rom the house, gave the woman some food,
and sent her to bed. Next morning she knew of no Nan but a pullet she
had.

The most sensational discovery in Suffolk was that John Lowes, pastor of
Brandeston, was a witch. The case was an extraordinary one and throws a
light on the witch alarms of the time. Lowes was eighty years old, and
had been pastor in the same place for fifty years. He got into trouble,
undoubtedly as a result of his inability to get along with those around
him. As a young man he had been summoned to appear before the synod at
Ipswich for not conforming to the rites of the Established Church.[25]
In the first year of Charles's reign he had been indicted for refusing
to exhibit his musket,[26] and he had twice later been indicted for
witchcraft and once as a common imbarritor.[27] The very fact that he
had been charged with witchcraft before would give color to the charge
when made in 1645. We have indeed a clue to the motives for this
accusation. A parishioner and a neighboring divine afterwards gave it as
their opinion that "Mr. Lowes, being a litigious man, made his
parishioners (too tenacious of their customs) very uneasy, so that they
were glad to take the opportunity of those wicked times to get him
hanged, rather than not get rid of him." Hopkins had afforded them the
opportunity. The witchfinder had taken the parson in hand. He had caused
him to be kept awake several nights together, and had run him backwards
and forwards about the room until he was out of breath. "Then they
rested him a little and then ran him again, and this they did for
several days and nights together, till he was weary of his life and
scarce sensible of what he said or did."[28] He had, when first accused,
denied all charges and challenged proof, but after he had been subjected
to these rigorous methods he made a full confession. He had, he said,
sunk a sailing vessel of Ipswich, making fourteen widows in a quarter of
an hour. The witchfinder had asked him if it did not grieve him to see
so many men cast away in a short time, and he answered: "No, he was
joyfull to see what power his Impes had."[29] He had, he boasted, a
charm to keep him out of gaol and from the gallows. It is too bad that
the crazed man's confidence in his charm was misplaced. His whole wild
confession is an illustration of the effectiveness of the torture. His
fate is indicative of the hysteria of the times and of the advantages
taken of it by malicious peo