“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