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.