The writings of John Greenleaf Whittier, Volume 5.
John Greenleaf Whittier, Ed.

One of my earliest recollections is that of an old woman, residing about two miles from the place of my nativity, who for many years had borne the unenviable reputation of a witch. She certainly had the look of one,—a combination of form, voice, and features which would have made the fortune of an English witch finder in the days of Matthew Paris or the Sir John Podgers of Dickens, and insured her speedy conviction in King James's High Court of Justiciary. She was accused of divers ill-doings,—such as preventing the cream in her neighbor's churn from becoming butter, and snuffing out candles at huskings and quilting-parties. ‘She roamed the country far and near, Bewitched the children of the peasants, Dried up the cows, and lamed the deer, And sucked the eggs, and killed the pheasants.’ The poor old woman was at length so sadly annoyed by her unfortunate reputation that she took the trouble to go before a justice of the peace, and made solemn oath that she was a Christian woman, and no witch.

Not many years since a sad-visaged, middle-aged man might be seen in the streets of one of our seaboard towns at times suddenly arrested in the midst of a brisk walk and fixed motionless for some minutes in the busy thoroughfare. No effort could induce him to stir until, in his opinion, the spell was removed and his invisible tormentor suffered him to proceed. He explained his singular