The judges asked me if I had anything to say against these charges.
“They are true in the main,” I replied. “More than this. If your honors will but send for the guns I will repeat the feats that caused so much wonder here before your eyes. To show you that though they are not easy to accomplish, yet I can do them with the strength God has given me. What witchcraft is there in that? As for the great stone by the brook, so far from lifting it with ease, it took all my powers, and, had it weighed a pound more I must have failed. The maid escaped harm, and I thank God for it, though it was through no power of mine.”
Then came Deliverance Hobbs. Her tale was strange enough. She had seen, she testified, a man, with my face, but with a monkey’s body, a dog’s feet and a peacock’s tail, riding in the air on a fence board, as she gathered up her wood one night. She said she knew it could not be me, for she had seen me sail with my company in the sloops a few days before. A day or so after she had seen me in the air a grievous sickness had fallen upon her daughter, she continued, and the child had cried out that a witch tormented her, thrusting pins and needles into her flesh. When they asked her to name the spirit, the girl had spoken my name.
This ended the testimony. The judges urged me again to confess that I was in league with Satan and the powers of darkness. That the devil was my master, and that I had promised to serve him for worldly gain. If I admitted this with a penitent heart, I might go free, they said. For it was a well established fact, according to Judge Hathorne, that, if a witch confessed, the evil spirits no longer tormented such a one, nor could he work harm to others.
But I refused to charge myself with such a crime, even to save my life. I told them all so, and said there were no witches, except those of a disordered mind.
It was dark now. Fantastic shadows filled the room, and a sound, like a great sigh, went up from the lips of the people. Then, at the orders of the judge, came tip-staves, with lighted candles, which only served to dispel the gloom in a few places, making the remainder more dark.
The jury filed out, and, though it seemed a year, they were back again, speedily.
“Guilty,” said the foreman. I could hear those of the assemblage catch their breaths as one man.
Then the judges put on their black caps, while Justice Hathorne said:
“And the sentence of this court is that you be taken hence, and hanged by the neck until you are dead, and may God have mercy on your soul.”