had a black cat,” that the wise neighbors at once remembered that Goody Garlick was double-tongued and naughty, and had a black cat. She was speedily indicted for witchcraft, and the gravamen appeared to be her constant tale-bearing. In 1706 a Virginian goody with a prettier name, Grace Sherwood, was tried as a witch; and with all the superstition of the day, and the added superstition of the surrounding and rapidly increasing negro population, there were but three Virginian witch-trials. Grace Sherwood’s name was also of constant recurrence in court annals, from the year 1690, on the court records of Princess Anne County, especially in slander cases. She was examined, after her indictment, for “witches marks” by a jury of twelve matrons, each of whom testified that Grace was “not like yur.” The magistrates seem to have been somewhat disconcerted at the convicting testimony of this jury, and at a loss how to proceed, but the witch asserted her willingness to endure trial by water. A day was set for the ducking, but it rained, and the tenderly considerate court thought the weather unfavorable for the trial on account of the danger to Grace’s health, and postponed the ducking. At last, on a sunny July day, when she could not take cold, the witch was securely pinioned and thrown into Lyn Haven Bay, with directions from the magistrates to “but her into the debth.” Into the “debth” of the water she should have contentedly and innocently sunk, but “contrary to the Judgments of all the spectators” she persisted in swimming, and at last was fished out and again examined to see whether the “witches marks” were washed off. One of the examiners was certainly far from being prepossessed in Grace’s favor. She was a dame who eight years before had testified that “Grace came to her one night, and rid her, and went out of the key hole or crack in the door like a black cat.” Grace Sherwood was not executed, and she did not die of the ducking, but it cooled her quarrelsome temper. She lived till 1740. The point where she was butted into the depth is to this day called Witches Duck. Grace Sherwood was not the only poor soul that passed through the “water-test” or “the fleeting on the water” for witchcraft. In September, 1692, in Fairfield, Conn., the accused witches “Mercy Disburrow and Elizabeth Clauson were bound hand and foot and put into the water, and they swam like cork, and one labored to press them into the water, and they buoyed up like cork.” Many cruel scenes were enacted in Connecticut, none more so than the persistent inquisition of Goodwife Knapp after she was condemned to death for witchcraft. She was constantly tormented by her old friends and neighbors to confess and to accuse one Goody Staples as an accomplice; but the poor woman repeated that she must not wrong any one nor say anything untrue. She added:--