ng-time carried away the snow, they leveled the house with the
ground. But, though they buried her out of their sight and pulled down
the rotten cottage she had inhabited for so many weary years, the
fearful memory of her evil name and dreadful end remained, and nearly
all the village came to regard her as, in very truth, a witch.

Only Mrs. Marjoram took from the cottage with pious love an ancient and
much-thumbed book, on whose fly-leaf was written 'Jason Fletcher, His
Bible.' Then, having no longer any reason to conceal the early history
of the deceased, she related to the village gossips--as a warning
against trusting too fully to evil appearances--the following

STORY OF POOR HANNAH LEE.

A long time ago--before the middle of the last century, in fact--there
dwelt in one of the most flourishing towns in Western Massachusetts a
family of Puritan extraction named Fletcher. Straitest among the strict,
John Cotton Fletcher and his wife Mehitabel held all lightness of
conduct or gamesomeness of speech as sin most devoutly to be prayed and
striven against, and not only 'kept' the ten commandments with pious
zeal, but, for the better serving of the Lord, invented an eleventh,
which read 'Laugh not at all.' _Holy days_ they knew, in number during
the year fifty-four, namely, the fifty-two 'Sabbaths' and the governor's
Fast and Thanksgiving days; _holidays_ they held in utter abhorrence,
deeming Christmas, especially, an invention of the devil. On 'work-days'
they worked; on 'Sabbath-days' they attended the preaching of the word;
otherwise, on the Lord's day, doing nothing save to eat and drink what
was absolutely necessary to keep them from faintness. They lived to
praise the Lord, and they must eat to live. But no cooking or other
labor was done on that day, and if the old horse was saddled to carry
them to meeting it was because that was a work of necessity. On Fast and
Thanksgiving days--because they were peculiarly of Puritan origin--there
was an especial effort at godliness, and woe, then, to any profaning
youngster who dared to shout or play within sound or sight of Deacon
Fletcher's premises. Every Saturday night, at sunset, all tools for men
and playthings for children were put away, to be disturbed no more till
sunset on Sunday. All papers, books, knitting-work, sewing, were
disposed of 'out of the way.' It was necessary to milk the cows, feed
the pigs, and saddle the horse, but that was all the work that was