prompted him to write
down, all that was amiable, and pleasing to a mind like his. So far as
the records and documents give us information, there is reason to
apprehend, that Mr. Noyes, like Stoughton, another old bachelor, never
recovered his mind from the frame of feeling or conviction in which it
was during the proceedings. His name is not found, as are those of
other ministers, to any petitions, memorials or certificates, in favor
of the sufferers during the trials, or of reparation to their memories
or to the feelings of their friends. He does not appear to have taken
any part in arresting the delusion or rectifying the public mind.

Of Cotton Mather, more is required to be said. He aspired to be
considered the leading champion of the Church, and the most successful
combatant against the Satanic powers. He seems to have longed for an
opportunity to signalize himself in this particular kind of warfare;
seized upon every occurrence that would admit of such a coloring to
represent it as the result of diabolical agency; circulated in his
numerous publications as many tales of witchcraft as he could collect
throughout New and Old England, and repeatedly endeavored to get up
cases of the kind in Boston. There is some ground for suspicion that
he was instrumental in originating the fanaticism in Salem; at any
rate, he took a leading part in fomenting it. And while there is
evidence that he endeavored, after the delusion subsided, to escape
the disgrace of having approved of the proceedings, and pretended to
have been in some measure opposed to them, it can be too clearly shown
that he was secretly and cunningly endeavoring to renew them during
the next year in his own parish in Boston.[A]

[Footnote A: I know nothing more artful and jesuitical than his
attempts to avoid the reproach of having been active in carrying on
the delusion in Salem and elsewhere, and, at the same time, to keep up
such a degree of credulity and superstition in the minds of the people
as to render it easy to plunge them into it again at the first
favorable moment. In the following passages, he endeavors to escape
the odium that had been connected with the prosecutions:--

"The world knows how many pages I have composed and published, and
particular gentlemen in the government know how many letters I have
written, to prevent the excessive credit of spectral accusations.

"In short, I do humbly but freely affirm it, that there is not a man
living in this world, who has been more desirous than the poor man I
to shelter my neighbors from the inconveniences of spectral outcries:
yea, I am very jealous I have done so much that way as to sin in what
I have done; such have been the cowardice and fearfulness whereunto my
regard unto the dissatisfaction of other people has precipitated me. I
know a man in the world, who has thought he has been able to convict
some such witches as ought to die; but his respect unto the public
peace has caused him rather to try whether he could not renew them by
repentance."

In his Life of Sir William Phips, he endeavors to take the credit to
himself of having doubted the propriety of the proceedings while they
were in progress. This work was published without his name, in order
that he might commend himself with more freedom. The advice given by
the ministers of Boston and the vicinity to the government has been
spoken of. Cotton Mather frequently took occasion to applaud and
magnify the merit of this production. In one of his writings, he
speaks of "the gracious words" it contained. In his Life of Phips, he
thus modestly takes the credit of its authorship to himself: it was
"drawn up, at their (the ministers') desire, by Mr. Mather the
younger, as I have been informed." And, in order the more effectually
to give the impression that he was rather opposed to the proceedings,
he quotes those portions of the paper which recommended caution and
circumspection, leaving out those other passages in which it was
vehemently urged to carry the proceedings on "speedily and
vigorously."

This single circumstance is decisive of the disingenuity of Dr.
Mather. As it was the purpose of the government, in requesting the
advice of the ministers, to ascertain their opinion of the expediency
of continuing the prosecutions, it was a complete and deliberate
perversion and falsification of their answer to omit the passages
which encouraged the proceedings, and to record those only which
recommended caution and circumspection. The object of Mather in
suppressing the important parts of the document has, however, in some
measure been answered. As the "Magnalia," within which his Life of
Phips is embraced, is the usual and popular source of information and
reference respecting the topics of which it treats, the opinion has
prevailed, that the Boston ministers, especially "Mr. Mather the
younger," endeavored to prevent the transactions connected with the
trial and execution of the supposed witches. Unfortunately, however,
for the reputation of Cotton Mather, Hutchinson has preserved the
address of the ministers entire: and it appears that they approved,
applauded, and stimulated the prosecutions; and that the people of
Salem and the surrounding country were the victims of a delusion, the
principal promoters of which have, to a great degree, been sheltered
from reproach by the dishonest artifice, which has now been exposed.

But, like other ambitious and grasping politicians, he was anxious to
have the support of all parties at the same time. After making court
to those who were dissatisfied with the prosecutions, he thus commends
himself to all who approved of them:--

"And why, after all my unwearied cares and pains to rescue the
miserable from the lions and bears of hell which had seized them, and
after all my studies to disappoint the devils in their designs to
confound my neighborhood, must I be driven to the necessity of an
apology? Truly, the hard representations wherewith some ill men have
reviled my conduct, and the countenance which other men have given to
these representations, oblige me to give mankind some account of my
behavior. No Christian can (I say none but evil-workers can) criminate
my visiting such of my poor flock as have at any time fallen under the
terrible and sensible molestations of evil angels. Let their
afflictions have been what they will, I could not have answered it
unto my glorious Lord, if I had withheld my just comforts and counsels
from them; and, if I have also, with some exactness, observed the
methods of the invisible world, when they have thus become observable,
I have been but a servant of mankind in doing so: yea, no less a
person than the venerable Baxter has more than once or twice, in the
most public manner, invited mankind to thank me for that service."

In other passages, he thus continues to stimulate and encourage the
advocates of the prosecutions:--

"Wherefore, instead of all apish shouts and jeers at histories which
have such undoubted confirmation as that no man that has breeding
enough to regard the common laws of human society will offer to doubt
of them, it becomes us rather to adore the goodness of God, who does
not permit such things every day to befall us all, as he sometimes did
permit to befall some few of our miserable neighbors.

"And it is a very glorious thing that I have now to mention: The
devils have, with most horrid operations, broke in upon our
neighborhood; and God has at such a rate overruled all the fury and
malice of those devils, that all the afflicted have not only been
delivered, but, I hope, also savingly brought home unto God; and the
reputation of no one good person in the world has been damaged, but,
instead thereof, the souls of many, especially of the rising
generation, have been thereby awakened unto some acquaintance with
religion. Our young people, who belonged unto the praying-meetings, of
both sexes, apart, would ordinarily spend whole nights, by whole weeks
together, in prayers and psalms upon these occasions, in which
devotions the devils could get nothing but, like fools, a scourge for
their own backs: and some scores of other young people, who were
strangers to real piety, were now struck with the lively
demonstrations of hell evidently set forth before their eyes, when
they saw persons cruelly frighted, wounded and starved by devils, and
scalded with burning brimstone, and yet so preserved in this tortured
state, as that, at the end of one month's wretchedness, they were as
able still to undergo another; so that, of these also, it might now be
said, 'Behold, they pray.' In the whole, the Devil got just nothing,
but God got praises, Christ got subjects, the Holy Spirit got temples,
the church got additions, and the souls of men got everlasting
benefits. I am not so vain as to say that any wisdom or virtue of mine
did contribute unto this good order of things; but I am so just as to
say, I did not hinder this good."

I cannot, indeed, resist the conviction, that, notwithstanding all his
attempts to appear dissatisfied, after they had become unpopular, with
the occurrences in the Salem trials, he looked upon them with secret
pleasure, and would have been glad to have had them repeated in
Boston.]

How blind is man to the future! The state of things which Cotton
Mather labored to bring about, in order that he might increase his own
influence over an infatuated people, by being regarded by them as
mighty to cast out and vanquish evil spirits, and as able to hold
Satan himself in chains by his prayers and his piety, brought him at
length into such disgrace that his power was broken down, and he
became the object of public ridicule and open insult. And the
excitement that had been produced for the purpose of restoring and
strengthening the influence of the clerical and spiritual leaders
resulted in effects which reduced that influence to a still lower
point. The intimate connection of Dr. Mather and other prominent
ministers with the witchcraft delusion brought a reproach upon the
clergy from which they have not yet recovered.

In addition to the designing exertions of ambitious ecclesiastics, and
the benevolent and praiseworthy efforts of those whose only aim was to
promote a real and thorough reformation of religion, all the passions
of our nature stood ready to throw their concentrated energy into the
excitement (as they are sure to do, whatever may be its character), so
soon as it became sufficiently strong to encourage their action.

The whole force of popular superstition, all the fanatical
propensities of the ignorant and deluded multitude, united with the
best feelings of our nature to heighten the fury of the storm. Piety
was indignant at the supposed rebellion against the sovereignty of
God, and was roused to an extreme of agitation and apprehension in
witnessing such a daring and fierce assault by the Devil and his
adherents upon the churches and the cause of the gospel. Virtue was
shocked at the tremendous guilt of those who were believed to have
entered the diabolical confederacy; while public order and security
stood aghast, amidst the invisible, the supernatural, the infernal,
and apparently the irresistible attacks that were making upon the
foundations of society. In baleful combination with principles, good
in themselves, thus urging the passions into wild operation, there
were all the wicked and violent affections to which humanity is
liable. Theological bitterness, personal animosities, local
controversies, private feuds, long-cherished grudges, and professional
jealousies, rushed forward, and raised their discordant voices, to
swell the horrible din; credulity rose with its monstrous and
ever-expanding form, on the ruins of truth, reason, and the senses;
malignity and cruelty rode triumphant through the storm, by whose fury
every mild and gentle sentiment had been shipwrecked; and revenge,
smiling in the midst of the tempest, welcomed its desolating wrath as
it dashed the mangled objects of its hate along the shore.

The treatment of the prisoners, by the administrative and subordinate
officers in charge of them, there is reason to apprehend, was more
than ordinarily harsh and unfeeling. The fate of Willard prevented
expressions of kindness towards them. The crime of which they were
accused put them outside of the pale of human charities. All who
believed them guilty looked upon them, not only with horror, but hate.
To have deliberately abandoned God and heaven, the salvation of Christ
and the brotherhood of man, was regarded as detestable, execrable, and
utterly and for ever damnable. This was the universal feeling at the
time when the fanaticism was at its height; or, if there were any
dissenters, they dared not show themselves. What the poor innocent
sufferers experienced of cruelty, wrong, and outrage from this cause,
it is impossible for words to tell. It left them in prison to neglect,
ignominious ill-treatment, and abusive language from the menials
having charge of them; it made their trials a brutal mockery; it made
the pathway to the gallows a series of insults from an exasperated
mob. If dear relatives or faithful friends kept near them, they did it
at the peril of their lives, and were forbidden to utter the
sentiments with which their hearts were breaking. There was no
sympathy for those who died, or for those who mourned.

It may seem strange to us, at this distance of time, and with the
intelligence prevalent in this age, that persons of such known,
established, and eminent reputation as many of those whose cases have
been particularly noticed, could possibly have been imagined guilty
of the crime imputed to them. The question arises in every mind, Why
did not their characters save them from conviction, and even from
suspicion? The answer is to be found in the peculiar views then
entertained of the power and agency of Satan. It was believed that it
would be one of the signs of his coming to destroy the Church of
Christ, that some of the "elect" would be seduced into his
service,--that he would drag captive in his chains, and pervert into
instruments to further his wicked cause, many who stood among the
highest in the confidence of Christians. This belief made them more
vehement in their proceedings against ministers, church-members, and
persons of good repute, who were proved, by the overwhelming evidence
of the "afflicted children" and the confessing witches, to have made a
compact with the Devil. There is reason to fear that Mr. Burroughs,
and all accused persons of the highest reputation before for piety and
worth, especially all who had been professors of religion and
accredited church-members, suffered more than others from the severity
of the judges and executive officers of the law, and from the rage and
hatred of the people. It was indeed necessary, in order to keep up the
delusion and maintain the authority of the prosecutions, to break down
the influence of those among the accused and the sufferers who had
stood the highest, and bore themselves the best through the fiery
ordeal of the examinations, trials, and executions.

It is indeed a very remarkable fact, which has justly been enlarged
upon by several who have had their attention turned to this subject,
that, of the whole number that suffered, none, in the final scene,
lost their fortitude for a moment. Many were quite aged; a majority,
women, of whom some, brought up in delicacy, were wholly unused to
rough treatment or physical suffering. They must have undergone the
most dreadful hardships, suddenly snatched from their families and
homes; exposed to a torrent of false accusations imputing to them the
most odious, shameful, and devilish crimes; made objects of the
abhorrence of their neighbors, and, through the notoriety of the
affair, of the world; carried to and fro, over rugged roads, from jail
to jail, too often by unfeeling sub-officials; immured in crowded,
filthy, and noisome prisons; heavily loaded with chains, in dungeons;
left to endure insufficient attention to necessary personal wants,
often with inadequate food and clothing; all expressions of sympathy
for them withheld and forbidden,--those who ought to have been their
comforters denouncing them in the most awful language, and consigning
them to the doom of excommunication from the church on earth and from
the hope of heaven. Surely, there have been few cases in the dark and
mournful annals of human suffering and wrong, few instances of "man's
inhumanity to man," to be compared with what the victims of this
tragedy endured. Their bearing through the whole, from the arrest to
the scaffold, reflects credit upon our common nature. The fact that
Wardwell lost his firmness, for a time, ought not to exclude his name
from the honored list. Its claim to be enrolled on it was nobly
retrieved by his recantation, and his manly death.

There is one consideration that imparts a higher character to the
deportment of these persons than almost any of the tests to which the
firmness of the mind of man has ever been exposed. There was nothing
outside of the mind to hold it up, but every thing to bear it down.
All that they had in this world, all on which they could rest a hope
for the next, was the consciousness of their innocence. Their fidelity
to this sense of innocence--for a lie would have saved them--their
unfaltering allegiance to this consciousness; the preservation of a
calm, steadfast, serene mind; their faith and their prayers, rising
above the maledictions of a maniac mob, in devotion to God and
forgiveness to men, and, as in the case of Martha Corey and George
Burroughs, in clear and collected expressions,--this was truly
sublime. It was appreciated, at the time, by many a heart melted back
to its humanity; and paved the way for the deliverance of the world,
we trust for ever, from all such delusions, horrors, and spectacles.
The sufferers in 1692 deserve to be held in grateful remembrance for
having illustrated the dignity of which our nature is capable; for
having shown that integrity of conscience is an armor which protects
the peace of the soul against all the powers that can assail it; and
for having given an example, that will be seen of all and in all
times, of a courage, constancy, and faithfulness of which all are
capable, and which can give the victory over infirmities of age,
weaknesses and pains of body, and the most appalling combination of
outrages to the mind and heart that can be accumulated by the violence
and the wrath of man. Superstition and ignorance consigned their names
to obloquy, and shrouded them in darkness. But the day has dawned; the
shadows are passing away; truth has risen; the reign of superstition
is over; and justice will be done to all who have been true to
themselves, and stood fast to the integrity of their souls, even to
the death.

The place selected for the executions is worthy of notice. It was at a
considerable distance from the jail, and could be reached only by a
circuitous and difficult route. It is a fatiguing enterprise to get at
it now, although many passages that approach it from some directions
have since been opened. But it was a point where the spectacle would
be witnessed by the whole surrounding country far and near, being on
the brow of the highest eminence in the vicinity of the town. As it
was believed by the people generally that they were engaged in a great
battle with Satan, one of whose titles was "the Prince of the Power of
the Air," perhaps they chose that spot to execute his confederates,
because, in going to that high point, they were flaunting him in his
face, celebrating their triumph over him in his own realm. There is no
contemporaneous nor immediately subsequent record, that the
executions took place on the spot assigned by tradition; but that
tradition has been uniform and continuous, and appears to be verified
by a singular item of evidence that has recently come to light. A
letter written by the late venerable Dr. Holyoke to a friend at a
distance, dated Salem, Nov. 25, 1791, has found its way back to the
possession of one of his grand-daughters, which contains the following
passage: "In the last month, there died a man in this town, by the
name of John Symonds, aged a hundred years lacking about six months,
having been born in the famous '92. He has told me that his nurse had
often told him, that, while she was attending his mother at the time
she lay in with him, she saw, from the chamber windows, those unhappy
people hanging on Gallows' Hill, who were executed for witches by the
delusion of the times." John Symonds lived and died near the southern
end of Beverly Bridge, on the south side of what is now Bridge Street.
He was buried from his house, and Dr. Bentley made the funeral prayer,
in which he is said to have used this language: "O God! the man who
with his own hands felled the trees, and hewed the timbers, and
erected the house in which we are now assembled, was the ancestor of
him whose remains we are about to inter." It is inferrible from this
that Symonds was born in the house from which he was buried. Gallows
Hill, now "Witch Hill" is in full view from that spot, and would be
from the chamber windows of a house there, at any time, even in the
season when intervening trees were in their fullest foliage, while no
other point in that direction would be discernible. From the only
other locality of persons of the name of Symonds, at that time, in
North Fields near the North Bridge, Witch Hill is also visible, and
the only point in that direction that then would have been.

"Witch Hill" is a part of an elevated ledge of rock on the western
side of the city of Salem, broken at intervals; beginning at Legg's
Hill, and trending northerly. The turnpike from Boston enters Salem
through one of the gaps in this ridge, which has been widened,
deepened, and graded. North of the turnpike, it rises abruptly to a
considerable elevation, called "Norman's Rocks." At a distance of
between three and four hundred feet, it sinks again, making a wide and
deep gulley; and then, about a third of a mile from the turnpike, it
re-appears, in a precipitous and, at its extremity, inaccessible
cliff, of the height of fifty or sixty feet. Its southern and western
aspect, as seen from the rough land north of the turnpike, is given in
the headpiece of the Third Part, at the beginning of this volume. Its
sombre and desolate appearance admits of little variety of
delineation. It is mostly a bare and naked ledge. At the top of this
cliff, on the southern brow of the eminence, the executions are
supposed to have taken place. The outline rises a little towards the
north, but soon begins to fall off to the general level of the
country. From that direction only can the spot be easily reached. It
is hard to climb the western side, impossible to clamber up the
southern face. Settlement creeps down from the north, and has
partially ascended the eastern acclivity, but can never reach the
brink. Scattered patches of soil are too thin to tempt cultivation,
and the rock is too craggy and steep to allow occupation. An active
and flourishing manufacturing industry crowds up to its base; but a
considerable surface at the top will for ever remain an open space. It
is, as it were, a platform raised high in air.

A magnificent panorama of ocean, island, headland, bay, river, town,
field, and forest spreads out and around to view. On a clear summer
day, the picture can scarcely be surpassed. Facing the sun and the
sea, and the evidences of the love and bounty of Providence shining
over the landscape, the last look of earth must have suggested to the
sufferers a wide contrast between the mercy of the Creator and the
wrath of his creatures. They beheld the face of the blessed God
shining upon them in his works, and they passed with renewed and
assured faith into his more immediate presence. The elevated rock,
uplifted by the divine hand, will stand while the world stands, in
bold relief, and can never be obscured by the encroachments of society
or the structures of art,--a fitting memorial of their constancy.

When, in some coming day, a sense of justice, appreciation of moral
firmness, sympathy for suffering innocence, the diffusion of refined
sensibility, a discriminating discernment of what is really worthy of
commemoration among men, a rectified taste, a generous public spirit,
and gratitude for the light that surrounds and protects us against
error, folly, and fanaticism, shall demand the rearing of a suitable
monument to the memory of those who in 1692 preferred death to a
falsehood, the pedestal for the lofty column will be found ready,
reared by the Creator on a foundation that can never be shaken while
the globe endures, or worn away by the elements, man, or time--the
brow of Witch Hill. On no other spot could such a tribute be more
worthily bestowed, or more conspicuously displayed.

The effects of the delusion upon the country at large were very
disastrous. It cast its shadows over a broad surface, and they
darkened the condition of generations. The material interests of the
people long felt its blight. Breaking out at the opening of the
season, it interrupted the planting and cultivating of the grounds. It
struck an entire summer out of one year, and broke in upon another.
The fields were neglected; fences, roads, barns, and even the
meeting-house, went into disrepair. Burdens were accumulated upon the
already over-taxed resources of the people. An actual scarcity of
provisions, amounting almost to a famine, continued for some time to
press upon families. Farms were brought under mortgage or sacrificed,
and large numbers of the people were dispersed. One locality in the
village, which was the scene of this wild and tragic fanaticism, bears
to this day the marks of the blight then brought upon it. Although in
the centre of a town exceeding almost all others in its agricultural
development and thrift,--every acre elsewhere showing the touch of
modern improvement and culture,--the "old meeting-house road," from
the crossing of the Essex Railroad to the point where it meets the
road leading north from Tapleyville, has to-day a singular appearance
of abandonment. The Surveyor of Highways ignores it. The old, gray,
moss-covered stone walls are dilapidated, and thrown out of line. Not
a house is on either of its borders, and no gate opens or path leads
to any. Neglect and desertion brood over the contiguous grounds.
Indeed, there is but one house standing directly on the roadside until
you reach the vicinity of the site of the old meeting-house; and that
is owned and occupied by a family that bear the name and are the
direct descendants of Rebecca Nurse. On both sides there are the
remains of cellars, which declare that once it was lined by a
considerable population. Along this road crowds thronged in 1692, for
weeks and months, to witness the examinations.

The ruinous results were not confined to the village, but extended
more or less over the country generally. Excitement, wrought up to
consternation, spread everywhere. People left their business and
families, and came from distant points, to gratify their curiosity,
and enable themselves to form a judgment of the character of the
phenomena here exhibited. Strangers from all parts swelled the
concourse, gathered to behold the sufferings of "the afflicted" as
manifested at the examinations; and flocked to the surrounding
eminences and the grounds immediately in front of Witch Hill, to catch
a view of the convicts as they approached the place selected for their
execution, offered their dying prayers, and hung suspended high in
air. Such scenes always draw together great multitudes. None have
possessed a deeper, stronger, or stranger attraction; and never has
the dread spectacle been held out to view over a wider area, or from
so conspicuous a spot. The assembling of such multitudes so often, for
such a length of time, and from such remote quarters, must have been
accompanied and followed by wasteful, and in all respects deleterious,
effects. The continuous or frequently repeated sessions of the
magistrates, grand jury, and jury of trials; and the attendance of
witnesses summoned from other towns, or brought from beyond the
jurisdiction of the Province, and of families and parties interested
specially in the proceedings,--must have occasioned an extensive and
protracted interruption of the necessary industrial pursuits of
society, and heavily increased the public burdens.

The destruction dealt upon particular families extended to so many as
to constitute in the aggregate a vast, wide-spread calamity.[A]

[Footnote A: The following is a statement of the loss inflicted upon
the estate of George Jacobs, Sr. The property of the son was utterly
destroyed.

     "_An Account of what was seized and taken away from my
     Father's Estate, George Jacobs, Sr., late of Salem,
     deceased, by Sheriff Corwin and his Assistants in the year
     1692._

     "When my said father was executed, and I was forced to fly
     out of the country, to my great damage and distress of my
     family, my wife and daughter imprisoned,--viz., my wife
     eleven months, and my daughter seven months in prison,--it
     cost them twelve pounds money to the officers, besides other
     charges.

Five cows, fair large cattle, £3 per cow                           £15 00 0
Eight loads of English hay taken out of the barn, 35_s._ per load   14  0 0
A parcel of apples that made 24 barrels cider to halves; viz., 12
  barrels cider, 8_s._ per barrel                                    4 16 0
Sixty bushels of Indian corn, 2_s._ 6_d._ per bushel                 7 10 0
A mare                                                               2  0 0
Two good feather beds, and furniture, rugs, blankets, sheets,
  bolsters and pillows                                              10  0 0
Two brass kettles, cost                                              6  0 0
Money, 12_s._; a large gold thumb ring, 20_s._                       1 12 0
Five swine                                                           3 15 0
A quantity of pewter which I cannot exactly know the worth,
  perhaps                                                            3  0 0
                                                                    -------
                                                                    67 13 0
Besides abundance of small things, meat in the house, fowls,
  chairs, and other things took clear away                  _above_ 12  0 0
                                                                    -------
                                                                    79 13 0
                                                                    =======

     "GEORGE JACOBS."

When Edward Bishop and his wife Sarah were arrested, household goods
which were valued by the sheriff himself at ten pounds,--he refusing
that sum for their restitution,--six cows, twenty-four swine,
forty-six sheep, were taken from his farm. The imprisonment of himself
and wife (prior to their escape) aggregated thirty-seven weeks. Ten
shillings a week for board, and other charges and prison fees
amounting to five pounds, were assessed upon his estate, and taken by
distraint. A family of twelve children was left without any to direct
or care for them, and the product of the farm for that year wholly cut
off.

There were taken from the estate of Samuel Wardwell, who was executed,
five cows, a heifer and yearling, a horse, nine hogs, eight loads of
hay, six acres of standing corn, and a set of carpenters' tools. From
the estate of Dorcas Hoar, a widow, there were taken two cows, an ox
and mare, four pigs, bed, bed-curtains and bedding, and other
household stuff.

Persons apprehended were made to pay all charges of every kind for
their maintenance, fuel, clothes, expenses of transportation from jail
to jail, and inexorable court and prison fees. The usual fee to the
clerk of the courts was £1. 17_s._ 5_d._, sometimes more; sometimes,
although very rarely, a little less. He must have received a large
amount of money in the aggregate that year. The prisoners were charged
for every paper that was drawn up. If a reprieve was obtained, there
was a fee. When discharged, there was a fee. The expenses of the
executions, even hangmen's fees, were levied on the families of the
sufferers. Abraham Foster, whose mother died in prison, to get her
body for burial, had to pay £2. 10_s._

When the value of money at that time is considered, and we bear in
mind that most of the persons apprehended were farmers, who have but
little cash on hand, and that these charges were levied on their
stock, crops, and furniture in their absence, and in the unrestrained
exercise of arbitrary will, by the sheriff or constables, we can judge
how utterly ruinous the operation must have been.]

The facts that belong to the story of the witchcraft delusion of 1692,
or that may in any way explain or illustrate it, so far as they can be
gathered from the imperfect and scattered records and papers that have
come down to us, have now been laid before you. But there are one or
two inquiries that force themselves upon thoughtful minds, which
demand consideration before we close the subject.

What are we to think of those persons who commenced and continued the
accusations,--the "afflicted children" and their associates?

In some instances and to some extent, the steps they took and the
testimony they bore may be explained by referring to the mysterious
energies of the imagination, the power of enthusiasm, the influence of
sympathy, and the general prevalence of credulity, ignorance,
superstition, and fanaticism at the time; and it is not probable,
that, when they began, they had any idea of the tremendous length to
which they were finally led on.

It was perhaps their original design to gratify a love of notoriety or
of mischief by creating a sensation and excitement in their
neighborhood, or, at the worst, to wreak their vengeance upon one or
two individuals who had offended them. They soon, however, became
intoxicated by the terrible success of their imposture, and were swept
along by the frenzy they had occasioned. It would be much more
congenial with our feelings to believe, that these misguided and
wretched young persons early in the proceedings became themselves
victims of the delusion into which they plunged every one else. But we
are forbidden to form this charitable judgment by the manifestations
of art and contrivance, of deliberate cunning and cool malice, they
exhibited to the end. Once or twice they were caught in their own
snare; and nothing but the blindness of the bewildered community saved
them from disgraceful exposure and well-deserved punishment. They
appeared as the prosecutors of every poor creature that was tried, and
seemed ready to bear testimony against any one upon whom suspicion
might happen to fall. It is dreadful to reflect upon the enormity of
their wickedness, if they were conscious of imposture throughout. It
seems to transcend the capabilities of human crime. There is, perhaps,
a slumbering element in the heart of man, that sleeps for ever in the
bosom of the innocent and good, and requires the perpetration of a
great sin to wake it into action, but which, when once aroused, impels
the transgressor onward with increasing momentum, as the descending
ball is accelerated in its course. It may be that crime begets an
appetite for crime, which, like all other appetites, is not quieted
but inflamed by gratification.

Their precise moral condition, the degree of guilt to be ascribed, and
the sentence to be passed upon them, can only be determined by a
considerate review of all the circumstances and influences around
them.

For a period embracing about two months, they had been in the habit of
meeting together, and spending the long winter evenings, at Mr.
Parris's house, practising the arts of fortune-telling, jugglery, and
magic. What they had heard in the traditions and fables of a credulous
and superstitious age,--stories handed down in the interior
settlements, circulated in companies gathered around the hearths of
farmhouses, indulging the excitements of terrified imaginations;
filling each other's minds with wondrous tales of second-sight, ghosts
and spirits from the unseen world, together with what the West-Indian
or South-American slaves could add,--was for a long time the food of
their fancies. They experimented continually upon what was the
spiritualism of their day, and grew familiar with the imagery and the
exhibitions of the marvellous. The prevalent notions concerning
witchcraft operations and spectral manifestations came into full
effect among them. Living in the constant contemplation of such
things, their minds became inflamed and bewildered; and, at the same
time, they grew expert in practising and exhibiting the forms of
pretended supernaturalism, the conditions of diabolical distraction,
and the terrors of demonology. Apparitions rose before them, revealing
the secrets of the past and of the future. They beheld the present
spectres of persons then bodily far distant. They declared in
language, fits, dreams, or trance, the immediate operations upon
themselves of the Devil, by the agency of his confederates. Their
sufferings, while thus under "an evil hand," were dreadful to behold,
and soon drew wondering and horror-struck crowds around them.

At this point, if Mr. Parris, the ministers, and magistrates had done
their duty, the mischief might have been stopped. The girls ought to
have been rebuked for their dangerous and forbidden sorceries and
divinations, their meetings broken up, and all such tamperings with
alleged supernaturalism and spiritualism frowned down. Instead of
this, the neighboring ministers were summoned to meet at Mr. Parris's
house to witness the extraordinary doings of the girls, and all they
did was to indorse, and pray over, them. Countenance was thus given to
their pretensions, and the public confidence in the reality of their
statements established. Magistrates from the town, church-members,
leading people, and people of all sorts, flocked to witness the awful
power of Satan, as displayed in the tortures and contortions of the
"afflicted children;" who became objects of wonder, so far as their
feats were regarded, and of pity in view of their agonies and
convulsions.

The aspect of the evidence rather favors the supposition, that the
girls originally had no design of accusing, or bringing injury upon,
any one. But the ministers at Parris's house, physicians and others,
began the work of destruction by pronouncing the opinion that they
were bewitched. This carried with it, according to the received
doctrine, a conviction that there were witches about; for the Devil
could not act except through the instrumentality of beings in
confederacy with him. Immediately, the girls were beset by everybody
to say who it was that bewitched them. Yielding to this pressure, they
first cried out upon such persons as might have been most naturally
suggested to them,--Sarah Good, apparently without a regular home, and
wandering with her children from house to house for shelter and
relief; Sarah Osburn, a melancholy, broken-minded, bed-ridden person;
and Tituba, a slave, probably of mixed African and Indian blood. At
the examination of these persons, the girls were first brought before
the public, and the awful power in their hands revealed to them. The
success with which they acted their parts; the novelty of the scene;
the ceremonials of the occasion, the magistrates in their imposing
dignity and authority, the trappings of the marshal and his officers,
the forms of proceeding,--all which they had never seen before; the
notice taken of them; the importance attached to them; invested the
affair with a strange fascination in their eyes, and awakened a new
class of sentiments and ideas in their minds. A love of distinction
and notoriety, and the several passions that are gratified by the
expression by others of sympathy, wonder, and admiration, were brought
into play. The fact that all eyes were upon them, with the special
notice of the magistrates, and the entire confidence with which their
statements were received, flattered and beguiled them. A fearful
responsibility had been assumed, and they were irretrievably committed
to their position. While they adhered to that position, their power
was irresistible, and they were sure of the public sympathy and of
being cherished by the public favor. If they faltered, they would be
the objects of universal execration and of the severest penalties of
law for the wrongs already done and the falsehoods already sworn to.
There was no retracing their steps; and their only safety was in
continuing the excitement they had raised. New victims were constantly
required to prolong the delusion, fresh fuel to keep up the
conflagration; and they went on to cry out upon others. With the
exception of two of their number, who appear to have indulged spite
against the families in which they were servants, there is no evidence
that they were actuated by private grievances or by animosities
personal to themselves. They were ready and sure to wreak vengeance
upon any who expressed doubts about the truth of their testimony, or
the propriety of the proceedings; but, beyond this, they were very
indifferent as to whom they should accuse. They were willing, as to
that matter, to follow the suggestions of others, and availed
themselves of all the gossip and slander and unfriendly talk in their
families that reached their ears. It was found, that a hint, with a
little information as to persons, places, and circumstances, conveyed
to them by those who had resentments and grudges to gratify, would be
sufficient for the purpose. There is reason to fear, that there were
some behind them, giving direction to the accusations, and managing
the frightful machinery, all the way through. The persons who were
apprehended had, to a considerable extent, been obnoxious, and subject
to prejudice, in connection with quarrels and controversies related in
Part I., vol. i. They were "Topsfield men," or the opponents of Bayley
or of Parris, or more or less connected with some other feuds. As
further proof that the girls were under the guidance of older heads,
it is obvious, that there was, in the order of the proceedings, a
skilful arrangement of times, sequences, and concurrents, that cannot
be ascribed to them. No novelist or dramatist ever laid his plot
deeper, distributed his characters more artistically, or conducted
more methodically the progress of his story.

In the mean while, they were becoming every day more perfect in the
performance of their parts; and their imaginative powers, nervous
excitability, and flexibility and rapidity of muscular action, were
kept under constant stimulus, and attaining a higher development. The
effect of these things, so long continued in connection with the
perpetual pretence, becoming more or less imbued with the character of
belief, of their alliance and communion with spiritual beings and
manifestations, may have unsettled, to some extent, their minds. Added
to this, a sense of the horrid consequences of their actions,
accumulating with every pang they inflicted, the innocent blood they
were shedding, and the depths of ruin into which they were sinking
themselves and others, not only demoralized, but to some extent,
perhaps, crazed them. It is truly a marvel that their physical
constitutions did not break down under the exhausting excitements, the
contortions of frame, the force to which the bodily functions were
subjected in trances and fits, and the strain upon all the vital
energies, protracted through many months. The wonder, however, would
have been greater, if the mental and moral balance had not thereby
been disturbed.

Perpetual conversance with ideas of supernaturalism; daily and nightly
communications, whether in the form of conscious imposture or honest
delusion, with the spiritual world, continued through a great length
of time,--as much at least as the exclusive contemplation of any one
idea or class of ideas,--must be allowed to be unsalutary. Whatever
keeps the thoughts wholly apart from the objects of real and natural
life, and absorbs them in abstractions, cannot be favorable to the
soundness of the faculties or the tone of the mind. This must
especially be the effect, if the subjects thus monopolizing the
attention partake of the marvellous and mysterious. When these things
are considered, and the external circumstances of the occasion, the
wild social excitement, the consternation, confusion, and horror, that
were all crowded and heaped up and kept pressing upon the soul without
intermission for months, the wonder is, indeed, that not only the
accusers, prosecutors, and sufferers, but the whole people, did not
lose their senses. Never was the great boon of life, a sound mind in a
sound body, more liable to be snatched away from all parties. The
depositions of Ann Putnam, Sr., have a tinge of sadness;--a
melancholy, sickly mania running through them. Something of the kind
is, perhaps, more or less discernible in the depositions of others.

Let us, then, relieve our common nature from the load of the
imputation, that, in its normal state, it is capable of such
inconceivable wickedness, by giving to these wretched persons the
benefit of the supposition that they were more or less deranged. This
view renders the lesson they present more impressive and alarming. Sin
in all cases, when considered by a mind that surveys the whole field,
is itself insanity. In the case of these accusers, it was so great as
to prove, by its very monstrousness, that it had actually subverted
their nature and overthrown their reason. They followed their victims
to the gallows, and jeered, scoffed, insulted them in their dying
hours. Sarah Churchill, according to the testimony of Sarah
Ingersoll, on one occasion came to herself, and manifested the
symptoms of a restored moral consciousness: but it was a temporary
gleam, a lucid interval; and she passed back into darkness,
continuing, as before, to revel in falsehood, and scatter destruction
around her. With this single exception, there is not the slightest
appearance of compunction or reflection among them. On the contrary,
they seem to have been in a frivolous, sportive, gay frame of thought
and spirits. There is, perhaps, in this view of their conduct and
demeanor, something to justify the belief that they were really
demented. The fact that a large amount of skilful art and adroit
cunning was displayed by them is not inconsistent with the supposition
that they had become partially insane; for such cunning and art are
often associated with insanity.

The quick wit and ready expedients of the "afflicted children" are
very remarkable. They were prompt with answers, if any attempted to
cross-examine them, extricated themselves most ingeniously if ever
brought into embarrassment, and eluded all efforts to entrap or expose
them. Among the papers is a deposition, the use of which at the trials
is not apparent. It does not purport to bear upon any particular case.
Joseph Hutchinson was a firm-minded man, of strong common sense. He
could not easily be deceived; and, although he took part in the
proceedings at the beginning, soon became opposed to them. It looks as
if, by close questions put to the child, Abigail Williams, on some
occasion of his casually meeting her, he had tried to expose the
falseness of her accusations, and that he was made to put the
conversation into the shape of a deposition. It is as follows:--

     "THE DEPOSITION OF JOSEPH HUTCHINSON, aged fifty-nine years,
     do testify as followeth: "Abigail Williams, I have heard you
     speak often of a book that has been offered to you. She said
     that there were two books: one was a short, thick book; and
     the other was a long book. I asked her what color the book
     was of. She said the books were as red as blood. I asked her
     if she had seen the books opened. She said she had seen it
     many times. I asked her if she did see any writing in the
     book. She said there were many lines written; and, at the end
     of every line, there was a seal. I asked her, who brought the
     book to her. She told me that it was the black man. I asked
     her who the black man was. She told me it was the Devil. I
     asked her if she was not afraid to see the Devil. She said,
     at the first she was, and did go from him; but now she was
     not afraid, but could talk with him as well as she could with
     me."

There is an air of ease and confidence in the answers of Abigail,
which illustrates the promptness of invention and assurance of their
grounds which the girls manifested on all occasions. They were never
at a loss, and challenged scrutiny. Hutchinson gained no advantage,
and no one else ever did, in an encounter with them.

Whatever opinion may be formed of the moral or mental condition of the
"afflicted children," as to their sanity and responsibility, there can
be no doubt that they were great actors. In mere jugglery and sleight
of hand, they bear no mean comparison with the workers of wonders, in
that line, of our own day. Long practice had given them complete
control over their countenances, intonations of voice, and the entire
muscular and nervous organization of their bodies; so that they could
at will, and on the instant, go into fits and convulsions, swoon and
fall to the floor, put their frames into strange contortions, bring
the blood to the face, and send it back again. They could be deadly
pale at one moment, at the next flushed; their hands would be clenched
and held together as with a vice; their limbs stiff and rigid or
wholly relaxed; their teeth would be set; they would go through the
paroxysms of choking and strangulation, and gasp for breath, bringing
froth and blood from the mouth; they would utter all sorts of screams
in unearthly tones; their eyes remain fixed, sometimes bereft of all
light and expression, cold and stony, and sometimes kindled into
flames of passion; they would pass into the state of somnambulism,
without aim or conscious direction in their movements, looking at some
point, where was no apparent object of vision, with a wild, unmeaning
glare. There are some indications that they had acquired the art of
ventriloquism; or they so wrought upon the imaginations of the
beholders, that the sounds of the motions and voices of invisible
beings were believed to be heard. They would start, tremble, and be
pallid before apparitions, seen, of course, only by themselves; but
their acting was so perfect that all present thought they saw them
too. They would address and hold colloquy with spectres and ghosts;
and the responses of the unseen beings would be audible to the fancy
of the bewildered crowd. They would follow with their eyes the airy
visions, so that others imagined they also beheld them. This was
surely a high dramatic achievement. Their representations of pain, and
every form and all the signs and marks of bodily suffering,--as in the
case of Ann Putnam's arm, and the indentations of teeth on the flesh
in many instances,--utterly deceived everybody; and there were men
present who could not easily have been imposed upon. The
Attorney-general was a barrister fresh from Inns of Court in London.
Deodat Lawson had seen something of the world; so had Joseph Herrick.
Joseph Hutchinson was a sharp, stern, and sceptical observer. John
Putnam was a man of great practical force and discrimination; so was
his brother Nathaniel, and others of the village. Besides, there were
many from Boston and elsewhere competent to detect a trick; but none
could discover any imposture in the girls. Sarah Nurse swore that she
saw Goody Bibber cheat in the matter of the pins; but Bibber did not
belong to the village, and was a bungling interloper. The accusing
girls showed extraordinary skill, ingenuity, and fancy in inventing
the stories to which they testified, and seemed to have been familiar
with the imagery which belonged to the literature of demonology. This
has led some to suppose that they must have had access to books
treating the subject. Our fathers abhorred, with a perfect hatred, all
theatrical exhibitions. It would have filled them with horror to
propose going to a play. But unwittingly, week after week, month in
and month out, ministers, deacons, brethren, and sisters of the church
rushed to Nathaniel Ingersoll's, to the village and town
meeting-houses, and to Thomas Beadle's Globe Tavern, and gazed with
wonder, awe, and admiration upon acting such as has seldom been
surpassed on the boards of any theatre, high or low, ancient or
modern.

There is another aspect that perplexes and confounds the judgments of
all who read the story. It is this: As it is at present the universal
opinion that the whole of this witchcraft transaction was a delusion,
having no foundation whatever but in the imaginations and passions;
and as it is now certain, that all the accused, both the condemned and
the pardoned, were entirely innocent,--how can it be explained that so
many were led to confess themselves guilty? The answer to this
question is to be found in those general principles which have led the
wisest legislators and jurists to the conclusion, that, although on
their face and at first thought, they appear to be the very best kind
of evidence, yet, maturely considered, confessions made under the hope
of a benefit, and sometime even without the impulses of such a hope,
are to be received with great caution and wariness. Here were
fifty-five persons, who declared themselves guilty of a capital, nay,
a diabolical crime, of which we know they were innocent. It is
probable that the motive of self-preservation influenced most of them.
An awful death was in immediate prospect. There was no escape from
the wiles of the accusers. The delusion had obtained full possession
of the people, the jury, and the Court. By acknowledging a compact
with Satan, they could in a moment secure their lives and liberty. It
was a position which only the firmest minds could safely occupy. The
principles and the prowess of ordinary characters could not withstand
the temptation and the pressure. They yielded, and were saved from an
impending and terrible death.

As these confessions had a decisive effect in precipitating the public
mind into the depths of its delusion, gave a fatal power to the
accusers, and carried the proceedings to the horrible extremities
which have concentrated upon them the attention of the world, they
assume an importance in the history of the affair that demands a full
and thorough exposition. At the examination of Ann Foster, at Salem
Village, on the 15th of July, 1692, the following confession was,
"after a while," extorted from her. It was undoubtedly the result of
the overwhelming effect of the horrors of her condition upon a
distressed and half-crazed mind. It shows the staple materials of
which confessions were made, and the forms of absurd superstition with
which the imaginations of people were then filled:--

     The Devil appeared to her in the shape of a bird at several
     times,--such a bird as she never saw the like before; and
     she had had this gift (viz., of striking the afflicted down
     with her eye) ever since. Being asked why she thought that
     bird was the Devil, she answered, because he came white and
     vanished away black; and that the Devil told her she should
     have this gift, and that she must believe him, and told her
     she should have prosperity: and she said that he had
     appeared to her three times, and always as a bird, and the
     last time about half a year since, and sat upon a
     table,--had two legs and great eyes, and that it was the
     second time of his appearance that he promised her
     prosperity. She further stated, that it was Goody Carrier
     that made her a witch. She told her, that, if she would not
     be a witch, the Devil would tear her to pieces, and carry
     her away,--at which time she promised to serve the Devil;
     that she was at the meeting of the witches at Salem Village;
     that Goody Carrier came, and told her of the meeting, and
     would have her go: so they got upon sticks, and went said
     journey, and, being there, did see Mr. Burroughs, the
     minister, who spake to them all; that there were then
     twenty-five persons met together; that she tied a knot in a
     rag, and threw it into the fire to hurt Timothy Swan, and
     that she did hurt the rest that complained of her by
     squeezing puppets like them, and so almost choked them; that
     she and Martha Carrier did both ride on a stick or pole when
     they went to the witch-meeting at Salem Village, and that
     the stick broke as they were carried in the air above the
     tops of the trees, and they fell: but she did hang fast
     about the neck of Goody Carrier, and they were presently at
     the village; that she had heard some of the witches say that
     there were three hundred and five in the whole country, and
     that they would ruin that place, the village; that there
     were also present at that meeting two men besides Mr.
     Burroughs, the minister, and one of them had gray hair; and
     that the discourse among the witches at the meeting in Salem
     Village was, that they would afflict there to set up the
     Devil's kingdom.

The confession of which the foregoing is the substance appears to have
been drawn out at four several examinations on different days, during
which she was induced by the influences around her to make her
testimony more and more extravagant at each successive examination.
Her daughter, Mary Lacy, called Goody Lacy, was brought up on the
charge of witchcraft at the same time; and, upon finding the mother
confessing, she saw that her only safety was in confessing also. When
confronted, the daughter cried out to the mother, "We have forsaken
Jesus Christ, and the Devil hath got hold of us. How shall we get
clear of this Evil One?" She proceeded to say that she had accompanied
her mother and Goody Carrier, all three riding together on the pole,
to Salem Village. She then made the following statement: "About three
or four years ago, she saw Mistress Bradbury, Goody Howe, and Goody
Nurse baptized by the old Serpent at Newbury Falls; that he dipped
their heads in the water, and then said they were his, and he had
power over them; that there were six baptized at that time, who were
some of the chief or higher powers, and that there might be near about
a hundred in company at that time." It being asked her "after what
manner she went to Newbury Falls," she answered, "the Devil carried
her in his arms." She said, that, "if she did take a rag, and roll it
up together, and imagine it to represent such and such a person, then
that, whatsoever she did to that rag so rolled up, the person
represented thereby would be in like manner afflicted." Her daughter,
also named Mary Lacy, followed the example of her mother and
grandmother, and made confession.

An examination of the confessions shows, that, when accused persons
made up their minds to confess, they saw, that, to make their safety
secure, it was necessary to go the whole length of the popular
superstition and fanaticism. In many instances, they appear to have
fabricated their stories with much ingenuity and tact, making them
tally with the statements of the accusers, adding points and items
that gave an air of truthfulness, and falling in with current notions
and fancies. They were undoubtedly under training by the girls, and
were provided with the materials of their testimony. Their depositions
are valuable, inasmuch as they enable us to collect about the whole of
the notions then prevalent on the subject. If, in delivering their
evidences, any prompting was needed, the accusers were at their
elbows, and helped them along in their stories. If, in any particular,
they were in danger of contradicting themselves or others, they were
checked or diverted. In one case, a confessing witch was damaging her
own testimony, whereupon one of the afflicted cried out that she saw
the shapes or apparitions of other witches interfering with her
utterance. The witness took the hint, pretended to have lost the power
of expressing herself, and was removed from the stand.

In some cases, the confessing witches showed great adroitness, and
knowledge of human nature. When a leading minister was visiting them
in the prison, one of them cried out as he passed her cell, calling
him by name, "Oh! I remember a text you preached on in England, twenty
years since, from these words: 'Your sin will find you out;' for I
find it to be true in my own case." This skilful compliment, showing
the power of his preaching making an impression which time could not
efface, was no doubt flattering to the good man, and secured for her
his favorable influence.

Justice requires that their own explanation of the influences which
led them to confess should not be withheld.

The following declaration of six women belonging to Andover is
accompanied by a paper signed by more than fifty of the most
respectable inhabitants of that town, testifying to their good
character, in which it is said that "by their sober, godly, and
exemplary conversation, they have obtained a good report in the place,
where they have been well esteemed and approved in the church of which
they are members:"--

     "We whose names are underwritten, inhabitants of Andover,
     when as that horrible and tremendous judgment, beginning at
     Salem Village, in the year 1692, by some called witchcraft,
     first breaking forth at Mr. Parris's house, several young
     persons, being seemingly afflicted, did accuse several
     persons for afflicting them; and many there believing it so
     to be, we being informed, that, if a person was sick, the
     afflicted person could tell what or who was the cause of
     that sickness: John Ballard of Andover, his wife being sick
     at the same time, he, either from himself, or by the advice
     of others, fetched two of the persons called the afflicted
     persons from Salem Village to Andover, which was the
     beginning of that dreadful calamity that befell us in
     Andover, believing the said accusations to be true, sent for
     the said persons to come together to the meeting-house in
     Andover, the afflicted persons being there. After Mr.
     Barnard had been at prayer, we were blindfolded, and our
     hands were laid upon the afflicted persons, they being in
     their fits, and falling into their fits at our coming into
     their presence, as they said: and some led us, and laid our
     hands upon them; and then they said they were well, and that
     we were guilty of afflicting them. Whereupon we were all
     seized as prisoners, by a warrant from the justice of the
     peace, and forthwith carried to Salem; and by reason of that
     sudden surprisal, we knowing ourselves altogether innocent
     of that crime, we were all exceedingly astonished and
     amazed, and consternated and affrighted, even out of our
     reason; and our nearest and dearest relations, seeing us in
     that dreadful condition, and knowing our great danger,
     apprehended there was no other way to save our lives, as the
     case was then circumstanced, but by our confessing ourselves
     to be such and such persons as the afflicted represented us
     to be, they, out of tenderness and pity, persuaded us to
     confess what we did confess. And, indeed, that confession
     that it is said we made was no other than what was suggested
     to us by some gentlemen, they telling us that we were
     witches, and they knew it, and we knew it, which made us
     think that it was so; and, our understandings, our reason,
     our faculties almost gone, we were not capable of judging of
     our condition; as also the hard measures they used with us
     rendered us incapable of making our defence, but said any
     thing, and every thing which they desired, and most of what
     we said was but in effect a consenting to what they said.
     Some time after, when we were better composed, they telling
     us what we had confessed, we did profess that we were
     innocent and ignorant of such things; and we hearing that
     Samuel Wardwell had renounced his confession, and was
     quickly after condemned and executed, some of us were told
     we were going after Wardwell.

     "MARY OSGOOD.
      MARY TYLER.
      DELIVERANCE DANE.
      ABIGAIL BARKER.
      SARAH WILSON.
      HANNAH TYLER."

The means employed, and the influences brought to bear upon persons
accused, were, in many cases, such as wholly to overpower them, and to
relieve their confessions, to a great extent, of a criminal character.
They were scarcely responsible moral agents. In the month of October,
Increase Mather came to Salem, to confer with the confessing witches
in prison. The result of his examinations is preserved in a document
of which he is supposed to have been the author. The following
extracts afford some explanation of the whole subject:--

     "Goodwife Tyler did say, that, when she was first
     apprehended, she had no fears upon her, and did think that
     nothing could have made her confess against herself. But
     since, she had found, to her great grief, that she had
     wronged the truth, and falsely accused herself. She said
     that, when she was brought to Salem, her brother Bridges
     rode with her; and that, all along the way from Andover to
     Salem, her brother kept telling her that she must needs be
     a witch, since the afflicted accused her, and at her touch
     were raised out of their fits, and urging her to confess
     herself a witch. She as constantly told him that she was no
     witch, that she knew nothing of witchcraft, and begged him
     not to urge her to confess. However, when she came to Salem,
     she was carried to a room, where her brother on one side,
     and Mr. John Emerson on the other side, did tell her that
     she was certainly a witch, and that she saw the Devil before
     her eyes at that time (and, accordingly, the said Emerson
     would attempt with his hand to beat him away from her eyes);
     and they so urged her to confess, that she wished herself in
     any dungeon, rather than be so treated. Mr. Emerson told
     her, once and again, 'Well, I see you will not confess!
     Well, I will now leave you; and then you are undone, body
     and soul, for ever.' Her brother urged her to confess, and
     told her that, in so doing, she could not lie: to which she
     answered, 'Good brother, do not say so; for I shall lie if I
     confess, and then who shall answer unto God for my lie?' He
     still asserted it, and said that God would not suffer so
     many good men to be in such an error about it, and that she
     would be hanged if she did not confess; and continued so
     long and so violently to urge and press her to confess, that
     she thought, verily, that her life would have gone from her,
     and became so terrified in her mind that she owned, at
     length, almost any thing that they propounded to her; that
     she had wronged her conscience in so doing; she was guilty
     of a great sin in belying of herself, and desired to mourn
     for it so long as she lived. This she said, and a great deal
     more of the like nature; and all with such affection,
     sorrow, relenting, grief, and mourning, as that it exceeds
     any pen to describe and express the same."

     "Goodwife Wilson said that she was in the dark as to some
     things in her confession. Yet she asserted that, knowingly,
     she never had familiarity with the Devil; that, knowingly,
     she never consented to the afflicting of any person, &c.
     However, she said that truly she was in the dark as to the
     matter of her being a witch. And being asked how she was in
     the dark, she replied, that the afflicted persons crying out
     of her as afflicting them made her fearful of herself; and
     that was all that made her say that she was in the dark."

     "Goodwife Bridges said that she had confessed against
     herself things which were all utterly false; and that she
     was brought to her confession by being told that she
     certainly was a witch, and so made to believe it,--though
     she had no other grounds so to believe."

Some explanation of the details which those, prevailed upon to
confess, put into their testimony, and which seemed, at the time, to
establish and demonstrate the truth of their statements, is afforded
by what Mary Osgood is reported, by Increase Mather, to have said to
him on this occasion:--

     "Being asked why she prefixed a time, and spake of her being
     baptized, &c., about twelve years since, she replied and
     said, that, when she had owned the thing, they asked the
     time, to which she answered that she knew not the time. But,
     being told that she did know the time, and must tell the
     time, and the like, she considered that about twelve years
     before (when she had her last child) she had a fit of
     sickness, and was melancholy; and so thought that that time
     might be as proper a time to mention as any, and accordingly
     did prefix the said time. Being asked about the cat, in the
     shape of which she had confessed that the Devil had appeared
     to her, &c., she replied, that, being told that the Devil
     had appeared to her, and must needs appear to her, &c. (she
     being a witch), she at length did own that the Devil had
     appeared to her; and, being pressed to say in what
     creature's shape he appeared, she at length did say that it
     was in the shape of a cat. Remembering that, some time
     before her being apprehended, as she went out at her door,
     she saw a cat, &c.; not as though she any whit suspected the
     said cat to be the Devil, in the day of it, but because some
     creature she must mention, and this came into her mind at
     that time."

This poor woman, as well as several others, besides Goodwife Tyler,
who denied and renounced their confessions, manifested, as Dr. Mather
affirms, the utmost horror and anguish at the thought that they could
have been so wicked as to have belied themselves, and brought injury
upon others by so doing. They "bewailed and lamented their accusing of
others, about whom they never knew any evil" in their lives. They
proved the sincerity of their repentance by abandoning and denouncing
their confessions, and thus offering their lives as a sacrifice to
atone for their falsehood. They were then awaiting their trial; and
there seemed no escape from the awful fate which had befallen all
persons brought to trial before, and who had not confessed or had
withdrawn their confession. Fortunately for them, the Court did not
meet again in 1692; and they were acquitted at the regular session, in
the January following.

In one of Calef's tracts, he sums up his views, on the subject of the
confessions, as follows:--

     "Besides the powerful argument of life (and freedom from
     hardships, not only promised, but also performed to all that
     owned their guilt), there are numerous instances of the
     tedious examinations before private persons, many hours
     together; they all that time urging them to confess (and
     taking turns to persuade them), till the accused were
     wearied out by being forced to stand so long, or for want of
     sleep, &c., and so brought to give assent to what they said;
     they asking them, 'Were you at such a witch meeting?' or,
     'Have you signed the Devil's book?' &c. Upon their replying
     'Yes,' the whole was drawn into form, as their confession."

This accounts for the similarity of construction and substance of the
confessions generally.

Calef remarks:--

     "But that which did mightily further such confessions was
     their nearest relations urging them to it. These, seeing no
     other way of escape for them, thought it the best advice
     that could be given; hence it was, that the husbands of
     some, by counsel, often urging, and utmost earnestness, and
     children upon their knees intreating, have at length
     prevailed with them to say they were guilty."

One of the most painful things in the whole affair was, that the
absolute conviction of the guilt of the persons accused, pervading the
community, took full effect upon the minds of many relatives and
friends. They did not consider it as a matter of the least possible
doubt. They therefore looked upon it as wicked obstinacy not to
confess, and, in this sense, an additional and most conclusive
evidence of a mind alienated from truth and wholly given over to
Satan. This turned natural love and previous friendships into
resentment, indignation, and abhorrence, which left the unhappy
prisoners in a condition where only the most wonderful clearness of
conviction and strength of character could hold them up. And, in many
cases where they yielded, it was not from unworthy fear, or for
self-preservation, but because their judgment was overthrown, and
their minds in complete subjection and prostration.

There can, indeed, hardly be a doubt, that, in some instances, the
confessing persons really believed themselves guilty. To explain this,
we must look into the secret chambers of the human soul; we must read
the history of the imagination, and consider its power over the
understanding. We must transport ourselves to the dungeon, and think
of its dark and awful walls, its dreary hours, its tedious loneliness,
its heavy and benumbing fetters and chains, its scanty fare, and all
its dismal and painful circumstances. We must reflect upon their
influence over a terrified and agitated, an injured and broken spirit.
We must think of the situation of the poor prisoner, cut off from
hope; hearing from all quarters, and at all times, morning, noon, and
night, that there is no doubt of his guilt; surrounded and overwhelmed
by accusations and evidence, gradually but insensibly mingling and
confounding the visions and vagaries of his troubled dreams with the
reveries of his waking hours, until his reason becomes obscured, his
recollections are thrown into derangement, his mind loses the power of
distinguishing between what is perpetually told him by others and what
belongs to the suggestions of his own memory: his imagination at last
gains complete ascendency over his other faculties, and he believes
and declares himself guilty of crimes of which he is as innocent as
the child unborn. The history of the transaction we have been
considering, affords a clear illustration of the truth and
reasonableness of this explanation.

The facility with which persons can be persuaded, by perpetually
assailing them with accusations of the truth of a charge, in reality
not true, even when it is made against themselves, has been frequently
noticed. Addison, in one of the numbers of his "Spectator," speaks of
it in connection with our present subject: "When an old woman," says
he, "begins to dote, and grow chargeable to a parish, she is generally
turned into a witch, and fills the whole country with extravagant
fancies, imaginary distempers, and terrifying dreams. In the mean
time, the poor wretch that is the innocent occasion of so many evils
begins to be frighted at herself, and sometimes confesses secret
commerces and familiarities that her imagination forms in a delirious
old age. This frequently cuts off charity from the greatest objects of
compassion, and inspires people with a malevolence towards those poor,
decrepit parts of our species in whom human nature is defaced by
infirmity and dotage."

This passage is important, in addition to the bearing it has upon the
point we have been considering, as describing the state of opinion and
feeling in England twenty years after the folly had been exploded
here. In another number of the same series of essays, he bears
evidence, that the superstitions which here came to a head in 1692 had
long been prevalent in the mother-country: "Our forefathers looked
upon nature with more reverence and horror before the world was
enlightened by learning and philosophy, and loved to astonish
themselves with the apprehensions of witchcraft, prodigies, charms,
and enchantments. There was not a village in England that had not a
ghost in it; the churchyards were all haunted; every large common had
a circle of fairies belonging to it; and there was scarce a shepherd
to be met with who had not seen a spirit." These fancies still linger
in the minds of some in the Old World and in the New.

After allowing for the utmost extent of prevalent superstitions, the
exaggerations incident to a state of general excitement, and the
fertile inventive faculties of the accusing girls, there is much in
the evidence that cannot easily be accounted for. In other cases than
that of Westgate, we find the symptoms of that bewildered condition of
the senses and imagination not at all surprising or unusual in the
experience of men staggering home in midnight hours from tavern
haunts. Disturbed dreams were, it is not improbable, a fruitful
source of delusion. A large part of the evidence is susceptible of
explanation by the supposition, that the witnesses had confounded the
visions of their sleeping, with the actual observations and
occurrences of their waking hours. At the trial of Susanna Martin, it
was in evidence, that one John Kembal had agreed to purchase a puppy
from the prisoner, but had afterwards fallen back from his bargain,
and procured a puppy from some other person, and that Martin was heard
to say, "If I live, I will give him puppies enough." The circumstances
seem to me to render it probable, that the following piece of evidence
given by Kembal, and to which the Court attached great weight, was the
result of a nightmare occasioned by his apprehension and dread of the
fulfilment of the reported threat:--

     "I, this deponent, coming from his intended house in the
     woods to Edmund Elliot's house where I dwelt, about the
     sunset or presently after; and there did arise a little
     black cloud in the north-west, and a few drops of rain, and
     the wind blew pretty hard. In going between the house of
     John Weed and the meeting-house, this deponent came by
     several stumps of trees by the wayside; and he by impulse he
     can give no reason of, that made him tumble over the stumps
     one after another, though he had his axe upon his shoulder
     which put him in much danger, and made him resolved to avoid
     the next, but could not.

     "And, when he came a little below the meeting-house, there
     did appear a little thing like a puppy, of a darkish color.
     It shot between my legs forward and backward, as one that
     were dancing the hay.[A] And this deponent, being free from
     all fear, used all possible endeavors to cut it with his
     axe, but could not hurt it; and, as he was thus laboring
     with his axe, the puppy gave a little jump from him, and
     seemed to go into the ground.

     "In a little further going, there did appear a black puppy,
     somewhat bigger than the first, but as black as a coal to
     his apprehension, which came against him with such violence
     as its quick motions did exceed his motions of his axe, do
     what he could. And it flew at his belly, and away, and then
     at his throat and over his shoulder one way, and go off, and
     up at it again another way; and with such quickness, speed,
     and violence did it assault him, as if it would tear out his
     throat or his belly. A good while, he was without fear; but,
     at last, I felt my heart to fail and sink under it, that I
     thought my life was going out. And I recovered myself, and
     gave a start up, and ran to the fence, and calling upon God
     and naming the name Jesus Christ, and then it invisibly
     away. My meaning is, it ceased at once; but this deponent
     made it not known to anybody, for fretting his wife."[B]

[Footnote A: Love's Labour's Lost, act v., sc. 1.]

[Footnote B: There are several other depositions in these cases, that
may perhaps be explained under the head of nightmare. The following
are specimens; that, for instance, of Robert Downer, of Salisbury, who
testifies and says,--

     "That, several years ago, Susanna Martin, the then wife of
     George Martin, being brought to court for a witch, the said
     Downer, having some words with her, this deponent, among
     other things, told her he believed that she was a witch, by
     what was said or witnessed against her; at which she,
     seeming not well affected, said that a, or some, she-devil
     would fetch him away shortly, at which this deponent was not
     much moved; but at night, as he lay in his bed in his own
     house, alone, there came at his window the likeness of a
     cat, and by and by came up to his bed, took fast hold of his
     throat, and lay hard upon him a considerable while, and was
     like to throttle him. At length, he minded what Susanna
     Martin threatened him with the day before. He strove what he
     could, and said, 'Avoid, thou she-devil, in the name of the
     Father, and the Son, and the Holy Ghost!' and then it let
     him go, and jumped down upon the floor, and went out at the
     window again."

Susanna Martin, by the boldness and severity of her language, in
defending herself against the charge of witchcraft, had evidently, for
a long time, rendered herself an object of dread, and seems to have
disturbed the dreams of the superstitious throughout the neighborhood.
For instance, Jarvis Ring, of Salisbury, made oath as follows:--

     "That, about seven or eight years ago, he had been several
     times afflicted, in the night-time, by some body or some
     thing coming up upon him when he was in bed, and did sorely
     afflict him by lying upon him; and he could neither move nor
     speak while it was upon him, but sometimes made a kind of
     noise that folks did hear him and come up to him; and, as
     soon as anybody came, it would be gone. This it did for a
     long time, both then and since, but he did never see anybody
     clearly; but one time, in the night, it came upon me as at
     other times, and I did then see the person of Susanna
     Martin, of Amesbury. I, this deponent, did perfectly see
     her; and she came to this deponent, and took him by the
     hand, and bit him by the finger by force, and then came and
     lay upon him awhile, as formerly, and after a while went
     away. The print of the bite is yet to be seen on the little
     finger of his right hand; for it was hard to heal. He
     further saith, that several times he was asleep when it
     came; but, at that time, he was as fairly awaked as ever he
     was, and plainly saw her shape, and felt her teeth, as
     aforesaid."

Barnard Peach made oath substantially as follows:--

     "That about six or seven years past, being in bed on a
     Lord's-day night, he heard a scrambling at the window, and
     saw Susanna Martin come in at the window, and jump down upon
     the floor. She was in her hood and scarf, and the same dress
     that she was in before, at meeting the same day. Being come
     in, she was coming up towards this deponent's face, but
     turned back to his feet, and took hold of them, and drew up
     his body into a heap, and lay upon him about an hour and a
     half or two hours, in all which time this deponent could not
     stir nor speak; but, feeling himself beginning to be
     loosened or lightened, and he beginning to strive, he put
     out his hand among the clothes, and took hold of her hand,
     and brought it up to his mouth, and bit three of the fingers
     (as he judges) to the breaking of the bones; which done, the
     said Martin went out of the chamber, down the stairs, and
     out of the door. The deponent further declared, that, on
     another Lord's-day night, while sleeping on the hay in a
     barn, about midnight the said Susanna Martin and another
     came out of the shop into the barn, and one of them said,
     'Here he is,' and then came towards this deponent. He,
     having a quarter-staff, made a blow at them; but the roof of
     the barn prevented it, and they went away: but this deponent
     followed them, and, as they were going towards the window,
     made another blow at them, and struck them both down; but
     away they went out at the shop-window, and this deponent saw
     no more of them. And the rumor went, that the said Martin
     had a broken head at that time; but the deponent cannot
     speak to that upon his own knowledge."

Any one who has had the misfortune to be subject to nightmare will
find the elements of his own experience very much resembling the
descriptions given by Kembal, Downer, Ring, and Peach. The terrors to
which superstition, credulity, and ignorance subjected their minds;
the frightful tales of witchcraft and apparitions to which they were
accustomed to listen; and the contagious fears of the neighborhood in
reference to Susanna Martin, taken in connection with a disordered
digestion, an overloaded stomach, and a hard bed, or a strange
lodging-place,--are wholly sufficient to account for all the phenomena
to which they testified.]

We are all exposed to the danger of confounding the impressions left
by the imagination, when, set free from all confinement, it runs wild
in dreams, with the actual experiences of wakeful faculties in real
life. It is a topic worthy the consideration of writers on evidence,
and of legal tribunals. So also is the effect, upon the personal
consciousness, of the continued repetition of the same story, or of
hearing it repeated by others. Instances are given in books,--perhaps
can be recalled by our own individual experience or observation,--in
which what was originally a deliberate fabrication of falsehood or of
fancy has come, at last, to be regarded as a veritable truth and a
real occurrence.

A thorough and philosophical treatise on the subject of evidence is,
in view of these considerations, much needed. The liability all men
are under to confound the fictions of their imaginations with the
realities of actual observation is not understood with sufficient
clearness by the community; and, so long as it is not understood and
regarded, serious mistakes and inconveniences will be apt to occur in
seasons of general excitement. We are still disposed to attribute more
importance than we ought to strong convictions, without stopping to
inquire whether they may not be in reality delusions of the
understanding. The cause of truth demands a more thorough examination
of this whole subject. The visions that appeared before the mind of
the celebrated Colonel Gardiner are still regarded by the generality
of pious people as evidence of miraculous interposition, while, just
so far as they are evidence to that point, so far is the authority of
Christianity overthrown; for it is a fact, that Lord Herbert of
Cherbury believed with equal sincerity and confidence that he had been
vouchsafed a similar vision sanctioning his labors, when about to
publish what has been pronounced one of the most powerful attacks ever
made upon our religion. It is dangerous to advance arguments in favor
of any cause which may be founded upon nothing better than the
reveries of an ardent imagination!

The phenomena of dreams, of the exercises and convictions which occupy
the mind, while the avenues of the senses are closed, and the soul is
more or less extricated from its connection with the body,
particularly in the peculiar conditions of partial slumber, are among
the deep mysteries of human experience. The writers on mental
philosophy have not given them the attention they deserve.

The testimony in these trials is particularly valuable as showing the
power of the imagination to completely deceive and utterly falsify the
senses of sober persons, when wide awake and in broad daylight. The
following deposition was given in Court under oath. The parties
testifying were of unquestionable respectability. The man was probably
a brother of James Bayley, the first minister of the Salem Village
parish.

     "THE DEPOSITION OF JOSEPH BAYLEY, aged forty-four
     years.--Testifieth and saith, that, on the twenty-fifth day
     of May last, myself and my wife being bound to Boston, on the
     road, when I came in sight of the house where John Procter
     did live, there was a very hard blow struck on my breast,
     which caused great pain in my stomach and amazement in my
     head, but did see no person near me, only my wife behind me
     on the same horse; and, when I came against said Procter's
     house, according to my understanding, I did see John Procter
     and his wife at said house. Procter himself looked out of the
     window, and his wife did stand just without the door. I told
     my wife of it; and she did look that way, and could see
     nothing but a little maid at the door. Afterwards, about
     half a mile from the aforesaid house, I was taken speechless
     for some short time. My wife did ask me several questions,
     and desired me, that, if I could not speak, I should hold up
     my hand; which I did, and immediately I could speak as well
     as ever. And, when we came to the way where Salem road cometh
     into Ipswich road, there I received another blow on my
     breast, which caused so much pain that I could not sit on my
     horse. And, when I did alight off my horse, to my
     understanding, I saw a woman coming towards us about sixteen
     or twenty pole from us, but did not know who it was: my wife
     could not see her. When I did get up on my horse again, to my
     understanding, there stood a cow where I saw the woman. After
     that, we went to Boston without any further molestation; but,
     after I came home again to Newbury, I was pinched and nipped
     by something invisible for some time: but now, through God's
     goodness to me, I am well again.--_Jurat in curia_ by both
     persons."

Bayley and his wife were going to Boston on election week. It was a
good two days' journey from Newbury, as the roads then were, and
riding as they did. According to the custom of the times, she was
mounted on a pillion behind him. They had probably passed the night at
the house of Sergeant Thomas Putnam, with whom he was connected by
marriage. It was at the height of the witchcraft delirium. Thomas
Putnam's house was the very focus of it. There they had listened to
highly wrought accounts of its wonders and terrors, had witnessed the
amazing phenomena exhibited by Ann Putnam and Mercy Lewis, and their
minds been filled with images of spectres of living witches, and
ghosts of the dead. They had seen with their own eyes the tortures of
the girls under cruel diabolical influence, of which they had heard so
much, and realized the dread outbreak of Satan and his agents upon the
lives and souls of men.

They started the next morning on their way through the gloomy woods
and over the solitary road. It was known that they were to pass the
house of John Procter, believed to be a chief resort of devilish
spirits. Oppressed with terror and awe, Bayley was on the watch, his
heart in his mouth. The moment he came in sight, his nervous agitation
reached its climax; and he experienced the shock he describes. When he
came opposite to the house, to his horror there was Procter looking at
him from the window, and Procter's wife standing outside of the door.
He knew, that, in their proper persons and natural bodies, they were,
at that moment, both of them, and had been, for six weeks, in irons,
in one of the cells of the jail at Boston. Bayley's wife, from her
position on the pillion behind him, had her face directed to the other
side of the road. He told her what he saw. She looked round to the
house, and could see nothing but a little maid at the door. After one
or two more fits of fright, he reached the Lynn road, had escaped from
the infernal terrors of the infected region, and his senses resumed
their natural functions. It was several days before his nervous
agitations ceased. Altogether, this is a remarkable case of
hallucination: showing that the wildest fancies brought before the
mind in dreams may be paralleled in waking hours; and that mental
excitement may, even then, close the avenues of the senses, exclude
the perception of reality, and substitute unsubstantial visions in the
place of actual and natural objects.

There may be an interest in some minds to know who the "little maid at
the door" was. The elder children of John Procter were either married
off, or lived on his farm at Ipswich, with the exception of Benjamin,
his oldest son, who remained with his father on the Salem farm.
Benjamin had been imprisoned two days before Bayley passed the house.
Four days before, Sarah, sixteen years of age, had also been arrested,
and committed to jail. This left only William, eighteen years of age,
who, three days after, was himself put into prison; Samuel, seven;
Abigail, between three and four years of age; and one still younger.
No female of the family was then at the house older than Abigail. This
poor deserted child was "the little maid." Curiosity to see the
passing strangers, or possibly the hope that they might be her father
and mother, or her brother and sister, brought her to the door.

In the terrible consequences that resulted from the mischievous, and
perhaps at the outset merely sportive, proceedings of the children in
Mr. Parris's family, we have a striking illustration of the principle,
that no one can foretell, with respect either to himself or others,
the extent of the suffering and injury that may be occasioned by the
least departure from truth, or from the practice of deception. In the
horrible succession of crimes through which those young persons were
led to pass, in the depth of depravity to which they were thrown, we
discern the fate that endangers all who enter upon a career of
wickedness.

No one can have an adequate knowledge of the human mind, who has not
contemplated its developments in scenes like those that have now been
related. It may be said of the frame of our spiritual, even with more
emphasis than of our corporeal nature, that we are fearfully and
wonderfully made. In the maturity of his bodily and mental
organization, health gliding through his veins, strength and symmetry
clothing his form, intelligence beaming from his countenance, and
immortality stamped on his brow, man is indeed the noblest work of
God. In the degradation and corruption to which he can descend, he is
the most odious and loathsome object in the creation. The human mind,
when all its faculties are fully developed and in proper proportions,
reason seated on its rightful throne and shedding abroad its light,
memory embracing the past, hope smiling upon the future, faith leaning
on Heaven, and the affections diffusing through all their gentle
warmth, is worthy of its source, deserves its original title of "image
of God," and is greater and better than the whole material universe.
It is nobler than all the works of God; for it is an emanation, a part
of God himself, "a ray from the fountain of light." But where, I ask,
can you find a more deplorable and miserable object than the mind in
ruins, tossed by its own rebellious principles, and distorted by the
monstrously unequal development of its faculties? You will look in
vain upon the earthquake, the volcano, or the hurricane, for those
elements of the awful and terrible which are manifested in a community
of men whose passions have trampled upon their principles, whose
imaginations have overthrown the government of reason, and who are
swept along by the torrent until all order and security are swallowed
up and lost. Such a spectacle we have now been witnessing. We have
seen the whole population of this place and vicinity yielding to the
sway of their credulous fancies, allowing their passions to be worked
up to a tremendous pitch of excitement, and rushing into excesses of
folly and violence that have left a stain on their memory, and will
awaken a sense of shame, pity, and amazement in the minds of their
latest posterity.

There is nothing more mysterious than the self-deluding power of the
mind, and there never were scenes in which it was more clearly
displayed than the witchcraft prosecutions. Honest men testified, with
perfect confidence and sincerity, to the most absurd impossibilities;
while those who thought themselves victims of diabolical influence
would actually exhibit, in their corporeal frames, all the appropriate
symptoms of the sufferings their imaginations had brought upon them.
Great ignorance prevailed in reference to the influences of the body
and the mind upon each other. While the imagination was called into a
more extensive and energetic action than at any succeeding or previous
period, its properties and laws were but little understood: the extent
of the connection of the will and the muscular system, the reciprocal
influence of the nerves and the fancy, and the strong and universally
pervading sympathy between our physical and moral constitutions, were
almost wholly unknown. These important subjects, indeed, are but
imperfectly understood at the present day.

It may perhaps be affirmed, that the relations of the human mind with
the spiritual world will never be understood while we continue in the
present stage of existence and mode of being. The error of our
ancestors--and it is an error into which men have always been prone to
fall, and from which our own times are by no means exempt--was in
imagining that their knowledge had extended, in this direction, beyond
the boundary fixed unalterably to our researches, while in this
corporeal life.

It admits of much question, whether human science can ever find a
solid foundation in what relates to the world of spirits. The only
instrument of knowledge we can here employ is language. Careful
thinkers long ago came to the conclusion, that it is impossible to
frame a language precisely and exclusively adapted to convey abstract
and spiritual ideas, even if it is possible, as some philosophers have
denied, for the mind, in its present state, to have such ideas. All
attempts to construct such a language, though made by the most
ingenious men, have failed. Language is based upon imagery, and
associations drawn from so much of the world as the senses disclose to
us; that is, from material objects and their relations. We are here
confined, as it were, within narrow walls. We can catch only glimpses
of what is above and around us, outside of those walls. Such glimpses
may be vouchsafed, from time to time, to rescue us from sinking into
materialism, and to keep alive our faith in scenes of existence
remaining to be revealed when the barriers of our imprisonment shall
be taken down, and what we call death lift us to a clearer and broader
vision of universal being.

Of the reality of the spiritual world, we are assured by consciousness
and by faith; but our knowledge of that world, so far as it can go
into particulars, or become the subject of definition or expression,
extends no further than revelation opens the way. In all ages, men
have been awakened to the "wonders of the invisible world;" but they
remain "wonders" still. Nothing like a permanent, stable, or distinct
science has ever been achieved in this department. Man and God are all
that are placed within our ken. Metaphysics and Theology are the names
given to the sciences that relate to them. The greater the number of
books written by human learning and ingenuity to expound them, the
more advanced the intelligence and piety of mankind, the less, it is
confessed, do we know of them in detail, the more they rise above our
comprehension, the more unfathomable become their depths. Experience,
history, the progress of light, all increase our sense of the
impossibility of estimating the capacities of the human soul. So also
we find that the higher we rise towards the Deity, in the
contemplation of his works and word, the more does he continue to
transcend our power to describe or imagine his greatness and glory.
The revelation which the Saviour brought to mankind is all that the
heart of man need desire, or the mind of man can comprehend. We are
God's children, and he is our Father. That is all; and, the wiser and
better we become, the more we are convinced and satisfied that it is
enough.

There are, undoubtedly, innumerable beings in the world of spirits,
besides departed souls, the Redeemer, and the Father. But of such
beings we have, while here, no absolute and specific knowledge. In
every age, as well as in our own, there have been persons who have
believed themselves to hold communication with unseen spirits. The
methods of entering into such communication have been infinitely
diversified, from the incantations of ancient sorcery to the mediums
and rappings of the present day. In former periods, particularly where
the belief of witchcraft prevailed, it was thought that such
communications could be had only with evil spirits, and, mostly, with
the Chief of evil spirits. They were accordingly treated as criminal,
and made the subject of the severest penalties known to the law. In
our day, no such penalties are attached to the practice of seeking
spiritual communications. Those who have a fancy for such experiments
are allowed to amuse themselves in this way without reproach or
molestation. It is not charged upon them that they are dealing with
the Evil One or any of his subordinates. They do not imagine such a
thing themselves. I have no disposition, at any time, in any given
case, to dispute the reality of the wonderful stories told in
reference to such matters. All that I am prompted ever to remark is,
that, if spirits do come, as is believed, at the call of those who
seek to put themselves into communication with them, there is no
evidence, I venture to suggest, that they are good spirits. I have
never heard of their doing much good, substantially, to any one. No
important truth has been revealed by them, no discovery been made, no
science had its field enlarged; no department of knowledge has been
brought into a clearer light; no great interest has been promoted; no
movement of human affairs, whether in the action of nations or the
transactions of men, has been advanced or in any way facilitated; no
impulse has been given to society, and no elevation to life and
character. It may be that the air is full of spiritual beings,
hovering about us; but all experience shows that no benefit can be
derived from seeking their intervention to share with us the duties or
the burdens of our present probation. The mischiefs which have flowed
from the belief that they can operate upon human affairs, and from
attempting to have dealings with them, have been illustrated in the
course of our narrative. In this view of the subject, no law is
needed to prevent real or pretended communication with invisible
beings. Enlightened reflection, common sense, natural prudence, would
seem to be sufficient to keep men from meddling at all with practices,
or countenancing notions, from which all history proclaims that no
good has ever come, but incalculable evil flowed.

For the conduct of life, while here in these bodies, we must confine
our curiosity to fields of knowledge open to our natural and ordinary
faculties, and embraced within the limits of the established condition
of things. Our fathers filled their fancies with the visionary images
of ghosts, demons, apparitions, and all other supposed forms and
shadows of the invisible world; lent their ears to marvellous stories
of communications with spirits; gave to supernatural tales of
witchcraft and demonology a wondering credence, and allowed them to
occupy their conversation, speculations, and reveries. They carried a
belief of such things, and a proneness to indulge it, into their daily
life, their literature, and the proceedings of tribunals,
ecclesiastical and civil. The fearful results shrouded their annals in
darkness and shame. Let those results for ever stand conspicuous,
beacon-monuments warning us, and coming generations, against
superstition in every form, and all credulous and vain attempts to
penetrate beyond the legitimate boundaries of human knowledge.

The phenomena of the real world, so far as science discloses them to
our contemplation; the records of actual history; the lessons of our
own experience; the utterances of the voice within, audible only to
ourselves; and the teachings of the Divine Word,--are sufficient for
the exercise of our faculties and the education of our souls during
this brief period of our being, while in these bodies. In God's
appointed time, we shall be transferred to a higher level of vision.
Then, but not before, we may hope for re-union with disembodied
spirits, for intercourse with angels, and for a nearer and more open
communion with all divine beings.

The principal difference in the methods by which communications were
believed to be made between mortals and spiritual beings, at the time
of the witchcraft delusion and now, is this. Then it was chiefly by
the medium of the eye, but at present by the ear. The "afflicted
children" professed to have seen and conversed with the ghosts of
George Burroughs's former wives and of others. They also professed to
have seen the shapes or appearances of living persons in a disembodied
form, or in the likeness of some animal or creature. Now it is
affirmed by those calling themselves Spiritualists, that, by certain
rappings or other incantations, they can summon into immediate but
invisible presence the spirits of the departed, hold conferences with
them, and draw from them information not derivable from any sources of
human knowledge. There is no essential distinction between the old and
the new belief and practice. The consequences that resulted from the
former would be likely to result from the latter, if it should obtain
universal or general credence, be allowed to mix with judicial
proceedings, or to any extent affect the rights of person, property,
or character.

The "afflicted children" at Salem Village had, by long practice,
become wonderful adepts in the art of jugglery, and probably of
ventriloquism. They did many extraordinary things, and were believed
to have constant communications with ghosts and spectres; but they did
not attain to spiritual rapping. If they had possessed that power, the
credulity of judges, ministers, magistrates, and people, would have
been utterly overwhelmed, and no limit could have been put to the
destruction they might have wrought.

If there was any thing supernatural in the witchcraft of 1692, if any
other than human spirits were concerned at all, one thing is beyond a
doubt: they were shockingly wicked spirits, and led those who dealt
with them to the utmost delusion, crime, and perdition; and this
example teaches all who seek to consult with spirits, through a medium
or in any other way, to be very strict to require beforehand the most
satisfactory and conclusive evidence of good character before they put
themselves into communication with them. Spirits who are said to
converse with people, in these modern ages, cannot be considered as
having much claim to a good repute. No valuable discovery of truth, no
important guidance in human conduct, no useful instruction, has ever
been conveyed to mankind through them; and much mischief perhaps may
have resulted from confiding in them. It is not wise to place our
minds under the influence of any of our fellow-creatures, in the
ordinary guise of humanity, unless we know something about them
entitling them to our acquaintance; much less so, to take them into
our intimacy or confidence. Spirits cannot be put under oath, or their
credibility be subjected to tests. Whether they are spirits of truth
or falsehood cannot be known; and common caution would seem to dictate
an avoidance of their company. The fields of knowledge opened to us in
the works of mortal men; the stores of human learning and science; the
pages of history, sacred or profane; the records of revelation; and
the instructions and conversation of the wise and good of our
fellow-creatures, while in the body,--are wide enough for our
exploration, and may well occupy the longest lifetime.

In its general outlines and minuter details, Salem Witchcraft is an
illustration of the fatal effects of allowing the imagination inflamed
by passion to take the place of common sense, and of pushing the
curiosity and credence of the human mind, in this stage of our being,
while in these corporeal embodiments, beyond the boundaries that ought
to limit their exercise. If we disregard those boundaries, and try to
overleap them, we shall be liable to the same results. The lesson
needs to be impressed equally upon all generations and ages of the
world's future history. Essays have been written and books published
to prove that the sense of the miraculous is destined to decline as
mankind becomes more enlightened, and ascribing a greater or less
tendency to the indulgence of this sense to particular periods of the
church, or systems of belief, or schools of what is called philosophy.
It is maintained that it was more prevalent in the mediæval ages than
in modern times. Some assert that it has had a greater development in
Catholic than Protestant countries; and some, perhaps, insist upon the
reverse. Some attempt to show that it has manifested itself more
remarkably among Puritans than in other classes of Protestant
Christians. The last and most pretentious form of this dogma is, that
the sense of the miraculous fades away in the progress of what
arrogates to itself the name of Rationalism. This is one of the
delusive results of introducing generalization into historical
disquisitions. History deals with man. Man is always the same. The
race consists, not of an aggregation, but of individuals, in all ages,
never moulded or melted into classes. Each individual has ever
retained his distinctness from every other. There has been the same
infinite variety in every period, in every race, in every nation.
Society, philosophy, custom, can no more obliterate these varieties
than they can bring the countenances and features of men into
uniformity. Diversity everywhere alike prevails. The particular forms
and shapes in which the sense of the miraculous may express itself
have passed and will pass away in the progress of civilization. But
the sense itself remains; just as particular costumes and fashions of
garment pass away, while the human form, its front erect and its
vision towards the heavens, remains. The sense of the miraculous
remains with Protestants as much as with Catholics, with Churchmen as
much as with Puritans, with those who reject all creeds, equally with
those whose creeds are the longest and the oldest. In our day, it must
have been generally noticed, that the wonders of what imagines itself
to be Spiritualism are rather more accredited by persons who aspire to
the character of rationalists than by those who hold on tenaciously to
the old landmarks of Orthodoxy.

The truth is, that the sense of the miraculous has not declined, and
never can. It will grow deeper and stronger with the progress of true
intelligence. As long as man thinks, he will feel that he is himself a
perpetual miracle. The more he thinks, the more will he feel it. The
mind which can wander into the deepest depths of the starry heavens,
and feel itself to be there; which, pondering over the printed page,
lives in the most distant past, communes with sages of hoar antiquity,
with prophets and apostles, joins the disciples as they walk with the
risen Lord to Emmaus, or mingles in the throng that listen to Paul at
Mars' Hill,--knows itself to be beyond the power of space or time, and
greater than material things. It knows not what it shall be; but it
feels that it is something above the present and visible. It realizes
the spiritual world, and will do so more and more, the higher its
culture, the greater its freedom, and the wider its view of the
material nature by which it is environed, while in this transitory
stage of its history.

The lesson of our story will be found not to discard spiritual things,
but to teach us, while in the flesh, not to attempt to break through
present limitations, not to seek to know more than has been made known
of the unseen and invisible, but to keep the inquiries of our minds
and the action of society within the bounds of knowledge now
attainable, and extend our curious researches and speculations only as
far as we can here have solid ground to stand upon.

To explain the superstitious opinions that took effect in the
witchcraft delusion, it is necessary to consider the state of biblical
criticism at that period. That department of theological learning was
then in a very immature condition.

The authority of Scripture, as it appeared on the face of the standard
version, seemed to require them to pursue the course they adopted; and
those enlarged and just principles of interpretation which we are
taught by the learned of all denominations at the present day to apply
to the Sacred Writings had not then been brought to the view of the
people or received by the clergy.

It was gravely argued, for instance, that there was nothing improbable
in the idea that witches had the power, in virtue of their compact
with the Devil, of riding aloft through the air, because it is
recorded, in the history of our Lord's temptation, that Satan
transported him in a similar manner to the pinnacle of the temple,
and to the summit of an exceedingly high mountain. And Cotton Mather
declares, that, to his apprehension, the disclosures of the wonderful
operations of the Devil, upon and through his subjects, that were made
in the course of the witchcraft prosecutions, had shed a marvellous
light upon the Scriptures! What a perversion of the Sacred Writings to
employ them for the purpose of sanctioning the extravagant and
delirious reveries of the human imagination! What a miserable
delusion, to suppose that the Word of God could receive illumination
from the most absurd and horrible superstition that ever brooded in
darkness over the mind of man!

One of the sources of the delusion of 1692 was ignorance of many
natural laws that have been revealed by modern science. A vast amount
of knowledge on these subjects has been attained since that time. In
our halls of education, in associations for the diffusion of
knowledge, and in a diversified and all-pervading popular literature,
what was dark and impenetrable mystery then has been explained,
accounted for, and brought within the grasp of all minds. The
contemplation of the evils brought upon our predecessors by their
ignorance of the laws of nature cannot but lead us to appreciate more
highly our opportunities to get knowledge in this department. As we
advance into the interior of the physical system to which we belong;
are led in succession from one revelation of beauty and grandeur to
another, and the field of light and truth displaces that of darkness
and mystery; while the fearful images that disturbed the faith and
bewildered the thoughts of our fathers are dissolving and vanishing,
the whole host of spirits, ghosts, and demons disappearing, and the
presence and providence of God alone found to fill all scenes and
cause all effects,--our hearts ought to rise to him in loftier
adoration and holier devotion. If, while we enjoy a fuller revelation
of his infinite and all-glorious operations and designs than our
fathers did, the sentiment of piety which glowed in their hearts like
a coal from the altar of God has been permitted to grow dim in ours,
no reproach their errors and faults can possibly authorize will equal
that which will justly fall upon us.

Another cause of their delusion was too great a dependence upon the
imagination. We shall find no lesson more clearly taught by history,
by experience, or by observation, than this, that man is never safe
while either his fancy or his feeling is the guiding principle of his
nature. There is a strong and constant attraction between his
imagination and his passions; and, if either is permitted to exercise
unlimited sway, the other will most certainly be drawn into
co-operation with it, and, when they are allowed to act without
restraint upon each other and with each other, they lead to the
derangement and convulsion of his whole system. They constitute the
combustible elements of our being: one serves as the spark to explode
the other. Reason, enlightened by revelation and guided by conscience,
is the great conservative principle: while that exercises the
sovereign power over the fancy and the passions, we are safe; if it is
dethroned, no limit can be assigned to the ruin that may follow. In
the scenes we have now been called to witness, we have perceived to
what lengths of folly, cruelty, and crime even good men have been
carried, who relinquished the aid, rejected the counsels, and
abandoned the guidance of their reason.

Another influence that operated to produce the catastrophe in 1692 was
the power of contagious sympathy. Every wise man and good citizen
ought to be aware of the existence and operation of this power. There
seems indeed to be a constitutional, original, sympathy in our nature.
When men act in a crowd, their heartstrings are prone to vibrate in
unison. Whatever chord of passion is struck in one breast, the same
will ring forth its wild note through the whole mass. This principle
shows itself particularly in seasons of excitement, and its power
rises in proportion to the ardor and zeal of those upon whom it acts.
It is for every one who desires to be preserved from the excesses of
popular feeling, and to prevent the community to which he belongs from
plunging into riotous and blind commotions, to keep his own judgment
and emotions as free as possible from a power that seizes all it can
reach, draws them into its current, and sweeps them round and round
like the Maelstrom, until they are overwhelmed and buried in its
devouring vortex. When others are heated, the only wisdom is to
determine to keep cool; whenever a people or an individual is rushing
headlong, it is the duty of patriotism and of friendship to check the
motion.

In this connection it may be remarked--and I should be sorry to bring
the subject to a close without urging the thought upon your
attention--that the mere power of sympathy, the momentum with which
men act in a crowd, is itself capable of convulsing society and
overthrowing all its safeguards, without the aid or supposed agency of
supernatural beings. The early history of the colony of New York
presents a case in point.

In 1741, just half a century after the witchcraft prosecutions in
Massachusetts, the city of New York, then containing about nine
thousand inhabitants, witnessed a scene quite rivalling, in horror and
folly, that presented here. Some one started the idea, that a
conspiracy was on foot, among the colored portion of the inhabitants,
to murder the whites. The story was passed from one to another.
Although subsequently ascertained to have been utterly without
foundation, no one stopped to inquire into its truth, or had the
wisdom or courage to discountenance its circulation. Soon a universal
panic, like a conflagration, spread through the whole community; and
the results were most frightful. More than one hundred persons were
cast into prison. Four white persons and eighteen negroes were hanged.
Eleven negroes were burned at the stake, and fifty were transported
into slavery. As in the witchcraft prosecutions, a clergyman was among
the victims, and perished on the gallows.

The "New-York Negro Plot," as it was called, was indeed marked by all
the features of absurdity in the delusion, ferocity in the popular
excitement, and destruction along the path of its progress, which
belonged to the witchcraft proceedings here, and shows that any
people, given over to the power of contagious passion, may be swept by
desolation, and plunged into ruin.

One of the practical lessons inculcated by the history that has now
been related is, that no duty is more certain, none more important,
than a free and fearless expression of opinion, by all persons, on all
occasions. No wise or philosophic person would think of complaining of
the diversities of sentiment it is likely to develop. Such diversities
are the vital principle of free communities, and the only elements of
popular intelligence. If the right to utter them is asserted by all
and for all, tolerance is secured, and no inconvenience results. It is
probable that there were many persons here in 1692 who doubted the
propriety of the proceedings at their commencement, but who were
afterwards prevailed upon to fall into the current and swell the tide.
If they had all discharged their duty to their country and their
consciences by freely and boldly uttering their disapprobation and
declaring their dissent, who can tell but that the whole tragedy might
have been prevented? and, if it might, the blood of the innocent may
be said, in one sense, to be upon their heads.

The leading features and most striking aspects of the witchcraft
delusion have been repeated in places where witches and the
interference of supernatural beings are never thought of: whenever a
community gives way to its passions, and spurns the admonitions and
casts off the restraints of reason, there is a delusion that can
hardly be described in any other phrase. We cannot glance our eye over
the face of our country without beholding such scenes: and, so long as
they are exhibited; so long as we permit ourselves to invest objects
of little or no real importance with such an inordinate imaginary
interest that we are ready to go to every extremity rather than
relinquish them; so long as we yield to the impulse of passion, and
plunge into excitement, and take counsel of our feelings rather than
our judgment,--we are following in the footsteps of our fanatical
ancestors. It would be wiser to direct our ridicule and reproaches to
the delusions of our own times than to those of a previous age; and it
becomes us to treat with charity and mercy the failings of our
predecessors, at least until we have ceased to imitate and repeat
them.

It has been my object to collect and arrange all the materials within
reach necessary to give a correct and adequate view of the passage of
history related and discussed in this work, and to suggest the
considerations and conclusions required by truth and justice. It is
worthy of the most thoughtful contemplation. The moralist,
metaphysician, and political philosopher will find few chapters of
human experience more fraught with instruction, and may well ponder
upon the lessons it teaches, scrutinize thoroughly all its periods,
phases, and branches, analyze its causes, eliminate its elements, and
mark its developments. The laws, energies, capabilities, and
liabilities of our nature, as exhibited in the character of
individuals and in the action of society, are remarkably illustrated.
The essential facts belonging to the transaction, gathered from
authentic records and reliable testimonies and traditions, have been
faithfully presented. THE WITCHCRAFT DELUSION OF 1692, so far
as I have been able to recover it from misunderstanding and oblivion,
has been brought to view; and I indulge the belief, that the subject
will commend itself to, and reward, the study of every meditative
mind.

I know not in what better terms the discussion of this subject can be
brought to a termination, than in those which express the conclusions
to which one of our own most distinguished citizens was brought, after
having examined the whole transaction with the eye of a lawyer and the
spirit of a judge. The following is from the Centennial Discourse
pronounced in Salem on the 18th of September, 1828, by the late Hon.
Joseph Story, of the Supreme Court of the United States:--

"We may lament, then," says he, "the errors of the times, which led to
these prosecutions. But surely our ancestors had no special reasons
for shame in a belief which had the universal sanction of their own
and all former ages; which counted in its train philosophers, as well
as enthusiasts; which was graced by the learning of prelates, as well
as by the countenance of kings; which the law supported by its
mandates, and the purest judges felt no compunctions in enforcing. Let
Witch Hill remain for ever memorable by this sad catastrophe, not to
perpetuate our dishonor, but as an affecting, enduring proof of human
infirmity; a proof that perfect justice belongs to one judgment-seat
only,--that which is linked to the throne of God."

In the work which has now reached its close, many strange phases of
humanity have been exposed. We have beheld, with astonishment and
horror, the extent to which it is liable to be the agent and victim of
delusion and ruin. Folly that cannot be exceeded; wrong, outrage, and
woe, melting the heart that contemplates them; and crime, not within
our power or province to measure,--have passed before us. But not the
dark side only of our nature has been displayed. Manifestations of
innocence, heroism, invincible devotion to truth, integrity of soul
triumphing over all the terrors and horrors that can be accumulated in
life and in death, Christian piety in its most heavenly radiance, have
mingled in the drama, whose curtain is now to fall. Noble specimens of
virtue in man and woman, old and young, have shed a light, as from
above, upon its dark and melancholy scenes. Not only the sufferers,
but some of those who shared the dread responsibility of the crisis,
demand our commiseration, and did what they could to atone for their
error.

The conduct of Judge Sewall claims our particular admiration. He
observed annually in private a day of humiliation and prayer, during
the remainder of his life, to keep fresh in his mind a sense of
repentance and sorrow for the part he bore in the trials. On the day
of the general fast, he rose in the place where he was accustomed to
worship, the Old South, in Boston, and, in the presence of the great
assembly, handed up to the pulpit a written confession, acknowledging
the error into which he had been led, praying for the forgiveness of
God and his people, and concluding with a request to all the
congregation to unite with him in devout supplication, that it might
not bring down the displeasure of the Most High upon his country, his
family, or himself. He remained standing during the public reading of
the paper. This was an act of true manliness and dignity of soul.

The following passage is found in his diary, under the date of April
23, 1720, nearly thirty years afterwards. It was suggested by the
perusal of Neal's "History of New England:"--

     "In Dr. Neal's 'History of New England,' its nakedness is
     laid open in the businesses of the Quakers, Anabaptists,
     witchcraft. The judges' names are mentioned p. 502; my
     confession, p. 536, vol. ii. The good and gracious God be
     pleased to save New England and me, and my family!"

There never was a more striking and complete fulfilment of the
apostolic assurance, that the prayer of a righteous man availeth much,
than in this instance. God has been pleased, in a remarkable manner,
to save and bless New England. The favor of Heaven was bestowed upon
Judge Sewall during the remainder of his life. He presided for many
years on the bench where he committed the error so sincerely deplored
by him, and was regarded by all as a benefactor, an ornament, and a
blessing to the community: while his family have enjoyed to a high
degree the protection of Providence from that day to this; have
adorned every profession, and every department of society; have filled
with honor the most elevated stations; have graced, in successive
generations, the same lofty seat their ancestor occupied; and been the
objects of the confidence, respect, and love of their fellow-citizens.

Your thoughts have been led through scenes of the most distressing and
revolting character. I leave before your imaginations one bright with
all the beauty of Christian virtue,--that which exhibits Judge Sewall
standing forth in the house of his God and in the presence of his
fellow-worshippers, making a public declaration of his sorrow and
regret for the mistaken judgment he had co-operated with others in
pronouncing. Here you have a representation of a truly great and
magnanimous spirit; a spirit to which the divine influence of our
religion had given an expansion and a lustre that Roman or Grecian
virtue never knew; a spirit that had achieved a greater victory than
warrior ever won,--a victory over itself; a spirit so noble and so
pure, that it felt no shame in acknowledging an error, and publicly
imploring, for a great wrong done to his fellow-creatures, the
forgiveness of God and man.

Our Essex poet, whose beautiful genius has made classical the banks of
his own Merrimac, shed a romantic light over the early homes and
characters of New England, and brought back to life the spirit, forms,
scenes, and men of the past, has not failed to immortalize, in his
verse, the profound penitence of the misguided but upright judge:--

    "Touching and sad, a tale is told,
    Like a penitent hymn of the Psalmist old,
    Of the fast which the good man life-long kept
    With a haunting sorrow that never slept,
    As the circling year brought round the time
    Of an error that left the sting of crime,
    When he sat on the bench of the witchcraft courts,
    With the laws of Moses and 'Hale's Reports,'
    And spake, in the name of both, the word
    That gave the witch's neck to the cord,
    And piled the oaken planks that pressed
    The feeble life from the warlock's breast!
    All the day long, from dawn to dawn,
    His door was bolted, his curtain drawn;
    No foot on his silent threshold trod,
    No eye looked on him save that of God,
    As he baffled the ghosts of the dead with charms
    Of penitent tears, and prayers, and psalms,
    And, with precious proofs from the sacred Word
    Of the boundless pity and love of the Lord,
    His faith confirmed and his trust renewed,
    That the sin of his ignorance, sorely rued,
    Might be washed away in the mingled flood
    Of his human sorrow and Christ's dear blood!"




SUPPLEMENT.




SUPPLEMENT.


     [The subject of Salem Witchcraft has been traced to its
     conclusion, and discussed within its proper limits, in the
     foregoing work. But whoever is interested in it as a chapter
     of history or an exhibition of humanity may feel a
     curiosity, on some points, that reasonably demands
     gratification. The questions will naturally arise, Who were
     the earliest to extricate themselves and the public from the
     delusion? what is known, beyond the facts mentioned in the
     progress of the foregoing discussion, of the later fortunes
     of its prominent actors? what the view taken in the
     retrospect by individuals and public bodies implicated in
     the transaction? and what opinions on the general subject
     have subsequently prevailed? To answer these questions is
     the design of this Supplement.]

It can hardly be said that there was any open and avowed opposition in
the community to the proceedings during their early progress. There is
some uncertainty and obscurity to what extent there was an unexpressed
dissent in the minds of particular private persons. On the general
subject of the existence and power of the Devil and his agency, more
or less, in influencing human and earthly affairs, it would be
difficult to prove that there was any considerable difference of
opinion.

The first undisguised and unequivocal opposition to the proceedings
was a remarkable document that has recently come to light. Among some
papers which have found their way to the custody of the Essex
Institute, is a letter, dated "Salisbury, Aug. 9, 1692," addressed "To
the worshipful Jonathan Corwin, Esq., these present at his house in
Salem." It is indorsed, "A letter to my grandfather, on account of
the condemnation of the witches." Its date shows that it was written
while the public infatuation and fury were at their height, and the
Court was sentencing to death and sending to the gallows its
successive cartloads. There is no injunction of secresy, and no
shrinking from responsibility. Although the name of the writer is not
given in full, he was evidently well known to Corwin, and had written
to him before on the subject. The messenger, in accordance with the
superscription, undoubtedly delivered it into the hands of the judge
at his residence on the corner of Essex and North Streets. The fact
that Jonathan Corwin preserved this document, and placed it in the
permanent files of his family papers, is pretty good proof that he
appreciated the weight of its arguments. It is not improbable that he
expressed himself to that effect to his brethren on the bench, and
perhaps to others. What he said, and the fact that he was holding such
a correspondence, may have reached the ears of the accusers, and led
them to commence a movement against him by crying out upon his
mother-in-law.

The letter is a most able argument against the manner in which the
trials were conducted, and, by conclusive logic, overthrows the whole
fabric of the evidence on the strength of which the Court was
convicting and taking the lives of innocent persons. No such piece of
reasoning has come to us from that age. Its author must be
acknowledged to have been an expert in dialectic subtleties, and a
pure reasoner of unsurpassed acumen and force. It requires, but it
will reward, the closest attention and concentration of thought in
following the threads of the argument. It reaches its conclusions on a
most difficult subject with clearness and certainty. It achieves and
realizes, in mere mental processes, quantities, and forces, on the
points at which it aims, what is called demonstration in mathematics
and geometry.

The writer does not discredit, but seems to have received, the then
prevalent doctrines relating to the personality, power, and attributes
of the Devil; and, from that standpoint, controverts and demolishes
the principles on which the Court was proceeding, in reference to the
"spectral evidence" and the credibility of the "afflicted children"
generally. The letter, and the formal argument appended to it, arrest
notice in one or two general aspects. There is an appearance of their
having proceeded from an elderly person, not at all from any marks of
infirmity of intellect, but rather from an air of wisdom and a tone of
authority which can only result from long experience and observation.
The circumstance that an amanuensis was employed, and the author
writes the initials of his signature only, strengthens this
impression. At the same time, there are indications of a free and
progressive spirit, more likely to have had force at an earlier period
of life. In some aspects, the document indicates a theological
education, and familiarity with matters that belong to the studies of
a minister; in others, it manifests habits of mind and modes of
expression and reasoning more natural to one accustomed to close legal
statements and deductions. If the production of a trained professional
man of either class, it would justly be regarded as remarkable. If its
author belonged to neither class, but was merely a local magistrate,
farmer, and militia officer, it becomes more than remarkable. There
must have been a high development among the founders of our villages,
when the laity could present examples of such a capacity to grasp the
most difficult subjects, and conduct such acute and abstruse
disquisitions. [See Appendix.]

The question as to the authorship of this paper may well excite
interest, involving, as it does, minute critical speculations. The
elements that enter into its solution illustrate the difficulties and
perplexities encompassing the study of local antiquities, and attempts
to determine the origin and bearings of old documents or to settle
minute points of history. The weight of evidence seems to indicate
that the document is attributable to Major Robert Pike, of Salisbury.
Whoever was its author did his duty nobly, and stands alone, above all
the scholars and educated men of the time, in bearing testimony
openly, bravely, in the very ears of the Court, against the
disgraceful and shocking course they were pursuing.[A]

[Footnote A: The facts and considerations in reference to the
authorship of the letter to Jonathan Corwin may be summarily stated as
follows:--

The letter is signed "R.P." Under these initials is written, "Robert
Pain," in a different hand, and, as the ink as well as the chirography
shows, at a somewhat later date. R.P. are blotted over, but with ink
of such lighter hue that the original letters are clearly discernible
under it. A Robert Paine graduated at Harvard College, in 1656. But he
was probably the foreman of the grand jury that brought in all the
indictments in the witchcraft trials; and therefore could not, from
the declarations in the letter itself, have been its author. The only
other person of that name at the time, of whom we have knowledge, was
his father, who seems, by the evidence we have, to have died in 1693.
(That date is given in the Harvard Triennial for the death of Robert
Paine, the graduate; but erroneously, I think, as signatures to
documents, and conveyances of property subsequently, can hardly be
ascribed to any other person.) Robert Paine, the father, from the
earliest settlement of Ipswich, had been one of the leading men of the
town, apparently of larger property than any other, often its deputy
in the General Court, and, for a great length of time, ruling elder of
the church. "Elder Pain," or Penn, as the name was often spelled,
enjoyed the friendship of John Norton, and all the ministers far and
near; and religious meetings were often held at his house. We know
nothing to justify us in saying that he could not have been the author
of this paper; but we also know nothing, except the appearance of his
name upon it, to impute it to him.

The document is dated from "Salisbury." So far as we know, Elder Paine
always lived in Ipswich; although, having property in the upper
county, he may have often been, and possibly in his last years
resided, there. It is, it is true, a strong circumstance, that his
name is written, although by a late hand, under the initials. It shows
that the person who wrote it thought that "R.P." meant Robert Paine;
but any one conversant especially with the antiquities of Ipswich, or
this part of the county, might naturally fall into such a mistake. The
authorship of documents was often erroneously ascribed. The words
"Robert Pain" were, probably, not on the paper when the indorsement
was made, "A letter to my grandfather," &c. Elder Robert Paine, if
living in 1692, was ninety-one years of age. The document under
consideration, if composed by him, is truly a marvellous
production,--an intellectual phenomenon not easily to be paralleled.

The facts in reference to Robert Pike, of Salisbury, as they bear upon
the question of the authorship of the document, are these: He was
seventy-six years of age in 1692, and had always resided in
"Salisbury." The letter and argument are both in the handwriting of
Captain Thomas Bradbury, Recorder of old Norfolk County. On this
point, there can be no question. Bradbury and Pike had been
fellow-townsmen for more than half a century, connected by all the
ties of neighborhood and family intermarriage, and jointly or
alternately had borne all the civic and military honors the people
could bestow. The document was prepared and delivered to the judge
while Mrs. Bradbury was in prison, and just one month before her
trial. Pike, as has been shown (p. 226), was deeply interested in her
behalf. The original signature ("R.P.") has the marked characteristics
of the same initial letters as found in innumerable autographs of his,
on file or record. There are interlineations, beyond question in
Pike's handwriting. These facts demonstrate that both Pike and
Bradbury were concerned in producing the document.

The history of Robert Pike proves that he was a man of great ability,
had a turn of mind towards logical exercises, and was, from early
life, conversant with disputations. Nearly fifty years before, he
argued in town-meeting against the propriety, in view of civil and
ecclesiastical law, of certain acts of the General Court. They
arraigned, disfranchised, and otherwise punished him for his
"litigiousness:" but the weight of his character soon compelled them
to restore his political rights; and the people of Salisbury, the very
next year, sent him among them as their deputy, and continued him from
time to time in that capacity. At a subsequent period, he was the
leader and spokesman of a party in a controversy about some
ecclesiastical affairs, involving apparently certain nice questions of
theology, which created a great stir through the country. The contest
reached so high a point, that the church at Salisbury excommunicated
him; but the public voice demanded a council of churches, which
assembled in September, 1676, and re-instated Major Pike condemning
his excommunication, "finding it not justifiable upon divers grounds."
On this occasion, as before, the General Court frowned upon and
denounced him; but the people came again to his rescue, sending him at
the next election into the House of Deputies, and kept him there until
raised to the Upper House as an Assistant. He was in the practice of
conducting causes in the courts, and was long a local magistrate and
one of the county judges.

He does not appear to have been present at any of the trials or
examinations of 1692; but his official position as Assistant caused
many depositions taken in his neighborhood to be acknowledged and
sworn before him. While entertaining the prevalent views about
diabolical agency, he always disapproved of the proceedings of the
Court in the particulars to which the arguments of the communication
to Jonathan Corwin apply,--the "spectre evidence,"--and the statements
and actings of "the afflicted children." There are indications that
sometimes he saw through the folly of the stories told by persons
whose depositions he was called to attest. One John Pressy was
circulating a wonderful tale about an encounter he had with the
spectre of Susanna Martin. Pike sent for him, and took his deposition.
Pressy averred, that, one evening, coming from Amesbury Ferry, he fell
in with the shape of Martin in the form of a body of light, which
"seemed to be about the bigness of a half-bushel." After much dodging
and manoeuvring, and being lost and bewildered, wandering to and fro,
tumbling into holes,--where, as the deposition states, no "such pitts"
were known to exist,--and other misadventures, he came to blows with
the light, and had several brushes with it, striking it with his
stick. At one time, "he thinks he gave her at least forty blows." He
finally succeeded in finding "his own house: but, being then seized
with fear, could not speak till his wife spoke to him at the door, and
was in such a condition that the family was afraid of him; which story
being carried to the town the next day, it was, upon inquiry,
understood, that said Goodwife Martin was in such a miserable case and
in such pain that they swabbed her body, as was reported." He
concludes his deposition by saying, that Major Pike "seemed to be
troubled that this deponent had not told him of it in season that she
might have been viewed to have seen what her ail was." The affair had
happened "about twenty-four years ago." Probably neither Pressy nor
the Court appreciated the keenness of the major's expression of
regret. It broke the bubble of the deposition. The whole story was the
product of a benighted imagination, disordered by fear, filled with
inebriate vagaries, exaggerated in nightmare, and resting upon wild
and empty rumors. Robert Pike's course, in the case of Mrs. Bradbury,
harmonizes with the supposition that he was Corwin's correspondent.

Materials may be brought to light that will change the evidence on the
point. It may be found that Elder Paine died before 1692: that would
dispose of the question. It may appear that he was living in Salisbury
at the time, and acted with Pike and Bradbury, they giving to the
paper the authority of his venerable name and years. But all that is
now known, constrains me to the conclusion stated in the text.]

William Brattle, an eminent citizen and opulent merchant of Boston,
and a gentleman of education and uncommon abilities, wrote a letter to
an unknown correspondent of the clerical profession, in October,
1692. It is an able criticism upon the methods of procedure at the
trials, condemning them in the strongest language; but it was a
confidential communication, and not published until many years
afterwards. He says that "the witches' meetings, the Devil's baptisms
and mock sacraments, which the accusing and confessing witches oft
speak of, are nothing else but the effect of their fancy, depraved and
deluded by the Devil, and not a reality to be regarded or minded by
any wise man." He charges the judges with having taken testimony from
the Devil himself, through witnesses who swore to what they said the
Devil communicated to them, thus indirectly introducing the Devil as a
witness; and he clinches the accusation by quoting the judges
themselves, who, when the accusing and confessing witnesses
contradicted each other, got over the difficulty by saying that the
Devil, in such instances, took away the memory of some of them, for
the moment, obscuring their brains, and misleading them. He sums up
this part of his reasoning in these words: "If it be thus granted that
the Devil is able to represent false ideas to the imaginations of the
confessors, what man of sense will regard the confessions, or any of
the words of these confessors?" He says that he knows several persons
"about the Bay,"--men, for understanding, judgment, and piety,
inferior to few, if any, in New England,--that do utterly condemn the
said proceedings. He repudiates the idea that Salem was, in any sense,
exclusively responsible for the transaction; and affirms that "other
justices in the country, besides the Salem justices, have issued out
their warrants;" and states, that, of the eight "judges, commissioned
for this Court at Salem, five do belong to Suffolk County, four of
which five do belong to Boston, and therefore I see no reason why
Boston should talk of Salem as though their own judges had had no hand
in these proceedings in Salem."

There is one view of the subject, upon which Brattle presses with much
force and severity. There is ground to suspect, that the proceedings
were suffered to go on, after some of those appearing to countenance
them had ceased to have faith in the accusations. He charges,
directly, complicity in the escape of Mrs. Carey, Mrs. English,
Captain Alden, Hezekiah Usher, and others, upon the high officials;
and says that while the evidence, upon which so many had been
imprisoned, sentenced, and executed, bore against Mrs. Thacher, of
Boston, she was never proceeded against. "She was much complained of
by the afflicted persons, and yet the justices would not issue out
their warrants to apprehend" her and certain others; while at the very
same time they were issuing, upon no better or other grounds, warrants
against so many others. He charges the judges with this most criminal
favoritism. The facts hardly justify such an imputation upon the
judges. They did not, after the trials had begun, it is probable, ever
issue warrants: that was the function of magistrates. With the
exception, perhaps, of Corwin, I think there is no evidence of there
having been any doubts or misgivings on the bench. It is altogether
too heavy a charge to bring, without the strongest evidence, upon any
one. To intimate that officials, or any persons, who did not believe
in the accusations, connived at the escape of their friends and
relatives, and at the same time countenanced, pretended to believe,
and gave deadly effect to them when directed against others, is
supposing a criminality and baseness too great to be readily admitted.
In that wild reign of the worst of passions, this would have
transcended them all in its iniquity. The only excusable people at
that time were those who honestly, and without a doubt, believed in
the guilt of the convicted. Those who had doubts, and did not frankly
and fearlessly express them, were the guilty ones. On their hands is
the stain of the innocent blood that was shed. It is not probable, and
is scarcely possible, that any considerable number could be at once
doubters and prosecutors. On this point, Brattle must be understood
to mean, not that judges, or others actively engaged in the
prosecutions, warded off proceedings against particular friends or
relatives from a principle of deliberate favoritism, but that third
parties, actuated by a sycophantic spirit, endeavored to hush up or
intercept complaints, when directed too near to the high officials, or
thought to gain their favor by aiding the escape of persons in whom
they were interested.

Brattle uses the same weapon which afterwards the opponents of Mr.
Parris, in his church at Salem Village, wielded with such decisive
effect against him and all who abetted him. It is much to be lamented,
that, instead of hiding it under a confidential letter, he did not at
the time openly bring it to bear in the most public and defiant
manner. One brave, strong voice, uttered in the face of the court and
in the congregations of the people, echoed from the corners of the
streets, and reaching the ears of the governor and magistrates,
denouncing the entire proceedings as the damnable crime of familiarity
with evil spirits, and sorcery of the blackest dye, might perhaps have
recalled the judges, the people, and the rulers to their senses. If
the spirit of the ancient prophets of God, of the Quakers of the
preceding age, or of true reformers of any age, had existed in any
breast, the experiment would have been tried. Brattle says,--

     "I cannot but admire that any should go with their
     distempered friends and relations to the afflicted children,
     to know what their distempered friends ail, whether they are
     not bewitched, who it is that afflicts them, and the like.
     It is true, I know no reason why these afflicted may not be
     consulted as well as any other, if so be that it was only
     their natural and ordinary knowledge that was had recourse
     to: but it is not on this notion that these afflicted
     children are sought unto, but as they have a supernatural
     knowledge; a knowledge which they obtain by their holding
     correspondence with spectres or evil spirits, as they
     themselves grant. This consulting of these afflicted
     children, as abovesaid, seems to me to be a very gross evil,
     a real abomination, not fit to be known in New England; and
     yet is a thing practised, not only by _Tom_ and _John_,--I
     mean the rude and more ignorant sort,--but by many who
     profess high, and pass among us for some of the better sort.
     This is that which aggravates the evil, and makes it heinous
     and tremendous; and yet this is not the worst of it,--for,
     as sure as I now write to you, even some of our civil
     leaders and spiritual teachers, who, I think, should punish
     and preach down such sorcery and wickedness, do yet allow
     of, encourage, yea, and practise, this very abomination. I
     know there are several worthy gentlemen in Salem who account
     this practice as an abomination, have trembled to see the
     methods of this nature which others have used, and have
     declared themselves to think the practice to be very evil
     and corrupt. But all avails little with the abettors of the
     said practice."

If Mr. Brattle and the "several worthy gentlemen" to whom he alludes,
instead of sitting in "trembling" silence, or whispering in private
their disapprobation, or writing letters under the injunction of
secrecy, had come boldly out, and denounced the whole thing, in a
spirit of true courage, meeting and defying the risk, and carrying the
war home, and promptly, upon the ministers, magistrates, and judges,
they might have succeeded, and exploded the delusion before it had
reached its fatal results.

He mentions, in the course of his letter, among those persons known by
him to disapprove of the proceedings,--

     "The Hon. Simon Bradstreet, Esq. (our late governor), the
     Hon. Thomas Danforth, Esq. (our late deputy-governor), the
     Rev. Mr. Increase Mather, and the Rev. Mr. Samuel Willard.
     Major N. Saltonstall, Esq., who was one of the judges, has
     left the court, and is very much dissatisfied with the
     proceedings of it. Excepting Mr. Hale, Mr. Noyes, and Mr.
     Parris, the reverend elders, almost throughout the whole
     country, are very much dissatisfied. Several of the late
     justices--viz., Thomas Graves, Esq.; N. Byfield, Esq.;
     Francis Foxcroft, Esq.--are much dissatisfied; also several
     of the present justices, and, in particular, some of the
     Boston justices, were resolved rather to throw up their
     commissions than be active in disturbing the liberty of
     Their Majesties' subjects merely on the accusations of these
     afflicted, possessed children."

It is to be observed, that the dissatisfaction was with some of the
methods adopted in the proceedings, and not with the prosecutions
themselves. Increase Mather and Samuel Willard signed the paper
indorsing Deodat Lawson's famous sermon, which surely drove on the
prosecutions; and the former expressed, in print, his approbation of
his son Cotton's "Wonders of the Invisible World," in which he labors
to defend the witchcraft prosecutions, and to make it out that those
who suffered were "malefactors." Dr. Increase Mather is understood to
have countenanced the burning of Calef's book, some few years
afterwards, in the square of the public grounds of Harvard College, of
which institution he was then president. It cannot be doubted,
however, that both the elder Mather and Mr. Willard had expressed,
more or less distinctly, their disapprobation of some of the details
of the proceedings. It is honorable to their memories, and shows that
the former was not wholly blinded by parental weakness, but willing to
express his dissent, in some particulars, from the course of his
distinguished son, and that the latter had an independence of
character which enabled him to criticise and censure a court in which
three of his parishioners sat as judges.

Brattle relates a story which seems to indicate that Increase Mather
sometimes was unguarded enough to express himself with severity
against those who gave countenance to the proceedings. "A person from
Boston, of no small note, carried up his child to Salem, near twenty
miles, on purpose that he might consult the afflicted about his child,
which accordingly he did; and the afflicted told him that his child
was afflicted by Mrs. Carey and Mrs. Obinson." The "afflicted," in
this and some other instances, had struck too high. The magistrates in
Boston were unwilling to issue a warrant against Mrs. Obinson, and
Mrs. Carey had fled. All that the man got for his pains, in carrying
his child to Salem, was a hearty scolding from Increase Mather, who
asked him "whether there was not a God in Boston, that he should go to
the Devil, in Salem, for advice."

Bradstreet's great age prevented, it is to be supposed, his public
appearance in the affair; but his course in a case which occurred
twelve years before fully justifies confidence in the statement of
Brattle. The tradition has always prevailed, that he looked with
disapprobation upon the proceedings, from beginning to end. The course
of his sons, and the action taken against them, is quite decisive to
the point.

Facts have been stated, which show that Thomas Danforth, if he
disapproved of the proceedings at Salem, in October, must have
undergone a rapid change of sentiments. No irregularities,
improprieties, extravagances, or absurdities ever occurred in the
examinations or trials greater than he was fully responsible for in
April. Having, in the mean while, been superseded in office, he had
leisure, in his retirement, to think over the whole matter; and it is
satisfactory to find that he saw the error of the ways in which he had
gone himself, and led others.

The result of the inquiry on this point is, that, while some, outside
of the village, began early to doubt the propriety of the proceedings
in certain particulars, they failed, with the single exception of
Robert Pike, to make manly and seasonable resistance. He remonstrated
in a writing signed with his own initials, and while the executions
were going on. He sent it to one of the judges, and did not shrink
from having his action known. No other voice was raised, no one else
breasted the storm, while it lasted. The errors which led to the
delusion were not attacked from any quarter at any time during that
generation, and have remained lurking in many minds, in a greater or
less degree, to our day.

There were, however, three persons in Salem Village and its immediate
vicinity, who deserve to be for ever remembered in this connection.
They resisted the fanaticism at the beginning, and defied its wrath.
Joseph Putnam was a little more than twenty-two years of age. He
probably did not enter into the question of the doctrines then
maintained on such subjects, but was led by his natural sagacity and
independent spirit to the course he took. In opposition to both his
brothers and both his uncles, and all the rest of his powerful and
extensive family, he denounced the proceedings through and through. At
the very moment when the excitement was at its most terrible stage,
and Mr. Parris held the life of every one in his hands, Joseph Putnam
expressed his disapprobation of his conduct by carrying his infant
child to the church in Salem to be baptized. This was a public and
most significant act. For six months, he kept some one of his horses
under saddle night and day, without a moment's intermission of the
precaution; and he and his family were constantly armed. It was
understood, that, if any one attempted to arrest him, it would be at
the peril of life. If the marshal should approach with overwhelming
force, he would spring to his saddle, and bid defiance to pursuit.
Such a course as this, taken by one standing alone against the whole
community to which he belonged, shows a degree of courage, spirit, and
resolution, which cannot but be held in honor.

Martha Corey was an aged Christian professor, of eminently devout
habits and principles. It is, indeed, a strange fact, that, in her
humble home, surrounded, as it then was, by a wilderness, this
husbandman's wife should have reached a height so above and beyond her
age. But it is proved conclusively by the depositions adduced against
her, that her mind was wholly disenthralled from the errors of that
period. She utterly repudiated the doctrines of witchcraft, and
expressed herself freely and fearlessly against them. The prayer which
this woman made "upon the ladder," and which produced such an
impression on those who heard it, was undoubtedly expressive of
enlightened piety, worthy of being characterized as "eminent" in its
sentiments, and in its demonstration of an innocent heart and life.

The following paper, in the handwriting of Mr. Parris, is among the
court-files. It has not the ordinary form of a deposition, but somehow
was sworn to in Court:--

     "The morning after the examination of Goody Nurse, Sam.
     Sibley met John Procter about Mr. Phillips's, who called to
     said Sibley as he was going to said Phillips's, and asked
     how the folks did at the village. He answered, he heard they
     were very bad last night, but he had heard nothing this
     morning. Procter replied, he was going to fetch home his
     jade; he left her there last night, and had rather given
     forty shillings than let her come up. Said Sibley asked why
     he talked so. Procter replied, if they were let alone so, we
     should all be devils and witches quickly; they should rather
     be had to the whipping-post; but he would fetch his jade
     home, and thrash the Devil out of her,--and more to the like
     purpose, crying, 'Hang them! hang them!'"

In another document, it is stated that Nathaniel Ingersoll and others
heard John Procter tell Joseph Pope, "that, if he had John Indian in
his custody, he would soon beat the Devil out of him."

The declarations thus ascribed to John Procter show that his views of
the subject were about right; and it will probably be generally
conceded, that the treatment he proposed for Mary Warren and "John
Indian," if dealt out to the "afflicted children" generally at the
outset, would have prevented all the mischief. A sound thrashing all
round, seasonably administered, would have reached the root of the
matter; and the story which has now been concluded of Salem witchcraft
would never have been told.

When the witchcraft tornado burst upon Andover, it prostrated every
thing before it. Accusers and accused were counted by scores, and
under the panic of the hour the accused generally confessed. But
Andover was the first to recover its senses. On the 12th of October,
1692, seven of its citizens addressed a memorial to the General Court
in behalf of their wives and children, praying that they might be
released on bond, "to remain as prisoners in their own houses, where
they may be more tenderly cared for." They speak of their "distressed
condition in prison,--a company of poor distressed creatures as full
of inward grief and trouble as they are able to bear up in life
withal." They refer to the want of "food convenient" for them, and to
"the coldness of the winter season that is coming which may despatch
such out of the way that have not been used to such hardships," and
represent the ruinous effects of their absence from their families,
who were at the same time required to maintain them in jail. On the
18th of October, the two ministers of Andover, Francis Dane and Thomas
Barnard, with twenty-four other citizens of Andover, addressed a
similar memorial to the Governor and General Court, in which we find
the first public expression of condemnation of the proceedings. They
call the accusers "distempered persons." They express the opinion that
their friends and neighbors have been misrepresented. They bear the
strongest testimony in favor of the persons accused, that several of
them are members of the church in full communion, of blameless
conversation, and "walking as becometh women professing godliness."
They relate the methods by which they had been deluded and terrified
into confession, and show the worthlessness of those confessions as
evidences against them. They use this bold and significant language:
"Our troubles we foresee are likely to continue and increase, if other
methods be not taken than as yet have been; and we know not who can
think himself safe, if the accusations of children and others who are
under a diabolical influence shall be received against persons of good
fame." On the 2d of January, 1693, the Rev. Francis Dane addressed a
letter to a brother clergyman, which is among the files, and was
probably designed to reach the eyes of the Court, in which he
vindicates Andover against the scandalous reports got up by the
accusers, and says that a residence there of forty-four years, and
intimacy with the people, enable him to declare that they are not
justly chargeable with any such things as witchcraft, charms, or
sorceries of any kind. He expresses himself in strong language: "Had
charity been put on, the Devil would not have had such an advantage
against us, and I believe many innocent persons have been accused and
imprisoned." He denounces "the conceit of spectre evidence," and warns
against continuing in a course of proceeding that will procure "the
divine displeasure." A paper signed by Dudley Bradstreet, Francis
Dane, Thomas Barnard, and thirty-eight other men and twelve women of
Andover, was presented to the Court at Salem to the same effect.

None of the persons named by Brattle can present so strong a claim to
the credit of having opposed the witchcraft fanaticism before the
close of the year 1692, as Francis Dane, his colleague Barnard, and
the citizens of Andover, who signed memorials to the Legislature on
the 18th of October, and to the Court of Trials about the same time.
There is, indeed, one conclusive proof that the venerable senior
pastor of the Andover Church made his disapprobation of the witchcraft
proceedings known at an earlier period, at least in his immediate
neighborhood. The wrath of the accusers was concentrated upon him to
an unparalleled extent from their entrance into Andover. They did not
venture to attack him directly. His venerable age and commanding
position made it inexpedient; but they struck as near him, and at as
many points, as they dared. They accused, imprisoned, and caused to be
convicted and sentenced to death, one of his daughters, Abigail
Faulkner. They accused, imprisoned, and brought to trial another,
Elizabeth Johnson. They imprisoned, and brought to the sentence of
death, his grand-daughter, Elizabeth Johnson, Jr. They cried out
against, and caused to be imprisoned, several others of his
grandchildren. They accused and imprisoned Deliverance the wife, and
also the "man-servant," of his son Nathaniel. There is reason for
supposing, as has been stated, that Elizabeth How was the wife of his
nephew. Surely, no one was more signalized by their malice and
resentment than Francis Dane; and he deserves to be recognized as
standing pre-eminent, and, for a time, almost alone, in bold
denunciation and courageous resistance of the execrable proceedings of
that dark day.

Francis Dane made the following statement, also designed to reach the
authorities, which cannot be read by any person of sensibility
without feeling its force, although it made no impression upon the
Court at the time:--

     "Concerning my daughter Elizabeth Johnson, I never had
     ground to suspect her, neither have I heard any other to
     accuse her, till by spectre evidence she was brought forth;
     but this I must say, she was weak, and incapacious, fearful,
     and in that respect I fear she hath falsely accused herself
     and others. Not long before she was sent for, she spake as
     to her own particular, that she was sure she was no witch.
     And for her daughter Elizabeth, she is but simplish at the
     best; and I fear the common speech, that was frequently
     spread among us, of their liberty if they would confess, and
     the like expression used by some, have brought many into a
     snare. The Lord direct and guide those that are in place,
     and give us all submissive wills; and let the Lord do with
     me and mine what seems good in his own eyes!"

There is nothing in the proceedings of the Special Court of Oyer and
Terminer more disgraceful than the fact, that the regular Court of
Superior Judicature, the next year, after the public mind had been
rescued from the delusion, and the spectral evidence repudiated,
proceeded to try these and other persons, and, in the face of such
statements as the foregoing, actually condemned to death Elizabeth
Johnson, Jr.

It is remarkable that Brattle does not mention Calef. The
understanding has been that they acted in concert, and that Brattle
had a hand in getting up some of Calef's arguments. The silence of
Brattle is not, upon the whole, at all inconsistent with their mutual
action and alliance. As Calef was more perfectly unembarrassed,
without personal relations to the clergy and others in high station,
and not afraid to stand in the gap, it was thought best to let him
take the fire of Cotton Mather. His name had not been connected with
the matter in the public apprehension. He was a merchant of Boston,
and a son of Robert Calef of Roxbury. His attention was called to the
proceedings which originated in Salem Village; and his strong
faculties and moral courage enabled him to become the most efficient
opponent, in his day, of the system of false reasoning upon which the
prosecutions rested. He prepared several able papers in different
forms, in which he discussed the subject with great ability, and
treated Cotton Mather and all others whom he regarded as instrumental
in precipitating the community into the fatal tragedy, with the
greatest severity of language and force of logic, holding up the whole
procedure to merited condemnation. They were first printed, at London,
in 1700, in a small quarto volume, under the title of "More Wonders of
the Invisible World." This publication burst like a bomb-shell upon
all who had been concerned in promoting the witchcraft prosecutions.
Cotton Mather was exasperated to the highest pitch. He says in his
diary: "He sent this vile volume to London to be published, and the
book is printed; and the impression is, this day week, arrived here.
The books that I have sent over into England, with a design to glorify
the Lord Jesus Christ, are not published, but strangely delayed; and
the books that are sent over to vilify me, and render me incapable to
glorify the Lord Jesus Christ,--these are published." Calef's writings
gave a shock to Mather's influence, from which it never recovered.

Great difficulty has been experienced in drawing the story out in its
true chronological sequence. The effect produced upon the public mind,
when it became convinced that the proceedings had been wrong, and
innocent blood shed, was a universal disposition to bury the
recollection of the whole transaction in silence, and, if possible,
oblivion. This led to a suppression and destruction of the ordinary
materials of history. Papers were abstracted from the files, documents
in private hands were committed to the flames, and a chasm left in the
records of churches and public bodies. The journal of the Special
Court of Oyer and Terminer is nowhere to be found. Hutchinson appears
to have had access to it. It cannot well be supposed to have been lost
by fire or other accident, because the records of the regular Court,
up to the very time when the Special Court came into operation, and
from the time when it expired, are preserved in order. A portion of
the papers connected with the trials have come down in a
miscellaneous, scattered, and dilapidated state, in the offices of the
Clerk of the Courts in the County of Essex, and of the Secretary of
the Commonwealth. By far the larger part have been abstracted, of
which a few have been deposited, by parties into whose hands they had
happened to come, with the Massachusetts Historical Society in Boston
and the Essex Institute at Salem. The records of the parish of Salem
Village, although exceedingly well kept before and after 1692 by
Thomas Putnam, are in another hand for that year, very brief, and
make no reference whatever to the witchcraft transactions. This
general desire to obliterate the memory of the calamity has nearly
extinguished tradition. It is more scanty and less reliable than on
any other event at an equal distance in the past. A subject on which
men avoided to speak soon died out of knowledge. The localities of
many very interesting incidents cannot be identified. This is very
observable, and peculiarly remarkable as to places in the now City of
Salem. The reminiscences floating about are vague, contradictory, and
few in number. In a community of uncommon intelligence, composed, to a
greater degree perhaps than almost any other, of families that have
been here from the first, very inquisitive for knowledge, and always
imbued with the historical spirit, it is truly surprising how little
has been borne down, by speech and memory, in the form of anecdote,
personal traits, or local incidents, of this most extraordinary and
wonderful occurrence of such world-wide celebrity. Almost all that we
know is gleaned from the offices of the Registry of Deeds and
Wills.[A]

[Footnote A: As an illustration of the oblivion that had settled over
the details of the transactions and characters connected with the
witchcraft prosecutions, it may be mentioned, that when, thirty-five
years ago, I prepared the work entitled 'Lectures on Witchcraft;
comprising a History of the Delusion in 1692,' although professional
engagements prevented my making the elaborate exploration that has now
been given to the subject, I extended the investigation over the
ordinary fields of research, and took particular pains to obtain
information brought down by tradition, gleaned all that could be
gathered from the memories of old persons then living of what they had
heard from their predecessors, and sought for every thing that local
antiquaries and genealogists could contribute. I find, by the methods
of inquiry adopted in the preparation of the present work, how
inadequate and meagre was the knowledge then possessed. Most of the
persons accused and executed, like Giles Corey, his wife Martha, and
Bridget Bishop, were supposed to have been of humble, if not mean
condition, of vagrant habits, and more or less despicable repute. By
following the threads placed in my hands, in the files of the
county-offices of Registry of Deeds and Wills, and documents connected
with trials at law, and by a collation of conveyances and the
administration of estates, I find that Corey, however eccentric or
open to criticism in some features of character and passages of his
life, was a large landholder, and a man of singular force and
acuteness of intellect; while his wife had an intelligence in advance
of her times, and was a woman of eminent piety. The same is found to
have been the case with most of those who suffered.

The reader may judge of my surprise in now discovering, that, while
writing the "Lectures on Witchcraft," I was owning and occupying a
part of the estate of Bridget Bishop, if not actually living in her
house. The hard, impenetrable, all but petrified oak frame seems to
argue that it dates back as far as when she rebuilt and renewed the
original structure. Little, however, did I suspect, while delivering
those lectures in the Lyceum Hall, that we were assembled on the site
of her orchard, the scene of the preternatural and diabolical feats
charged upon her by the testimony of Louder and others. Her estate was
one of the most eligible and valuable in the old town, with a front,
as has been mentioned, of a hundred feet on Washington Street, and
extending along Church Street more than half the distance to St.
Peter's Street. At the same time, her husband seems to have had a
house in the village, near the head of Bass River. It is truly
remarkable, that the locality of the property and residence of a
person of her position, and who led the way among the victims of such
an awful tragedy, should have become wholly obliterated from memory
and tradition, in a community of such intelligence, consisting, in so
large a degree, of old families, tracing themselves back to the
earliest generations, and among whom the innumerable descendants of
her seven great-grandchildren have continued to this day. It can only
be accounted for by the considerations mentioned in the text.
Tradition was stifled by horror and shame. What all desired to forget
was forgotten. The only recourse was in oblivion; and all, sufferers
and actors alike, found shelter under it.]

It is remarkable, that the marshal and sheriff, both quite young men,
so soon followed their victims to the other world. Jonathan Walcot,
the father of Mary, and next neighbor to Parris, removed from the
village, and died at Salem in 1699. Thomas Putnam and Ann his wife,
the parents of the "afflicted child," who acted so extraordinary a
part in the proceedings and of whom further mention will be made, died
in 1699,--the former on the 24th of May, the latter on the 8th of
June,--at the respective ages of forty-seven and thirty-eight.[A]
There are indications that they saw the errors into which they had
been led. If their eyes were at all opened to this view, how terrible
must have been the thought of the cruel wrongs and wide-spread ruin of
which they had been the cause! Of the circumstances of their deaths,
or their last words and sentiments, we have no knowledge. It is not
strange, that, in addition to all her woes, the death of her husband
was more than Mrs. Ann Putnam could bear, and that she followed him
so soon to the grave. Of the other accusers, we have but little
information. Elizabeth Booth was married to Israel Shaw about the year
1700. Mary Walcot was married, somewhere between 1692 and 1697, to a
person belonging to Woburn, whose name is torn or worn off from Mr.
Parris's records. Of the other "afflicted children" nothing is known,
beyond the fact, that the Act of the Legislature of the Province,
reversing the judgments, and taking off the attainder from those who
were sentenced to death in 1692, has this paragraph: "Some of the
principal accusers and witnesses in those dark and severe prosecutions
have since discovered themselves to be persons of profligate and
vicious conversation;" and Calef speaks of them as "vile varlets," and
asserts that their reputations were not without spot before, and that
subsequently they became abandoned to open and shameless vice.

[Footnote A: The looseness and inaccuracy of persons in reference to
their own ages, in early times, is quite observable. In depositions,
they speak of themselves as "about" so many years, or as of so many
years "or thereabouts." A variance on this point is often found in the
statements of the same person at different times. Neither are records
always to be relied upon as to precision. In the record-book of the
village church, Mr. Parris enters the age of Mrs. Ann Putnam, at the
date of her admission, June 4, 1691, as "Ann: ætat: 27." But an
"Account of the Early Settlers of Salisbury," in the "New-England
Historical and Genealogical Register," vol. vii. p. 314, gives the
date of her birth "15, 4, 1661." Her age is stated above according to
this last authority; and, if correct, she was not so young, at the
time of her marriage, as intimated (vol. i. p. 253), but seventeen
years five months and ten days. It is difficult, however, to conceive
how Parris, who was careful about such matters, and undoubtedly had
his information from her own lips, could have been so far out of the
way. Her brother, William Carr, in 1692, deposed that he was then
forty-one years of age or thereabouts; whereas, the "Account of the
Early Settlers of Salisbury," just referred to, gives the date of his
birth "15, 1, 1648." It is indeed singular, that two members of a
family of their standing should have been under an error as to their
own age; one to an extent of almost, the other of some months more
than, three years.]

A very considerable number of the people left the place. John Shepard
and Samuel Sibley sold their lands, and went elsewhere; as did Peter
Cloyse, who never brought his family to the village after his wife's
release from prison. Edward and Sarah Bishop sold their estates, and
took up their abode at Rehoboth. Some of the Raymond family removed to
Middleborough. The Haynes family emigrated to New Jersey. No mention
is afterwards found of other families in the record-books. The
descendants of Thomas and Edward Putnam, in the next generation, were
mostly dispersed to other places; but those of Joseph remained on his
lands, and have occupied his homestead to this day. It is a singular
circumstance, that some of the spots where, particularly, the great
mischief was brewed, are, and long have been, deserted. Where the
parsonage stood, with its barn and garden and well and pathways, is
now a bare and rugged field, without a vestige of its former
occupancy, except a few broken bricks that mark the site of the house.
The same is the case of the homestead of Jonathan Walcot. It was in
these two families that the affair began and was matured. The spots
where several others, who figured in the proceedings, lived, have
ceased to be occupied; and the only signs of former habitation are
hollows in the ground, fragments of pottery, and heaps of stones
denoting the location of cellars and walls. Here and there, where
houses and other structures once stood, the blight still rests.

Some circumstances relating to the personal history of those who
experienced the greatest misery during the prevalence of the dreadful
fanaticism, and were left to mourn over its victims, have happened to
be preserved in records and documents on file. On the 30th of
November, 1699, Margaret Jacobs was married to John Foster. She
belonged to Mr. Noyes's parish; but the recollection of his agency in
pushing on proceedings which carried in their train the execution of
her aged grandfather, the exile of her father, the long imprisonment
of her mother and herself, with the prospect of a violent and shameful
death hanging over them every hour, and, above all, her own wretched
abandonment of truth and conscience for a while, probably under his
persuasion, made it impossible for her to think of being married by
him. Mr. Greene was known to sympathize with those who had suffered,
and the couple went to the village to be united. Some years
afterwards, when the church of the Middle Precinct, now South Danvers,
was organized, John and Margaret Foster, among the first, took their
children there for baptism; and their descendants are numerous, in
this neighborhood and elsewhere. Margaret, the widow of John Willard,
married William Towne. Elizabeth, the widow of John Procter, married,
subsequently to 1696, a person named Richards. Edward Bishop, the
husband of Bridget, a few years afterwards was appointed guardian of
Susannah Mason, the only child of Christian, who was the only child of
Bridget by her former husband Thomas Oliver. Bishop seems to have
invested the money of his ward in the lot at the extreme end of
Forrester Street, where it connects with Essex Street, bounded by
Forrester Street on the north and east, and Essex Street on the south.
This was the property of Susannah when she married John Becket, Jr.
Bishop appears to have continued his business of a sawyer to a very
advanced age, and died in Salem, in 1705.

Sarah Nurse, about two years after her mother's death, married Michael
Bowden, of Marblehead; and they occupied her father's house, in the
town of Salem, of which he had retained the possession. His family
having thus all been married off, Francis Nurse gave up his homestead
to his son Samuel, and divided his remaining property among his four
sons and four daughters. He made no formal deed or will, but drew up a
paper, dated Dec. 4, 1694, describing the distribution of the estate,
and what he expected of his children. He gave them immediate occupancy
and possession of their respective portions. The provision made by the
old man for his comfort, and the conditions required of his children,
are curious. They give an interesting insight of the life of a rural
patriarch. He reserved his "great chair and cushion;" a great chest;
his bed and bedding; wardrobe, linen and woollen; a pewter pot; one
mare, bridle, saddle, and sufficient fodder; the whole of the crop of
corn, both Indian and English, he had made that year. The children
were to discharge all the debts of his estate, pay him fourteen pounds
a year, and contribute equally, as much more as might be necessary for
his comfortable maintenance, and also to his "decent burial." The
labors of his life had closed. He had borne the heaviest burden that
can be laid on the heart of a good man. He found rest, and sought
solace and support, in the society and love of his children and their
families, as he rode from house to house on the road he had opened, by
which they all communicated with each other. The parish records show
that he continued his interest in its affairs. He lived just long
enough to behold sure evidence that justice would be done to the
memory of those who suffered, and the authors of the mischief be
consigned to the condemnation of mankind. The tide, upon which Mr.
Parris had ridden to the destruction of so many, had turned; and it
was becoming apparent to all, that he would soon be compelled to
disappear from his ministry in the village, before the awakening
resentment of the people and the ministers. Francis Nurse died on the
22d of November, 1695, seventy-seven years of age. His sons with their
wives, and his daughters with their husbands, went into the Probate
Court with the paper before described, and unanimously requested the
judge to have the estate divided according to its terms. This is
conclusive proof that the father had been just and wise in his
arrangements, and that true fraternal love and harmony pervaded the
whole family. The descendants, under the names of Bowden, Tarbell, and
Russell, are dispersed in various parts of the country: those under
the name of Preston, while some have gone elsewhere, have been ever
since, and still are, among the most respectable and honored citizens
of the village. Some of the name of Nurse have also remained, and
worthily represent and perpetuate it.

I have spoken of the tide's beginning to turn in 1695. Sure
indications to that effect were then quite visible. It had begun far
down in the public mind before the prosecutions ceased; but it was
long before the change became apparent on the surface. It was long
before men found utterance for their feelings.

Persons living at a distance have been accustomed, and are to this
day, to treat the Salem-witchcraft transaction in the spirit of
lightsome ridicule, and to make it the subject of jeers and jokes. Not
so those who have lived on, or near, the fatal scene. They have ever
regarded it with solemn awe and profound sorrow, and shunned the
mention, and even the remembrance, of its details. This prevented an
immediate expression of feeling, and delayed movements in the way of
attempting a reparation of the wrongs that had been committed. The
heart sickened, the lips were dumb, at the very thought of those
wrongs. Reparation was impossible. The dead were beyond its reach. The
sorrows and anguish of survivors were also beyond its reach. The voice
of sympathy was felt to be unworthy to obtrude upon sensibilities that
had been so outraged. The only refuge left for the individuals who had
been bereaved, and for the body of the people who realized that
innocent blood was on all their hands, was in humble and soul-subdued
silence, and in prayers for forgiveness from God and from each other.

It was long before the public mind recovered from its paralysis. No
one knew what ought to be said or done, the tragedy had been so awful.
The parties who had acted in it were so numerous, and of such
standing, including almost all the most eminent and honored leaders of
the community from the bench, the bar, the magistracy, the pulpit, the
medical faculty, and in fact all classes and descriptions of persons;
the mysteries connected with the accusers and confessors; the
universal prevalence of the legal, theological, and philosophical
theories that had led to the proceedings; the utter impossibility of
realizing or measuring the extent of the calamity; and the general
shame and horror associated with the subject in all minds; prevented
any open movement. Then there was the dread of rekindling animosities
which time was silently subduing, and nothing but time could fully
extinguish. Slowly, however, the remembrance of wrongs was becoming
obscured. Neighborhood and business relations were gradually
reconciling the estranged. Offices of civility, courtesy, and
good-will were reviving; social and family intimacies and connections
were taking effect and restoring the community to a natural and
satisfactory condition. Every day, the sentiment was sinking deeper in
the public mind, that something was required to be done to avert the
displeasure of Heaven from a guilty land. But while some were ready to
forgive, and some had the grace to ask to be forgiven, any general
movement in this direction was obstructed by difficulties hard to be
surmounted.

The wrongs committed were so remediless, the outrages upon right,
character, and life, had been so shocking, that it was expecting too
much from the ordinary standard of humanity to demand a general
oblivion. On the other hand, so many had been responsible for them,
and their promoters embraced such a great majority of all the leading
classes of society, that it was impossible to call them to account.
Dr. Bentley describes the condition of the community, in some brief
and pregnant sentences, characteristic of his peculiar style: "As soon
as the judges ceased to condemn, the people ceased to accuse....
Terror at the violence and guilt of the proceedings succeeded
instantly to the conviction of blind zeal; and what every man had
encouraged all professed to abhor. Few dared to blame other men,
because few were innocent. The guilt and the shame became the portion
of the country, while Salem had the infamy of being the place of the
transactions.... After the public mind became quiet, few things were
done to disturb it. But a diminished population, the injury done to
religion, and the distress of the aggrieved, were seen and felt with
the greatest sorrow.... Every place was the subject of some direful
tale. Fear haunted every street. Melancholy dwelt in silence in every
place, after the sun retired. Business could not, for some time,
recover its former channels; and the innocent suffered with the
guilty."

While the subject was felt to be too dark and awful to be spoken of,
and most men desired to bury it in silence, occasionally the
slumbering fires would rekindle, and the flames of animosity burst
forth. The recollection of the part he had acted, and the feelings of
many towards him in consequence, rendered the situation of the sheriff
often quite unpleasant; and the resentment of some broke out in a
shameful demonstration at his death, which occurred early in 1697. Mr.
English, representing that class who had suffered under his official
hands in 1692, having a business demand upon him, in the shape of a
suit for debt, stood ready to seize his body after it was prepared for
interment, and prevented the funeral at the time. The body was
temporarily deposited on the sheriff's own premises. There were, it is
probable, from time to time, other less noticeable occurrences
manifesting the long continued existence of the unhappy state of
feeling engendered in 1692. There were really two parties in the
community, generally both quiescent, but sometimes coming into open
collision; the one exasperated by the wrongs they and their friends
had suffered, the other determined not to allow those who had acted in
conducting the prosecutions to be called to account for what they had
done. After the lapse of thirty years, and long subsequent to the
death of Mr. Noyes, Mr. English was prosecuted for having said that
Mr. Noyes had murdered Rebecca Nurse and John Procter.

It has been suggested, that the bearing of the executive officers of
the law towards the prisoners was often quite harsh. This resulted
from the general feeling, in which these officials would have been
likely to sympathize, of the peculiarly execrable nature of the crime
charged upon the accused, and from the danger that might attend the
manifestation of any appearance of kindly regard for them. So far as
the seizure of goods is considered, or the exaction of fees, the
conduct of the officials was in conformity with usage and
instructions. The system of the administration of the law, compared
with our times, was stern, severe, and barbarous. The whole tone of
society was more unfeeling. Philanthropy had not then extended its
operations, or directed its notice, to the prison. Sheriff Corwin was
quite a young man, being but twenty-six years of age at the time of
his appointment. He probably acted under the advice of his relatives
and connections on the bench. I think there is no evidence of any
particular cruelty evinced by him. The arrests, examinations, and
imprisonments had taken place under his predecessor, Marshal Herrick,
who continued in the service as his deputy.

That individual, indeed, had justly incurred the resentment of the
sufferers and their friends, by eager zeal in urging on the
prosecutions, perpetual officiousness, and unwarrantable interference
against the prisoners at the preliminary examinations. The odium
originally attached to the marshal seems to have been transferred to
his successor, and the whole was laid at the door of the sheriff.
Marshal Herrick does not appear to have been connected with Joseph
Herrick, who lived on what is now called Cherry Hill, but was a man of
an entirely different stamp. He was thirty-four years of age, and had
not been very long in the country. John Dunton speaks of meeting him
in Salem, in 1686, and describes him as a "very tall, handsome man,
very regular and devout in his attendance at church, religious without
bigotry, and having every man's good word." His impatient activity
against the victims of the witchcraft delusion wrought a great change
in the condition of this popular and "handsome" man, as is seen in a
petition presented by him, Dec. 8, 1692; to "His Excellency Sir
William Phips, Knight, Captain-general and Governor of Their
Majesties' Territories and Dominions of Massachusetts Bay in New
England; and to the Honorable William Stoughton, Esq.,
Deputy-Governor; and to the rest of the Honored Council." It begins
thus: "The petition of your poor servant, George Herrick, most humbly
showeth." After recounting his great and various services "for the
term of nine months," as marshal or deputy-sheriff in apprehending
many prisoners, and conveying them "unto prison and from prison to
prison," he complains that his whole time had been taken up so that he
was incapable of getting any thing for the maintenance of his "poor
family:" he further states that he had become so impoverished that
necessity had forced him to lay down his place; and that he must
certainly come to want, if not in some measure supplied. "Therefore I
humbly beseech Your Honors to take my case and condition so far into
consideration, that I may have some supply this hard winter, that I
and my poor children may not be destitute of sustenance, and so
inevitably perish; for I have been bred a gentleman, and not much used
to work, and am become despicable in these hard times." He concludes
by declaring, that he is not "weary of serving his king and country,"
nor very scrupulous as to the kind of service; for he promises that
"if his habitation" could thereby be "graced with plenty in the room
of penury, there shall be no services too dangerous and difficult, but
your poor petitioner will gladly accept, and to the best of my power
accomplish. I shall wholly lay myself at Your Honorable feet for
relief." Marshal Herrick died in 1695.

But, while this feeling was spreading among the people, the government
were doing their best to check it. There was great apprehension, that,
if allowed to gather force, it would burst over all barriers, that no
limit would be put to its demands for the restoration of property
seized by the officers of the law, and that it would wreak vengeance
upon all who had been engaged in the prosecutions. Under the influence
of this fear, the following attempt was made to shield the sheriff of
the county from prosecutions for damages by those whose relatives had
suffered:--

     "_At a Superior Court of Judicature, Court of Assize, and
     General Jail Delivery, held at Ipswich, the fifteenth day of
     May, anno Domini 1694._--Present, William Stoughton, Esq.,
     _Chief-justice_; Thomas Danforth, Esq.; Samuel Sewall, Esq.

     "This Court, having adjusted the accounts of George Corwin,
     Esq., high-sheriff for the county of Essex, do allow the
     same to be just and true; and that there remains a balance
     due to him, the said Corwin, of £67. 6_s._ 4_d._, which is
     also allowed unto him; and, pursuant to law, this Court doth
     fully, clearly, and absolutely acquit and discharge him,
     the said George Corwin, his heirs, executors, and
     administrators, lands and tenements, goods and chattels, of
     and from all manner of sum or sums of money, goods or
     chattels levied, received, or seized, and of all debts,
     duties, and demands which are or may be charged in his, the
     said Corwin's, accounts, or which may be imposed by reason
     of the sheriff's office, or any thing by him done by virtue
     thereof, or in the execution of the same, from the time he
     entered into the said office, to this Court."

This extraordinary attempt of the Court to close the doors of justice
beforehand against suits for damages did not seem to have any effect;
for Mr. English compelled the executors of the sheriff to pay over to
him £60. 3_s_.

At length, the government had to meet the public feeling. A
proclamation was issued, "By the Honorable the Lieutenant-Governor,
Council, and Assembly of His Majesty's province of the Massachusetts
Bay, in General Court assembled." It begins thus: "Whereas the anger
of God is not yet turned away, but his hand is still stretched out
against his people in manifold judgments;" and, after several
specifications of the calamities under which they were suffering, and
referring to the "many days of public and solemn" addresses made to
God, it proceeds: "Yet we cannot but also fear that there is something
still wanting to accompany our supplications; and doubtless there are
some particular sins which God is angry with our Israel for, that have
not been duly seen and resented by us, about which God expects to be
sought, if ever he again turn our captivity." Thursday, the fourteenth
of the next January, was accordingly appointed to be observed as a day
of prayer and fasting,--

     "That so all God's people may offer up fervent supplications
     unto him, that all iniquity may be put away, which hath
     stirred God's holy jealousy against this land; that he would
     show us what we know not, and help us, wherein we have done
     amiss, to do so no more; and especially, that, whatever
     mistakes on either hand have been fallen into, either by the
     body of this people or any orders of men, referring to the
     late tragedy, raised among us by Satan and his instruments,
     through the awful judgment of God, he would humble us
     therefor, and pardon all the errors of his servants and
     people that desire to love his name; that he would remove
     the rod of the wicked from off the lot of the righteous;
     that he would bring in the American heathen, and cause them
     to hear and obey his voice.

     "Given at Boston, Dec. 17, 1696, in the eighth year of His
     Majesty's reign.

     ISAAC ADDINGTON, _Secretary_."

The jury had acted in conformity with their obligations and honest
convictions of duty in bringing in their verdicts. They had sworn to
decide according to the law and the evidence. The law under which they
were required to act was laid down with absolute positiveness by the
Court. They were bound to receive it, and to take and weigh the
evidence that was admitted; and to their minds it was clear, decisive,
and overwhelming, offered by persons of good character, and confirmed
by a great number of confessions. If it had been within their
province, as it always is declared not to be, to discuss the general
principles, and sit in judgment on the particular penalties of law, it
would not have altered the case; for, at that time, not only the
common people, but the wisest philosophers, supported the
interpretation of the law that acknowledged the existence of
witchcraft, and its sanction that visited it with death.

Notwithstanding all this, however, so tender and sensitive were the
consciences of the jurors, that they signed and circulated the
following humble and solemn declaration of regret for the part they
had borne in the trials. As the publication of this paper was highly
honorable to those who signed it, and cannot but be contemplated with
satisfaction by all their descendants, I will repeat their names:--

     "We whose names are underwritten, being in the year 1692
     called to serve as jurors in court at Salem, on trial of
     many who were by some suspected guilty of doing acts of
     witchcraft upon the bodies of sundry persons,--we confess
     that we ourselves were not capable to understand, nor able
     to withstand, the mysterious delusions of the powers of
     darkness and Prince of the air, but were, for want of
     knowledge in ourselves and better information from others,
     prevailed with to take up with such evidence against the
     accused as, on further consideration and better information,
     we justly fear was insufficient for the touching the lives
     of any (Deut. xvii. 6), whereby we fear we have been
     instrumental, with others, though ignorantly and
     unwittingly, to bring upon ourselves and this people of the
     Lord the guilt of innocent blood; which sin the Lord saith
     in Scripture he would not pardon (2 Kings xxiv. 4),--that
     is, we suppose, in regard of his temporal judgments. We do
     therefore hereby signify to all in general, and to the
     surviving sufferers in special, our deep sense of, and
     sorrow for, our errors in acting on such evidence to the
     condemning of any person; and do hereby declare, that we
     justly fear that we were sadly deluded and mistaken,--for
     which we are much disquieted and distressed in our minds,
     and do therefore humbly beg forgiveness, first, of God, for
     Christ's sake, for this our error, and pray that God would
     not impute the guilt of it to ourselves nor others: and we
     also pray that we may be considered candidly and aright by
     the living sufferers, as being then under the power of a
     strong and general delusion, utterly unacquainted with, and
     not experienced in, matters of that nature.

     "We do heartily ask forgiveness of you all, whom we have
     justly offended; and do declare, according to our present
     minds, we would none of us do such things again, on such
     grounds, for the whole world,--praying you to accept of this
     in way of satisfaction for our offence, and that you would
     bless the inheritance of the Lord, that he may be entreated
     for the land.

     "THOMAS FISK, _Foreman_.         THOMAS PEARLY, Sr.
      WILLIAM FISK.                   JOHN PEABODY.
      JOHN BACHELER.                  THOMAS PERKINS.
      THOMAS FISK, Jr.                SAMUEL SAYER.
      JOHN DANE.                      ANDREW ELIOT.
      JOSEPH EVELITH.                 HENRY HERRICK, Sr."

In 1697, Rev. John Hale, of Beverly, published a work on the subject
of the witchcraft persecutions, in which he gives the reasons which
led him to the conclusion that there was error at the foundation of
the proceedings. The following extract shows that he took a rational
view of the subject:--

     "It may be queried then, How doth it appear that there was a
     going too far in this affair?

     "ANSWER I.--By the number of persons accused. It cannot be
     imagined, that, in a place of so much knowledge, so many, in
     so small a compass of land, should so abominably leap into
     the Devil's lap,--at once.

     "ANS. II.--The quality of several of the accused was such as
     did bespeak better things, and things that accompany
     salvation. Persons whose blameless and holy lives before did
     testify for them; persons that had taken great pains to bring
     up _their children in the nurture and admonition of the
     Lord_, such as we had charity for as for our own souls,--and
     charity is a Christian duty, commended to us in 1 Cor. xiii.,
     Col. iii. 14, and many other places.

     "ANS. III.--The number of the afflicted by Satan daily
     increased, till about fifty persons were thus vexed by the
     Devil. This gave just ground to suspect some mistake.

     "ANS. IV.--It was considerable, that nineteen were executed,
     and all denied the crime to the death; and some of them were
     knowing persons, and had before this been accounted blameless
     livers. And it is not to be imagined but that, if all had
     been guilty, some would have had so much tenderness as to
     seek mercy for their souls in the way of confession, and
     sorrow for such a sin.

     "ANS. V.--When this prosecution ceased, the Lord so chained
     up Satan, that the afflicted grew presently well: the accused
     are generally quiet, and for five years since we have no such
     molestation by them."

Such reasonings as these found their way into the minds of the whole
community; and it became the melancholy conviction of all candid and
considerate persons that innocent blood had been shed. Standing where
we do, with the lights that surround us, we look back upon the whole
scene as an awful perversion of justice, reason, and truth.

On the 13th of June, 1700, Abigail Faulkner presented a well-expressed
memorial to the General Court, in which she says that her pardon "so
far had its effect, as that I am yet suffered to live, but this only
as a malefactor convict upon record of the most heinous crimes that
mankind can be supposed to be guilty of;" and prays for "the defacing
of the record" against her. She claims it as no more than a simple act
of justice; stating that the evidence against her was wholly confined
to the "afflicted, who pretended to see me by their spectral sight,
and not with their bodily eyes." That "the jury (upon only their
testimony) brought me in 'Guilty,' and the sentence of death was
passed upon me;" and that it had been decided that such testimony was
of no value. The House of Representatives felt the force of her
appeal, and voted that "the prayer of the petitioner be granted." The
council declined to concur, but addressed "His Excellency to grant the
petitioner His Majesty's gracious pardon; and His Excellency expressed
His readiness to grant the same." Some adverse influence, it seemed,
prevailed to prevent it.

On the 18th of March, 1702, another petition was presented to the
General Court, by persons of Andover, Salem Village, and Topsfield,
who had suffered imprisonment and condemnation, and by the relations
of others who had been condemned and executed on the testimony, as
they say, of "possessed persons," to this effect:--

     "Your petitioners being dissatisfied and grieved that
     (besides what the condemned persons have suffered in their
     persons and estates) their names are exposed to infamy and
     reproach, while their trial and condemnation stands upon
     public record, we therefore humbly pray this honored Court
     that something may be publicly done to take off infamy from
     the names and memory of those who have suffered as
     aforesaid, that none of their surviving relations nor their
     posterity may suffer reproach on that account."

     [Signed by Francis Faulkner, Isaac Easty, Thorndike Procter,
     and eighteen others.]

On the 20th of July, in answer to the foregoing petitions, a bill was
ordered by the House of Representatives to be drawn up, forbidding in
future such procedures, as in the witchcraft trials of 1692; declaring
that "no spectre evidence may hereafter be accounted valid or
sufficient to take away the life or good name of any person or persons
within this province, and that the infamy and reproach cast on the
names and posterity of said accused and condemned persons may in some
measure be rolled away." The council concurred with an additional
clause, to acquit all condemned persons "of the penalties to which
they are liable upon the convictions and judgments in the courts, and
estate them in their just credit and reputation, as if no such
judgment had been had."

This petition was re-enforced by an "address" to the General Court,
dated July 8, 1703, by several ministers of the county of Essex. They
speak of the accusers in the witchcraft trials as "young persons under
diabolical molestations," and express this sentiment: "There is great
reason to fear that innocent persons then suffered, and that God may
have a controversy with the land upon that account." They earnestly
beg that the prayer of the petitioners, lately presented, may be
granted. This petition was signed by Thomas Barnard, of Andover;
Joseph Green, of Salem Village; William Hubbard, John Wise, John
Rogers, and Jabez Fitch, of Ipswich; Benjamin Rolfe, of Haverhill;
Samuel Cheever, of Marblehead; Joseph Gerrish, of Wenham; Joseph
Capen, of Topsfield; Zechariah Symmes, of Bradford; and Thomas Symmes,
of Boxford. Francis Dane, of Andover, had died six years before. John
Hale, of Beverly, had died three years before. The great age of John
Higginson, of Salem,--eighty-seven years,--probably prevented the
papers being handed to him. It is observable, that Nicholas Noyes, his
colleague, is not among the signers.

What prevented action, we do not know; but nothing was done. Six years
afterwards, on the 25th of May, 1709, an "humble address" was
presented to the General Court by certain inhabitants of the province,
some of whom "had their near relations, either parents or others, who
suffered death in the dark and doleful times that passed over this
province in 1692;" and others "who themselves, or some of their
relations, were imprisoned, impaired and blasted in their reputations
and estates by reason of the same." They pray for the passage of a
"suitable act" to restore the reputations of the sufferers, and to
make some remuneration "as to what they have been damnified in their
estates thereby." This paper was signed by Philip English and
twenty-one others. Philip English gave in an account in detail of what
articles were seized and carried away, at the time of his arrest, from
four of his warehouses, his wharf, and shop-house, besides the
expenses incurred in prison, and in escaping from it. It appears by
this statement, that he and his wife were nine weeks in jail at Salem
and Boston. Nothing was done at this session. The next year, Sept. 12,
1710, Isaac Easty presented a strong memorial to the General Court in
reference to his case. He calls for some remuneration. In speaking of
the arrest and execution of his "beloved wife," he says "my sorrow and
trouble of heart in being deprived of her in such a manner, which this
world can never make me any compensation for." At the same time, the
daughters of Elizabeth How, the son of Sarah Wildes, the heirs of Mary
Bradbury, Edward Bishop and his wife Sarah, sent in severally similar
petitions,--all in earnest and forcible language. Charles, one of the
sons of George Burroughs, presented the case of his "dear and honored
father;" declaring that his innocence of the crime of which he was
accused, and his excellence of character, were shown in "his careful
catechising his children, and upholding religion in his family, and
by his solemn and savory written instructions from prison." He
describes in affecting details the condition in which his father's
family of little children was left at his death. One of Mr.
Burroughs's daughters, upon being required to sign a paper in
reference to compensation, expresses her distress of mind in these
words: "Every discourse on this melancholy subject doth but give a
fresh wound to my bleeding heart. I desire to sit down in silence."
John Moulton, in behalf of the family of Giles Corey, says that they
"cannot sufficiently express their grief" for the death, in such a
manner, of "their honored father and mother." Samuel Nurse, in behalf
of his brothers and sisters, says that their "honored and dear mother
had led a blameless life from her youth up.... Her name and the name
of her posterity lies under reproach, the removing of which reproach
is the principal thing wherein we desire restitution. And, as we know
not how to express our loss of such a mother in such a way, so we know
not how to compute our charge, but leave it to the judgment of others,
and shall not be critical." He distinctly intimates, that they do not
wish any money to be paid them, unless "the attainder is taken off."
Many other petitions were presented by the families of those who
suffered, all in the same spirit; and several besides the Nurses
insisted mainly upon the "taking off the attainder."

The General Court, on the 17th of October, 1710, passed an act, that
"the several convictions, judgments, and attainders be, and hereby
are, reversed, and declared to be null and void." In simple justice,
they ought to have extended the act to all who had suffered; but they
confined its effect to those in reference to whom petitions had been
presented. The families of some of them had disappeared, or may not
have had notice of what was going on; so that the sentence which the
Government acknowledged to have been unjust remains to this day
unreversed against the names and memory of Bridget Bishop, Susanna
Martin, Alice Parker, Ann Pudeator, Wilmot Read, and Margaret Scott.
The stain on the records of the Commonwealth has never been fully
effaced. What caused this dilatory and halting course on the part of
the Government, and who was responsible for it, cannot be ascertained.
Since the presentation of Abigail Faulkner's petition in 1700, the
Legislature, in the popular branch at least, and the Governor, appear
to have been inclined to act favorably in the premises; but some power
blocked the way. There is some reason to conjecture that it was the
influence of the home government. Its consent to have the prosecutions
suspended, in 1692, was not very cordial, but, while it approved of
"care and circumspection therein," expressed reluctance to allow any
"impediment to the ordinary course of justice."

On the 17th of December, 1711, Governor Dudley issued his warrant for
the purpose of carrying out a vote of the "General Assembly," "by and
with the advice and consent of Her Majesty's Council," to pay "the sum
of £578. 12_s._" to "such persons as are living, and to those that
legally represent them that are dead;" which sum was divided as
follows:--

John Procter and wife      £150  0  0
George Jacobs                79  0  0
George Burroughs             50  0  0
Sarah Good                   30  0  0
Giles Corey and wife         21  0  0
Dorcas Hoar                  21 17  0
Abigail Hobbs                10  0  0
Rebecca Eames                10  0  0
Mary Post                     8 14  0
Mary Lacy                     8 10  0
Ann Foster                    6 10  0
Samuel Wardwell and wife     36 15  0
Rebecca Nurse                25  0  0
Mary Easty                   20  0  0
Mary Bradbury                20  0  0
Abigail Faulkner             20  0  0
John Willard                 20  0  0
Sarah Wildes                 14  0  0
Elizabeth How                12  0  0
Mary Parker                   8  0  0
Martha Carrier                7  6  0
                           ----------
                           £578 12  0
                           ==========

The distribution, as above, according to the evidence as it has come
down to us, is as unjust and absurd as the smallness of the amount,
and the long delay before it was ordered, are discreditable to the
province. One of the larger sums was allowed to William Good, while he
clearly deserved nothing, as he was an adverse witness in the
examination of his wife, and did what he could to promote the
prosecution against her. He did not, it is true, swear that he
believed her to be a witch; but what he said tended to prejudice the
magistrates and the public against her. Benjamin Putnam acted as his
attorney, and received the money for him. Good was a retainer and
dependant of that branch of the Putnam family; and its influence gave
him so large a proportionate amount, and not the reason or equity of
the case. More was allowed to Abigail Hobbs, a very malignant witness
against the prisoners, than to the families of several who were
executed. Nearly twice as much was allowed for Abigail Faulkner, who
was pardoned, as for Elizabeth How, who was executed. The sums allowed
in the cases of Parker, Carrier, and Foster, were shamefully small.
The public mind evidently was not satisfied; and the Legislature were
pressed for a half-century to make more adequate compensation, and
thereby vindicate the sentiment of justice, and redeem the honor of
the province.

On the 8th of December, 1738, Major Samuel Sewall, a son of the Judge,
introduced an order in the House of Representatives for the
appointment of a committee to get information relating to "the
circumstances of the persons and families who suffered in the calamity
of the times in and about the year 1692." Major Sewall entered into
the matter with great zeal. The House unanimously passed the order. He
was chairman of the committee; and, on the 9th of December, wrote to
his cousin Mitchel Sewall in Salem, son of Stephen, earnestly
requesting him and John Higginson, Esq., to aid in accomplishing the
object. The following is an extract from a speech delivered by
Governor Belcher to both Houses of the Legislature, Nov. 22, 1740. It
is honorable to his memory.

     "The Legislature have often honored themselves in a kind and
     generous remembrance of such families and of the posterity
     of such as have been sufferers, either in their persons or
     estates, for or by the Government, of which the public
     records will give you many instances. I should therefore be
     glad there might be a committee appointed by this Court to
     inquire into the sufferings of the people called Quakers, in
     the early days of this country, as also into the descendants
     of such families as were in a manner ruined in the mistaken
     management of the terrible affair called witchcraft. I
     really think there is something incumbent on this Government
     to be done for relieving the estates and reputations of the
     posterities of the unhappy families that so suffered; and
     the doing it, though so long afterwards, would doubtless be
     acceptable to Almighty God, and would reflect honor upon the
     present Legislature."

On the 31st of May, 1749, the heirs of George Burroughs addressed a
petition to Governor Shirley and the General Court, setting forth "the
unparalleled persecutions and sufferings" of their ancestor, and
praying for "some recompense from this Court for the losses thereby
sustained by his family." It was referred to a committee of both
Houses. The next year, the petitioners sent a memorial to Governor
Spencer Phips and the General Court, stating, that "it hath fell out,
that the Hon. Mr. Danforth, chairman of the said committee, had not,
as yet, called them together so much as once to act thereon, even to
this day, as some of the honorable committee themselves were pleased,
with real concern, to signify to your said petitioners." The House
immediately passed this order: "That the committee within referred to
be directed to sit forthwith, consider the petition to them committed,
and report as soon as may be."

All that I have been able to find, as the result of these long-delayed
and long-protracted movements, is a statement of Dr. Bentley, that the
heirs of Philip English received two hundred pounds. He does not say
when the act to this effect was passed. Perhaps some general measure
of the kind was adopted, the record of which I have failed to meet.
The engrossing interest of the then pending French war, and of the
vehement dissensions that led to the Revolution, probably prevented
any further attention to this subject, after the middle of the last
century.

It is apparent from the foregoing statements and records, that while
many individuals, the people generally, and finally Governor Belcher
and the House of Representatives emphatically, did what they could,
there was an influence that prevailed to prevent for a long time, if
not for ever, any action of the province to satisfy the demands made
by justice and the honor of the country in repairing the great wrongs
committed by the legislative, executive, and judicial branches of the
Government in 1692. The only bodies of men who fully came up to their
duty on the occasion were the clergy of the county, and, as will
appear, the church at Salem Village.

What was done by the First Church in Salem is shown in the following
extract from its records:--

     "March 2, 1712.--After the sacrament, a church-meeting was
     appointed to be at the teacher's house, at two of the clock
     in the afternoon, on the sixth of the month, being Thursday:
     on which day they accordingly met to consider of the several
     following particulars propounded to them by the teacher;
     viz.:--

     "1. Whether the record of the excommunication of our Sister
     Nurse (all things considered) may not be erased and blotted
     out. The result of which consideration was, That whereas, on
     July 3d, 1692, it was proposed by the Elders, and consented
     to by an unanimous vote of the church, that our Sister Nurse
     should be excommunicated, she being convicted of witchcraft
     by the Court, and she was accordingly excommunicated, since
     which the General Court having taken off the attainder, and
     the testimony on which she was convicted being not now so
     satisfactory to ourselves and others as it was generally in
     that hour of darkness and temptation; and we being solicited
     by her son, Mr. Samuel Nurse, to erase and blot out of the
     church records the sentence of her excommunication,--this
     church, having the matter proposed to them by the teacher,
     and having seriously considered it, doth consent that the
     record of our Sister Nurse's excommunication be accordingly
     erased and blotted out, that it may no longer be a reproach
     to her memory, and an occasion of grief to her children.
     Humbly requesting that the merciful God would pardon
     whatsoever sin, error, or mistake was in the application of
     that censure and of that whole affair, through our merciful
     High-priest, who knoweth how to have compassion on the
     ignorant, and those that are out of the way.

     "2. It was proposed whether the sentence of excommunication
     against our Brother Giles Corey (all things considered) may
     not be erased and blotted out. The result was, That whereas,
     on Sept. 18, 1692, it was considered by the church, that our
     Brother Giles Corey stood accused of and indicted for the
     sin of witchcraft, and that he had obstinately refused to
     plead, and so threw himself on certain death. It was agreed
     by the vote of the church, that he should be excommunicated
     for it; and accordingly he was excommunicated. Yet the
     church, having now testimony in his behalf, that, before his
     death, he did bitterly repent of his obstinate refusal to
     plead in defence of his life, do consent that the sentence
     of his excommunication be erased and blotted out."

It will be noticed that these proceedings were not had at a regular
public meeting, but at a private meeting of the church, on a week-day
afternoon, at the teacher's house. The motives that led to them were a
disposition to comply with the act of the General Court, and the
solicitations of Mr. Samuel Nurse, rather than a profound sense of
wrong done to a venerable member of their own body, who had claims
upon their protection as such. The language of the record does not
frankly admit absolutely that there was sin, error, or mistake, but
requests forgiveness for whatsoever there may have been. The character
of Rebecca Nurse, and the outrageous treatment she had received from
that church, in the method arranged for her excommunication, demanded
something more than these hypothetical expressions, with such a
preamble.

The statement made in the vote about Corey is, on its face, a
misrepresentation. From the nature of the proceeding by which he was
destroyed, it was in his power, at any moment, if he "repented of his
obstinate refusal to plead," by saying so, to be instantly released
from the pressure that was crushing him. The only design of the
torture was to make him bring it to an end by "answering" guilty, or
not guilty. Somebody fabricated the slander that Corey's resolution
broke down under his agonies, and that he bitterly repented; and Mr.
Noyes put the foolish scandal upon the records of the church.

The date of this transaction is disreputable to the people of Salem.
Twenty years had been suffered to elapse, and a great outrage allowed
to remain unacknowledged and unrepented. The credit of doing what was
done at last probably belongs to the Rev. George Corwin. His call to
the ministry, as colleague with Mr. Noyes, had just been consummated.
The introduction of a new minister heralded a new policy, and the
proceedings have the appearance of growing out of the kindly and
auspicious feelings which generally attend and welcome such an era.

The Rev. George, son of Jonathan Corwin, was born May 21, 1683, and
graduated at Harvard College in 1701. Mr. Barnard, of Marblehead,
describes his character: "The spirit of early devotion, accompanied
with a natural freedom of thought and easy elocution, a quick
invention, a solid judgment, and a tenacious memory, laid the
foundation of a good preacher; to which his acquired literature, his
great reading, hard studies, deep meditation, and close walk with God,
rendered him an able and faithful minister of the New Testament." The
records of the First Church, in noticing his death, thus speak of him:
"He was highly esteemed in his life, and very deservedly lamented at
his death; having been very eminent for his early improvement in
learning and piety, his singular abilities and great labors, his
remarkable zeal and faithfulness. He was a great benefactor to our
poor." Those bearing the name of Curwen among us are his descendants.
He died Nov. 23, 1717.

The Rev. Nicholas Noyes died Dec. 13, 1717. He was a person of
superior talents and learning. He published, with the sermon preached
by Cotton Mather on the occasion, a poem on the death of his venerable
colleague, Mr. Higginson, in 1708; and also a poem on the death of
Rev. Joseph Green, in 1715. Although an amiable and benevolent man in
other respects, it cannot be denied that he was misled by his errors
and his temperament into the most violent course in the witchcraft
prosecutions; and it is to be feared that his feelings were never
wholly rectified in reference to that transaction.

Jonathan, the father of the Rev. George Corwin, and whose part as a
magistrate and judge in the examinations and trials of 1692 has been
seen, died on the 9th of July, 1718, seventy-eight years of age.

It only remains to record the course of the village church and people
in reference to the events of 1692. After six persons, including
Rebecca Nurse, had suffered death; and while five others, George
Burroughs, John Procter, John Willard, George Jacobs, and Martha
Carrier, were awaiting their execution, which was to take place on the
coming Friday, Aug. 19,--the facts, related as follows by Mr. Parris
in his record-book, occurred:--

     "Sabbath-day, 14th August, 1692.--The church was stayed
     after the congregation was dismissed, and the pastor spake
     to the church after this manner:--

     "'Brethren, you may all have taken notice, that, several
     sacrament days past, our brother Peter Cloyse, and Samuel
     Nurse and his wife, and John Tarbell and his wife, have
     absented from communion with us at the Lord's Table, yea,
     have very rarely, except our brother Samuel Nurse, been with
     us in common public worship: now, it is needful that the
     church send some persons to them to know the reason of their
     absence. Therefore, if you be so minded, express
     yourselves.'

     "None objected. But a general or universal vote, after some
     discourse, passed, that Brother Nathaniel Putnam and the two
     deacons should join with the pastor to discourse with the
     said absenters about it.

     "31st August.--Brother Tarbell proves sick, unmeet for
     discourse; Brother Cloyse hard to be found at home, being
     often with his wife in prison at Ipswich for witchcraft; and
     Brother Nurse, and sometimes his wife, attends our public
     meeting, and he the sacrament, 11th September, 1692: upon
     all which we choose to wait further."

When it is remembered that the individuals aimed at all belonged to
the family of Rebecca Nurse, whose execution had taken place three
weeks before under circumstances with which Mr. Parris had been so
prominently and responsibly connected, this proceeding must be felt by
every person of ordinary human sensibilities to have been cruel,
barbarous, and unnatural. Parris made the entry in his book, as he
often did, some time after the transaction, as the inserted date of
Sept. 11, shows. What his object was in commencing disciplinary
treatment of this distressed family is not certain. It may be that he
was preparing to get up such a feeling against them as would make it
safe to have the "afflicted" cry out upon some of them. Or it may be
that he wished to get them out of his church, to avoid the possibility
of their proceeding against him, by ecclesiastical methods, at some
future day. He could not, however, bring his church to continue the
process. This is the first indication that the brethren were no longer
to be relied on by him to go all lengths, and that some remnants of
good feeling and good sense were to be found among them.

But Mr. Parris was determined not to allow the public feeling against
persons charged with witchcraft to subside, if he could help it; and
he made one more effort to renew the vehemence of the prosecutions. He
prepared and preached two sermons, on the 11th of September, from the
text, Rev. xvii. 14: "These shall make war with the Lamb, and the Lamb
shall overcome them: for he is Lord of lords, and King of kings; and
they that are with him are called and chosen and faithful." They are
entitled, "The Devil and his instruments will be warring against
Christ and his followers." This note is added, "After the condemnation
of six witches at a court at Salem, one of the witches, viz., Martha
Corey, in full communion with our church." The following is a portion
of "the improvement" in the application of these discourses:--

     "It may serve to reprove such as seem to be so amazed at the
     war the Devil has raised amongst us by wizards and witches,
     against the Lamb and his followers, that they altogether
     deny it. If ever there were witches, men and women in
     covenant with the Devil, here are multitudes in New England.
     Nor is it so strange a thing that there should be such; no,
     nor that some church-members should be such. Pious Bishop
     Hall saith, 'The Devil's prevalency in this age is most
     clear in the marvellous number of witches abounding in all
     places. Now hundreds (says he) are discovered in one shire;
     and, if fame deceive us not, in a village of fourteen houses
     in the north are found so many of this damned brood.
     Heretofore, only barbarous deserts had them; but now the
     civilized and religious parts are frequently pestered with
     them. Heretofore, some silly, ignorant old woman, &c.; but
     now we have known those of both sexes who professed much
     knowledge, holiness, and devotion, drawn into this damnable
     practice.'"

The foregoing extract is important as showing that some persons at the
village had begun to express their disbelief of the witchcraft
doctrine of Mr. Parris, "altogether denying it." The title and drift
of the sermons in connection with the date, and his proceedings, the
month before, against Samuel Nurse, Tarbell, and Cloyse, members of
his church, give color to the idea that he was designing to have them
"cried out" against, and thus disposed of. It is a noticeable fact,
that, about this time, Cotton Mather was also laying his plans for a
renewal, or rather continuance, of witchcraft prosecutions. Nine days
after these sermons were preached by Parris, Mather wrote the
following letter to Stephen Sewall of Salem:--

     BOSTON, Sept. 20, 1692.

     MY DEAR AND MY VERY OBLIGING STEPHEN,--It is my hap to be
     continually ... with all sorts of objections, and objectors
     against the ... work now doing at Salem; and it is my further
     good hap to do some little service for God and you in my
     encounters.

     But that I may be the more capable to assist in lifting up a
     standard against the infernal enemy, I must renew my most
     importunate request, that you would please quickly to
     perform what you kindly promised, of giving me a narrative
     of the evidences given in at the trials of half a dozen, or
     if you please a dozen, of the principal witches that have
     been condemned. I know 'twill cost you some time; but, when
     you are sensible of the benefit that will follow, I know you
     will not think much of that cost; and my own willingness to
     expose myself unto the utmost for the defence of my friends
     with you makes me presume to plead something of merit to be
     considered.

     I shall be content, if you draw up the desired narrative by
     way of letter to me; or, at least, let it not come without a
     letter, wherein you shall, if you can, intimate over again
     what you have sometimes told me of the awe which is upon the
     hearts of your juries, with ... unto the validity of the
     spectral evidences.

     Please also to ... some of your observations about the
     confessors and the credibility of what they assert, or about
     things evidently preternatural in the witchcrafts, and
     whatever else you may account an entertainment, for an
     inquisitive person, that entirely loves you and _Salem_.
     Nay, though I will never lay aside the character which I
     mentioned in my last words, yet I am willing, that, when you
     write, you should imagine me as obstinate a Sadducee and
     witch-advocate as any among us: address me as one that
     believed nothing reasonable; and when you have so knocked me
     down, in a spectre so unlike me, you will enable me to box
     it about among my neighbors, till it come--I know not where
     at last.

     But assure yourself, as I shall not wittingly make what you
     write prejudicial to any worthy design which those two
     excellent persons, Mr. Hale and Mr. Noyse, may have in hand;
     so you shall find that I shall be, sir, your grateful
     friend,

     C. MATHER.

     P.S.--That which very much strengthens the charms of the
     request which this letter makes you is, that His Excellency
     the Governor laid his positive commands upon me to desire
     this favor of you; and the truth is, there are some of his
     circumstances with reference to this affair, which I need
     not mention, that call for the expediting of your
     kindness,--_kindness_, I say, for such it will be esteemed
     as well by him as by your servant,

     C. MATHER.

In order to understand the character and aim of this letter, it will
be necessary to consider its date. It was written Sept. 20, 1692. On
the 19th of August, but one month before, Dr. Mather was acting a
conspicuous part under the gallows at Witch-hill, at the execution of
Mr. Burroughs and four others, increasing the power of the awful
delusion, and inflaming the passions of the people. On the 9th of
September, six more miserable creatures received sentence of death. On
the 17th of September, nine more received sentence of death. On the
19th of September, Giles Corey was crushed to death. And, on the 22d
of September, eight were executed. These were the last that suffered
death. The letter, therefore, was written while the horrors of the
transaction were at their height, and by a person who had himself been
a witness of them, and whose "good hap" it had been to "do some little
service" in promoting them. The object of the writer is declared to
be, that he might be "more capable to assist in lifting up a standard
against the infernal enemy." The literal meaning of this expression
is, that he might be enabled to get up another witchcraft delusion
under his own special management and control. Can any thing be
imagined more artful and dishonest than the plan he had contrived to
keep himself out of sight in all the operations necessary to
accomplish his purpose? "Nay, though I will never lay aside the
character which I mentioned in my last words, yet I am willing, that,
when you write, you should imagine me as obstinate a Sadducee and
witch-advocate as any among us: address me as one that believed
nothing reasonable; and when you have so knocked me down, in a spectre
so unlike me, you will enable me to box it about among my neighbors,
till it come--I know not where at last."

Upon obtaining the document requisite to the fulfilment of his design,
he did "box it about" so effectually among his neighbors, that he
succeeded that next summer in getting up a wonderful case of
witchcraft, in the person of one Margaret Rule, a member of his
congregation in Boston. Dr. Mather published an account of her
long-continued fastings, even unto the ninth day, and of the
incredible sufferings she endured from the "infernal enemy." "She was
thrown," says he, "into such exorbitant convulsions as were
astonishing to the spectators in general. They that could behold the
doleful condition of the poor family without sensible compassions
might have entrails, indeed, but I am sure they could have no true
bowels in them." So far was he successful in spreading the delusion,
that he prevailed upon six men to testify that they had seen Margaret
Rule lifted bodily from her bed, and raised by an invisible power "so
as to touch the garret floor;" that she was entirely removed from the
bed or any other material support; that she continued suspended for
several minutes; and that a strong man, assisted by several other
persons, could not effectually resist the mysterious force that lifted
her up, and poised her aloft in the air! The people of Boston were
saved from the horrors intended to be brought upon them by this dark
and deep-laid plot, by the activity, courage, and discernment of Calef
and others, who distrusted Dr. Mather, and, by watching his movements,
exposed the imposture, and overthrew the whole design.

Mr. Parris does not appear to have produced much effect by his
sermons. The people had suffered enough from the "war between the
Devil and the Lamb," as he and Mather had conducted it; and it could
not be renewed.

Immediately upon the termination of the witchcraft proceedings, the
controversy between Mr. Parris and the congregation, or the
inhabitants, as they were called, of the village, was renewed, with
earnest resolution on their part to get rid of him. The parish
neglected and refused to raise the means for paying his salary; and a
majority of the voters, in the meetings of the "inhabitants,"
vigilantly resisted all attempts in his favor. The church was still
completely under his influence; and, as has been stated in the First
Part, he made use of that body to institute a suit against the people.
The court and magistrates were wholly in his favor, and peremptorily
ordered the appointment, by the people, of a new committee. The
inhabitants complied with the order by the election of a new
committee, but took care to have it composed exclusively of men
opposed to Mr. Parris; and he found himself no better off than before.
He concluded not to employ his church any longer as a principal agent
in his lawsuit against the parish; but used it for another purpose.

After the explosion of the witchcraft delusion, the relations of
parties became entirely changed. The prosecutors at the trials were
put on the defensive, and felt themselves in peril. Parris saw his
danger, and, with characteristic courage and fertility of resources,
prepared to defend himself, and carry the war upon any quarter from
which an attack might be apprehended. He continued, on his own
responsibility, to prosecute, in court, his suit against the parish,
and in his usual trenchant style. As the law then was, a minister, in
a controversy with his parish, had a secure advantage, and absolutely
commanded the situation, if his church were with him. From the time of
his settlement, Parris had shaped his policy on this basis. He had
sought to make his church an impregnable fortress against his
opponents. But, to be impregnable, it was necessary that there should
be no enemies within it. A few disaffected brethren could at any time
demand, and have a claim to, a mutual council; and Mr. Parris knew,
that, before the investigations of such a council, his actions in the
witchcraft prosecutions could not stand. This perhaps suggested his
movements, in August, 1692, against Samuel Nurse, John Tarbell, and
Peter Cloyse. He did not at that time succeed in getting rid of them;
and they remained in the church, and, with the exception of Cloyse, in
the village. They might at any time take the steps that would lead to
a mutual council; and Mr. Parris was determined, at all events, to
prevent that. It was evident that the members of that family would
insist upon satisfaction being given them, in and through the church,
for the wrongs he had done them. Although, in the absence of Cloyse,
but two in number, there was danger that sympathy for them might reach
others of the brethren. Thomas Wilkins, a member in good standing, son
of old Bray Wilkins, and a connection of John Willard, an intelligent
and resolute man, had already joined them. Parris felt that others
might follow, and that whatever could be done to counteract them must
be done quickly. He accordingly initiated proceedings in his church to
rid himself of them, if not by excommunication, at least by getting
them under discipline, so as to prevent the possibility of their
dealing with him.

This led to one of the most remarkable passages of the kind in the
annals of the New-England churches. It is narrated in detail by Mr.
Parris, in his church record-book. It would not be easy to find
anywhere an example of greater skill, wariness, or ability in a
conflict of this sort. On the one side is Mr. Parris, backed by his
church and the magistrates, and aided, it is probable, by Mr. Noyes;
on the other, three husbandmen. They had no known backers or advisers;
and, at frequent stages of the fencing match, had to parry or strike,
without time to consult any one. Mr. Parris was ingenious, quick, a
great strategist, and not over-scrupulous as to the use of his
weapons. Nurse, Tarbell, and Wilkins were cautious, cool, steady, and
persistent. Of course, they were wholly inexperienced in such things,
and liable to make wrong moves, or to be driven or drawn to untenable
ground. But they will not be found, I think, to have taken a false
step from beginning to end. Their line of action was extremely narrow.
It was necessary to avoid all personalities, and every appearance of
passion or excitement; to make no charge against Mr. Parris that could
touch the church, as such, or reflect upon the courts, magistrates, or
any others that had taken part in the prosecutions. It was necessary
to avoid putting any thing into writing, with their names attached,
which could in any way be tortured into a libel. Parris lets fall
expressions which show that he was on the watch for something of the
kind to seize upon, to transfer the movement from the church to the
courts. Entirely unaccustomed to public speaking, these three farmers
had to meet assemblages composed of their opponents, and much wrought
up against them; to make statements, and respond to interrogatories
and propositions, the full and ultimate bearing of which was not
always apparent: any unguarded expression might be fatal to their
cause. Their safety depended upon using the right word at the right
time and in the right manner, and in withholding the statement of
their grievances, in adequate force of language, until they were under
the shelter of a council. If, during the long-protracted conferences
and communications, they had tripped at any point, allowed a phrase or
syllable to escape which might be made the ground of discipline or
censure, all would be lost; for Parris could not be reached but
through a council, and a council could not even be asked for except by
brethren in full and clear standing. It was often attempted to ensnare
them into making charges against the church; but they kept their eye
on Parris, and, as they told him more than once in the presence of the
whole body of the people, on him alone. Limited as the ground was on
which they could stand, they held it steadfastly, and finally drove
him from his stronghold.

On the first movement of Mr. Parris offensively upon them, they
commenced their movement upon him. The method by which alone they
could proceed, according to ecclesiastical law and the platform of
the churches, was precisely as it was understood to be laid down in
Matt. xviii. 15-17. Following these directions, Samuel Nurse first
called alone upon Mr. Parris, and privately made known his grievances.
Parris gave him no satisfaction. Then, after a due interval, Nurse,
Tarbell, and Wilkins called upon him together. He refused to see them
together, but one at a time was allowed to go up into his study.
Tarbell and Nurse each spent an hour or more with him, leaving no time
for Wilkins. In these interviews, he not only failed to give
satisfaction, but, according to his own account, treated them in the
coolest and most unfeeling manner, not allowing himself to utter a
soothing word, but actually reiterating his belief of the guilt of
their mother; telling them, as he says, "that he had not seen
sufficient grounds to vary his opinion." Cloyse came soon after to the
village, and had an interview with him for the same purpose. Parris
saw them one only at a time, in order to preclude their taking the
second step required by the gospel rule; that is, to have a brother of
the church with them as a witness. He also took the ground that they
could not be witnesses for each other, but that he should treat them
all as only one person in the transaction. A sense of the injustice of
his conduct, or some other consideration, led William Way, another of
the brethren, to go with them as a witness. Nurse, Tarbell, Wilkins,
Cloyse, and Way went to his house together. He said that the four
first were but one person in the case; but admitted that Way was a
distinct person, a brother of accredited standing, and a witness. He
escaped, however, under the subterfuge that the gospel rule required
"two or _three_ witnesses." In this way, the matter stood for some
time; Parris saying that they had not complied with the conditions in
Matt. xviii., and they maintaining that they had.

The course of Parris was fast diminishing his hold upon the public
confidence. It was plain that the disaffected brethren had done what
they could, in an orderly way, to procure a council. At length, the
leading clergymen here and in Boston, whose minds were open to reason,
thought it their duty to interpose their advice. They wrote to Parris,
that he and his church ought to consent to a council. They wrote a
second time in stronger terms. Not daring to quarrel with so large a
portion of the clergy, Parris pretended to comply with their advice,
but demanded a majority of the council to be chosen by him and his
church. The disaffected brethren insisted upon a fair, mutual council;
each party to have three ministers, with their delegates, in it. To
this, Parris had finally to agree. The dissatisfied brethren named, as
one of their three, a church at Ipswich. Parris objected to the
Ipswich church. The dissenting brethren insisted that each side should
be free to select its respective three churches. Parris was not
willing to have Ipswich in the council. The other party insisted, and
here the matter hung suspended. The truth is, that the disaffected
brethren were resolved to have the Rev. John Wise in the council. They
knew Cotton Mather would be there, on the side of Parris; and they
knew that John Wise was the man to meet him. The public opinion
settled down in favor of the dissatisfied brethren, on the ground that
each party to a mutual council ought to--and, to make it really
mutual, must--have free and full power to nominate the churches to be
called by it. Parris, being afraid to have a mutual council, and
particularly if Mr. Wise was in it, suddenly took a new position. He
and his church called an _ex parte_ council, at which the following
ministers, with their delegates, were present: Samuel Checkley of the
New South Church, James Allen of the First Church, Samuel Willard of
the Old South, Increase and Cotton Mather of the North Church,--all of
Boston; Samuel Torrey of Weymouth; Samuel Phillips of Rowley, and
Edward Payson, also of Rowley. Among the delegates were many of the
leading public men of the province. The result was essentially
damaging to Mr. Parris. The tide was now strongly set against him. The
Boston ministers advised him to withdraw from the contest. They
provided a settlement for him in Connecticut, and urged him to quit
the village, and go there. But he refused, and prolonged the struggle.
In the course of it, papers were drawn up and signed, one by his
friends, another by his opponents, together embracing nearly all the
men and women of the village. Those who did not sign either paper were
understood to sympathize with the disaffected brethren. Many who
signed the paper favorable to him acted undoubtedly from the motive
stated in the heading; viz., that the removal of Mr. Parris could do
no good, "for we have had three ministers removed already, and by
every removal our differences have been rather aggravated." Another
removal, they thought, would utterly ruin them. They do not express
any particular interest in Mr. Parris, but merely dread another
change. They preferred to bear the ills they had, rather than fly to
others that they knew not of. It is a very significant fact, that
neither Mrs. Ann Putnam nor the widow Sarah Houlton signed either
paper (the Sarah Houlton whose name appears was the wife of Joseph
Houlton, Sr.). There is reason to believe that they regretted the part
they had taken, particularly against Rebecca Nurse, and probably did
not feel over favorably to the person who had led them into their
dreadful responsibility.

In the mean time, the controversy continued to wax warm among the
people. Mr. Parris was determined to hold his place, and, with it, the
parsonage and ministry lands. The opposition was active, unappeasable,
and effective. The following paper, handed about, illustrates the
methods by which they assailed him:--

     "As to the contest between Mr. Parris and his hearers, &c.,
     it may be composed by a satisfactory answer to Lev. xx. 6:
     'And the soul that turneth after such as have familiar
     spirits, and after wizards, to go a-whoring after them, I
     will set my face against that soul, and will cut him off
     from among his people.' 1 Chron. x. 13, 14: 'So Saul died
     for his transgression which he committed against the
     Lord,--even against the word of the Lord, which he kept
     not,--and also for asking counsel of one who had a familiar
     to inquire of it, and inquired not of the Lord: therefore he
     slew him,'" &c.

Mr. Parris mirrored, or rather daguerrotyped, his inmost thoughts upon
the page of his church record-book. Whatever feeling happened to
exercise his spirit, found expression there. This gives it a truly
rare and singular interest. Among a variety of scraps variegating the
record, and thrown in with other notices of deaths, he has the
following:--

     "1694, Oct. 27.--Ruth, daughter to Job Swinnerton (died),
     and buried the 28th instant, being the Lord's Day; and the
     corpse carried by the meeting-house door in time of singing
     before meeting afternoon, and more at the funeral than at
     the sermon."

This illustrates the state of things. The Swinnerton family were all
along opposed to Mr. Parris, and kept remarkably clear from the
witchcraft delusion. Originally, it was not customary to have prayers
at funerals. At any rate, all that Mr. Parris had to do on the
occasion was to witness and record the fact, which he indites in the
pithy manner in which he often relieves his mind, that more people
went to the distant burial-ground than came to hear him preach. The
procession was made up of his opponents; the congregation, of his
friends. At last, Captain John Putnam proposed that each party should
choose an equal number from themselves to decide the controversy; and
that Major Bartholomew Gedney, from the town, should be invited to act
as moderator of the joint meeting. Both sides agreed, and appointed
their representatives. Major Gedney consented to preside. But this
movement came to nothing, probably owing to the refractoriness of Mr.
Parris; for, from that moment, he had no supporters. The church ceased
to act: its members were merged in the meeting of the inhabitants.
There was no longer any division among them. The party that had acted
as friends of Mr. Parris united thenceforward with his opponents to
defend the parish in the suit he had brought against it in the courts.
The controversy was quite protracted. The Court was determined to
uphold him, and expressed its prejudice against the parish, sometimes
with considerable severity of manner and action.[A]

[Footnote A: The following passage is from the parish records:--

"On the 3d of February, 1693, a warrant was issued for a meeting of
the inhabitants of the village, signed by Thomas Preston, Joseph Pope,
Joseph Houlton, and John Tarbell, of the standing annual committee, to
be held Feb. 14, 'to consider and agree and determine who are capable
of voting in our public transactions, by the power given us by the
General-court order at our first settlement; and to consider of and
make void a vote in our book of records, on the 18th of June, 1689,
where there is a salary of sixty-six pounds stated to Mr. Parris, he
not complying with it; also to consider of and make void several votes
in the book of records on the 10th of October, 1692, where our
ministry house and barn and two acres of land seem to be conveyed from
us after a fraudulent manner.'"

At this meeting, it was voted, that "all men that are ratable, or
hereafter shall be living within that tract of land mentioned in our
General-court order, shall have liberty in nominating and appointing a
committee, and voting in any of our public concerns."

By referring to the account, in the First Part, of the controversy
between the inhabitants of the village and Mr. Bayley, "the power"
above alluded to, "given us by the General Court," will be seen fully
described. In its earnestness to fasten Mr. Bayley upon "the
inhabitants," the Court elaborately ordained the system by which they
should be constrained to provide for him, and compelled to raise the
means of paying his salary. As no church had then been organized, the
General Court fastened the duty upon "householders." The fact had not
been forgotten, and the above vote showed that the parish intended to
hold on to the power then given them. This highly incensed the Court
of Sessions. It ordered the parish book of records to be produced
before it, and caused a condemnation of such a claim of right to be
written out, in open Court, on the face of the record, where it is now
to be seen. It is as follows:--

"At the General Sessions of the Peace holden at Ipswich, March the
28th, 1693. This Court having viewed and considered the above
agreement or vote contained in the last five lines, finding the same
to be repugnant to the laws of this province, do declare the same to
be null and void, and that this order be recorded with the records of
this Court.

"Attest, STEPHEN SEWALL, _Clerk_."]

The parish heeded not the frowns of the Court, but persisted
inexorably in its purpose to get rid of Mr. Parris. After an obstinate
contest, it prevailed. In the last stage of the controversy, it
appointed four men, as its agents or attorneys, whose names indicate
the spirit in which it acted,--John Tarbell, Samuel Nurse, Daniel
Andrew, and Joseph Putnam. His dauntless son did not follow the wolf
through the deep and dark recesses of his den with a more determined
resolution than that with which Joseph Putnam pursued Samuel Parris
through the windings of the law, until he ferreted him out, and rid
the village of him for ever.

Finally, the inferior court of Common Pleas, before which Mr. Parris
had carried the case, ordered that the matters in controversy between
him and the inhabitants of Salem Village should be referred to
arbitrators for decision. The following statement was laid before them
by the persons representing the inhabitants:--

     _"To the Honorable Wait Winthrop, Elisha Cook, and Samuel
     Sewall, Esquires, Arbitrators, indifferently chosen, between
     Mr. Samuel Parris and the Inhabitants of Salem Village._

     _"The Remonstrances of several Aggrieved Persons in the said
     Village, with further Reasons why they conceive they ought
     not to hear Mr. Parris, nor to own him as a Minister of the
     Gospel, nor to contribute any Support to him as such for
     several years past, humbly offered as fit for
     consideration._

     "We humbly conceive that, having, in April, 1693, given our
     reasons why we could not join with Mr. Parris in prayer,
     preaching, or sacrament, if these reasons are found
     sufficient for our withdrawing (and we cannot yet find but
     they are), then we conceive ourselves virtually discharged,
     not only in conscience, but also in law, which requires
     maintenance to be given to such as are orthodox and
     blameless; the said Mr. Parris having been teaching such
     dangerous errors, and preached such scandalous immoralities,
     as ought to discharge any (though ever so gifted otherways)
     from the work of the ministry, particularly in his oath
     against the lives of several, wherein he swears that the
     prisoners with their looks knock down those pretended
     sufferers. We humbly conceive that he that swears to more
     than he is certain of, is equally guilty of perjury with him
     that swears to what is false. And though they did fall at
     such a time, yet it could not be known that they did it,
     much less could they be certain of it; yet did swear
     positively against the lives of such as he could not have
     any knowledge but they might be innocent.

     "His believing the Devil's accusations, and readily
     departing from all charity to persons, though of blameless
     and godly lives, upon such suggestions; his promoting such
     accusations; as also his partiality therein in stifling the
     accusations of some, and, at the same time, vigilantly
     promoting others,--as we conceive, are just causes for our
     refusal, &c.

     "That Mr. Parris's going to Mary Walcot or Abigail Williams,
     and directing others to them, to know who afflicted the
     people in their illnesses,--we understand this to be a
     dealing with them that have a familiar spirit, and an
     implicit denying the providence of God, who alone, as we
     believe, can send afflictions, or cause devils to afflict
     any: this we also conceive sufficient to justify such
     refusal.

     "That Mr. Parris, by these practices and principles, has
     been the beginner and procurer of the sorest afflictions,
     not to this village only, but to this whole country, that
     did ever befall them.

     "We, the subscribers, in behalf of ourselves, and of several
     others of the same mind with us (touching these things),
     having some of us had our relations by these practices taken
     off by an untimely death; others have been imprisoned and
     suffered in our persons, reputations, and estates,--submit
     the whole to your honors' decision, to determine whether we
     are or ought to be any ways obliged to honor, respect, and
     support such an instrument of our miseries; praying God to
     guide your honors to act herein as may be for his glory, and
     the future settlement of our village in amity and unity.

     "JOHN TARBELL,
     SAMUEL NURSE,
     JOSEPH PUTNAM,
     DANIEL ANDREW,

     _Attorneys for the people of the Village_.

     Boston, July 21, 1697."

The arbitrators decided that the inhabitants should pay to Mr. Parris
a certain amount for arrearages, and also the sum of £79. 9_s._ 6_d._
for all his right and interest in the ministry house and land, and
that he be forthwith dismissed; and his ministerial relation to the
church and society in Salem Village dissolved. The parish raised the
money with great alacrity. Nathaniel Ingersoll, who had, as has been
stated, made him a present at his settlement of a valuable piece of
land adjoining the parsonage grounds, bought it back, paying him a
liberal price for it, fully equal to its value; and he left the place,
so far as appears, for ever.

On the 14th of July, 1696, in the midst of his controversy with his
people, his wife died. She was an excellent woman; and was respected
and lamented by all. He caused a stone slab to be placed at the head
of her grave, with a suitable inscription, still plainly legible,
concluding with four lines, to which his initials are appended,
composed by him, of which this is one: "Farewell, best wife, choice
mother, neighbor, friend." Her ashes rest in what is called the
Wadsworth burial ground.

Mr. Parris removed to Newton, then to Concord; and in November, 1697,
began to preach at Stow, on a salary of forty pounds, half in money
and half in provisions, &c. A grant from the general court was relied
upon from year to year to help to make up the twenty pounds to be paid
in money. Afterwards he preached at Dunstable, partly supported by a
grant from the general court, and finally in Sudbury, where he died,
Feb. 27, 1720. His daughter Elizabeth, who belonged, it will be
remembered, to the circle of "afflicted children" in 1692, then nine
years of age, in 1710 married Benjamin Barnes of Concord. Two other
daughters married in Sudbury. His son Noyes, who graduated at Harvard
College in 1721, became deranged, and was supported by the town. His
other son Samuel was long deacon of the church at Sudbury, and died
Nov. 22, 1792, aged ninety-one years.

In the "Boston News Letter," No. 1433, July 15, 1731, is a notice, as
follows:--

     "Any person or persons who knew Mr. Samuel Parris, formerly
     of Barbadoes, afterwards of Boston in New England, merchant,
     and after that minister of Salem Village, &c., deceased to
     be a son of Thomas Parris of the island aforesaid, Esq. who
     deceased 1673, or sole heir by will to all his estate in
     said island, are desired to give or send notice thereof to
     the printer of this paper; and it shall be for their
     advantage."

Whether the identity of Mr. Parris, of Salem Village, with the son of
Thomas Parris, of Barbadoes, was established, we have no information.
If it was, some relief may have come to his descendants. There is
every reason to believe, that, after leaving the village, he and his
family suffered from extremely limited means, if not from absolute
poverty. The general ill-repute brought upon him by his conduct in the
witchcraft prosecutions followed him to the last. He had forfeited the
sympathy of his clerical brethren by his obstinate refusal to take
their advice. They earnestly, over and over again, expostulated
against his prolonging the controversy with the people of Salem
Village, besought him to relinquish it, and promised him, if he would,
to provide an eligible settlement elsewhere. They actually did provide
one. But he rejected their counsels and persuasions, in expressions of
ill-concealed bitterness. So that, when he was finally driven away,
they felt under no obligations to befriend him; and with his eminent
abilities he eked out a precarious and inadequate maintenance for
himself and family, in feeble settlements in outskirt towns, during
the rest of his days.

It is difficult to describe the character of this unfortunate man.
Just as is the condemnation which facts compel history to pronounce, I
have a feeling of relief in the thought, that, before the tribunal to
which he so long ago passed, the mercy we all shall need, which
comprehends all motives and allows for all infirmities, has been
extended to him, in its infinite wisdom and benignity.

He was a man of uncommon abilities, of extraordinary vivacity and
activity of intellect. He does not appear to have been wilfully
malevolent; although somewhat reckless in a contest, he was not
deliberately untruthful; on the contrary, there is in his statements a
singular ingenuousness and fairness, seldom to be found in a partisan,
much more seldom in a principal. Although we get almost all we know of
the examinations of accused parties in the witchcraft proceedings, and
of his long contentions with his parish, from him, there is hardly any
ground to regret that the parties on the other side had no friends to
tell their story. A transparency of character, a sort of instinctive
incontinency of mind, which made him let out every thing, or a sort of
blindness which prevented his seeing the bearings of what was said and
done, make his reports the vehicles of the materials for the defence
of the very persons he was prosecuting. I know of no instance like it.
His style is lucid, graphic, lively, natural to the highest degree;
and whatever he describes, we see the whole, and, as it were, from all
points of view. Language flowed from his pen with a facility,
simplicity, expressiveness, and accuracy, not surpassed or often
equalled. He wrote as men talk, using colloquial expressions without
reserve, but always to the point. When we read, we hear him;
abbreviating names, and clipping words, as in the most familiar and
unguarded conversation. He was not hampered by fear of offending the
rules which some think necessary to dignify composition. In his
off-hand, free and easy, gossiping entries in the church-book, or in
his carefully prepared productions, like the "Meditations for Peace,"
read before his church and the dissatisfied brethren, we have
specimens of plain good English, in its most translucent and effective
forms. Considering that his academic education was early broken off,
and many intermediate years were spent in commercial pursuits, his
learning and attainments are quite remarkable. The various troubles
and tragic mischiefs of his life, the terrible wrongs he inflicted on
others, and the retributions he brought upon himself, are traceable to
two or three peculiarities in his mental and moral organization.

He had a passion for a scene, a ceremony, an excitement. He delighted
in the exercise of power, and rejoiced in conflicts or commotions,
from the exhilaration they occasioned, and the opportunity they gave
for the gratification of the activity of his nature. He pursued the
object of getting possession of the ministry house and land with such
desperate pertinacity, not, I think, from avaricious motives, but for
the sake of the power it would give him as a considerable landholder.
His love of form and public excitement led him to operate as he did
with his church. He kept it in continual action during the few years
of his ministry. He had at least seventy-five special meetings of that
body, without counting those which probably occurred without number,
but of which there is no record, during the six months of the
witchcraft period. Twice, the brethren gave out, wholly exhausted; and
the powers of the church were, by vote, transferred to a special
committee, to act in its behalf, composed of persons who had time and
strength to spare. But Mr. Parris, never weary of excitement, would
have been delighted to preside over church-meetings, and to be a
participator in vehement proceedings, every day of his life. The more
noisy and heated the contention, the more he enjoyed it. During all
the transactions connected with the witchcraft prosecutions, he was
everywhere present, always wide awake, full of animation, if not
cheerfulness, and ready to take any part to carry them on. These
propensities and dispositions were fraught with danger, and prolific
of evil in his case, in consequence of what looks very much like a
total want in himself of many of the natural human sensibilities, and
an inability to apprehend them in others. Through all the horrors of
the witchcraft prosecutions, he never evinced the slightest
sensibility, and never seemed to be aware that anybody else had any.
It was not absolute cruelty, but the absence of what may be regarded
as a natural sense. It was not a positive wickedness, but a negative
defect. He seemed to be surprised that other people had sentiments,
and could not understand why Tarbell and Nurse felt so badly about the
execution of their mother. He told them to their faces, without
dreaming of giving them offence, that, while they thought she was
innocent, and he thought she was guilty and had been justly put to
death, it was a mere difference of opinion, as about an indifferent
matter. In his "Meditations for Peace," presented to these
dissatisfied brethren, for the purpose and with an earnest desire of
appeasing them, he tells them that the indulgence of such feelings at
all is a yielding to "temptation," being under "the clouds of human
weakness," and "a bewraying of remaining corruption." Indeed, the
theology of that day, it must be allowed, bore very hard upon even the
best and most sacred affections of our nature. The council, in their
Result, allude to the feelings of those whose parents, and other most
loved and honored relatives and connections, had been so cruelly torn
from them and put to death, as "infirmities discovered by them in such
an heart-breaking day," and bespeak for their grief and lamentations a
charitable construction. They ask the church, whose hands were red
with the blood of their innocent and dearest friends, not to pursue
them with "more critical and vigorous proceedings" in consequence of
their exhibiting these natural sensibilities on the occasion, but "to
treat them with bowels of much compassion." These views had taken full
effect upon Mr. Parris, and obliterated from his breast all such
"infirmities." This is the only explanation or apology that can be
made for him.

Of the history of Cotton Mather, subsequently to the witchcraft
prosecutions, and more or less in consequence of his agency in them,
it may be said that the residue of his life was doomed to
disappointment, and imbittered by reproach and defeat. The storm of
fanatical delusion, which he doubted not would carry him to the
heights of clerical and spiritual power, in America and everywhere,
had left him a wreck. His political aspirations, always one of his
strongest passions, were wholly blasted; and the great aim and crown
of his ambition, the Presidency of Harvard College, once and again and
for ever had eluded his grasp. I leave him to tell his story, and
reveal the state of his mind and heart in his own most free and full
expressions from his private diary for the year 1724.

     "1. What has a gracious Lord helped me to do for the
     _seafaring tribe_, in prayers for them, in sermons to them,
     in books bestowed upon them, and in various projections and
     endeavors to render the sailors a happy generation? And yet
     there is not a man in the world so reviled, so slandered, so
     cursed among sailors.

     "2. What has a gracious Lord helped me to do for the
     instruction and salvation and comfort of the poor negroes?
     And yet some, on purpose to affront me, call their negroes by
     the name of COTTON MATHER, that so they may, with some shadow
     of truth, assert crimes as committed by one of that name,
     which the hearers take to be _Me_.

     "3. What has a gracious Lord given me to do for the profit
     and honor of the female sex, especially in publishing the
     virtuous and laudable characters of holy women? And yet
     where is the man whom the female sex have spit more of their
     venom at? I have cause to question whether there are twice
     ten in the town but what have, at some time or other, spoken
     _basely_ of me.

     "4. What has a gracious Lord given me to do, that I may be a
     blessing to my relatives? I keep a catalogue of them, and
     not a week passes me without some good devised for some or
     other of them, till I have taken all of them under my
     cognizance. And yet where is the man who has been so
     tormented with such _monstrous_ relatives? Job said, '_I am
     a brother to dragons._'

     "5. What has a gracious Lord given me to do for the
     vindication and reputation of the Scottish nation? And yet
     no Englishman has been so vilified by the tongues and pens
     of Scots as I have been.

     "6. What has a gracious Lord given me to do for the good of
     the country, in applications without number for it in all
     its interests, besides publications of things useful to it
     and for it? And yet there is no man whom the country so
     loads with disrespect and calumnies and manifold expressions
     of aversion.

     "7. What has a gracious Lord given me to do for the
     upholding of the government, and the strengthening of it,
     and the bespeaking of regards unto it? And yet the
     discountenance I have almost perpetually received from the
     government! Yea, the indecencies and indignities which it
     has multiplied upon me are such as no other man has been
     treated with.

     "8. What has a gracious Lord given me to do, that the
     COLLEGE may be owned for the bringing forth such as
     are somewhat known in the world, and have read and wrote as
     much as many have done in other places? And yet the College
     for ever puts all possible marks of disesteem upon me. If I
     were the greatest blockhead that ever came from it, or the
     greatest blemish that ever came to it, they could not easily
     show me more contempt than they do.

     "9. What has a gracious Lord given me to do for the study of
     _a profitable conversation_? For nearly fifty years
     together, I have hardly ever gone into any company, or had
     any coming to me, without some explicit contrivance to speak
     something or other that they might be the wiser or the
     better for. And yet my company is as little sought for, and
     there is as little resort unto it, as any minister that I am
     acquainted with.

     "10. What has a gracious Lord given me to do in _good
     offices_, wherever I could find opportunities for the doing
     of them? I for ever entertain them with alacrity. I have
     offered pecuniary recompenses to such as would advise me of
     them. And yet I see no man for whom all are so loth to do
     good offices. Indeed I find some cordial friends, _but how
     few_! Often have I said, What would I give if there were any
     one man in the world to do for me what I am willing to do
     for every man in the world!

     "11. What has a gracious Lord given me to do in the writing
     of many books for the advancing of piety and the promoting
     of his kingdom? There are, I suppose, more than three
     hundred of them. And yet I have had more books written
     against me, more pamphlets to traduce and reproach me and
     belie me, than any man I know in the world.

     "12. What has a gracious Lord given me to do in a variety
     of _services_? For many lustres of years, not a day has
     passed me, without some devices, even written devices, to be
     serviceable. And yet my sufferings! They seem to be (as in
     reason they should be) more than my services. Everybody
     points at me, and speaks of me as by far the most afflicted
     minister in all New England. And many look on me as the
     greatest sinner, because the greatest sufferer; and are
     pretty arbitrary in their conjectures upon my punished
     miscarriages."

     "_Diary, May 7, 1724._--The sudden death of the unhappy man
     who sustained the place of President in our College will
     open a door for my doing singular services in the best of
     interests. I do not know that the care of the College will
     now be cast upon me, though I am told that it is what is
     most generally wished for. If it should be, I shall be in
     abundance of distress about it; but, if it should not, yet I
     may do many things for the good of the College more quietly
     and more hopefully than formerly.

     "_June 5._--The College is in great hazard of dissipation
     and grievous destruction and confusion. My advice to some
     that have some influence on the public may be seasonable.

     "_July 1, 1724._--This day being our _insipid, ill-contrived
     anniversary_, which we call the _Commencement_, I chose to
     spend it at home in supplications, partly on the behalf of
     the College that it may not be foolishly thrown away, but
     that God may bestow such a President upon it as may prove a
     rich blessing unto it and unto all our churches."

On the 18th of November, 1724, the corporation of Harvard College
elected the Rev. Benjamin Colman, pastor of the Brattle-street Church
in Boston, to the vacant presidential chair. He declined the
appointment. The question hung in suspense another six months. In
June, 1725, the Rev. Benjamin Wadsworth, pastor of the First Church in
Boston, was elected, accepted the office, and held it to his death, on
the 16th of March, 1737. It may easily be imagined how keenly these
repeated slights were felt by Cotton Mather. He died on the 13th of
February, 1728.

From the early part of the spring of 1695, when the abortive attempt
to settle the difficulty between Mr. Parris and the people of the
village, by the umpirage of Major Gedney, was made, it evidently
became the settled purpose of the leading men, on both sides, to
restore harmony to the place. On all committees, persons who had been
prominent in opposition to each other were joined together, that, thus
co-operating, they might become reconciled. This is strikingly
illustrated in the "seating of the meeting-house," as it was called.
In 1699, in a seat accommodating three persons, John Putnam the son of
Nathaniel, and John Tarbell, were two of the three. Another seat for
three was occupied by James and John Putnam, sons of John, and by
Thomas Wilkins. Thomas Putnam and Samuel Nurse were placed in the same
seat; and so were the wives of Thomas Putnam and Samuel Nurse, and the
widow Sarah Houlton. The widow Preston, daughter of Rebecca Nurse, was
seated with the widow Walcot, mother of Mary, one of the accusing
girls.

We see in this the effect of the wise and decisive course adopted by
Mr. Parris's successor, the Rev. Joseph Green. Immediately upon his
ordination, Nov. 10, 1698, he addressed himself in earnest to the work
of reconciliation in that distracted parish. From the date of its
existence, nearly thirty years before, it had been torn by constant
strife. It had just passed through scenes which had brought all hearts
into the most terrible alienation. A man of less faith would not have
believed it possible, that the horrors and outrages of those scenes
could ever be forgotten, forgiven, or atoned for, by those who had
suffered or committed the wrongs. But he knew the infinite power of
the divine love, which, as a minister of Christ, it was his office to
inspire and diffuse. He knew that, with the blessing of God, that
people, who had from the first been devouring each other, and upon
whose garments the stain of the blood of brethren and sisters was
fresh, might be made "kind one to another, tender-hearted, forgiving
one another, even as God for Christ's sake hath forgiven" them. In
this heroic and Christ-like faith, he entered upon and steadfastly
adhered to his divine work. He pursued it with patience, wisdom, and
courageous energy. No ministry in the whole history of the New-England
churches has had a more difficult task put upon it, and none has more
perfectly succeeded in its labors. I shall describe the administration
of this good man, as a minister of reconciliation, in his own words,
transcribed from his church records:--

     "Nov. 25, 1698, being spent in holy exercises (in order to
     our preparation for the sacrament of the Lord's Supper), at
     John Putnam, Jr.'s, after the exercise, I desired the church
     to manifest, by the usual sign, that they were so cordially
     satisfied with their brethren, Thomas Wilkins, John Tarbell,
     and Samuel Nurse, that they were heartily desirous that
     they would join with us in all ordinances, that so we might
     all live lovingly together. This they consented unto, and
     none made any objection, but voted it by lifting up their
     hands. And further, that whatever articles they had drawn up
     against these brethren formerly, they now looked upon them
     as nothing, but let them fall to the ground, being willing
     that they should be buried for ever.

     "Feb. 5, 1699.--This day, also our brother John Tarbell, and
     his wife, and Thomas Wilkins and his wife, and Samuel
     Nurse's wife, joined with us in the Lord's Supper; which is
     a matter of thankfulness, seeing they have for a long time
     been so offended as that they could not comfortably join
     with us.

     "1702.--In December, the pastor spake to the church, on the
     sabbath, as followeth: 'Brethren, I find in your church-book
     a record of Martha Corey's being excommunicated for
     witchcraft; and, the generality of the land being sensible
     of the errors that prevailed in that day, some of her
     friends have moved me several times to propose to the church
     whether it be not our duty to recall that sentence, that so
     it may not stand against her to all generations; and I
     myself being a stranger to her, and being ignorant of what
     was alleged against her, I shall now only leave it to your
     consideration, and shall determine the matter by a vote the
     next convenient opportunity.'

     "Feb. 14, 1702/3.--The major part of the brethren consented
     to the following: 'Whereas this church passed a vote, Sept.
     11, 1692, for the excommunication of Martha Corey, and that
     sentence was pronounced against her Sept. 14, by Mr. Samuel
     Parris, formerly the pastor of this church; she being,
     before her excommunication, condemned, and afterwards
     executed, for supposed witchcraft; and there being a record
     of this in our church-book, page 12, we being moved
     hereunto, do freely consent and heartily desire that the
     same sentence may be revoked, and that it may stand no
     longer against her; for we are, through God's mercy to us,
     convinced that we were at that dark day under the power of
     those errors which then prevailed in the land; and we are
     sensible that we had not sufficient grounds to think her
     guilty of that crime for which she was condemned and
     executed; and that her excommunication was not according to
     the mind of God, and therefore we desire that this may be
     entered in our church-book, to take off that odium that is
     cast on her name, and that so God may forgive our sin, and
     may be atoned for the land; and we humbly pray that God will
     not leave us any more to such errors and sins, but will
     teach and enable us always to do that which is right in his
     sight.'

     "There was a major part voted, and six or seven dissented.

     "J. GR., _Pr._"

The First Church in Salem rescinded its votes of excommunication of
Rebecca Nurse and Giles Corey, in March, 1712. The church at the
village was nearly ten years before it, in this act of justice to
itself and to the memory of the injured dead. Mr. Green did not wait
until the public sentiment drove him to it. He regarded it as his duty
to lead, and keep in front of that sentiment, in the right direction.
He did not wait until everybody demanded it to be done, but instantly
began to prepare his people for it. At the proper time, he gave notice
that he was about to bring the question before them; and he
accordingly did so. He had no idea of allowing a few narrow-minded,
obstinate individuals to keep the blot any longer upon the records of
his church. His conduct is honorable to his name, and to the name of
the village. By wise, prudent, but persistent efforts, he gradually
repaired every breach, brought his parish out from under reproach, and
set them right with each other, with the obligations of justice, and
with the spirit of Christianity. It is affecting to read his
ejaculations of praise and gratitude to God for every symptom of the
prevalence of harmony and love among the people of his charge.

The man who extinguished the fires of passion in a community that had
ever before been consumed by them deserves to be held in lasting
honor. The history of the witchcraft delusion in Salem Village would,
indeed, be imperfectly written, if it failed to present the character
of him who healed its wounds, obliterated the traces of its malign
influence on the hearts and lives of those who acted, and repaired the
wrongs done to the memory of those who suffered, in it. Joseph Green
had a manly and amiable nature. He was a studious scholar and an able
preacher. He was devoted to his ministry and faithful to its
obligations. He was a leader of his people, and shared in their
occupations and experiences. He was active in the ordinary employments
of life and daily concerns of society. Possessed of independent
property, he was frugal and simple in his habits, and liberal in the
use of his means. The parsonage, while he lived in it, was the abode
of hospitality, and frequented by the best society in the
neighborhood. By mingled firmness and kindliness, he met and removed
difficulties. He had a cheerful temperament, was not irritated by the
course of events, even when of an unpleasant character. While Mr.
Noyes was disturbed, even to resentment, by encroachments upon his
parish, in the formation of new societies in the middle precinct of
Salem, now South Danvers, and in the second precinct of Beverly, now
Upper Beverly, Mr. Green, although they drew away from him as many as
from Mr. Noyes, went to participate in the raising of their
meeting-houses. Of a genial disposition, he countenanced innocent
amusements. He was fond of the sports of the field. The catamount was
among the trophies of his sure aim, and he came home with his
huntsman's bag filled with wild pigeons. He would take his little sons
before and behind him on his horse, and spend a day with them fishing
and fowling on Wilkins's Pond; and, when Indians threatened the
settlements, he would shoulder his musket, join the brave young men of
his parish, and be the first in the encounter, and the last to
relinquish the pursuit of the savage foe.

He was always, everywhere, a peacemaker; by his genial manner, and his
genuine dignity and decision of character, he removed dissensions from
his church and neighborhood, and secured the respect while he won the
love of all. That such a person was raised up and placed where he was
at that time, was truly a providence of God.

The part performed in the witchcraft tragedy by the extraordinary
child of twelve years of age, Ann Putnam, has been fully set forth. As
has been stated, both her parents (and no one can measure their share
of responsibility, nor that of others behind them, for her conduct)
died within a fortnight of each other, in 1699. She was then nineteen
years of age; a large family of children, all younger than herself,
was left with her in the most melancholy orphanage. How many there
were, we do not exactly know: eight survived her. Although their
uncles, Edward and Joseph, were near, and kind, and able to care for
them, the burden thrown upon her must have been great. With the
terrible remembrance of the scenes of 1692, it was greater than she
could bear. Her health began to decline, and she was long an invalid.
Under the tender and faithful guidance of Mr. Green, she did all that
she could to seek the forgiveness of God and man. After consultations
with him, in visits to his study, a confession was drawn up, which she
desired publicly to make. Upon conferring with Samuel Nurse, it was
found to be satisfactory to him, as the representative of those who
had suffered from her testimony. It was her desire to offer this
confession and a profession of religion at the same time. The day was
fixed, and made known to the public. On the 25th of August, 1706, a
great concourse assembled in the meeting-house. Large numbers came
from other places, particularly from the town of Salem. The following
document, having been judged sufficient and suitable, was written out
in the church-book the evening before, and signed by her. It was read
by the pastor before the congregation, who were seated; she standing
in her place while it was read, and owning it as hers by a declaration
to that effect at its close, and also acknowledging the signature.

     _"The Confession of Anne Putnam, when she was received to
     Communion, 1706._

     "I desire to be humbled before God for that sad and humbling
     providence that befell my father's family in the year about
     '92; that I, then being in my childhood, should, by such a
     providence of God, be made an instrument for the accusing of
     several persons of a grievous crime, whereby their lives
     were taken away from them, whom now I have just grounds and
     good reason to believe they were innocent persons; and that
     it was a great delusion of Satan that deceived me in that
     sad time, whereby I justly fear I have been instrumental,
     with others, though ignorantly and unwittingly, to bring
     upon myself and this land the guilt of innocent blood;
     though what was said or done by me against any person I can
     truly and uprightly say, before God and man, I did it not
     out of any anger, malice, or ill-will to any person, for I
     had no such thing against one of them; but what I did was
     ignorantly, being deluded by Satan. And particularly, as I
     was a chief instrument of accusing of Goodwife Nurse and her
     two sisters, I desire to lie in the dust, and to be humbled
     for it, in that I was a cause, with others, of so sad a
     calamity to them and their families; for which cause I
     desire to lie in the dust, and earnestly beg forgiveness of
     God, and from all those unto whom I have given just cause of
     sorrow and offence, whose relations were taken away or
     accused.

     [Signed] [Illustration: [signature]]

     "This confession was read before the congregation, together
     with her relation, Aug. 25, 1706; and she acknowledged it.

     "J. GREEN, _Pastor_.

This paper shows the baleful influence of the doctrine of Satan then
received. It afforded a refuge and escape from the compunctions of
conscience. The load of sin was easily thrown upon the back of Satan.
This young woman was undoubtedly sincere in her penitence, and was
forgiven, we trust and believe; but she failed to see the depth of her
iniquity, and of those who instigated and aided her, in her false
accusations. The blame, and the deed, were wholly hers and theirs.
Satan had no share in it. Human responsibility cannot thus be avoided.

While, in a certain sense, she imputes the blame to Satan, this
declaration of Ann Putnam is conclusive evidence that she and her
confederate accusers did not believe in any communications having been
made to them by invisible spirits of any kind. Those persons, in our
day, who imagine that they hold intercourse, by rapping or otherwise,
with spiritual beings, have sometimes found arguments in favor of
their belief in the phenomena of the witchcraft trials. But Ann
Putnam's confession is decisive against this. If she had really
received from invisible beings, subordinate spirits, or the spirits of
deceased persons, the matters to which she testified, or ever believed
that she had, she would have said so. On the contrary, she declares
that she had no foundation whatever, from any source, for what she
said, but was under the subtle and mysterious influence of the Devil
himself.

She died at about the age of thirty-six years. Her will is dated May
20, 1715, and was presented in probate June 29, 1716. Its preamble is
as follows:--

     "In the name of God, amen. I, Anne Putnam, of the town of
     Salem, single woman, being oftentimes sick and weak in body,
     but of a disposing mind and memory, blessed be God! and
     calling to mind the mortality of my body, and that it is
     appointed for all men once to die, do make this my last will
     and testament. First of all, I recommend my spirit into the
     hands of God, through Jesus Christ my Redeemer, with whom I
     hope to live for ever; and, as for my body, I commit it to
     the earth, to be buried in a Christian and decent manner, at
     the discretion of my executor, hereafter named, nothing
     doubting but, by the mighty power of God, to receive the
     same again at the resurrection."

She divided her land to her four brothers, and her personal estate to
her four sisters.

It seems that she was frequently the subject of sickness, and her
bodily powers much weakened. The probability is, that the
long-continued strain kept upon her muscular and nervous organization,
during the witchcraft scenes, had destroyed her constitution. Such
uninterrupted and vehement exercise, to their utmost tension, of the
imaginative, intellectual, and physical powers, in crowded and heated
rooms, before the public gaze, and under the feverish and consuming
influence of bewildering and all but delirious excitement, could
hardly fail to sap the foundations of health in so young a child. The
tradition is, that she had a slow and fluctuating decline. The
language of her will intimates, that, at intervals, there were
apparent checks to her disease, and rallies of strength,--"oftentimes
sick and weak in body." She inherited from her mother a sensitive and
fragile constitution; but her father, although brought to the grave,
probably by the terrible responsibilities and trials in which he had
been involved, at a comparatively early age, belonged to a long-lived
race and neighborhood. The opposite elements of her composition
struggled in a protracted contest,--on the one side, a nature morbidly
subject to nervous excitability sinking under the exhaustion of an
overworked, overburdened, and shattered system; on the other, tenacity
of life. The conflict continued with alternating success for years;
but the latter gave way at last. Her story, in all its aspects, is
worthy of the study of the psychologist. Her confession, profession,
and death point the moral.

The Rev. Joseph Green died Nov. 26, 1715. The following tribute to his
memory is inscribed on the records of the church. It is in the
handwriting, and style of thought and language, of Deacon Edward
Putnam.

     "Then was the choicest flower and greenest olive-tree in the
     garden of our God here cut down in its prime and flourishing
     estate at the age of forty years and two days, who had been
     a faithful ambassador from God to us eighteen years. Then
     did that bright star set, and never more to appear here
     among us; then did our sun go down; and now what darkness is
     come upon us! Put away and pardon our iniquities, O Lord!
     which have been the cause of thy sore displeasure, and
     return to us again in mercy, and provide yet again for this
     thy flock a pastor after thy own heart, as thou hath
     promised to thy people in thy word; on which promise we have
     hope, for we are called by thy name; and, oh, leave us not!"

The Rev. Peter Clark was ordained June 5, 1717. The termination of the
connection between the Salem Village church and the witchcraft
delusion, and all similar kinds of absurdity and wickedness, is marked
by the following record, which fully and for ever redeems its
character. If Samuel Parris had been as wise and brave as Peter Clark,
he would, in the same decisive manner, have nipped the thing in the
bud.

     _"Salem Village Church Records._

     "Sept. 5, 1746.--At a church meeting appointed on the
     lecture, the day before, on the occasion of several persons
     in this parish being reported to have resorted to a woman of
     a very ill reputation, pretending to the art of divination
     and fortune-telling, &c., to make inquiry into that matter,
     and to take such resolutions as may be thought proper on the
     occasion, the brethren of the church then present came into
     the following votes; viz., That for Christians, especially
     church-members, to seek to and consult reputed witches or
     fortune-tellers, this church is clearly of opinion, and
     firmly believes on the testimony of the Word of God, is
     highly impious and scandalous, being a violation of the
     Christian covenant sealed in baptism, rendering the persons
     guilty of it subject to the just censure of the church.

     "No proof appearing against any of the members of this
     church (some of whom had been strongly suspected of this
     crime), so as to convict them of their being guilty, it was
     further voted, That the pastor, in the name of the church,
     should publicly testify their disapprobation and abhorrence
     of this infamous and ungodly practice of consulting witches
     or fortune-tellers, or any that are reputed such; exhorting
     all under their watch, who may have been guilty of it, to an
     hearty repentance and returning to God, earnestly seeking
     forgiveness in the blood of Christ, and warning all against
     the like practice for the time to come.

     "Sept. 7.--This testimony, exhortation, and warning, voted
     by the church, was publicly given by the pastor, before the
     dismission of the congregation."

The Salem Village Parish, when its present pastor, the Rev. Charles B.
Rice, was settled, Sept. 2, 1863, had been in existence a hundred and
ninety-one years. During its first twenty-five years, it had four
ministers, whose aggregate period of service was eighteen years.
During the succeeding hundred and sixty-six years, it had four
ministers, whose aggregate period of service was one hundred and
fifty-eight years. They had all been well educated, several were men
of uncommon endowments, and without exception they possessed qualities
suitable for success and usefulness in their calling.

The first period was filled with an uninterrupted series of troubles,
quarrels, and animosities, culminating in the most terrific and
horrible disaster that ever fell upon a people. The second period was
an uninterrupted reign of peace, harmony, and unity; no religious
society ever enjoying more comfort in its privileges, or exhibiting a
better example of all that ought to characterize a Christian
congregation.

The contrast between the lives of its ministers, in the two periods
respectively, is as great as between their pastorates. The first four
suffered from inadequate means of support, and, owing to the feuds in
the congregation, rates not being collected, were hardly supplied with
the necessaries of life. There is no symptom in the records of the
second period of there having ever been any difficulty on this score.
The prompt fulfilment of their contracts by the people, and the favor
of Providence, placed the ministers above the reach or approach of
inconvenience or annoyance from that quarter.

The history of the New-England churches presents no epoch more
melancholy, distressful, and stormy than the first, and none more
united, prosperous, or commendable than the second period in the
annals of the Salem Village church.

The contrast between the fortunes and fates of the ministers of these
two periods is worthy of being stated in detail.

James Bayley began to preach at the Village at the formation of the
society, when he was quite a young man, within three years from
receiving his degree at Harvard College. After about seven years,
during which he buried his wife and three children, and encountered a
bitter and turbulent opposition,--so far as we can see, most causeless
and unreasonable,--he relinquished the ministry altogether, and spent
the residue of his life in another profession elsewhere.

The ministry of George Burroughs, at the Village, lasted about two
years. The violence of both parties to the controversy by which the
parish had been rent was concentrated upon his innocent and
unsheltered head. He was, at a public assembly of his people, in his
own meeting-house, arrested, and taken out in the custody of the
marshal of the county, a prisoner for a debt incurred to meet the
expenses of his wife's recent funeral, of an amount less than the
salary then due him, and which, in point of fact, he had paid at the
time by an order upon the parish treasurer. From such outrageous
ill-treatment, he escaped by resigning his ministry. He was followed
to his retreat in a remote settlement, and while engaged there, a
laborious, self-sacrificing, and devoted minister, was, by the
malignity of his enemies at the Village, suddenly seized, all
unconscious of having wronged a human creature, snatched from the
table where he was taking his frugal meal in his humble home, torn
from his helpless family, hurried up to the Village; overwhelmed in a
storm of falsehood, rage, and folly; loaded with irons, immured in a
dungeon, carried to the place of execution, consigned to the death of
a felon; and his uncoffined remains thrown among the clefts of the
rocks of Witch Hill, and left but half buried,--for a crime of which
he was as innocent as the unborn child.

Deodat Lawson, a great scholar and great preacher, after a two years'
trial, and having buried his wife and daughter at the Village,
abandoned the attempt to quell the storm of passion there. He found
another settlement on the other side of Massachusetts Bay, which he
left without taking leave, and was never heard of more by his people.
Eight years afterwards, he re-appeared in the reprint, at London, of
his famous Salem Village sermon, and then vanished for ever from
sight. A cloud of impenetrable darkness envelopes his name at that
point. Of his fate nothing is known, except that it was an "unhappy"
one.

Samuel Parris, after a ministry of seven years, crowded from the very
beginning with contention and animosity, and closed in desolation,
ruin, and woes unutterable, havoc scattered among his people and the
whole country round, was driven from the parish, the blood of the
innocent charged upon his head, and, for the rest of his days,
consigned to obscurity and penury. The place of his abode has upon it
no habitation or structure of man; and the only vestiges left of him
are his records of the long quarrel with his congregation, and his
inscription on the headstone, erected by him, as he left the Village
for ever, over the fresh grave of his wife.

Surely, the annals of no church present a more dismal, shocking, or
shameful history than this.

Joseph Green, on the 26th of November, 1715, terminated with his life
a ministry of eighteen years, as useful, beneficent, and honorable as
it had been throughout harmonious and happy. Peter Clark died in
office, June 10, 1768, after a service of fifty-one years. He was
recognized throughout the country as an able minister and a learned
divine. Peace and prosperity reigned, without a moment's intermission,
among the people of his charge. Benjamin Wadsworth, D.D., also died in
office, Jan. 18, 1826, after a service of fifty-four years. Through
life he was universally esteemed and loved in all the churches. Milton
P. Braman, D.D., on the 1st of April, 1861, terminated by resignation
a ministry of thirty-five years. He always enjoyed universal respect
and affection, and the parish under his care, uninterrupted union and
prosperity. He did not leave his people, but remains among them,
participating in the enjoyment of their privileges, and upholding the
hands of his successor. His eminent talents are occasionally exercised
in neighboring pulpits, and in other services of public usefulness. He
lives in honored retirement on land originally belonging to Nathaniel
Putnam, distant only a few rods, a little to the north of east, from
the spot owned and occupied by his first predecessor, James Bayley.

It can be said with assurance, of this epoch in the history of the
Salem Village church and society, that it can hardly be paralleled in
all that indicates the well-being of man or the blessings of Heaven.
No such contrast, as these two periods in the annals of this parish
present, can elsewhere be found.

Prosecutions for witchcraft continued in the older countries after
they had been abandoned here; although it soon began to be difficult,
everywhere, to procure the conviction of a person accused of
witchcraft. In 1716, a Mrs. Hicks and her daughter, the latter aged
nine years, were hanged in Huntingdon, in England, for witchcraft. In
the year 1720, an attempt, already alluded to, was made to renew the
Salem excitement in Littleton, Mass., but it failed: the people had
learned wisdom at a price too dear to allow them so soon to forget it.
In a letter to Cotton Mather, written Feb. 19, 1720, the excellent Dr.
Watts, after having expressed his doubts respecting the sufficiency of
the spectral evidence for condemnation, says, in reference to the
Salem witchcraft, "I am much persuaded that there was much immediate
agency of the Devil in these affairs, and perhaps there were some real
witches too." Not far from this time, we find what was probably the
opinion of the most liberal-minded and cultivated people in England
expressed in the following language of Addison: "To speak my thoughts
freely, I believe, in general, that there is and has been such a thing
as witchcraft, but, at the same time, can give no credit to any
particular instance of it."

There was an execution for witchcraft in Scotland in 1722. As late as
the middle of the last century, an annual discourse, commemorative of
executions that took place in Huntingdon during the reign of Queen
Elizabeth, continued to be delivered in that place. An act of a
Presbyterian synod in Scotland, published in 1743, and reprinted at
Glasgow in 1766, denounced as a national sin the repeal of the penal
laws against witchcraft.

Blackstone, the great oracle of British law, and who flourished in the
latter half of the last century, declared his belief in witchcraft in
the following strong terms: "To deny the possibility, nay, the actual
existence, of witchcraft and sorcery, is at once flatly to contradict
the revealed Word of God, in various passages both of the Old and New
Testament; and the thing itself is a truth to which every nation in
the world hath in its turn borne testimony, either by examples
seemingly well attested, or by prohibitory laws, which at least
suppose the possibility of commerce with evil spirits."

It is related, in White's "Natural History of Selborne," that, in the
year 1751, the people of Tring, a market town of Hertfordshire, and
scarcely more than thirty miles from London, "seized on two
superannuated wretches, crazed with age and overwhelmed with
infirmities, on a suspicion of witchcraft." They were carried to the
edge of a horse-pond, and there subjected to the water ordeal. The
trial resulted in the acquittal of the prisoners; but they were both
drowned in the process.

A systematic effort seems to have been made during the eighteenth
century to strengthen and renew the power of superstition. Alarmed by
the progress of infidelity, many eminent and excellent men availed
themselves of the facilities which their position at the head of the
prevailing literature afforded them, to push the faith of the people
as far as possible towards the opposite extreme of credulity. It was a
most unwise, and, in its effects, deplorable policy. It was a betrayal
of the cause of true religion. It was an acknowledgment that it could
not be vindicated before the tribunal of severe reason. Besides all
the misery produced by filling the imagination with unreal objects of
terror, the restoration to influence, during the last century, of the
fables and delusions of an ignorant age, has done incalculable injury,
by preventing the progress of Christian truth and sound philosophy;
thus promoting the cause of the very infidelity it was intended to
check. The idea of putting down one error by setting up another cannot
have suggested itself to any mind that had ever been led to appreciate
the value or the force of truth. But this was the policy of Christian
writers from the time of Addison to that of Johnson. The latter
expressly confesses, that it was necessary to maintain the credit of
the belief of the existence and agency of ghosts, and other
supernatural beings, in order to help on the argument for a future
state as founded upon the Bible.

Dr. Hibbert, in his excellent book on the "Philosophy of Apparitions,"
illustrates some remarks similar to those just made, by the following
quotation from Mr. Wesley:--

     "It is true, that the English in general, and indeed most of
     the men in Europe, have given up all accounts of witches and
     apparitions as mere old wives' fables. I am sorry for it;
     and I willingly take this opportunity of entering my solemn
     protest against this violent compliment, which so many that
     believe the Bible pay to those who do not believe it. I owe
     them no such service. I take knowledge, these are at the
     bottom of the outcry which has been raised, and with such
     insolence spread throughout the nation, in direct
     opposition, not only to the Bible, but to the suffrage of
     the wisest and best men in all ages and nations. They well
     know (whether Christians know it or not), that the giving up
     witchcraft is, in effect, giving up the Bible. And they
     know, on the other hand, that, if but one account of the
     intercourse of men with separate spirits be admitted, their
     whole castle in the air (Deism, Atheism, Materialism) falls
     to the ground. I know no reason, therefore, why we should
     suffer even this weapon to be wrested out of our hands.
     Indeed, there are numerous arguments besides, which
     abundantly confute their vain imaginations. But we need not
     be hooted out of one: neither reason nor religion requires
     this."

The belief in witchcraft continued to hold a conspicuous place among
popular superstitions during the whole of the last century. Many now
living can remember the time when it prevailed very generally. Each
town or village had its peculiar traditionary tales, which were
gravely related by the old, and deeply impressed upon the young.

The legend of the "Screeching Woman" of Marblehead is worthy of being
generally known. The story runs thus: A piratical cruiser, having
captured a Spanish vessel during the seventeenth century, brought her
into Marblehead harbor, which was then the site of a few humble
dwellings. The male inhabitants were all absent on their fishing
voyages. The pirates brought their prisoners ashore, carried them at
the dead of the night into a retired glen, and there murdered them.
Among the captives was an English female passenger. The women who
belonged to the place heard her dying outcries, as they rose through
the midnight air, and reverberated far and wide along the silent
shores. She was heard to exclaim, "O mercy, mercy! Lord Jesus Christ,
save me! Lord Jesus Christ, save me!" Her body was buried by the
pirates on the spot. The same piercing voice is believed to be heard
at intervals, more or less often, almost every year, in the stillness
of a calm starlight or clear moonlight night. There is something, it
is said, so wild, mysterious, and evidently superhuman in the sound,
as to strike a chill of dread into the hearts of all who listen to it.
The writer of an article on this subject, in the "Marblehead Register"
of April 3, 1830, declares, that "there are not wanting, at the
present day, persons of unimpeachable veracity and known
respectability, who still continue firmly to believe the tradition,
and to assert that they themselves have been auditors of the sounds
described, which they declare were of such an unearthly nature as to
preclude the idea of imposition or deception."

When "the silver moon unclouded holds her way," or when the stars are
glistening in the clear, cold sky, and the dark forms of the moored
vessels are at rest upon the sleeping bosom of the harbor; when no
natural sound comes forth from the animate or inanimate creation but
the dull and melancholy rote of the sea along the rocky and winding
coast,--how often is the watcher startled from the reveries of an
excited imagination by the piteous, dismal, and terrific screams of
the unlaid ghost of the murdered lady!

A negro died, fifty years ago, in that part of Danvers called
originally Salem Village, at a very advanced age. He was supposed to
have reached his hundredth year. He never could be prevailed upon to
admit that there was any delusion or mistake in the proceedings of
1692. To him, the whole affair was easy of explanation. He believed
that the witchcraft was occasioned by the circumstance of the Devil's
having purloined the church-book, and that it subsided so soon as the
book was recovered from his grasp. Perhaps the particular hypothesis
of the venerable African was peculiar to himself; but those persons
must have a slight acquaintance with the history of opinions in this
and every other country, who are not aware that the superstition on
which it was founded has been extensively entertained by men of every
color, almost, if not quite, up to the present day. If the doctrines
of demonology have been completely overthrown and exterminated in our
villages and cities, it is a very recent achievement; nay, I fear that
in many places the auspicious event remains to take place.

In the year 1808, the inhabitants of Great Paxton, a village of
Huntingdonshire, in England, within sixty miles of London, rose in a
body, attacked the house of an humble, and, so far as appears,
inoffensive and estimable woman, named Ann Izard, suspected of
bewitching three young females,--Alice Brown, Fanny Amey, and Mary
Fox,--dragged her out of her bed into the fields, pierced her arms and
body with pins, and tore her flesh with their nails, until she was
covered with blood. They committed the same barbarous outrage upon her
again, a short time afterwards; and would have subjected her to the
water ordeal, had she not found means to fly from that part of the
country.

The writer of the article "Witchcraft," in Rees's "Cyclopædia,"
gravely maintains the doctrine of "ocular fascination."

Prosecutions for witchcraft are stated to have occurred, in the first
half of the present century, in some of the interior districts of our
Southern States. The civilized world is even yet full of necromancers
and thaumaturgists of every kind. The science of "palmistry" is still
practised by many a muttering vagrant; and perhaps some in this
neighborhood remember when, in the days of their youthful fancy, they
held out their hands, that their future fortunes might be read in the
lines of their palms, and their wild and giddy curiosity and anxious
affections be gratified by information respecting wedding-day or
absent lover.

The most celebrated fortune-teller, perhaps, that ever lived, resided
in an adjoining town. The character of "Moll Pitcher" is familiarly
known in all parts of the commercial world. She died in 1813. Her
place of abode was beneath the projecting and elevated summit of High
Rock, in Lynn, and commanded a view of the wild and indented coast of
Marblehead, of the extended and resounding beaches of Lynn and
Chelsea, of Nahant Rocks, of the vessels and islands of Boston's
beautiful bay, and of its remote southern shore. She derived her
mysterious gifts by inheritance, her grandfather having practised them
before in Marblehead. Sailors, merchants, and adventurers of every
kind, visited her residence, and placed confidence in her predictions.
People came from great distances to learn the fate of missing friends,
or recover the possession of lost goods; while the young of both
sexes, impatient of the tardy pace of time, and burning with curiosity
to discern the secrets of futurity, availed themselves of every
opportunity to visit her lowly dwelling, and hear from her prophetic
lips the revelation of the most tender incidents and important events
of their coming lives. She read the future, and traced what to mere
mortal eyes were the mysteries of the present or the past, in the
arrangement and aspect of the grounds or settlings of a cup of tea or
coffee. Her name has everywhere become the generic title of
fortune-tellers, and occupies a conspicuous place in the legends and
ballads of popular superstition. Her renown has gone abroad to the
farthest regions, and her memory will be perpetuated in the annals of
credulity and imposture. An air of romance is breathed around the
scenes where she practised her mystic art, the interest and charm of
which will increase as the lapse of time removes her history back
towards the dimness of the distant past.

The elements of the witchcraft delusion of 1692 are slumbering still
in the bosom of society. We hear occasionally of haunted houses, cases
of second-sight, and communications from the spiritual world. It
always will be so. The human mind feels instinctively its connection
with a higher sphere. Some will ever be impatient of the restraints
of our present mode of being, and prone to break away from them; eager
to pry into the secrets of the invisible world, willing to venture
beyond the bounds of ascertainable knowledge, and, in the pursuit of
truth, to aspire where the laws of evidence cannot follow them. A love
of the marvellous is inherent to the sense of limitation while in
these terrestrial bodies; and many will always be found not content to
wait until this tabernacle is dissolved and we shall be clothed upon
with a body which is from Heaven.




APPENDIX.


  I. LAWSON'S PREFATORY ADDRESS.
 II. LAWSON'S BRIEF ACCOUNT.
III. LETTER TO JONATHAN CORWIN.
 IV. EXTRACTS FROM MR. PARRIS'S CHURCH RECORDS.




APPENDIX.


I.

PREFATORY ADDRESS.

[From the edition of Deodat Lawson's Sermon printed in London, 1704.]

_To all my Christian Friends and Acquaintance, the Inhabitants of
Salem Village._

CHRISTIAN FRIENDS,--The sermon here presented unto you was delivered
in your audience by that unworthy instrument who did formerly spend
some years among you in the work of the ministry, though attended with
manifold sinful failings and infirmities, for which I do implore the
pardoning mercy of God in Jesus Christ, and entreat from you the
covering of love. As this was prepared for that particular occasion
when it was delivered amongst you, so the publication of it is to be
particularly recommended to your service.

My heart's desire and continual prayer to God for you all is, that you
may be saved in the day of the Lord Jesus Christ; and, accordingly,
that all means he is using with you, by mercies and afflictions,
ordinances and providences, may be sanctified to the building you up
in grace and holiness, and preparing you for the kingdom of glory. We
are told by the apostle (Acts xiv. 22), that through many tribulations
we must enter into the kingdom of God. Now, since (besides your share
in the common calamities, under the burden whereof this poor people
are groaning at this time) the righteous and holy God hath been
pleased to permit a sore and grievous affliction to befall you, such
as can hardly be said to be common to men; viz., by giving liberty to
Satan to range and rage amongst you, to the torturing the bodies and
distracting the minds of some of the visible sheep and lambs of the
Lord Jesus Christ. And (which is yet more astonishing) he who is the
accuser of the brethren endeavors to introduce as criminal some of the
visible subjects of Christ's kingdom, by whose sober and godly
conversation in times past we could draw no other conclusions than
that they were real members of his mystical body, representing them as
the instruments of his malice against their friends and neighbors.

I thought meet thus to give you the best assistance I could, to help
you out of your distresses. And since the ways of the Lord, in his
permissive as well as effective providence, are unsearchable, and his
doings past finding out, and pious souls are at a loss what will be
the issue of these things, I therefore bow my knees unto the God and
Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, that he would cause all grace to
abound to you and in you, that your poor place may be delivered from
those breaking and ruining calamities which are threatened as the
pernicious consequences of Satan's malicious operations; and that you
may not be left to bite and devour one another in your sacred or civil
society, in your relations or families, to the destroying much good
and promoting much evil among you, so as in any kind to weaken the
hands or discourage the heart of your reverend and pious pastor, whose
family also being so much under the influence of these troubles,
spiritual sympathy cannot but stir you up to assist him as at all
times, so especially at such a time as this; he, as well as his
neighbors, being under such awful circumstances. As to this discourse,
my humble desire and endeavor is, that it may appear to be according
to the form of sound words, and in expressions every way intelligible
to the meanest capacities. It pleased God, of his free grace, to give
it some acceptation with those that heard it, and some that heard of
it desired me to transcribe it, and afterwards to give way to the
printing of it. I present it therefore to your acceptance, and commend
it to the divine benediction; and that it may please the Almighty God
to manifest his power in putting an end to your sorrows of this
nature, by bruising Satan under your feet shortly, causing these and
all other your and our troubles to work together for our good now, and
salvation in the day of the Lord, is the unfeigned desire, and shall
be the uncessant prayer, of--

Less than the least, of all those that serve,

In the Gospel of our Lord Jesus,

DEODAT LAWSON.


II.

DEODAT LAWSON'S NARRATIVE.

[Appended to his Sermon, London edition, 1704.]

At the request of several worthy ministers and Christian
friends, I do here annex, by way of appendix to the preceding sermon,
some brief account of those amazing things which occasioned that
discourse to be delivered. Let the reader please therefore to take it
in the brief remarks following, and judge as God shall incline him.

It pleased God, in the year of our Lord 1692, to visit the people at a
place called Salem Village, in New England, with a very sore and
grievous affliction, in which they had reason to believe that the
sovereign and holy God was pleased to permit Satan and his instruments
to affright and afflict those poor mortals in such an astonishing and
unusual manner.

Now, I having for some time before attended the work of the ministry
in that village, the report of those great afflictions came quickly to
my notice, and the more readily because the first person afflicted was
in the minister's family who succeeded me after I was removed from
them. In pity, therefore, to my Christian friends and former
acquaintance there, I was much concerned about them, frequently
consulted with them, and fervently, by divine assistance, prayed for
them; but especially my concern was augmented when it was reported, at
an examination of a person suspected for witchcraft, that my wife and
daughter, who died three years before, were sent out of the world
under the malicious operations of the infernal powers, as is more
fully represented in the following remarks. I did then desire, and was
also desired by some concerned in the Court, to be there present, that
I might hear what was alleged in that respect; observing, therefore,
when I was amongst them, that the case of the afflicted was very
amazing and deplorable, and the charges brought against the accused
such as were ground of suspicions, yet very intricate, and difficult
to draw up right conclusions about them; I thought good, for the
satisfaction of myself and such of my friends as might be curious to
inquire into those mysteries of God's providence and Satan's malice,
to draw up and keep by me a brief account of the most remarkable
things that came to my knowledge in those affairs, which remarks were
afterwards (at my request) revised and corrected by some who sat
judges on the bench in those matters, and were now transcribed from
the same paper on which they were then written. After this, I being by
the providence of God called over into England in the year 1696, I
then brought that paper of remarks on the witchcraft with me; upon the
sight thereof some worthy ministers and Christian friends here desired
me to reprint the sermon, and subjoin the remarks thereunto in way of
appendix; but for some particular reasons I did then decline it. But
now, forasmuch as I myself had been an eye and ear witness of most of
those amazing things, so far as they came within the notice of human
senses, and the requests of my friends were renewed since I came to
dwell in London, I have given way to the publishing of them, that I
may satisfy such as are not resolved to the contrary, that there may
be (and are) such operations of the powers of darkness on the bodies
and minds of mankind by divine permission, and that those who sat
judges on those cases may, by the serious consideration of the
formidable aspect and perplexed circumstances of that afflictive
providence, be in some measure excused, or at least be less censured,
for passing sentence on several persons as being the instruments of
Satan in those diabolical operations, when they were involved in such
a dark and dismal scene of providence, in which Satan did seem to spin
a finer thread of spiritual wickedness than in the ordinary methods of
witchcraft: hence the judges, desiring to bear due testimony against
such diabolical practices, were inclined to admit the validity of such
a sort of evidence as was not so clearly and directly demonstrable to
human senses as in other cases is required, or else they could not
discover the mysteries of witchcraft. I presume not to impose upon my
Christian or learned reader any opinion of mine how far Satan was an
instrument in God's hand in these amazing afflictions which were on
many persons there about that time; but I am certainly convinced, that
the great God was pleased to lengthen his chain to a very great degree
for the hurting of some and reproaching of others, as far as he was
permitted so to do. Now, that I may not grieve any whose relations
were either accused or afflicted in those times of trouble and
distress, I choose to lay down every particular at large, without
mentioning any names or persons concerned (they being wholly unknown
here); resolving to confine myself to such a proportion of paper as is
assigned to these remarks in this impression of the book, yet, that I
may be distinct, shall speak briefly to the matter under three heads;
viz.:--

1. Relating to the afflicted.
2. Relating to the accused. And,
3. Relating to the confessing witches.

To begin with the afflicted.--

1. One or two of the first that were afflicted complaining of unusual
illness, their relations used physic for their cure; but it was
altogether in vain.

2. They were oftentimes very stupid in their fits, and could neither
hear nor understand, in the apprehension of the standers-by; so that,
when prayer hath been made with some of them in such a manner as might
be audible in a great congregation, yet, when their fit was off, they
declared they did not hear so much as one word thereof.

3. It was several times observed, that, when they were discoursed with
about God or Christ, or the things of salvation, they were presently
afflicted at a dreadful rate; and hence were oftentimes outrageous, if
they were permitted to be in the congregation in the time of the
public worship.

4. They sometimes told at a considerable distance, yea, several miles
off, that such and such persons were afflicted, which hath been found
to be done according to the time and manner they related it; and they
said the spectres of the suspected persons told them of it.

5. They affirmed that they saw the ghosts of several departed persons,
who, at their appearing, did instigate them to discover such as (they
said) were instruments to hasten their deaths, threatening sorely to
afflict them if they did not make it known to the magistrates. They
did affirm at the examination, and again at the trial of an accused
person, that they saw the ghosts of his two wives (to whom he had
carried very ill in their lives, as was proved by several
testimonies), and also that they saw the ghosts of my wife and
daughter (who died above three years before); and they did affirm,
that, when the very ghosts looked on the prisoner at the bar, they
looked red, as if the blood would fly out of their faces with
indignation at him. The manner of it was thus: several afflicted being
before the prisoner at the bar, on a sudden they fixed all their eyes
together on a certain place of the floor before the prisoner, neither
moving their eyes nor bodies for some few minutes, nor answering to
any question which was asked them: so soon as that trance was over,
some being removed out of sight and hearing, they were all, one after
another, asked what they saw; and they did all agree that they saw
those ghosts above mentioned. I was present, and heard and saw the
whole of what passed upon that account, during the trial of that
person who was accused to be the instrument of Satan's malice therein.

6. In this (worse than Gallick) persecution by the dragoons of hell,
the persons afflicted were harassed at such a dreadful rate to write
their names in a Devil-book presented by a spectre unto them: and one,
in my hearing, said, "I will not, I will not write! It is none of
God's book, it is none of God's book: it is the Devil's book, for
aught I know;" and, when they steadfastly refused to sign, they were
told, if they would but touch, or take hold of, the book, it should
do; and, lastly, the diabolical propositions were so low and easy,
that, if they would but let their clothes, or any thing about them,
touch the book, they should be at ease from their torments, it being
their consent that is aimed at by the Devil in those representations
and operations.

7. One who had been long afflicted at a stupendous rate by two or
three spectres, when they were (to speak after the manner of men)
tired out with tormenting of her to force or fright her to sign a
covenant with the Prince of Darkness, they said to her, as in a
diabolical and accursed passion, "Go your ways, and the Devil go with
you; for we will be no more pestered and plagued about you." And, ever
after that, she was well, and no more afflicted, that ever I heard
of.

8. Sundry pins have been taken out of the wrists and arms of the
afflicted; and one, in time of examination of a suspected person, had
a pin run through both her upper and her lower lip when she was called
to speak, yet no apparent festering followed thereupon, after it was
taken out.

9. Some of the afflicted, as they were striving in their fits in open
court, have (by invisible means) had their wrists bound fast together
with a real cord, so as it could hardly be taken off without cutting.
Some afflicted have been found with their arms tied, and hanged upon
an hook, from whence others have been forced to take them down, that
they might not expire in that posture.

10. Some afflicted have been drawn under tables and beds by
undiscerned force, so as they could hardly be pulled out; and one was
drawn half-way over the side of a well, and was, with much difficulty,
recovered back again.

11. When they were most grievously afflicted, if they were brought to
the accused, and the suspected person's hand but laid upon them, they
were immediately relieved out of their tortures; but, if the accused
did but look on them, they were instantly struck down again. Wherefore
they used to cover the face of the accused, while they laid their
hands on the afflicted, and then it obtained the desired issue: for it
hath been experienced (both in examinations and trials), that, so soon
as the afflicted came in sight of the accused, they were immediately
cast into their fits; yea, though the accused were among the crowd of
people unknown to the sufferers, yet, on the first view, were they
struck down, which was observed in a child of four or five years of
age, when it was apprehended, that so many as she could look upon,
either directly or by turning her head, were immediately struck into
their fits.

12. An iron spindle of a woollen wheel, being taken very strangely out
of an house at Salem Village, was used by a spectre as an instrument
of torture to a sufferer, not being discernible to the standers-by,
until it was, by the said sufferer, snatched out of the spectre's
hand, and then it did immediately appear to the persons present to be
really the same iron spindle.

13. Sometimes, in their fits, they have had their tongues drawn out of
their mouths to a fearful length, their heads turned very much over
their shoulders; and while they have been so strained in their fits,
and had their arms and legs, &c., wrested as if they were quite
dislocated, the blood hath gushed plentifully out of their mouths for
a considerable time together, which some, that they might be satisfied
that it was real blood, took upon their finger, and rubbed on their
other hand. I saw several together thus violently strained and
bleeding in their fits, to my very great astonishment that my
fellow-mortals should be so grievously distressed by the invisible
powers of darkness. For certainly all considerate persons who beheld
these things must needs be convinced, that their motions in their fits
were preternatural and involuntary, both as to the manner, which was
so strange as a well person could not (at least without great pain)
screw their bodies into, and as to the violence also, they were
preternatural motions, being much beyond the ordinary force of the
same persons when they were in their right minds; so that, being such
grievous sufferers, it would seem very hard and unjust to censure them
of consenting to, or holding any voluntary converse or familiarity
with, the Devil.

14. Their eyes were, for the most part, fast closed in their
trance-fits, and when they were asked a question they could give no
answer; and I do verily believe, they did not hear at that time; yet
did they discourse with the spectres as with real persons, asserting
things and receiving answers affirmative or negative, as the matter
was. For instance, one, in my hearing, thus argued _with_, and railed
_at_, a spectre: "Goodw---, begone, begone, begone! Are you not
ashamed, a woman of your profession, to afflict a poor creature so?
What hurt did I ever do you in my life? You have but two years to
live, and then the Devil will torment your soul for this. Your name is
blotted out of God's book, and it shall never be put into God's book
again. Begone! For shame! Are you not afraid of what is coming upon
you? I know, I know what will make you afraid,--the wrath of an angry
God: I am sure that will make you afraid. Begone! Do not torment me. I
know what you would have" (we judged she meant her soul): "but it is
out of your reach; it is clothed with the white robes of Christ's
righteousness." This sufferer I was well acquainted with, and knew her
to be a very sober and pious woman, so far as I could judge; and it
appears that she had not, in that fit, voluntary converse with the
Devil, for then she might have been helped to a better guess about
that woman abovesaid, as to her living but two years, for she lived
not many months after that time. Further, this woman, in the same fit,
seemed to dispute with a spectre about a text of Scripture: the
apparition seemed to deny it; she said she was sure there was such a
text, and she would tell it; and then said she to the apparition, "I
am sure you will be gone, for you cannot stand before that text." Then
was she sorely afflicted,--her mouth drawn on one side, and her body
strained violently for about a minute; and then said, "It is, it is,
it is," three or four times, and then was afflicted to hinder her from
telling; at last, she broke forth, and said, "It is the third chapter
of the Revelations." I did manifest some scruple about reading it,
lest Satan should draw any thereby superstitiously to improve the word
of the eternal God; yet judging I might do it once, for an experiment,
I began to read; and, before I had read through the first verse, she
opened her eyes, and was well. Her husband and the spectators told me
she had often been relieved by reading texts pertinent to her
case,--as Isa. 40, 1, ch. 49, 1, ch. 50, 1, and several others. These
things I saw and heard from her.

15. They were vehemently afflicted, to hinder any persons praying with
them, or holding them in any religious discourse. The woman mentioned
in the former section was told by the spectre I should not go to
prayer; but she said I should, and, after I had done, reasoned with
the apparition, "Did not I say he should go to prayer?" I went also to
visit a person afflicted in Boston; and, after I was gone into the
house to which she belonged, she being abroad, and pretty well, when
she was told I was there, she said, "I am loath to go in; for I know
he will fall into some good discourse, and then I am sure I shall go
into a fit." Accordingly, when she came in, I advised her to improve
all the respite she had to make her peace with God, and sue out her
pardon through Jesus Christ, and beg supplies of faith and every grace
to deliver her from the powers of darkness; and, before I had uttered
all this, she fell into a fearful fit of diabolical torture.

16. Some of them were asked how it came to pass that they were not
affrighted when they saw the _black-man_: they said they were at
first, but not so much afterwards.

17. Some of them affirmed they saw the _black-man_ sit on the gallows,
and that he whispered in the ears of some of the condemned persons
when they were just ready to be turned off, even while they were
making their last speech.

18. They declared several things to be done by witchcraft, which
happened before some of them were born,--as strange deaths of persons,
casting away of ships, &c.; and they said the spectres told them of
it.

19. Some of them have sundry times seen a _white-man_ appearing
amongst the spectres, and, as soon as he appeared, the _black-witches_
vanished: they said this white-man had often foretold them what
respite they should have from their fits, as sometimes a day or two or
more, which fell out accordingly. One of the afflicted said she saw
him, in her fit, and was with him in a glorious place which had no
candle nor sun, yet was full of light and brightness, where there was
a multitude in white, glittering robes, and they sang the song in Rev.
5, 9; Psal. 110, 149. She was loath to leave that place, and said,
"_How long shall I stay here? Let me be along with you._" She was
grieved she could stay no longer in that place and company.

20. A young woman that was afflicted at a fearful rate had a spectre
appeared to her with a white sheet wrapped about it, not visible to
the standers-by until this sufferer (violently striving in her fit)
snatched at, took hold, and tore off a corner of that sheet. Her
father, being by her, endeavored to lay hold upon it with her, that
she might retain what she had gotten; but, at the passing-away of the
spectre, he had such a violent twitch of his hand as if it would have
been torn off: immediately thereupon appeared in the sufferer's hand
the corner of a sheet,--a real cloth, _visible_ to the spectators,
which (as it is said) remains still to be seen.

REMARKABLE THINGS RELATING TO THE ACCUSED.

1. A woman, being brought upon public examination, desired to go to
prayer. The magistrates told her they came not there to hear her pray,
but to examine her in what was alleged against her relating to
suspicions of witchcraft.

2. It was observed, both in times of examination and trial, that the
accused seemed little affected with what the sufferers underwent, or
what was charged against them as being the instruments of Satan
therein, so that the spectators were grieved at their unconcernedness.

3. They were sometimes their _own image_, and not always practising
upon poppets made of clouts, wax, or other materials, (according to
the old methods of witchcraft); for _natural_ actions in them seemed
to produce preternatural impressions on the afflicted, as biting their
lips in time of examination and trial caused the sufferers to be
bitten so as they produced the marks before the magistrates and
spectators: the accused pinching their hands together seemed to cause
the sufferers to be _pinched_; those again _stamping_ with their feet,
_these_ were tormented in their legs and feet, so as they _stamped
fearfully_. After all this, if the accused did but lean against the
bar at which they stood, some very sober women of the afflicted
complained of their breasts, as if their bowels were torn out; thus,
some have since confessed, they were wont to afflict such as were the
objects of their malice.

4. Several were accused of having familiarity with the _black-man_ in
time of examination and trial, and that he whispered in their ears,
and therefore they could not hear the magistrates; and that one woman
accused rid (in her shape and spectre) by the place of judicature,
behind the black man, in the very time when she was upon examination.

5. When the suspected were standing at the bar, the afflicted have
affirmed that they saw their shapes in other places suckling a yellow
bird; sometimes in one place and posture, and sometimes in another.
They also foretold that the spectre of the prisoner was going to
afflict such or such a sufferer, which presently fell out accordingly.

6. They were accused by the sufferers to keep days of hellish fasts
and thanksgivings; and, upon one of their fast-days, they told a
sufferer she must not eat, it was fast-day. She said she would: they
told her they would choke her then, which, when she did eat, was
endeavored.

7. They were also accused to hold and administer diabolical
sacraments; viz., a mock-baptism and a Devil-supper, at which cursed
imitations of the sacred institutions of our blessed Lord they used
forms of words to be trembled at in the very rehearsing: concerning
baptism I shall speak elsewhere. At their cursed supper, they were
said to have red bread and red drink; and, when they pressed an
afflicted person to eat and drink thereof, she turned away her head,
and spit at it, and said, "I will not eat, I will not drink: it is
blood. That is not the bread of life, that is not the water of life;
and I will have none of yours." Thus horribly doth Satan endeavor to
have his kingdom and administrations to resemble those of our Lord
Jesus Christ.

8. Some of the most _sober_ afflicted persons, when they were well,
did affirm the spectres of such and such as they did complain of in
their fits did appear to them, and could relate what passed betwixt
them and the apparitions, after their fits were over, and give account
after what manner they were hurt by them.

9. Several of the accused would neither in time of examination nor
trial confess any thing of what was laid to their charge: some would
not admit of any minister to pray with them, others refused to pray
for themselves. It was said by some of the confessing witches, that
such as have received the Devil-sacrament can never confess: only one
woman condemned, after the death-warrant was signed, freely confessed,
which occasioned her reprieval for some time; and it was observable
this woman had one lock of hair of a very great length, viz., four
foot and seven inches long by measure. This lock was of a different
color from all the rest, which was short and gray. It grew on the
hinder part of her head, and was matted together like an elf-lock. The
Court ordered it to be cut off, to which she was very unwilling, and
said she was told if it were cut off she should die or be sick; yet
the Court ordered it so to be.

10. A person who had been frequently transported to and fro by the
devils for the space of near two years, was struck dumb for about nine
months of that time; yet he, after that, had his speech restored to
him, and did depose upon oath, that, in the time while he was dumb, he
was many times bodily transported to places where the witches were
gathered together, and that he there saw feasting and dancing; and,
being struck on the back or shoulder, was thereby made fast to the
place, and could only see and hear at a distance. He did take his oath
that he did, with his bodily eyes, see some of the accused at those
witch-meetings several times. I was present in court when he gave his
testimony. He also proved by sundry persons, that, at those times of
transport, he was bodily absent from his abode, and could nowhere be
found, but being met with by some on the road, at a distance from his
home, was suddenly conveyed away from them.

11. The afflicted persons related that the spectres of several eminent
persons had been brought in amongst the rest; but, as the sufferers
said the Devil could not hurt them in their shapes, but two witches
seemed to take them by each hand, and lead them or force them to come
in.

12. Whiles a godly man was at prayer with a woman afflicted, the
daughter of that woman (being a sufferer in the like kind) affirmed
that she saw two of the persons accused at prayer to the Devil.

13. It was proved by substantial evidences against one person accused,
that he had such an unusual strength (though a very little man), that
he could hold out a gun with one hand behind the lock, which was near
seven foot in the barrel, being as much as a lusty man could command
with both hands after the usual manner of shooting. It was also
proved, that he lifted barrels of meat and barrels of molasses out of
a canoe alone, and that putting his fingers into a barrel of molasses
(full within a finger's length according to custom) he carried it
several paces; and that he put his finger into the muzzle of a gun
which was more than five foot in the barrel, and lifted up the
butt-end thereof, lock, stock, and all, without any visible help to
raise it. It was also testified, that, being abroad with his wife and
his wife's brother, he occasionally staid behind, letting his wife and
her brother walk forward; but, suddenly coming up with them, he was
angry with his wife for what discourse had passed betwixt her and her
brother: they wondering how he should know it, he said, "I know your
thoughts;" at which expression, they, being amazed, asked him how he
could do that; he said, "My God, whom I serve, makes known your
thoughts to me."

I was present when these things were testified against him, and
observed that he could not make any plea for himself (in these things)
that had any weight: he had the liberty of challenging his jurors
before empanelling, according to the statute in that case, and used
his liberty in challenging many; yet the jury that were sworn brought
him in guilty.

14. The magistrates privately examined a child of four or five years
of age, mentioned in the remarks of the afflicted, sect. 11: [p. 530]
and the child told them it had a little snake which used to suck on
the lowest joint of its forefinger; and, when they (inquiring where)
pointed to other places, it told them not _there_ but _here_, pointing
on the lowest joint of the forefinger, where they observed a deep red
spot about the bigness of a flea-bite. They asked it who gave it that
snake, whether the black man gave it: the child said no, its mother
gave it. I heard this child examined by the magistrates.

15. It was proved by sundry testimonies against some of the accused,
that, upon their malicious imprecations, wishes, or threatenings, many
observable deaths and diseases, with many other odd inconveniences,
have happened to cattle and other estate of such as were so threatened
by them, and some to the persons of men and women.

REMARKABLE THINGS CONFESSED BY SOME SUSPECTED OF BEING GUILTY OF
WITCHCRAFT.

1. It pleased God, for the clearer discovery of those mysteries of the
kingdom of darkness, so to dispose, that several persons, men, women,
and children, did confess their hellish deeds, as followeth:--

2. They confessed against themselves that they were witches, told how
long they had been so, and how it came about that the Devil appeared
to them; viz., sometimes upon discontent at their mean condition in
the world, sometimes about fine clothes, sometimes for the gratifying
other carnal and sensual lusts. Satan then, upon his appearing to
them, made them fair (though false) promises, that, if they would
yield to him, and sign his book, their desires should be answered to
the uttermost, whereupon they signed it; and thus the accursed
confederacy was confirmed betwixt them and the Prince of Darkness.

3. Some did affirm that there were some hundreds of the society of
witches, considerable companies of whom were affirmed to muster in
arms by beat of drum. In time of examinations and trials, they
declared that such a man was wont to call them together from all
quarters to witch-meetings with the sound of a diabolical trumpet.

4. Being brought to see the prisoners at the bar upon their trials,
they did affirm in open court (I was then present), that they had
oftentimes seen them at witch-meetings, where was feasting, dancing,
and jollity, as also at Devil-sacraments; and particularly that they
saw such a man ---- amongst the rest of the cursed crew, and affirmed
that he did administer the sacrament of Satan to them, encouraging
them to go on in their way, and they should certainly prevail. They
said also that such a woman ---- was a deacon, and served in
distributing the diabolical elements: they affirmed that there were
great numbers of the witches.

5. They affirmed that many of those wretched souls had been baptized
at Newbury Falls, and at several other rivers and ponds; and, as to
the manner of administration, the great Officer of Hell took them up
by the body, and, putting their heads into the water, said over them,
"Thou art mine, I have full power over thee:" and thereupon they
engaged and covenanted to renounce God, Christ, their sacred baptism,
and the whole way of Gospel salvation, and to use their utmost
endeavors to oppose the kingdom of Christ, and to set up and advance
the kingdom of Satan.

6. Some, after they had confessed, were very penitent, and did wring
their hands, and manifest a distressing sense of what they had done,
and were by the mercies of God recovered out of those snares of the
kingdom of darkness.

7. Several have confessed against their own mothers, that they were
instruments to bring them into the Devil's covenant, to the undoing of
them, body and soul; and some girls of eight or nine years of age did
declare, that, after they were so betrayed by their mothers to the
power of Satan, they saw the Devil go in their own shapes to afflict
others.

8. Some of those that confessed were immediately afflicted at a
dreadful rate, after the same manner with the other sufferers.

9. Some of them confessed, that they did afflict the sufferers
according to the time and manner they were accused thereof; and, being
asked what they did to afflict them, some said that they pricked pins
into poppets made with rags, wax, and other materials: one that
confessed after the signing the death-warrant said she used to afflict
them by clutching and pinching her hands together, and wishing in what
part and after what manner she would have them afflicted, and it was
done.

10. They confessed the design was laid by this witchcraft to root out
the interest of Christ in New England, and that they began at the
Village in order to settling the kingdom of darkness and the powers
thereof; declaring that such a man ---- was to be head conjurer, and
for his activity in that affair was to be crowned king of hell, and
that such a woman ---- was to be queen of hell.

Thus I have given my reader a brief and true account of those fearful
and amazing operations and intrigues of the Prince of Darkness: and I
must call them so; for, let some persons be as incredulous as they
please about the powerful and malicious influence of evil angels upon
the minds and bodies of mankind, _sure I am_ none that observed those
things above mentioned could refer them to any other head than the
sovereign permission of the holy God, and the malicious operations of
his and our implacable enemy. I have here related nothing more than
what was acknowledged to be true by the judges that sat on the bench,
and other credible persons there, which I have without prejudice or
partiality represented.

I therefore close all with my uncessant prayers, that the great and
everlasting Jehovah would, for the sake of his blessed Son, our most
glorious intercessor, rebuke Satan, and so vanquish him, from time to
time, that his power may be more and more every day suppressed, his
kingdom destroyed; and that all his malicious and accursed instruments
in those spiritual wickednesses may gnash their teeth, melt away, and
be ashamed in their secret places, till they come to be judged and
condemned unto the place of everlasting burnings prepared for the
Devil and his angels, that they may there be tormented with him for
ever and ever.


III.

LETTER FROM R.P. TO JONATHAN CORWIN.

SALISBURY, Aug. 9, 1692.

HONORED SIR,--According as in my former to you I hinted that I held
myself obliged to give you some farther account of my rude though
solemn thoughts of that great case now before you, the happy
management whereof do so much conduce to the glory of God, the safety
and tranquillity of the country, besides what I have said in my former
and the enclosed, I further humbly present to consideration the
doubtfulness and unsafety of admitting spectre testimony against the
life of any that are of blameless conversation, and plead innocent,
from the uncertainty of them and the incredulity of them; for as for
diabolical visions, apparitions, or representations, they are more
commonly false and delusive than real, and cannot be known when they
are real and when feigned, but by the Devil's report; and then not to
be believed, because he is the father of lies.

1. Either the organ of the eye is abused and the senses deluded, so as
to think they do see or hear some thing or person, when indeed they do
not, and this is frequent with common jugglers.

2. The Devil himself appears in the shape and likeness of a person or
thing, when it is not the person or thing itself; so he did in the
shape of Samuel.

3. And sometimes persons or things themselves do really appear, but
how it is possible for any one to give a true testimony, which
possibly did see neither shape nor person, but were deluded; and if
they did see any thing, they know not whether it was the person or but
his shape. All that can be rationally or truly said in such a case is
this,--that I did see the shape or likeness of such a person, if my
senses or eyesight were not deluded: and they can honestly say no
more, because they know no more (except the Devil tells them more);
and if he do, they can but say he told them so. But the matter is
still incredible: first, because it is but their saying the Devil told
them so; if he did so tell them, yet the verity of the thing remains
still unproved, because the Devil was a liar and a murtherer (John
viii. 44), and may tell these lies to murder an innocent person.

But this case seems to be solved by an assertion of some, that affirm
that the Devil do not or cannot appear in the shape of a godly person,
to do hurt: others affirm the contrary, and say that he can and often
have so done, of which they give many instances for proof of what
they say; which if granted, the case remains yet unsolved, and yet the
very hinge upon which that weighty case depends. To which I humbly
say: First, That I do lament that such a point should be so needful to
be determined, which seems not probable, if possible, to be determined
to infallible satisfaction for want of clear Scripture to decide it
by, though very rational to be believed according to rules; as, for
instance, if divers examples are alleged of the shape of persons that
have been seen, of whom there is ample testimony that they lived and
died in the faith, yet, saith the objecter, 'tis possible they may be
hypocrites, therefore the proof not infallible: and as it may admit of
such an objection against the reasons given on the affirmative, much
more may the same objection be made against the negative, for which
they can or do give no reason at all, nor can a negative be proved
(therefore difficult to be determined to satisfy infallibly); but,
seeing it must be discussed, I humbly offer these few words: First, I
humbly conceive that the saints on earth are not more privileged in
that case than the saints in heaven; but the Devil may appear in the
shape of a saint in heaven, namely, in the shape of Samuel (1 Sam.
xxviii. 13, 14); therefore he can or may represent the shape of a
saint that is upon the earth. Besides, there may be innocent persons
that are not saints, and their innocency ought to be their security,
as well as godly men's; and I hear nobody question but the Devil may
take their shape.

Secondly, It doth not hurt any man or woman to present the shape or
likeness of an innocent person, more than for a limner or carver to
draw his picture, and show it, if he do not in that form do some evil
(nor then neither), if the laws of man do not oblige him to suffer for
what the Devil doth in his shape, the laws of God do not.

Thirdly, The Devil had power, by God's permission, to take the very
person of our Lord Jesus Christ, in the day or time of his
humiliation, and carry him from place to place, and tempted him with
temptations of horrid blasphemy, and yet left him innocent. Why may we
not suppose the like may be done to a good man? And why not much more
appear in his shape (or make folk think it is his shape, when indeed
it is not), and yet the person be innocent, being far enough off, and
not knowing of it, nor would consent if he had known it, his
profession and conversation being otherwise?

Fourthly, I suppose 'tis granted by all, that the person of one that
is dead cannot appear, because the soul and body are separated, and so
the person is dissolved, and so ceaseth to be: and it is as certain
that the person of the living cannot be in two places at one time, but
he that is at Boston cannot be at Salem or Cambridge at the same time;
but as the malice and envy in the Devil makes it his business to seek
whom he may devour, so no question but he doth infuse the same quality
into those that leave Jesus Christ to embrace him, that they do envy
those that are innocent, and upon that account be as ready to say and
swear that they did see them as the Devil is to present their shape to
them. Add but this also, that, when they are once under his power, he
puts them on headlong (they must needs go whom the Devil drives,
saith the proverb), and the reason is clear,--because they are taken
captive by him, to do his will. And we see, by woful and undeniable
experience, both in the afflicted persons and the confessors, some of
them, that he torments them at his pleasure, to force them to accuse
others. Some are apt to doubt they do but counterfeit; but, poor
souls! I am utterly of another mind, and I lament them with all my
heart; but, take which you please, the case is the same as to the main
issue. For, if they counterfeit, the wickedness is the greater in
them, and the less in the Devil: but if they be compelled to it by the
Devil, against their wills, then the sin is the Devil's, and the
sufferings theirs; but if their testimonies be allowed of, to make
persons guilty by, the lives of innocent persons are alike in danger
by them, which is the solemn consideration that do disquiet the
country.

Now, that the only wise God may so direct you in all, that he may have
glory, the country peace and safety, and your hands strengthened in
that great work, is the desire and constant prayer of your humble
servant, R.P., who shall no further trouble you at present.

_Position._--That to put a witch to death is the command of God, and
therefore the indispensable duty of man,--namely, the magistrate (Ex.
xxii. 18); which, granted, resolves two questions that I have heard
made by some:--

First, Whether there are any such creatures as witches in the world.
Secondly, If there be, whether they can be known to be such by men:
both which must be determined on the affirmative, or else that
commandment were in vain.

_Position Second._--That it must be witches that are put to death, and
not innocent persons: "Thou shalt not condemn the innocent nor the
righteous" (Ex. xxiii. 7).

_Query._--Which premised, it brings to this query,--namely, how a
witch may be known to be a witch.

_Answer._--First, By the mouth of two or three witnesses (Deut xix.
15; Matt. xviii. 16; Deut. xvii. 6). Secondly, They may be known by
their own confession, being _compos mentis_, and not under horrid
temptation to self-murther (2 Sam. xvi.; Josh. vii. 16).

_Query Second._--What is it that those two or three witnesses must
swear? Must they swear that such a person is a witch? Will that do the
thing, as is vulgarly supposed?

_Answer._--I think that is too unsafe to go by, as well as hard to be
done by the advised: First, because it would expose the lives of all
alike to the pleasure or passion of those that are minded to take them
away; secondly, because that, in such a testimony, the witnesses are
not only informers in matter of fact, but sole judges of the
crime,--which is the proper work of the judges, and not of witnesses.

_Query Third._--What is it that the witnesses must testify in the
case, to prove one to be a witch?

_Answer._--They must witness the person did put forth some act which,
if true, was an act of witchcraft, or familiarity with the Devil, the
witness attest the fact to be upon his certain knowledge, and the
judges to judge that fact to be such a crime.

_Query Fourth._--What acts are they which must be proved to be
committed by a person, that shall be counted legal proof of
witchcraft, or familiarity with the Devil?

_Answer._--This I do profess to be so hard a question, for want of
light from the Word of God and laws of men, that I do not know what to
say to it; and therefore humbly conceive, that, in such a difficulty,
it may be more safe, for the present, to let a guilty person live till
further discovery, than to put an innocent person to death.

First, Because a guilty person may afterward be discovered, and so put
to death; but an innocent person to be put to death cannot be brought
again to life when once dead.

Secondly, Because secret things belong to God only, but revealed
things to us and to our children. And though it be so difficult
sometimes, yet witches there are, and may be known by some acts or
other put forth by them, that may render them such; for Scripture
examples, I can remember but few in the Old Testament, besides Balaam
(Num. xxii. 6, xxxi. 16).

First, The sorcerers of Egypt could not tell the interpretation of
Pharaoh's dream, though he told them his dream (Gen. xli. 8): his
successors afterwards had sorcerers, that by enchantments did, first,
turn their rods into serpents (Exod. vii. 11, 12); second, turned
water into blood; thirdly, brought frogs upon the land of Egypt (Exod.
viii. 7).

Thirdly, Nebuchadnezzar's magicians said that they would tell him the
interpretation, if he would tell them his dream (Dan. iv. 7); but the
king did not believe them (ver. 8, 9).

Fourthly, The Witch of Endor raised the Devil, in the likeness of
Samuel, to tell Saul his fortune; and Saul made use of him accordingly
(1 Sam. xxviii. 8, 11-15); and, as for New Testament, I see very
little of that nature. Our Lord Jesus Christ did cast out many devils,
and so did his disciples, both while he was upon earth and afterward,
of which some were dreadfully circumstanced (Mark ix. 18; Mark v.
2-5); but of witches, we only read of four mentioned in the apostles'
time: first, Simon Magus (Acts viii. 9, 11); secondly, Elymas the
sorcerer (Acts xiii. 6, 8); thirdly, the seven sons of Sceva, a Jew,
that were vagabond Jews,--exorcists (Acts xix. 13-16); fourthly, the
girl which, by a spirit of divination, brought her master much gain
(Acts xvi. 16), whether it were by telling fortunes or finding out
lost things, as our cunning men do, is not said; but something it was
that was done by that spirit which was in her, which, being cast out,
she could not do. Now, whatever was done by any of these, by the help
of the Devil, or by virtue of familiarity with him, or that the Devil
did do by their consent or instigation, it is that which, the like
being now proved to be done by others, is legal conviction of
witchcraft, or familiarity with the Devil.

As I remember, Mr. Perkins apprehends witchcraft may be sometimes
committed by virtue of an implicit covenant with the Devil, though
there be not explicit covenant visibly between them; namely, by using
such words and gestures whereby they do intimate to the Devil what
they would have him do, and he doth it.

3. To tell events contingent, or to bring any thing to pass by
supernatural means, or by no means.

I have heard of some that make a circle, and mumble over some uncouth
words; and some that have been spiteful and suspicious persons, that
have sent for a handful of thatch from the house or barn of him that
they have owed a spite to, and the house have been burnt as they had
burnt the thatch that they fetched.

When Captain Smith was cast away in the ship built by Mr. Stevens at
Gloucester, many years ago, it was said that the woman that was
accused for doing it did put a dish in a pail of water, and sent her
girl several times to see the motion of the dish, till at last it was
turned over, and then the woman said, "Now Smith is gone," _or_ "is
cast away."

A neighbor of mine, who was a Hampshire man, told me that a suspected
woman desired something of some of the family, which being denied, she
either muttered or threatened, and some evil suddenly followed, and
they put her into a cart to carry her to Winchester; and, when they
had gone a little way, the team could not move the cart, though in
plain ground. The master commanded to carry a knitch of straw, and
burn her in the cart; which to avoid, she said they should go along,
and they did. This they did several times before they came to
Winchester, of which passages the men that went with her gave their
oaths, and she was executed.

Some have been transformed into dogs, cats, hares, hogs, and other
creatures; and in those shapes have sometimes received wounds which
have made them undeniably guilty, and so confessed. Sometimes having
their imps sucking them, or infallible tokens that they are sucked, in
the search of which great caution to be given, because of some
superfluities of nature, and diseases that people are incident unto,
as the piles, &c., of which the judges are, upon the testimony of the
witnesses, to determine what of crime is proved by any of these
circumstances, with many other, in which God is pleased many times, by
some overt acts, to bring to light that secret wickedness to apparent
conviction, sometimes by their own necessitated confession, whereby
those that he hath commanded to be put to death may be known to be
such, which, when known, then it is a duty to put them to death, and
not before, though they were as guilty before as then.

There are two queries more with respect to what is proper to us in
this juncture of time, of which we have no account of the like being
common at other times, or in other places; namely, these,--

_Query Fifth._--The fifth query is, what we are to think of those
persons at Salem, or the Village, before whom people are brought for
detection, or otherwise to be concerned with them, in order to their
being apprehended or acquitted.

_Answer_.--That I am, of all men, the least able to give any
conjecture about it, because I do not know it, having myself never
seen it, nor know nothing of it but by report, in which there must be
supposed a possibility of some mistake, in part or in whole; but that
which I have here heard is this: First, That they do tell who are
witches, of which some they know, and some they do not. Secondly, They
tell who did torment such and such a person, though they know not the
person. Thirdly, They are tormented themselves by the looks of persons
that are present, and recovered again by the touching of them.
Fourthly, That, if they look to them, they fall down tormented; but,
if the persons accused look from them, they recover, or do not fall
into that torment. Fifthly, They can tell when a person is coming
before they see them, and what clothes they have, and some what they
have done for several years past, which nobody else ever accused them
with, nor do not yet think them guilty of. Sixthly, That the dead out
of their graves do appear unto them, and tell them that they have been
murdered, and require them to see them to be revenged on the
murtherers, which they name to them; some of which persons are well
known to die their natural deaths, and publicly buried in the sight of
all men. Now, if these things be so, I thus affirm,--

First, That whatsoever is done by them that is supernatural, is either
divine or diabolical.

Secondly, That nothing is, or can be, divine, but what have God's
stamp upon it, to which he refers for trial (Isa. viii. 19, 20): "If
they speak not according to these, there is no light in them."

Thirdly, And by that rule none of these actions of theirs have any
warrant in God's word, but condemned wholly.

First, It is utterly unlawful to inquire of the dead, or to be
informed by them (Isa. viii. 19). It was an act of the Witch of Endor
to raise the dead, and of a reprobate Saul to inquire of him (1 Sam.
xxviii. 8, 11-14; Deut. xviii. 11).

Secondly, It is a like evil to seek to them that have familiar spirits
(Lev. xix. 31). It was the sin of Saul in the forementioned place (1
Sam. xxviii. 8); and of wicked Manasses (2 Kings, xxi. 6).

Thirdly, No more is it likely that their racking and tormenting should
be done by God or good angels, but by the Devil, whose manner have
ever been to be so employed. Witness his dealing with the poor child
(Mark ix. 17, 19, 20-22); and with the man that was possessed by him
(Mark v. 2-5); besides what he did to Job (Job ii. 7); and all the
lies that he told against him to the very face of God.

Fourthly, The same may be rationally said of all the rest. Who should
tell them things that they do not see, but the Devil; especially when
some things that they tell are false and mistaken?

_Query Sixth_.--These things premised, it now comes to the last and
greatest question or query; namely, How shall it be known when the
Devil do any of these acts of his own proper motion, without human
concurrence, consent, or instigation, and when he doth it by the
suggestion or consent of any person? This question, well resolved,
would do our business.

First, That the Devil can do acts supernatural without the furtherance
of him by human consent or concurrence; but men or women cannot do
them without the help of the Devil (must be granted). That granted, it
follows, that the Devil is always the doer, but whether abetted in it
by anybody is uncertain.

Secondly, Will it be sufficient for the Devil himself to say such a
man or woman set him a work to torment such a person by looking upon
him? Is the Devil a competent witness in such a case?

Thirdly, Or are those that are tormented by him legal witnesses to say
that the Devil doth it by the procurement of such a person, whenas
they know nothing about it but what comes to them from the Devil (that
torments them)?

Fourthly, May we believe the witches that do accuse any one because
they say so (can the fruit be better than the tree)? If the root of
all their knowledge be the Devil, what must their testimony be?

Fifthly, Their testimony may be legal against themselves, because they
know what themselves do, but cannot know what another doth but by
information from the Devil: I mean in such cases when the person
accused do deny it, and his conversation is blameless (Prov. xviii. 5;
Prov. xix. 5).

First, It is directly contrary to the use of reason, the law of
nature, and principles of humanity, to deny it, and plead innocent,
when accused of witchcraft, and yet, at the same time, to be acting
witchcraft in the sight of all men, when they know their lives lie at
stake by doing it. Self-interest teaches every one better.

Secondly, It is contrary to the Devil's nature, or common practice, to
accuse witches. They are a considerable part of his kingdom, which
would fall, if divided against itself (Matt. xii. 26); except we think
he that spake the words understood not what he said (which were
blasphemy to think); or that those common principles or maxims are now
changed; or that the Devil have changed his nature, and is now become
a reformer to purge out witches out of the world, out of the country,
and out of the churches; and is to be believed, though a liar and a
murtherer from the beginning, and also though his business is going
about continually, seeking whom he may destroy (1 Pet. v. 8); and his
peculiar subject of his accusation are the brethren: called the
accuser of the brethren.

_Objection._--God do sometimes bring things to light by his providence
in a way extraordinary.

_Answer._--It is granted God have so done, and brought hidden things
to light, which, upon examination, have been proved or confessed, and
so the way is clear for their execution; but what is that to this
case, where the Devil is accuser and witness?


IV.

EXTRACTS FROM MR. PARRIS'S CHURCH RECORDS.

     [The following passages are taken from the records of the
     Salem Village Church, as specimens of Mr. Parris's style of
     narrative in that interesting document, and as shedding some
     light upon the subject of these volumes:--]

Sab: 4 Nov. [1694].--After sermon in the afternoon, it was
propounded to the brethren, whether the church ought not to inquire
again of our dissenting brethren after the reason of their dissent.
Nothing appearing from any against it, it was put to vote, and carried
in the affirmative (by all, as far as I know, except one brother,
Josh: Rea), that Brother Jno. Tarbell should, the next Lord's Day,
appear and give in his reasons in public; the contrary being
propounded, if any had aught to object against it. But no dissent was
manifested; and so Brother Nathaniel Putnam and Deacon Ingersoll were
desired to give this message from the church to the said Brother
Tarbell.

Sab: 11 Nov.--Before the evening blessing was pronounced, Brother
Tarbell was openly called again and again; but, he not appearing,
application was made to the abovesaid church's messengers for his
answer: whereupon said Brother Putnam reported that the said Brother
Tarbell told him he did not know how to come to us on a Lord's Day,
but desired rather that he might make his appearance some week-day.
Whereupon the congregation was dismissed with the blessing: and the
church stayed, and, by a full vote, renewed their call of said Brother
Tarbell to appear the next Lord's Day for the ends abovesaid; and
Deacon Putnam and Brother Jonathan Putnam were desired to be its
messengers to the said dissenting brother.

Sab: 18 Nov.--The said brother came in the afternoon; and, after
sermon, he was asked the reasons for his withdrawing: whereupon he
produced a paper, which he was urged to deliver to the pastor to
communicate to the church; but he refused it, asking who was the
church's mouth. To which, when he was answered, "The pastor," he
replied, Not in this case, because his offence was with him. The
pastor demanded whether he had offence against any of the church
besides the pastor. He answered, "No." So at length we suffered a
non-member, Mr. Jos: Hutchinson, to read it. After which the pastor
read openly before the whole congregation his overtures for peace and
reconciliation. After which said Tarbell, seemingly (at least) much
affected, said, that, if half so much had been said formerly, it had
never come to this. But he added that others also were dissatisfied
besides himself: and therefore he desired opportunity that they might
come also, which was immediately granted; viz., the 26 instant, at two
o'clock.

26 Nov.--At the public meeting above appointed at the meeting-house,
after the pastor had first sought the grace of God with us in prayer,
he then summed up to the church and congregation (among which were
several strangers) the occasion of our present assembling, as is
hinted the last meeting. Then seeing, together with Brother Tarbell,
two more of our dissenting brethren, viz., Sam: Nurse, and Thomas
Wilkins (who had, to suit their designs, placed themselves in a seat
conveniently together), the church immediately, to save further
sending for them, voted that said Brother Wilkins and Brother Nurse
should now, together with Brother Tarbell, give in their reasons of
withdrawing from the church. Then the pastor applied himself to all
these three dissenters, pressing the church's desire upon them. So
they produced a paper, which they much opposed the coming into the
pastor's hands, and his reading of it; but at length they yielded to
it. Whilst the paper was reading, Brother Nurse looked upon another
(which he said was the original): and, after it was read throughout,
he said it was the same with what he had. Their paper was as
followeth:--

"The reasons why we withdraw from communion with the church of Salem
Village, both as to hearing the word preached, and from partaking with
them at the Lord's Table, are as followeth:--

"1. Why we attend not on public prayer and preaching the word, these
are, (1.) The distracting and disturbing tumults and noises made by
the persons under diabolical power and delusions, preventing sometimes
our hearing and understanding and profiting of the word preached; we
having, after many trials and experiences, found no redress in this
case, accounted ourselves under a necessity to go where we might hear
the word in quiet. (2.) The apprehensions of danger of ourselves being
accused as the Devil's instruments to molest and afflict the persons
complaining, we seeing those whom we had reason to esteem better than
ourselves thus accused, blemished, and of their lives bereaved,
foreseeing this evil, thought it our prudence to withdraw. (3.) We
found so frequent and positive preaching up some principles and
practices by Mr. Parris, referring to the dark and dismal mysteries of
iniquity working amongst us, as was not profitable, but offensive.
(4.) Neither could we, in conscience, join with Mr. Parris in many of
the requests which he made in prayer, referring to the trouble then
among us and upon us; therefore thought it our most safe and peaceable
way to withdraw.

"2. The reasons why we hold not communion with them at the Lord's
Table are, first, we esteem ourselves justly aggrieved and offended
with the officer who doth administer, for the reasons following: (1.)
From his declared and published principles, referring to our
molestation from the invisible world, differing from the opinion of
the generality of the Orthodox ministers of the whole country. (2.)
His easy and strong faith and belief of the affirmations and
accusations made by those they call the afflicted. (3.) His laying
aside that grace which, above all, we are required to put on; namely,
charity toward his neighbors, and especially towards those of his
church, when there is no apparent reason for the contrary. (4.) His
approving and practising unwarrantable and ungrounded methods for
discovering what he was desirous to know referring to the bewitched or
possessed persons, as in bringing some to others, and by and from them
pretending to inform himself and others who were the Devil's
instruments to afflict the sick and pained. (5.) His unsafe and
unaccountable oath, given by him against sundry of the accused. (6.)
His not rendering to the world so fair, if true, an account of what he
wrote on examination of the afflicted. (7.) Sundry unsafe, if sound,
points of doctrine delivered in his preaching, which we esteem not
warrantable, if Christian. (8.) His persisting in these principles,
and justifying his practices, not rendering any satisfaction to us
when regularly desired, but rather further offending and dissatisfying
ourselves.

"JOHN TARBELL.
THO: WILKINS.
SAM: NURSE."

When the pastor had read these charges, he asked the dissenters above
mentioned whether they were offended with none in the church besides
himself. They replied, that they articled against none else. Then the
officer asked them if they withdrew from communion upon account of
none in the church besides himself. They answered, that they withdrew
only upon my account. Then I read them my "Meditations for Peace,"
mentioned 18 instant; viz.:--

"Forasmuch as it is the undoubted duty of all Christians to pursue
peace (Ps. xxxiv. 14), even unto a reaching of it, if it be possible
(Rom. xii. 18, 19); and whereas, through the righteous, sovereign, and
awful Providence of God, the Grand Enemy to all Christian peace has,
of late, been most tremendously let loose in divers places hereabouts,
and more especially amongst our sinful selves, not only to interrupt
that partial peace which we did sometimes enjoy, but also, through his
wiles and temptations and our weaknesses and corruptions, to make
wider breaches, and raise more bitter animosities between too many of
us, in which dark and difficult dispensation we have been all, or most
of us, of one mind for a time, and afterwards of differing
apprehensions, and, at last, are but in the dark,--upon serious
thoughts of all, and after many prayers, I have been moved to present
to you (my beloved flock) the following particulars, in way of
contribution towards a regaining of Christian concord (if so be we
are not altogether unappeasable, irreconcilable, and so destitute of
the good spirit which is first pure, then peaceable, gentle, and easy
to be entreated, James iii. 17); viz., (1.) In that the Lord ordered
the late horrid calamity (which afterwards, plague-like, spread in
many other places) to break out first in my family, I cannot but look
upon as a very sore rebuke, and humbling providence, both to myself
and mine, and desire so we may improve it. (2.) In that also in my
family were some of both parties, viz., accusers and accused, I look
also upon as an aggravation of the rebuke, as an addition of wormwood
to the gall. (3.) In that means were used in my family (though totally
unknown to me or mine, except servants, till afterwards) to raise
spirits and create apparitions in no better than a diabolical way, I
do look upon as a further rebuke of Divine Providence. And by all, I
do humbly own this day, before the Lord and his people, that God has
been righteously spitting in my face (Num. xii. 14). And I desire to
lie low under all this reproach, and to lay my hand upon my mouth.
(4.) As to the management of those mysteries, as far as concerns
myself, I am very desirous (upon farther light) to own any errors I
have therein fallen into, and can come to a discerning of. In the mean
while, I do acknowledge, upon after-considerations, that, were the
same troubles again, (which the Lord, of his rich mercy, for ever
prevent), I should not agree with my former apprehensions in all
points; as, for instance, (1.) I question not but God sometimes
suffers the Devil (as of late) to afflict in the shape of not only
innocent but pious persons, or so delude the senses of the afflicted
that they strongly conceit their hurt is from such persons, when,
indeed, it is not. (2.) The improving of one afflicted to inquire by,
who afflicts the others, I fear may be, and has been, unlawfully used,
to Satan's great advantage. (3.) As to my writing, it was put upon me
by authority; and therein I have been very careful to avoid the
wronging of any (_a_). (4). As to my oath, I never meant it, nor do I
know how it can be otherwise construed, than as vulgarly and every one
understood; yea, and upon inquiry, it may be found so worded also.
(5.) As to any passage in preaching or prayer, in that sore hour of
distress and darkness, I always intended but due justice on each hand,
and that not according to man, but God (who knows all things most
perfectly), however, through weakness or sore exercise, I might
sometimes, yea, and possibly sundry times, unadvisedly expressed
myself. (6.) As to several that have confessed against themselves,
they being wholly strangers to me, but yet of good account with better
men than myself, to whom also they are well known, I do not pass so
much as a secret condemnation upon them; but rather, seeing God has so
amazingly lengthened out Satan's chain in this most formidable
outrage, I much more incline to side with the opinion of those that
have grounds to hope better of them. (7.) As to all that have unduly
suffered in these matters (either in their persons or relations),
through the clouds of human weakness, and Satan's wiles and sophistry,
I do truly sympathize with them; taking it for granted that such as
drew themselves clear of this great transgression, or that have
sufficient grounds so to look upon their dear friends, have hereby
been under those sore trials and temptations, that not an ordinary
measure of true grace would be sufficient to prevent a bewraying of
remaining corruption. (8.) I am very much in the mind, and abundantly
persuaded, that God (for holy ends, though for what in particular is
best known to himself) has suffered the evil angels to delude us on
both hands, but how far on the one side or the other is much above me
to say. And, if we cannot reconcile till we come to a full discerning
of these things, I fear we shall never come to agreement, or, at
soonest, not in this world. Therefore (9), in fine, The matter being
so dark and perplexed as that there is no present appearance that all
God's servants should be altogether of one mind, in all circumstances
touching the same, I do most heartily, fervently, and humbly beseech
pardon of the merciful God, through the blood of Christ, of all my
mistakes and trespasses in so weighty a matter; and also all your
forgiveness of every offence in this and other affairs, wherein you
see or conceive I have erred and offended; professing, in the presence
of the Almighty God, that what I have done has been, as for substance,
as I apprehended was duty,--however through weakness, ignorance, &c.,
I may have been mistaken; I also, through grace, promising each of you
the like of me. And so again, I beg, entreat, and beseech you, that
Satan, the devil, the roaring lion, the old dragon, the enemy of all
righteousness, may no longer be served by us, by our envy and strifes,
where every evil work prevails whilst these bear sway (Isa. iii.
14-16); but that all, from this day forward, may be covered with the
mantle of love, and we may on all hands forgive each other heartily,
sincerely, and thoroughly, as we do hope and pray that God, for
Christ's sake, would forgive each of ourselves (Matt. xviii. 21 _ad
finem_; Col. iii. 12, 13). Put on, therefore, as the elect of God,
holy and beloved, bowels of mercies, kindness, humbleness of mind,
meekness, long-suffering, forbearing one another, and forgiving one
another. If any man have a quarrel against any, even as Christ forgave
you, so also do ye (Eph. iv. 31, 32). Let all bitterness and wrath and
anger and clamor and evil-speaking be put away from you, with all
malice; and be ye kind one to another, tender-hearted, forgiving one
another, even as God, for Christ's sake, hath forgiven you. Amen,
amen.

SAM: PARRIS.

"26 Nov., 1694."

     [In the record, off against (a) as above, the following is
     in Mr. Parris's writing:]

(_a_) Added, by the desire of the council, this following paragraph;
viz., Nevertheless, I fear, that, in and through the throng of the
many things written by me, in the late confusions, there has not been
a due exactness always used; and, as I now see the inconveniency of my
writing so much on those difficult occasions, so I would lament every
error of such writings.--Apr. 3, 1695. Idem. S.P.

     [The above passage (_a_) is inserted in a marginal space
     left for it on a page containing the record of a meeting,
     Nov. 26, 1694, while it is dated April 3, 1695, and
     purports to be added "by the desire of the council," which
     met at the last-named date. There are other indications,
     that the record of Mr. Parris's controversy with the
     dissatisfied brethren, consequent upon the proceedings in
     1692, was made originally on separate sheets of paper, and
     then compiled, and inscribed in the church-book, as it there
     appears. There are several other entries, which refer to
     dates ahead. He probably made out his record near the close
     of the struggle which resulted in his dismission, and left
     it, on the pages of the book, as his history of the case.
     After giving his "Meditations for Peace," the record goes
     on:--]

After I had read these overtures abovesaid, I desired the brethren to
declare themselves whether they remained still dissatisfied. Brother
Tarbell answered, that they desired to consider of it, and to have a
copy of what I had read. I replied, that then they must subscribe
their reasons (above mentioned), for as yet they were anonymous: so at
length, with no little difficulty, I purchased the subscription of
their charges by my abovesaid overtures, which I gave, subscribed with
my name, to them, to consider of; and so this meeting broke up. Note
that, during this agitation with our dissenting brethren, they
entertained frequent whisperings with comers and goers to them and
from them; particularly Dan: Andrews, and Tho: Preston from Mr. Israel
Porter, and Jos: Hutchinson, &c.

Nov. 30, 1694.--Brother Nurse and Brother Tarbell (bringing with them
Joseph Putnam and Tho: Preston) towards night came to my house, where
they found the two deacons and several other brethren; viz., Tho:
Putnam, Jno. Putnam, Jr., Benj. Wilkins, and Ezek: Cheever, besides
Lieutenant Jno. Walcot. And Brother Tarbell said they came to answer
my paper, which they had now considered of, and their answer was this;
viz., that they remained dissatisfied, and desired that the church
would call a council, according to the advice we had lately from
ministers.

     [An account has been given, p. 493, of the attempts of the
     "dissatisfied brethren" to procure a mutual council to
     decide the controversy between them and Mr. Parris. On the
     14th of June, 1694, a letter was addressed to him, advising
     him to agree to the call of such a council, signed by John
     Higginson, of the First Church in Salem; James Allen, of the
     First Church in Boston; John Hale, of the church in Beverly;
     Samuel Willard, of the Old South Church in Boston; Samuel
     Cheever, of the church in Marblehead; and Joseph Gerrish, of
     the church in Wenham. Nicholas Noyes joined in the advice,
     "with this proviso, that he be not chosen one of the
     council." Mr. Parris contrived to avoid following the
     advice. On the 10th of September, Messrs. Higginson, Allen,
     Willard, Cheever, and Gerrish again, in earnest and quite
     peremptory terms, renewed their advice in another letter to
     Mr. Parris. No longer venturing to resist their authority,
     he yielded, and consented to a mutual council, upon certain
     terms, one of which was, that neither of the churches whose
     ministers had thus forced him to the measure should be of
     the council. The following passages give the conclusion of
     the matter, as related by Mr. Parris in his record-book:--]

Feb. 12 [1695].--The church met again, as last agreed upon; and, after
a while, our dissenting brethren, Tho: Wilkins, Sam: Nurse, and Jno.
Tarbell, came also. After our constant way of begging the presence of
God with us, we desired our dissenting brethren to acquaint us
whether they would accept of our last proposals, which they desired to
this day to consider of. They answered, that they were willing to drop
the six churches from whose elders we had had the advice abovesaid,
dated 14 June last; but they were not free to exclude Ipswich. This
they stuck unto long, and then desired that they might withdraw a
little to confer among themselves about it, which was granted. But
they quickly returned, as resolved for Ipswich as before. We desired
them to nominate the three churches they would have sent to: and,
after much debate, they did; viz., Rowley, Salisbury, and Ipswich.
Whereupon we voted, by a full consent, Rowley and Salisbury churches
for a part of the council, and desired them to nominate a third
church. But still they insisted on Ipswich, which we told them they
were openly informed, the last meeting, that we had excepted against.
Then they were told that we would immediately choose three other
churches to join with the two before nominated and voted, if they saw
not good to nominate any more; or else we would choose two other
churches to join with the aforesaid two, if they pleased. They
answered, they would be willing to that, if Ipswich might be one of
them. Then it was asked them, if a dismission to some other Orthodox
church, where they might better please themselves, would content them.
Brother Tarbell answered, "Ay, if we could find a way to remove our
livings too." Then it was propounded, whether we could not unite
amongst ourselves. The particular answer hereunto I remember not; but
(I think) such hints were given by them as if it were impossible. Thus
much time being gone, it being well towards sunset, and we concluding
that it was necessary that we should do something ourselves, if they
would not (as the elders had heretofore desired) accept of our joining
with them, we dismissed them; and, by a general agreement amongst
ourselves, read and voted letters to the churches at North Boston,
Weymouth, Maiden, and Rowley, for their help in a council.

     [Mr. Parris's plan of finding refuge in an _ex-parte_
     council was utterly frustrated. On the 1st of March, the
     "reverend elders in the Bay accounted it advisable," as he
     expresses it in his records, that the First Church and the
     Old South Church in Boston should be added to the council.
     They wrote to him to that effect, and he had to comply. This
     brought James Allen and Samuel Willard into the council, and
     determined the character of the result, which, coming from a
     tribunal called by him to adjudicate the case, and hearing
     only such evidence as he laid before it, so far as it bore
     against him, was decisive and fatal. It was as follows:--]

The elders and messengers of the churches--met in council at Salem
Village, April 3, 1695, to consider and determine what is to be done
for the composure of the present unhappy differences in that
place,--after solemn invocation of God in Christ for his direction, do
unanimously declare and advise as followeth:--

I. We judge that, albeit in the late and the dark time of the
confusions, wherein Satan had obtained a more than ordinary liberty to
be sifting of this plantation, there were sundry unwarrantable and
uncomfortable steps taken by Mr. Samuel Parris, the pastor of the
church in Salem Village, then under the hurrying distractions of
amazing afflictions; yet the said Mr. Parris, by the good hand of God
brought unto a better sense of things, hath so fully expressed it,
that a Christian charity may and should receive satisfaction
therewith.

II. Inasmuch as divers Christian brethren in the church of Salem
Village have been offended at Mr. Parris for his conduct in the time
of the difficulties and calamities which have distressed them, we now
advise them charitably to accept the satisfaction which he hath
tendered in his Christian acknowledgments of the errors therein
committed; yea, to endeavor, as far as 'tis possible, the fullest
reconciliation of their minds unto communion with him, in the whole
exercise of his ministry, and with the rest of the church (Matt. vi.
12-14; Luke xvii. 3; James v. 16).

III. Considering the extreme trials and troubles which the
dissatisfied brethren in the church of Salem Village have undergone in
the day of sore temptation which hath been upon them, we cannot but
advise the church to treat them with bowels of much compassion,
instead of all more critical or rigorous proceedings against them, for
the infirmities discovered by them in such an heart-breaking day. And
if, after a patient waiting for it, the said brethren cannot so far
overcome the uneasiness of their spirits, in the remembrance of the
disasters that have happened, as to sit under his ministry, we advise
the church, with all tenderness, to grant them a dismission unto any
other society of the faithful whereunto they may desire to be
dismissed (Gal. vi. 1, 2; Ps. ciii. 13, 14; Job xix. 21).

IV. Mr. Parris having, as we understand, with much fidelity and
integrity acquitted himself in the main course of his ministry since
he hath been pastor to the church in Salem Village, about his first
call whereunto, we look upon all contestations now to be both
unreasonable and unseasonable; and our Lord having made him a blessing
unto the souls of not a few, both old and young, in this place, we
advise that he be accordingly respected, honored, and supported, with
all the regards that are due to a painful minister of the gospel (1
Thess. v. 12, 13; 1 Tim. v. 17).

V. Having observed that there is in Salem Village a spirit full of
contentions and animosities, too sadly verifying the blemish which
hath heretofore lain upon them, and that some complaints brought
against Mr. Parris have been either causeless and groundless, or
unduly aggravated, we do, in the name and fear of the Lord, solemnly
warn them to consider, whether, if they continue to devour one
another, it will not be bitterness in the latter end; and beware lest
the Lord be provoked thereby utterly to deprive them of those which
they should account their precious and pleasant things, and abandon
them to all the desolations of a people that sin away the mercies of
the gospel (James iii. 16; Gal. v. 15; 2 Sam. ii. 26; Isa. v. 4, 5, 6;
Matt. xxi. 43).

VI. If the distempers in Salem Village should be (which God forbid!)
so incurable, that Mr. Parris, after all, find that he cannot, with
any comfort and service, continue in his present station, his removal
from thence will not expose him unto any hard character with us, nor,
we hope, with the rest of the people of God among whom we live (Matt.
x. 14; Acts xxii. 18).

All which advice we follow with our prayers that the God of peace
would bruise Satan under our feet. Now, the Lord of peace himself give
you peace always by all means.

INCREASE MATHER, _Moderator_.

*JOSEPH BRIDGHAM.   *EPHRAIM HUNT.
*SAMUEL CHECKLEY.   *NATHLL. WILLIAMS.
*WILLIAM TORREY.     SAMUEL PHILLIPS.
*JOSEPH BOYNTON.     JAMES ALLEN.
*RICHARD MIDDLECOT.  SAMUEL TORREY.
*JOHN WALLEY.        SAMUEL WILLARD.
*JER: DUMMER.        EDWARD PAYSON.
*NEHEMIAH JEWET.     COTTON MATHER.

     [The names of the lay members of the Council are marked
     thus, *. They were persons of high standing in civil life.
     Samuel Checkley was not (as stated [Supplement, p. 494],
     through an inadvertence, of which, I trust, not many such
     instances can be found in these volumes) the Rev. Mr.
     Checkley, but his father, Col. Samuel Checkley, a citizen of
     Boston, of much prominence at the time.

     The foregoing document is skilfully drawn. While kindly in
     its tone towards Mr. Parris, it is, in reality, a strong
     condemnation of his course, especially in Article I., as
     also in the paragraph marked (_a_), (p. 549), "added by the
     desire of the Council" to his "Meditations for Peace."
     Article III. discountenances the proceedings of his church
     in its censure of "the dissatisfied brethren," and requires
     that they should be recognized and treated as members in
     good standing. The fifth article administers rebuke with an
     equal hand to both sides, while the sixth and last
     recommends the removal of Mr. Parris, if the alienation of
     his opponents should prove "incurable."

     As an authoritative condemnation of the proceedings related
     in this work, pronounced at the time, it is a fitting final
     close of the presentation of this subject.]


THE END.








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