She confesses, that about eleven years ago, when she was in a
melancholy state and condition, she used to walk abroad in her orchard,
and, upon a certain time, she saw the appearance of a cat at the end of
the house, which yet she thought was a real cat. However, at that time
it diverted her from praying to God, and instead thereof she prayed to
the Devil; about which time she made a covenant with the Devil, who,
as a black man, came to her and presented her a book, upon which she
laid her finger and that left a red spot. And that upon her signing
her book the devil told her he was her god, and that she should serve
and worship him, and believes she consented to it. She says further,
that about two years agone, she was carried through the air, in company
with Deacon Frye’s wife, Ebenezer Baker’s wife, and Goody Tyler, to
five-mile pond, where she was baptized by the Devil, who dipped her
face in the water, and made her renounce her former baptism, and told
her that she must be his, soul and body, forever, and that she must
serve him, which she promised to do. She says, the renouncing her first
baptism was after her dipping, and that she was transported back again
through the air, in company with the fore-named persons, in the same
manner as she went, and believes they were carried upon a pole. Q.
How many persons were upon the pole? A. As I said before, viz. four
persons and no more but whom she had named above. She confesses she
has afflicted three persons, viz. John Sawdy, Martha Sprague and Rose
Foster, and that she did it by pinching her bed clothes, and giving
consent the Devil should do it in her shape, and that the Devil could
not do it without her consent. She confesses the afflicting persons
in the court, by the glance of her eye. She says, as she was coming
down to Salem to be examined, she and the rest of the company with her
stopped at Mr. Phillips’s to refresh themselves; and the afflicted
persons, being behind them upon the road, came up just as she was
mounting again, and were then afflicted, and cried out upon her, so
that she was forced to stay until they were all passed; and said she
only looked that way towards them.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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