Candy and the girls having played their parts so well, there was no escape for poor Mrs. Hawkes but in confession, which she forthwith made.  They were both committed to prison.  Fortunately, it was not convenient to bring them to trial until the next January, when, the delusion having blown over, they were acquitted.

Besides those already mentioned, there were others, among the victims of this delusion, whose cases excite our tenderest sensibility, and deepen our horror in the contemplation of the scene.  It seems, that, some time before the transactions took place in Salem Village, a difficulty arose between two families on the borders of Topsfield and Ipswich, such as often occur among neighbors, about some small matter of property, fences, or boundaries.  Their names were Perley and How.  A daughter of Perley, about ten years of age, hearing, probably, strong expressions by her parents, became excited against the Hows, and charged the wife of How with bewitching her.  She acted much after the manner of the “afflicted girls” in Salem Village, which was near the place of her residence.  Very soon the idea became current that Mrs. How was a witch; and every thing that happened amiss to any one was laid at her door.  She was cried out against by the “afflicted children” in Salem Village, and carried before the magistrates for examination on the 31st of May, 1692.  Upon being brought into her presence, the accusers fell into their usual fits and convulsions, and charged her with tormenting them.  To the question, put by the magistrates, “What say you to this charge?” her answer was, “If it was the last moment I was to live, God knows I am innocent of any thing in this nature.”  The papers connected with her trial bear abundant testimony to the excellent character of this pious and amiable woman.  A person, who had lived near her twenty-four years, states, in her deposition, “that she had found her a neighborly woman, conscientious in her dealing, faithful to her promises, and Christianlike in her conversation.”  Several others join in a deposition to this effect:  “For our own parts, we have been well acquainted with her for above twenty years.  We never saw but that she carried it very well, and that both her words and actions were always such as well became a good Christian.”

The following passages illustrate the wicked arts sometimes used to bring accusations upon innocent persons, and give affecting proof of the excellence of the character and heart of Elizabeth How:—­

“THE TESTIMONY OF SAMUEL PHILLIPS, aged about sixty-seven, minister of the word of God in Rowley, who saith that Mr. Payson (minister of God’s word also in Rowley) and myself went, being desired, to Samuel Perly, of Ipswich, to see their young daughter, who was visited with strange fits; and, in her fits (as her father and mother affirmed), did mention Goodwife How, the wife of James How, Jr., of Ipswich, as if she was in the house, and did afflict her.  When we were