“Sd hugh beeing asked whethar hee did not say hee had made a Contract with ye deuell five years senc with his heart and signed to ye deuells book and then seald it with his bloud which Contract was to serve ye deuell and the deuell to serve him he saith he did say so and sayd he ded so and wret his name and sealed ye Contract with his bloud and that he had ever since been practising Eivel against every man:  hee also sayd ye deuell opned ye dore of eben booths hous made it fly open and ye gate fly open being asked how he could tell he sayd he deuell apeered to him like a boye and told him hee ded make them fly open and then ye boye went out of his sight.

“This examination taken and Confessed before authority in fairefeild before Us Testis the date above “Jon.  Bur, Assist “Nathan Gold, Asist.”

“The Grand Jury upon consideration of this Case re-turnd, Ignoramus....

“This Court do grant to the said Hugh Crotia A Gaol Delivery, he paying the Master of the Gaol his just fees and dues upon his release and also all the Charge laid out on him at Fairfield, & in bringing him to prison.

ELIZABETH GARLICK

In 1657, when Easthampton, Long Island, was within the jurisdiction of New York, becoming a few months later a part of Connecticut, two persons came over from Gardiner’s Island and settled in the colony, Joshua Garlick and Elizabeth his wife—­whilom servants of the famous engineer and colonist Lion Gardiner.

Stories of Elizabeth’s practice of witchcraft and other black arts followed her, and despite her attendance at church she fell under suspicion, and was arrested, and held by the magistrates for trial after hearing various witnesses.  Credulity offers no better illustrations than those which fell from the lips of some of the witnesses in this case.

Tuning a psalm—­A black thing—­A double tongued woman—­A doleful noise—­Burning the herbs—­The sick child—­Gardiner’s ox—­The dead ram—­Burning “the sow’s tale"

Goodwife Howell, during her illness which hastened Elizabeth’s arrest, “tuned a psalm and screked out several times together very grievously,” and cried “a witch! a witch! now are you come to torter me because I spoke two or three words against you,” and also said, she saw a black thing at the beds featte, that Garlick was double-tongued, pinched her with pins, and stood by the bed ready to tear her in pieces.  And William Russell, in a fit of insomnia or indigestion, before daybreak, “heard a very doleful noyse on ye backside of ye fire, like ye noyse of a great stone thrown down among a heap of stones.”