“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