suspected that a woman, who charged him with injustice in detaining some land from here, did, by witchcraft, occasion these preternatural occurrences. However, at last they came to an end.” Now I have done with thee, O credulous and sour Cotton Mather! so get thee back again to thy tomb in the old burying-ground on Copp’s Hill, where, unless thy nature is radically changed, thou makest it uncomfortable for those about thee. Nearly a hundred years afterwards, Portsmouth had another witch--a tangible witch in this instance--one Molly Bridget, who cast her malign spell on the eleemosynary pigs at the Almshouse, where she chanced to reside at the moment. The pigs were manifestly bewitched, and Mr. Clement March, the superintendent of the institution, saw only one remedy at hand, and that was to cut off and burn the tips of their tales. But when the tips were cut off they disappeared, and it was in consequence quite impracticable to burn them. Mr. March, who was a gentleman of expedients, ordered that all the chips and underbrush in the yard should be made into heaps and consumed, hoping thus to catch and do away with the mysterious and provoking extremities. The fires were no sooner lighted than Molly Bridget rushed from room to room in a state of frenzy. With the dying flames her own vitality subsided, and she was dead before the ash-piles were cool. I say it seriously when I say that these are facts of which there is authentic proof. If the woman had recovered, she would have fared badly, even at that late period, had she been in Salem; but the death-penalty has never been hastily inflicted in Portsmouth. The first execution that ever took place there was that of Sarah Simpson and Penelope Kenny, for the murder of an infant in 1739. The sheriff was Thomas Packer, the same official who, twenty-nine years later, won unenviable notoriety at the hanging of Ruth Blay. The circumstances are set forth by the late Albert Laighton in a spirited ballad, which is too long to quote in full. The following stanzas, however, give the pith of the story-- “And a voice among them shouted, “Pause before the deed is done; We have asked reprieve and pardon For the poor misguided one.’ “But these words of Sheriff Packer Rang above the swelling noise: ‘Must I wait and lose my dinner? Draw away the cart, my boys!’ “Nearer came the sound and louder, Till a steed with panting breath, From its sides the white foam dripping, Halted at the scene of death; “And a messenger alighted, Crying to the crowd, ‘Make way! This I bear to Sheriff Packer; ‘Tis a pardon for Ruth Blay!’”