Nooks and Corners of the New England Coast Part 26

[Ill.u.s.tration: PUTNAM'S TAVERN SIGN.]

FOOTNOTES:

[134] Mather and Hutchinson deal largely with it. Upham and Drake have compiled, arranged, and a.n.a.lyzed it.

[135] Exod. xxii., 18 (1491 B.C.): "Thou shalt not suffer a witch to live."

[136] Abigail Williams, eleven; Mary Walcut, seventeen; Ann Putnam, twelve; Mercy Lewis, seventeen; Mary Warren, twenty; Elizabeth Booth, eighteen; Sarah Churchill, twenty; Susannah Sheldon, age not known.

[137] Account of Thomas Brattle.

[138] See his life, page 80.

[139] Endicott had a grant of three hundred acres on the tongue of land between Cow-house and Duck rivers. The site does justice to his discernment.

[140] Raised in 1837 to the memory of soldiers of Danvers killed in the battle of Lexington.

[141] The Queen's portrait by Tilt, the gold box and medal presented by the city of London and by Congress to Mr. Peabody.

[Ill.u.s.tration: WASHINGTON STREET, SALEM.]

CHAPTER XV.

A WALK TO WITCH HILL.

"Do not the hist'ries of all ages Relate miraculous presages, Of strange turns in the world's affairs, Foreseen by astrologers, soothsayers, Chaldeans, learned genethliacs, And some that have writ almanacs?"

_Hudibras._

In 1692 Salem may have contained four hundred houses. A few specimens of this time now remain in odd corners--Rip Van Winkles or Wandering Jews of old houses, that have outlived their day of usefulness, and would now be at rest. Objects of scorn to the present generation, they have silently endured the contemptuous flings of the pa.s.ser-by, as well, perchance, as the frowns and haughty stare of rows of plate-gla.s.s windows along the street. As well put new wine in old bottles, as an old house in a new dress; it is always an old house, despite the thin veneer of miscalled improvements. The architect can do nothing with it to the purpose; the carpenter can make nothing of it. There they are, with occupants equally old-fashioned--of, yet not belonging to the present.

Some have stood so long in particular neighborhoods, have outlived so many modern structures, as to become points of direction, like London Stone or Charing-cross. The stranger's puzzled questioning is often met with, "You know that old house in such a street?" And so the old house helps us to find our way not alone to the past, but in the present.

[Ill.u.s.tration: BIRTHPLACE OF HAWTHORNE.]

Undoubted among such specimens as will be met with in the neighborhood of the wharves, or between Ess.e.x Street and the water-side, is the old gambrel-roofed, portly-chimneyed house in which our "Wizard of the North" first drew breath. It stands in Union Street, at the left as you pa.s.s down. Many pilgrims loiter and ponder there over these words:

"SALEM, October 4th, Union Street [Family Mansion]."

[Ill.u.s.tration: SHATTUCK HOUSE.]

"Here I sit in my old accustomed chamber, where I used to sit in days gone by. Here I have written many tales--many that have been burned to ashes, many that doubtless deserved the same fate. This claims to be called a haunted chamber, for thousands upon thousands of visions have appeared to me in it; and some few of them have become visible to the world. If ever I should have a biographer, he ought to make great mention of this chamber in my memoirs, because so much of my lonely youth was wasted here, and here my mind and character were formed; and here I have been glad and hopeful, and here I have been despondent. And here I sat a long, long time, waiting patiently for the world to know me, and sometimes wondering why it did not know me sooner, or whether it would ever know me at all--at least, till I were in my grave."

[Ill.u.s.tration: ROOM IN WHICH HAWTHORNE WAS BORN.]

It is not my purpose to attempt a description of Salem, or of what is to be seen there. Her merchants are princes. No doubt they were in Josselyn's mind when he said some of the New Englanders were "d.a.m.nable rich." French writers of that day speak of her "_bourgeois entierement riches_." Those substantial mansions of red brick, tree-shaded and ivy-trellised, represent what Carlyle named the "n.o.blesse of commerce,"

with money in its pocket.

Writing in 1685 upon the English invasions of Acadia, Sieur Bergier thus characterizes Salem and Boston:

"The English who inhabit these two straggling boroughs (_bourgades_) are for the greater part fugitives out of England, guilty of the death of the late king (Charles Stuart), and accused of conspiring against the reigning sovereign. The rest are corsairs and sea-robbers, who have united themselves with the former in a sort of independent republic."

This is rather earlier than the date usually fixed for the planting of democracy in America, but perhaps none too early. Endicott had then cut the cross from the standard of England with his poniard; and Charles II.

had been humbled in the persons of his commissioners.

Let us walk on through Ess.e.x Street, unheeding the throng, unmindful of the statelier buildings, until we approach an ancient landmark at the corner of North Street. Its claims on our attention are twofold. It is said to have been the dwelling of Roger Williams, for whom Southey, when reminded that Wales had been more famous for mutton than great men, avowed he had a sincere respect, yet it is even more celebrated as the scene of examinations during the Reign of Terror in 1692.[142]

In appearance the original house might have been transplanted out of old London. Its peaked gables, with pine-apples carved in wood surmounting its latticed windows, and colossal chimney, put it unmistakably in the age of ruffs, Spanish cloaks, and long rapiers. It has long been divested of its antique English character, now appearing no more than a reminiscence of its former self. However, from a recessed area at the back its narrow cas.e.m.e.nts and excrescent stairways are yet to be seen. A ma.s.sive frame, filled between with brick, plastered with clay, with the help of its tower-like chimney, has stood immovable against the a.s.saults of time. Such houses, and their number is not large, represent the original forest that stood on the site of ancient Salem.

[Ill.u.s.tration: THE OLD WITCH HOUSE.]

Jonathan Corwin, or Curwin, made a councilor under the new charter granted by King William, was one of the judges before whom the preliminary examinations were held, both here and at the Village.

Governor Corwin, of Ohio, is accounted a descendant, as was the author of "The Scarlet Letter" of another witch-judge, John Hathorne. The reader may imagine the novelist on his knees before the grave-stone of his ancestor, striving to sc.r.a.pe the moss from its half-obliterated characters.[143] Other examinations took place in Thomas Beadle's tavern.

[Ill.u.s.tration: FRAGMENT OF EXAMINATION OF REBECCA NURSE,

In Handwriting of Rev. Samuel Parris.[144]]

Knowing the world believed in witchcraft, our horror at the atrocities of '92 is moderated by the probability that nothing less than the shedding of innocent blood could have annihilated the delusion. The king believed in it, the governor and judges believed in it, and the most sensible and learned gave ample credence to it. Queen Anne wrote a letter to Phips that shows she admitted it as a thing unquestioned.[145]

The clergy, with singular unanimity, recognized it.

[Ill.u.s.tration: THOMAS BEADLE'S TAVERN, 1692.]

The revulsion that followed equaled the precipitation that had marked the proceedings. One of the judges made public confession of his error.[146] Officers of the court were persecuted until the day of their death.

There is one hard, inflexible character, that was never known to have relented. William Stoughton, lieutenant-governor, presided at these trials. It is related that once, on hearing of a reprieve granted some of the condemned, he left the bench, exclaiming, "We were in a way to have cleared the land of these. Who is it obstructs the course of justice I know not. The Lord be merciful to the country."

This pudding-faced, sanctimonious, yet merciless judge had listened to the heart-broken appeals of the victims, raising their manacled hands to heaven for that justice denied them upon earth. "I have got n.o.body to look to but G.o.d." "There is another judgment, dear child." "The Lord will not suffer it." Others as pa.s.sionately reproached their accusers, but all were confounded, because all were believers in the fact of witchcraft.[147]

Whether Witch Hill be the first or last place visited, it is there Salem witchcraft culminates. There is seen, in approaching by the railway from Boston, a bleak and rocky eminence bestrown with a little soil. Houses of the poorer sort straggle up its eastern acclivity, while the south and west faces remain as formed by nature, abrupt and precipitous. The hill is one of a range stretching away northward in a broken line toward the Merrimac. On the summit is a tolerably level area of several acres.

Not a tree was growing on it when I was there. The bleak winds sweep over it without hinderance.

On the 19th of July, 1692, an unusual stir might have been observed in Salem. We may suppose the town excited beyond any thing that had been known in its history. The condemned witches, Sarah Good, Sarah Wildes, Elizabeth Howe, Susannah Martin, and Rebecca Nurse, are to be hanged on Gallows Hill.

The narrow lane in which the common jail is situated is thronged with knots of men and women, wearing gloomy, awe-struck faces, conversing in under-tones. Before the jail door are musketeers of the train-band, armed and watchful. The crowd gives way on the approach of a cart that stops in front of the prison door, which is now wide opened. On one side stands the jailer, with ponderous keys hanging at his girdle; on the other is the sheriff, grasping his staff of office. The guard clears a pa.s.sage, and then the sheriff's voice is heard calling upon the condemned to come forth.

There are five of them, all women. They look pale, haggard, despairing.

At sight of them a murmur ripples through the crowd, succeeded by solemn stillness. As they mount the cart with weak and tottering steps--for some are old and feeble and gray-haired--audible sobs are heard among the by-standers. Men's lips are compressed and teeth clenched as they look on with white faces. All is ready. The guard surrounds the cart, as if a rescue were feared. It takes a score of strong men, armed to the teeth, to conduct five helpless women to death!

I suppose there were outcries, hootings, and imprecations, as is the rabble's wont. If so, I believe they were borne with the resignation and heroism that make woman the superior of man in supreme moments. At last the cavalcade is grouped around the place of execution. The gallows and the fatal ladder are there, grotesque yet horrible. To each of those five women they meant martyrdom, and nothing less.

The provost-marshal commands silence while he reads the warrant. This formality ended, he replaces it in his belt. Expectation is intense as the condemned are seen to take leave of each other, like people who have done with this world. Then a shiver, like an electric spark, runs through the mult.i.tude as the hangman seizes them, pinions and blindfolds them, and, in the name of King William and Queen Mary, hangs them by the neck until dead.

Being leagued with Satan, they were denied the consolations of religion vouchsafed to pirates, murderers, and like malefactors. Poor old Rebecca Nurse had been led, heavily ironed, up the broad aisle of Salem Church to be thrust out of its communion. At the scaffold Rev. Mr. Noyes, of Salem, insulted the last moments of Sarah Good. "You are a witch, and you know it," said this servant of Christ. She turned upon him fiercely, "You lie, and if you take away my life G.o.d will give you blood to drink."[148] That few of the martyrs chose to buy their lives with a lie has enn.o.bled their memories for all time. It is written: "If I would but go to h.e.l.l for an eternal moment or so, I might be knighted."