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.