is mother, and when she had
heard all he had to tell, she was constrained to ask:

"Who are they?"

Mrs. Stevens, like her son, was too well bred to pry into the secrets of
her guests. A few days later Mr. Waters again disappeared and was not
seen for two months.

It was at the close of a sultry day in July that Mr. John Louder and his
neighbor Bly were returning from Boston in a cart. As usual, their
conversation was of the solemn kind, characteristic of the Puritan. The
many mysteries in nature and out of nature formed their principal topic.
Each had had his long, ardent conflict with sin and Satan.

Each was a firm believer in personal devils and legions of devils. The
spirits of the air were thought to be all about them, even at that very
moment.

"Neighbor Bly, I believe that she is a witch," said Louder.

"Verily, even so do I."

"If the magistrates would so adjudge her, she would, according to the
laws, be hung."

"Truly she would. I saw her shape again last night."

"Did you?"

"Yes, she came to my bed and did grievously torment me, by sitting for
fully two hours upon my chest."

"Why did you not call upon the name of God, and she would have gone?"

"Fain would I have done so, had it been possible; but her appearance
took from me the power of speech, and I was dumb. She sat upon me,
grinning at me, and she said:

"'Would ye speak if ye could?'

"Then at last a yellow bird came in at the window and whispered some
words in her ear, and the shape flew away with a black man."

"Verily, neighbor Bly, you have been grievously tormented; yet little
worse is your case than my own. My cattle are bewitched and die. The
witches hurl balls at them from any distance, which strike them, and
they shrink and die at once. The other morn I had salted my cows, when
one suddenly showed strange signs of illness and soon fell on her side
and did die. Neighbor Towne, who witnessed it, said the poor beast was
struck with a witch ball. He says they gather the hair from the back of
the afflicted beasts and, making a ball of it from the spittle of their
mouths, blow their breath upon it and hurl it any distance to an object.
The object so struck will at once wither and die. He said that, should I
strip the hair from the spine of the dead brute, a ball made of it would
strike down any other beast of the herd, even if thrown by my own hand."

With a sigh, Bly said:

"Truly, we live in the age when the devil is to be lo