age); 'I tell you it's as true as a sermon in the
meetin'-house. You'll soon find out what she can do. Why, there's young
Stout, as fine a lad as ever walked the streets, or stood by the helm of
his vessel in a gale o' wind; and look at him now, pale and cadaverous,
and walking round people's gardens, on the edge of narrow fences where
nobody but a rope-dancer, with a pole in his hands, could keep his
balance, and a hundred more such antics; everybody knows she bewitched
him.'

"'But what for?' we asked.

"'Oh, they had a quarrel, and pretty soon he began to cut these capers.'

"My sister Ann, the widow, however, who had always a brave spirit,
declared that she did not care a fig for all the witches in Christendom;
but I must own that I was very much alarmed. You may be sure, we none of
us much liked this sort of greeting, on the first day of our entering
into our new habitation, and we prepared to retire early, my mother, who
was a truly pious person, trusting to the only sure defence. Upon going
to my chamber, I found there was no fastening to the door; in fact the
handle itself was quite out of kilter, and it could not be shut tight. I
moved up to it, therefore, a chest of drawers, putting some things on
top, and thus brought the door close. I was just about to blow out the
candle to get into bed, when I heard a scrambling in the chimney, and you
may believe it or not, but it's the solemn truth--a black cat jumped from
the fire-place, ran and leaped a-top of the things I had placed against
the door, put her paw upon the handle of it, gave me one sidelong glance,
opened the door itself and passed out. I was too frightened for anything
but to wrap myself thoroughly in the bedclothes, and trembling with
terror, at last fell into a troubled sleep."

"Are you sure, Aunt Judith," said my uncle Richard, "that the cat did not
go under the bed?"

"I tell you, as plainly as I see you now, I saw her open the door, look
round at me with that malicious kind of expression, go out and shut the
door behind her; and in the morning everything I had piled up against it
was unmoved."

"It must have been the ghost of a cat, then," said my uncle; "but did
anything else happen, afterwards?"

"Yes, in a few days we had got a baking ready and the oven heated, when
the old woman came in with an armful of wood, threw it down on the
hearth, and said she wanted to bake. The oven was for the use of both
parts of the house; but we told he