University of Virginia Library

8. CHAPTER VIII.

The following letter, written by Hope Leslie,
and addressed to Everell Fletcher, then residing
in England, will show, briefly, the state of affairs
at Bethel, seven years subsequent to the date of
the events already detailed. Little had occurred,
save the changes of the seasons, in nature and human
life, to mark the progress of time.

“Dear Everell,

“This is the fifth anniversary of the day you
left us—your birth-day, too, you know; so we celebrate
it, but with a blended joy and grief, which,
as my dear guardian says, is suitable to the mixed
condition of human life.

“I surprised him, this morning, with a painting,
on which I had expended much time and laid out

all my poor skill. The scene is a forest glade—a
boy is sleeping under a birch tree, near a thicket
of hazle bushes, and from their deepest shadow
peeps a gaunt wolf in the act of springing on
him, while just emerging from the depths of the
wood, in the back ground, appears a man with a
musket levelled at the animal. I had placed the
painting on the mantel-piece, and it caught your
father's eye as he entered to attend our morning
exercise. He said nothing, for, you know, the order
of our devotions is as strictly observed as
were the services of the ancient temple. So we
all took our accustomed places—I mine on the
cushion beside your father; yours still stands on
the other side of him, like the vacant seat of Banquo.
Love can paint as well as fear; and though
no form, palpable to common eyes, is seated there,
yet, to our second sight, imagination produces
from her shadowy regions the form of our dear
Everell.

“I believe the picture had touched the hidden
springs of memory, for your father, though he was
reading the chapter of Exodus that speaks of the
wise-hearted men who wrought for the sanctuary,
(a portion of scripture not particularly moving,)
repeatedly wiped the gathering tears from his eyes.
Jennet is never lagging in the demonstration of
religious emotion, and I inferred, from her responsive
hems! and hahs! that, as there was no obvious
cause for tears, she fancied affecting types were
lurking in the `loops and selvedges, and tenons

and sockets, and fine twined linen,' about which
your father was reading. But when he came, in
his prayer, to his customary mention of his absent
child—when he touched upon the time when his
habitation was made desolate—and then upon
the deliverance of his son, his only son, from the
savage foe, and the ravening beast—his voice
faltered—every heart responded; Digby sobbed
aloud—and even aunt Grafton, whose aversion
to standing at her devotions has not diminished
with her increasing years, stood a monument
of patience till the clock twice told the
hour; though it was but the other day when she
thought your father was drawing to a close, and
he started a new topic, that she broke out, after
her way of thinking aloud, “well, if he is going
on t'other tack, I'll sit down.”

“When the exercise was finished, Digby gave
vent to his pleasure. `There, Jennet,' he said,
rubbing his hands exultingly, `you are always on
the look-out for witchcraft. I wonder what you
call that? It is a perfect picture of the place
where I found Mr. Everell, as that fellow there, in
the frieze jacket is of me; and any body would
know that, though they would not expect to see
John Digby painted in a picture. To be sure, Mr.
Everell does not look quite so pale and famished
as he did when I first saw him sleeping under that
birch tree: as I live, she has put his name there,
just as he had carved it. Well, it will be a

kind of a history for Mr. Everell's children, when
we, and the forest too, are laid low.'

“Your father permitted the honest fellow's volubility
to flow unrepressed; he himself only said,
as he drew me to him and kissed me, `you have
kept a faithful copy of our dear Everell in your
memory.'

“My honest tutor Cradock and aunt Grafton
contended for the honour of my excellence in the
art—poor Cradock, my Apollo! He maintained
that he had taught me the theory, while aunt
Grafton boasted her knowledge of the practice:
but, alas! the little honour my success reflected
on them, was not worth their contest; and I did
them no injustice in secretly ascribing all my skill
to the source whence the Corinthian maid derived
her power to trace, by the secret lamp, the
shade of her lover. Affection for my dear Everell
and for his father is my inspiration; but, I
confess, it might never have appeared in the mimicry,
of even this rude painting, if aunt Grafton
had not taken lessons at the Convent of the Chartreux
at Paris, and had daily access, as you know
she has a thousand times repeated to us, to the
paintings of Rossi and Albati in the palace of
Fontainbleau.

“But into what egotism does this epistolary
journalizing betray me? The day is yours, Everell,
and I will not speak again of myself.

“Aunt Grafton, meaning to do it what honour
she could, had our dinner-table set out with massive

silver dishes, engraved with her family's armorial
bearings. They have never before seen
the light in America. Your father smiled at their
contrast with our bare walls, pine tables, chairs,
&c.—and said, `we looked like Attila, in his rude
hut, surrounded with the spoils of Rome;' and
aunt Grafton, who has a decided taste for all the
testimonials of her family grandeur, entered into
a warm discussion with Master Cradock as to how
far the new man might lawfully indulge in a vain
show. By the way, their skirmishing on the debateable
grounds of church and state, have of
late almost ceased. When I remarked this to
your father, he said, he believed I had brought
about the present amicable state of affairs by affording
them a kind of neutral ground, where
their common affections and interests met. Whatever
has produced this result, it is too happy not
to be carefully cherished, so I have taken care
that my poor tutor, who never would intentionally
provoke a human being, should avoid, as far as
possible, all those peculiarities, which, as some
colours offend certain animals, were sure, every
day, and thrice a day, to call forth aunt Grafton's
animadversions. I have, too, entered into a secret
confederacy with Digby—the effect of which is,
that Master Cradock's little brown wig is brushed
every morning, and is, at least once each day,
straight on his head. The brush has invaded too,
the hitherto unexplored regions of his broadcloth,
and his black stock gives place, on every Lord's
day at least, to a white collar. Aunt Grafton herself
has more than once remarked, that `for one of
these scholar-folks, he goes quite decent.' As to
aunt Grafton, I am afraid that if you were here,
though we may both have gained with our years a
little discretion—yet I am afraid we should laugh,
as we were wont to do, at her innocent peculiarities.
She spends many a weary hour in devising
new head-gear, and both daily, as Jennet says,
break the law against costly apparel. Jennet is
the same untired and tiresome railer. If there
are anodynes for the tongue in England, pray send
some for her.

“We are going, to-morrow, on an excursion to
a new settlement on the river, called Northampton.
Your father feared the toils and perils of the way
for me, and has consented, reluctantly, to my being
of the party. Aunt Grafton remonstrated, and
expressed her natural and kind apprehensions, by
alleging that it was `very unladylike, and a thing
quite unheard of in England,' for a young person,
like me, to go out exploring a new country. I
urged, that our new country developes faculties
that young ladies, in England, were unconscious
of possessing. She maintained, as usual, that
whatever was not practised and known in England,
was not worth possessing; but finally she
concluded her opposition with her old customary
phrase, `Well, it's peculiar of you, Miss Hope,'

which, you know, she always uses to characterize
whatever opposes her opinions or inclinations.

“My good tutor, who would fain be my ægisbearer,
insists on attending me. You may laugh at
him, Everell, and call him my knight-errant, or
squire, or what you will; but I assure you, he is a
right godly and suitable appendage to a pilgrim
damsel. I will finish my letter when I return; a
journey of twenty miles has put my thoughts,
(which, you know, are ever ready to take wing,) to
flight.

“25th October, Thursday,—or, as the injunction
has come from Boston that we be more particular
in avoiding these heathen designations,
10th month, 5th day.

“Dear Everell,—We followed the Indian footpath
that winds along the margin of the river,
and reached Northampton without any accident.
There is but a narrow opening there, scooped out
of the forest, and Mr. Holioke, wishing to have an
extensive view of the country, engaged an Indian
guide to conduct your father and himself to the
summit of a mountain, which rises precipitously
from the meadows, and overlooks an ocean of
forest.

“I had gazed on the beautiful summits of this
mountain, that, in this transparent October atmosphere,
were as blue and bright as the heavens

themselves, till I had an irrepressible desire to go
to them; and, like the child who cried for the
horns of the silver moon, I should have cried too,
if my wishes had been unattainable.

“Your father acquiescéd (as my conscience tells
me, Everell, he does too easily) in my wishes, and
nobody objected but my tutor, who evidently
thought it would be unmanly for him to shrink
from toils that I braved, and who looked forward
with dread and dismay to the painful ascent.
However, we all reached the summit, without
scath to life or limb, and then we looked down
upon a scene that made me clap my hands, and
my pious companions raise their eyes in silent devotion.
I hope you have not forgotten the autumnal
brilliancy of our woods. They say the foliage
in England has a paler sickly hue, but for our
western world—nature's youngest child—she has
reserved her many-coloured robe, the brightest
and most beautiful of her garments. Last
week the woods were as green as an emerald,
and now they look as if all the summer-spirits
had been wreathing them with flowers of the
richest and most brilliant dyes.

“Philosophers may inquire into the process of
nature, and find out, if they can, how such sudden
changes are produced, though, after all, I fancy
their inquiries will turn out like the experiment of
the inquisitive boy, who cut open the drum to find
the sound; but I love to lend my imagination to

poets' dreams, and to fancy nature has her myriads
of little spirits, who
He must have a torpid imagination, and a cold
heart, I think, who does not fancy these vast forests
filled with invisible intelligences. Have these
beautiful vallies of our Connecticut, which we saw
from the mountain, looking like a smile on nature's
rugged face, and stretching as far as our
vision extended, till the broad river diminished in
the shadowy distance, to a silver thread; have
they been seen and enjoyed only by those savages,
who have their summer home in them? While
I was pondering on this thought, Mr. Holioke,
who seldom indulges in a fanciful suggestion, said
to your father, `The Romans, you know, brother
Fletcher, had their Cenotapha, empty sepulchres,
in honour of those who died in their country's
cause, and mouldered on a distant soil. Why
may we not have ours? and surmise that the spirits
of those who have died for liberty and religion,
have come before us to this wilderness, and
taken possession in the name of the Lord?'

“We lingered for an hour or two on the mountain.
Mr. Holioke and your father were noting
the sites for future villages, already marked out
for them by clusters of Indian huts. The instinct
of the children of the forest guides them to these
rich intervals, which the sun and the river prepare

and almost till for them. While the gentlemen
were thus engaged, I observed that the highest
rock of the mountain was crowned with a pyramidal
pile of stones, and about them were strewn
relicts of Indian sacrifices. It has, I believe, been
the custom of people, in all ages, who were instructed
only by nature, to worship on high places.[1]
I pointed to the rude altar, and ventured
to ask Mr. Holioke if an acceptable service might
not have been offered there?

“He shook his head at me, as if I were little
better than a heathen, and said, `it was all worship
to an unknown God.'

“`But,' said your father, `the time is approaching,
when through the vallies beneath, and on this
mount, incense shall rise from christian hearts.'

“`It were well,' replied Mr. Holioke, `if we
now, in the spirit, consecrated it to the Lord.'

“`And let me stand sponsor for it,' said I,
`while you christen it Holioke.'

“I was gently rebuked for my levity, but my
hint was not unkindly taken; for the good man
has never since spoken of his name-sake, without
calling it `Mount Holioke.'

“My senses were enchanted on that high place.
I listened to the mighty sound that rose from the
forest depths of the abyss, like the roar of the
distant ocean, and to the gentler voices of nature,
borne on the invisible waves of air—the farewell
notes of the few birds that still linger with us
—the rustling of the leaves beneath the squirrel's
joyous leap—the whizzing of the partridge startled
from his perch; the tinkling of the cow-bell, and the
barking of the Indian's dog. I was lying with my
ear over the rock, when your father reminded me
that it was time to return, and bade Digby, who
had attended us, `look well to Miss Leslie's
descent, and lend a helping hand to Master
Cradock.'

“My poor tutor's saffron skin changed to brick
colour; and that he might not think I heard the
imputation cast upon his serviceable powers, I
stepped between him and Digby, and said, `that
with such wings on each side of me, I might fly
down the mountain.'

“`Ah, Miss Hope Leslie,' said Cradock, restored
to his self-complacency, `you are a merry
thought atween us.' He would fain have appeared
young and agile; not from vanity, Everell,
but to persuade me to accept his proffered assistance.
Poor old man! he put me in mind, as he
went after Digby, panting and leaping (or rather
settling) from crag to crag, of an ancient horse,
that almost cracks his bones to keep pace with a
colt. His involuntary groans betrayed the pain

of his stiffened muscles, and I lingered on every
projecting cliff, on the pretence of taking a farewell
look of the vallies, but really to allow him
time to recover breath.

“In the mean time the gentlemen had got
far in advance of us. We came to the last rock of
difficult passage; Digby gave me his hand to assist
me in springing from it, and asked Cradock
to ascertain if the foot-hold below was sure; a
necessary precaution, as the matted leaves had
sometimes proved treacherous. Cradock in performing
this office, startled a rattle-snake, that lay
concealed under a mass of leaves and moss; the
reptile coiled himself up, and darted his fangs
into his hand. I heard the rattle of victory, and
saw the poor man's deathly paleness, as he sunk
to the ground, exclaiming, `I am but a dead sinner!'

“Digby turned to pursue the snake, and I
sprang from the rock. I begged Cradock to
show me the wound; it was on the back of his
hand. I assured him I could easily extract the
venom, and would have applied my lips to the
wound, but he withdrew his hand. Digby at
that moment returned. `She would suck the
poison from my hand, Digby,' said Cradock;
`verily, she is but little lower than the angels.'

“`What! Miss Hope!' exclaimed Digby,
`would you be guilty of self-murder, even if you
could save the old gentleman from dying—and
dying, as it were, by the will of the Lord?' I assured

Digby that there was no danger whatever
to me; that I had read of many cases of poison
being extracted in that way, without the slightest
injury to the person extracting it. He asked me
where I had read such stories. I was obliged to
refer to a book of aunt Grafton's, called `The
Wonders of the Crusades.' This seemed to Digby
but apocryphal authority; he shook his head, and
said, `he would believe such fables no where out
of the Bible. 'I entreated, vehemently, for I well
knew it could not harm me, and I believed it to
be life or death to my poor tutor. He seemed
half disposed to yield to me. `Thou hast a marvellous
persuasion, child,' he said; `and now I
remember me of a proverb they have in Italy—the
lips extract venom from the heart, and poison
from the wound.'

“Digby again shook his head. `Nothing but
one of those flourishes they put into verses,' he
said. `Come, come, Master Cradock, stir up a
manly spirit, and let's on to the fort, where we
may get help it's lawful for you to use; and don't
ransack your memory for any more such scholar-rubbish
to uphold you in consenting to our young
lady's exposing her life, to save the fag end of
yours.'

“`Expose her life!' retorted Cradock, rising
with a feeling of honest indignation, that for a
moment overcame the terror of death. `Digby,
you know that if I had a hundred lives, I would
rather lose them all, than expose her precious
life.'

“`I believe you, Master Cradock—I believe
you; and whether you live, or die, I will always
uphold you for a true-hearted man; and you must
excuse me for my boldness in speaking, when I
thought our young Mistress was putting herself
in the jaws of death.'

“We now made all speed to reach the fort;
but when we arrived there, no aid could be obtained,
and poor Cradock's death was regarded
as inevitable. I remembered to have heard Nelema
say, that she knew a certain antidote to the
poison of a rattle-snake; and when I told this to
your father, he ordered our horses to be saddled,
and we set out immediately for home, where we
arrived in six hours. Even in that brief space
the disease had made fearful progress. The
wound was horribly inflamed, and the whole arm
swoln and empurpled. I saw despair in every
face that looked on Cradock. I went myself,
attended by Jennet and Digby, to Nelema's
hut, for I knew if the old woman was in one of
her moody fits, she would not come for any bidding
but mine.

“Jennet, as you know was always her wont,
took up her testimony against `the old heathen
witch.' `It were better,' she said, `to die, than
to live by the devil's help.' I assured her, that
if the case were her own, I would not oppose
her pious preference; but that now I must have
my own way, and I believed the Giver of life would
direct the means of its preservation.

“Though it was near midnight, we found
Nelema sitting at the entrance of her hut. I
told her my errand. `Peace be with you, child,'
she said. `I knew you were coming, and have
been waiting for you.' She is superstitious, or
loves to affect supernatural knowledge, and I
should have thought nothing of her harmless
boast, had I not seen by the significant shake of
Jennet's head, that she set it down against her.
The old woman filled a deer-skin pouch from a
repository of herbs in one corner of her hut, and
then returned to Bethel with us. We found
Cradock in a state of partial delirium, and nervous
restlessness, which, your father said, was the
immediate precursor of death. Aunt Grafton
was kneeling at his bedside, reading the prayers
for the dying.

Nelema ordered every one, with the exception
of myself, to leave the room, for she said her cures
would not take effect, unless there was perfect
silence. Your father retired to his own apartment,
and gave orders that he should, in no case,
be diverted from his prayers. Aunt Grafton withdrew
with evident reluctance, and Jennet, lingered
till Nelema's patience was exhausted, when she
pushed her out of the room, and barred the door
against her.

“I confess, Everell, I would gladly have been
excluded too, for I recoiled from witnessing Cradock's
mortal agony; but I dared in no wise
cross Nelema, so I quietly took the lamp, as she

bade me, and stood at the head of the bed. She
first threw aside her blanket, and discovered a
kind of wand, which she had concealed beneath
it, wreathed with a snake's skin. She then pointed
to the figure of a snake delineated on her naked
shoulder. `It is the symbol of our tribe,' she
said. `Foolish child!' she continued, for she saw
me shudder; `it is a sign of honour, won for our
race by him who first drew from the veins the poison
of the king of all creeping things. The tale was told
by our fathers, and sung at our feasts; and now
am I, the last of my race, bidden to heal a servant
in the house of our enemies.' She remained for
a moment, silent, motionless, and perfectly abstracted.
A loud groan from Cradock roused her.
She bent over him, and muttered an incantation
in her own tongue. She then, after many efforts,
succeeded in making him swallow a strong decoction,
and bathed the wound and arm with the
same liquor. These applications were repeated at
short intervals, during which she brandished her
wand, making quick and mysterious motions, as
if she were writing hieroglyphics on the invisible
air. She writhed her body into the most horrible
contortions, and tossed her withered arms wildly
about her, and, Everell, shall I confess to you,
that I trembled lest she should assume the living
form of the reptile whose image she bore? So
violent was her exercise, that the sweat poured
from her face like rain, and, ever and anon, she
sank down in momentary exhaustion, and stupor;
and then would spring to her feet, as a race horse
starts on the course, fling back her long black
locks that had fallen over her bony face, and repeat
the strange process.

“After a while—how long I know not, for anxiety
and terror prevented my taking any note of
time—Cradock showed plain symptoms of amendment—his
respiration became free—the colour in
his face subsided—his brow, which had been
drawn to a knot, relaxed, and his whole appearance
became natural and tranquil. `Now,' whispered
Nelema to me, `fear no more for him—he
has turned his back on the grave. I will stay
here and watch him; but go thou to thy bed—
thy cheek is pale with weariness and fear.'

“I was too happy at that moment to feel weariness,
and would have remained, but Nelema's
gestures for me to withdraw were vehement, and I
left her, mentally blessing her for her effectual aid.
As I opened the door, I stumbled against Jennet.
It was evident from her posture, that she had been
peeping through the key-hole. Do not think me
a vixen, Everell, if I confess that my first impulse
was to box her ears; however, I suppressed my
rage, and, for the first time in my life, was prudent
and temporizing, and I stooped to beg her
to go with me to my room—I am sure it was with
the timid voice of one who asks a favour, for, the
moment we were in the light, I saw by her mien
that she felt the power was all in her own hands.
`It is enough,' she said, `to make the hair of a

saint stand on end to have such carryings-on in my
master's house; and you, Miss Hope Leslie, that
have been, as it were, exalted to heaven in point
of privileges, that you should be nothing better
than an aid and abetment of this imissary of Satan.'

“ `Hush,' said I, `Jennet, and keep your breath
to give thanks for good Mr. Cradock's recovery.
Nelema has cured him—Satan does not send forth
his emissaries with healing gifts.'

“ `Now, Miss Leslie,' retorted the provoking
creature, `you are in the very gall of bitterness
and blindness of the flesh. Did not the magicians
with their enchantments even as did Moses and
Aaron? The sons of darkness always put on the
form of the sons of light. I always said so. I
knew what it would come to. I said she was a
witch in Mistress Fletcher's time.'

“ `And you spoke falsely then, as you do now,
Jennet, for Nelema is no witch.'

“ `No witch!' rejoined Jennet, screaming with
her screech-owl voice, so loud that I was afraid
your father would overhear her; `try her then—
see if she can read in the Bible—or Mr. Cotton's
catechism—no, no; but give her your aunt Grafton's
prayer book, and she will read as glib as a
minister.'

“ `Jennet,' said I, `you are mad outright—
you seem to forget that Nelema cannot read any
thing.'

“ `It is all the same as if she could,' persisted

Jennet; `her master makes short teaching—there
are none so deaf as those that won't hear. I tell
you again, Miss Hope Leslie—remember Mrs.
Fletcher—remember what she got for shutting
her ears to me.'

“You will forgive me, Everell, for losing my
patience utterly at these profane allusions to your
mother, and commanding Jennet to leave my
room.

“She made me bitterly repent my want of self-command;
for, self-willed as the fools of Solomon's
time, she determined to have her own way,
and went to your father's room, where she gained
admittance, and gave such a description of Nelema's
healing process, that, late as it was, I was
summoned to his presence.

“As I followed Jennet along the passage, she
whispered to me, `now for the love of your own
soul, don't use his blind partiality to pervert his
judgment.'

“I made no reply, but mentally resolved that
I would task my power and ingenuity to the utmost
to justify Nelema. When we came into the
study, Jennet, to my great joy, was dismissed. It
is much easier for me to contend with my superiors,
than my inferiors. Your father bade me sit
down by him. I seated myself on the foot-stool
at his feet, so that I could look straight into his
eyes; for many a time, when my heart has quailed
at his solemn address, the tender spirit stationed in
that soft hazle eye of his—so like yours, Everell

—has quieted all my apprehensions. I spoke first,
and said, `I was sure Jennet had spoiled the good
news of my tutor's amendment, or he would not
look so grave.'

“He replied, `that it was time to look grave
when a pow-wow dared to use her diabolical spells,
mutterings, and exorcisms, beneath a christian
roof, and in the presence of a christian maiden,
and on a christian man; but,' he added, `perhaps
Jennet hath not told the matter rightly—her zeal
is not always according to knowledge. I would
gladly believe that my house has not been profaned.
Tell me, Hope, all you witnessed—tell
me truly.'

“I obeyed. Your father heard me through
without any comment, but now and then a deep-drawn
sigh; and when I had finished, he asked,
`what I understood by the strange proceedings I
had described?'

“ `May I not answer,' I said, `in the language
of scripture, `that this only I know, that whereas
thy servant was sick, he is now whole.”

“ `Do not, my dear child,' said your father,
`rashly misapply scripture—and thus add to your
sin, in (as I trust ignorantly) dealing with this
witch and her familiars.'

“I replied, `I did not believe Nelema had used
any witchcraft.'

“He asked me, `if I had not been told, that
some of our catechised Indians had confessed that
when they were pagans they were pow-wows, devoted

in their infancy to demons—that these pow-wows
were factors for the devil—that they held
actual conversation, and were in open and avowed
confederacy with him?'

“I said, `I had heard all this;' but asked, `if
it were right to take the confession of these poor
children of ignorance and superstition against
themselves?' I repeated what I had often heard
you, Everell, say, that Magawisca believed the
mountain, and the valley, the air, the trees, every
little rivulet, had their present invisible spirit—and
that the good might hold discourse with them.
`Why not believe the one,' I asked, `as well as
the other?'

“Your father looked at me sternly. `Dost thou
not believe in witchcraft, child?' he said. While
I hesitated how to reply, lest I should, in some
way, implicate Nelema, your father hastily turned
the leaves of the Bible, that lay on his table, and
opened to every text where familiar spirits, necromancers,
sorcerers, wizards, witches, and witchcraft,
are spoken of.

“I felt as if the windows of heaven were opened
on my devoted head. As soon as I could collect
my wits, I said something, confusedly, about
not having thought much on the subject; but that
I had supposed, as indeed I always did, that bad
spirits were only permitted to appear on earth,
when there were, also, good spirits and holy prophets
to oppose them.

“Your father looked steadily at me, for a few

moments, then closing the Bible, he said, `I will
not blame thee, my child, but myself, that I have
left thee to the guidance of thy natural erring reason;
I should have better instructed thee.' He
then kissed me, bade me good night, and opened
the door for me to depart. I ventured to ask, `if
I might not say to Jennet, that it was his order,
she should be silent in regard to Nelema?'

“ `No, no,' he said, `meddle no farther with
that matter, but go to your own apartment,
and remain there till the bell rings for morning
prayers.'

“My heart rebelled, but I dared not disobey.
I came to my room, and have been sitting by my
open window, in the hope of hearing Nelema's
parting footsteps; but I have listened in vain, and
unable to sleep, I have tried to tranquillize my
mind by writing to you. Poor old Nelema! if
she is given up to the magistrates, it will go hard
with her—Jennet is such an obstinate self-willed
fool! I believe she will be willing to see Nelema
hung for a witch, that she may have the pleasure
of saying, `I told you so.'

“Poor Nelema!—such a harmless, helpless,
lonely being—my tears fall so fast on my paper,
that I can scarcely write. I blame myself for
bringing her into this hapless case—but it may be
better than I fear. I will leave my letter and try
to sleep.

“It is as I expected: Nelema was sent, early
this morning, to the magistrates. She was tried
before our triumvirate, Mr. Pynchon, Holioke,
and Chapin. It was not enough to lay on her
the crime of curing Cradock, but Jennet and some
of her gossips imputed to her all the mischances
that have happened for the last seven years. My
testimony was extorted from me, for I could not
disguise my reluctance to communicate any thing
that could be made unfavourable to her. Our
magistrates looked sternly on me, and Mr. Holioke
said, `Take care, Hope Leslie, that thou art
not found in the folly of Balaam, who would have
blessed, when the Lord commanded him to curse.'

“I said, `It was better to mistake in blessing
than in cursing, and that I was sure Nelema was
as innocent as myself.' I know not whence I had
my courage, but I think truth companies not with
cowardice; however, what I would fain call courage,
Mr. Pynchon thought necessary to rebuke
as presumption:—`Thou art somewhat forward,
maiden,' he said, `in giving thy opinion; but thou
must know, that we regard it but as the whistle of
a bird; withdraw, and leave judgment to thy
elders.'

“In leaving the room I passed close to Nelema.
I gave her my hand in token of kindness;
and though I heard a murmur of `shame—
shame!' I did not withdraw it till the poor old
creature had bowed her wrinkled brow upon it,

and dropped a tear which no suffering could have
extorted.

“The trial went on, and she was pronounced
worthy of death; but as the authority of our magistracy
does not extend to life, limb, or banishment,
her fate is referred to the court at Boston.
In the mean time, she awaits her sentence in a
cell, in Mr. Pynchon's cellar. We have, as yet,
no jail.

“Digby has been summoned before the magistrates,
and publickly reproved for expressing himself
against their proceedings. Mr. Pynchon
charged him to speak no more against godly governors
and righteous government, for “to such
scoffers heaven had sent divers plagues—some
had been spirited away by Satan—some blown
up in our harbours—and some, like poor Austin
of Quinnepaig, taken into Turkish captivity!!”
Digby's feelings are suppressed, but not subdued.

“How I wish you were here, dear Everell.
Sometimes I wish your mother's letter had not
been so persuasive. Nothing but that last request
of hers, would have induced your father to send
you to your uncle Stretton. If you were here, I
am sure you would devise some way to save Nelema.

When she is gone, you will never again
hear of Magawisca. I shall never hear more of
my sweet sister. They both, if we may believe
Nelema, still dwell safely in the wigwam of Mononotto,
among the Mohawks. These Mohawks
are said to be a fierce race; and all those tribes
who dwell near the coast, and have, in some measure,
come under a christian jurisdiction, and are
called `praying and catechised Indians,' say, that
the Mohawks are to them as wolves to sheep. I
cannot bear to think of my gentle timid sister, a
very dove in her nature, among these fierce tribes.
I wonder that I am ever happy, and yet it is so
natural to me to be happy! The commander of
the fort at Albany, at Governor Winthrop's request,
has made great efforts to obtain some
information about my sister, but without any satisfactory
result. Still Nelema insists to me, that
her knowledge is certain; and when I have endeavoured
to ascertain the source whence she
derived it, she pointed upwards, indicating that
she held mysterious intelligence with the spirits
of the air; but I believe she employed this artifice
to hide some intercourse she holds with distant and
hostile tribes.

“What a tragi-comedy is life, Everell!—I am
sure your favourite, Shakespear, has copied nature
in dividing his scenes between mirth and sadness.

I have laughed to-day, heartily, and for a
few moments I quite forgot poor Nelema, and all
my heart-rending anxieties about her. My tutor,
for the first time since his most unlucky mishap,
left his room, and made his appearance in the parlour.
I was sitting there with aunt Grafton, and
I rose to shake his hand, and express my unfeigned
joy on his recovery. His little gray eyes were,
for a moment, blinded with tears at what he was
pleased to call the `condescendency of my regard
for him.' He then stood for a moment, as if he
were lost, as you know is always his wont, when a
blur comes over his mind, which is none of the
clearest at best. I thought he looked pale and
weak, and I offered him a chair and begged him
to sit down, but he declined it with a wave, or rather
a poke, of his hand, for he never in his life
made a motion so graceful as a wave, and drawing
a paper from his pocket, he said, `I have here
an address to thee, sweet Miss Hope Leslie,
wherein I have put in a body of words the spirit
of my late meditations, and I have endeavoured
to express, in the best latinity with which many
years of daily and nightly study have possessed
me, my humble sense of that marvellous wit and
kindness of thine, which made thee, as it were, a
ministering angel unto me, when I was brought
nigh unto the grave by the bite of that most cunning
beast of the field, with whom, I verily believe,
the devil left a portion of his spirit, in payment
of the body he borrowed to beguile our
first parents.'

“This long preamble finished, Master Cradock
began the reading of his address, of which, being
in the language of the learned, I could not, as you
know, understand one word; however, he did not
perceive that my smiles were not those of intelligence,
nor hear aunt Grafton's remark, that
`much learning and little wit had made him as
crazy as a loon.' He had not proceeded far,
when his knees began to shake under him, and
disdaining to sit, (an attitude, I suppose, proscribed
in the ceremonies of the schools, the
only ceremonies he observes) he contrived, with
the aid of the chair I had placed for him, to kneel.
When he had finished his address, which, according
to the rules of art, had a beginning, a middle,
and, thank heaven, an end, he essayed to rise;
but, alas! though, like Falstaff, he had an `alacrity
in sinking,' to rise was impossible; for beside
the usual impediments of his bulk and clumsiness,
he was weakened and stiffened by his late sickness;
so I was fain to call Digby to his assistance,
and run away to my own apartment to write
you, dear Everell, who are ever patient with my
Bethel chronicles, an account of what aunt Grafton
calls, `this scholar foolery.'

“Yesterday was our lecture day, and I went to
the village to attend the meeting. A sudden
storm of hail and wind came on during the exercises,

and continued after, and I was obliged to
accept Mrs. Pynchon's invitation to go home with
her. After we had taken our supper, I observed
Mr. Pynchon fill a plate, bountifully, with provisions
from the table, and give it with a large key,
which he took from a little cupboard over the fire-place,
to a serving woman. She returned, in a
short time, with the key, and, as I observed, restored
it to its place. Digby came shortly after
to attend me home. The family hospitably urged
me to remain, and ascertaining from Digby that
there was no especial reason for my return, I
dismissed him.

“The next morning I was awakened from a
deep sleep by one of Mr. Pynchon's daughters,
who told me, with a look of terror, that a despatch
had arrived early that morning from Boston,
notifying the acquiescence of the Court
there, in the opinion of our magistrates, and Nelema's
sentence of condemnation to death—that
her father had himself gone to the cell to announce
her fate to her, when lo! she had vanished—the
prison-door was fast—the key in its usual
place—but the witch was spirited away. I hurried
on my clothes, and trembling with surprise,
pleasure, or whatever emotion you may please
to ascribe to me, I descended to the parlor,
where the family and neighbours had assembled
to talk over the strange event. I only added exclamations
to the various conjectures that were
made. No one had any doubt as to who had been

Nelema's deliverer, unless a suspicion was implied
in the inquiring glances which Mr. Pynchon
cast on me, but which, I believe, no one but myself
observed. Some could smell sulphur from the
outer kitchen door to the door of the cell; and
there were others who fancied that, at a few yards
distance from the house, there were on the ground
marks of a slight scorching—a plain indication
of a visitation from the enemy of mankind. One
of the most sagacious of our neighbours remarked,
that he had often heard of Satan getting his
servants into trouble, but he never before heard
of his getting them out. However, the singularity
of the case only served to magnify their wonder,
without, in the least, weakening their faith in
the actual, and, as it appeared, friendly alliance
between Nelema, and the evil one. Indeed, I was
the only person present whose belief in her
witchcraft was not, as it were, converted into
sight.

“Everell, I had been visited by a strange dream
that night, which I will venture to relate to you;
for you, at least, will not think me confederate
with Nelema's deliverer.

“Methought I stood, with the old woman, beneath
the elm tree, at the end of Mr. Pynchon's
garden; the moon, through an opening of the
branches, shone brightly on her face—it was wet
with tears.

“`I shall not forget,' she said, `who saved me
from dying by the hand of an enemy. As surely

as the sun will appear there again,' she added,
pointing to the east—`so surely, Hope Leslie, you
shall see your sister.'

“ `But, Nelema,' said I, `my poor little sister
is in the far western forests—you can never reach
there.'

“ `I will reach there,' she replied—`if I crawl
on my hands and knees, I will reach there.'

“Think you, dear Everell, my sister will ever
expound this dream to me?

“I was the first to carry the news to Bethel.
Your father was in one of his meditative humours,
and heeded it no more than if I had told him a
bird had flown from its cage. Jennet joined in
the general opinion, that Satan, or at least one of
his emissaries, had opened the prison door; and
our good Digby, with his usual fearlessness,
maintained, in the teeth of her exhortation and
invective, that an angel had wrought for the innocent
old woman.

“A week has elapsed. It is whispered that on
the night Nelema vanished, Digby was missed by
his bed-fellow!—strange depredations were committed
on Jennet's larder!—and muffled oars were
heard on the river!

“Our magistrates have made long and frequent
visits to Bethel, and have held secret conferences
with your father. The purport of them I leave

you to conjecture from the result. Yesterday he
sent for me to the study. He appeared deeply
affected. It was some time before he could command
his voice; at length he said, that he had
determined to accept for me Madam Winthrop's
invitation to Boston. I told him, and told him
truly, that I did not wish to go to Boston—
that I was perfectly contented—perfectly happy.
`And what,' I asked, `will you and poor aunt
Grafton do without me?'

“ `Your aunt goes with you,' he said; `and as
for me, my dear child, I have too long permitted
myself the indulgence of having you with me. I
have a pilgrimage to accomplish through this
wilderness, and I am sinful if I linger to watch
the unfolding of even the single flower that has
sprung up in my path.'

“ `But,' said I, `does not He who appoints the
path through the wilderness, set the flowers by
the wayside? I will not—I will not be plucked
up and cast away.' He kissed me, and said, `I
believe, my beloved child, thou wert sent in mercy
to me; but it were indeed sinful to convert
the staff vouchsafed to my pilgrimage into fetters.
I should ever bear in mind that life is a race and
a warfare, and nothing else: you have this yet to
learn, Hope. I have proved myself not fit to
teach, or to guide thee—nor is your aunt. Madam
Winthrop will give you pious instruction
and counsel, and her godly niece, Esther Downing,
will, I trust, win you to the narrow path,

which, as the elders say, she doth so steadily pursue.'

“The idea of this puritanical guardianship
did not strike me agreeably, and besides, I love
Bethel—I love your father—with my whole soul
I love him; and, as you already know, Everell,
therefore it is no confession, I love to have my
own way, and I said, I would not go.

“ `You must go, my child,' said your father;
`I cannot find it in my heart to chide you for your
reluctance, but you must go. Neither you, nor I,
have any choice.'

“ `But why must I go?' I asked.

“ `Ask no questions,' he replied; `it is fixed
that you must go. Tell your aunt Grafton that
she must be ready to leave Springfield next week.
Mr. Pynchon and his servants attend you. Now
leave me, my child, for when you are with me,
you touch at will every chord in my heart, and I
would fain keep it still now.'

“I left him, Everell, while I could command my
tears; and after I had given them free course, I
informed aunt Grafton of our destiny. She was
so delighted with the prospect of a visit to Boston,
that I, too, began to think it must be very
pleasant; and my dread of this straight-laced Mrs.
Winthrop and her perpendicular niece, gave
place to indefinite anticipations of pleasure. I
shall, at any rate, see you sooner than if I remained
here. Thank heaven, the time of your return
approaches; and now that it is so near, I rejoice

that your father has not been persuaded, by those
who seem to me to take a very superfluous care
of his private affairs, to recall you sooner. On
this subject he has stood firm: satisfied, as he
has always said, that he could not err in complying
with the last request of your sainted mother.

“Aunt Grafton charges me with divers messages
to you, but I will not add a feather to this
leaden letter, which you will now have to read,
as I have written it, by instalments.

“Farewell, dear Everell, forget not thy loving
friend and sister,
“Hope Leslie.”

As Hope had declined her aunt's messages, the
good lady affixed them herself—and here they
follow.

“To Everell Fletcher.
“Valued sir

—Being much hurried in point of
time, I would fain have been myself excused from
writing, but Miss Hope declines adding to her
letter what I have indited.

In your last, you mention being visited with the
great cold, which, I take from your account of it,
to be the same as that with which we were all
shaken soon after the coronation of his present
Majesty. (God bless him!) I had then a recipe
given me for an infallible remedy, by the Lady
Penyvere, great aunt, by the mother's side, to la
belle Rosette, maid of honour to the queen.

“I enclose it for you, believing it will greatly advantage
you, though Hope insists that if the cold
has not yet left you, it will be a chronic disease
before this reaches you; in which case, I would
advise you to apply to old Lady Lincoln, who
hath in her family receipt-book, many renowned
cures for chronics. I remember one in particular,
somewhere about the middle of the book,
which follows immediately after a rare recipe for
an every-day plum-pudding.

“I doubt not that years have mended thee, and
that thou wouldst now condemn the folly and
ignorance of thy childhood, which made thee
then deride the most sovereign remedies. Hope,
I am sorry to say, is as obstinate as ever; and it
was but yesterday, when I wished her to take
some diluents for a latent fever, that she reminded
me of the time when she, and you, in one of
your mischievous pranks, threw the pennyroyal
tea out of the window, and suffered me to believe
that it had cured an incipient pleurisy. Thus
presumptuous is youth! Hope is, to be sure, notwithstanding
her living entirely without medicine,
in indifferent good health; her form is rather
more slender than when you left us, as is becoming
at seventeen; but her cheek is as round and
as ruddy as a peach. I should not care so much
about her self-will on the score of medicine, but
that her stomach being in such perfect order now,
would bear every kind of preventive, and medicines
of this class are so simple, that they can do

no harm. I believe it is true, as old Doctor Panton
used to say, `your healthy people are always
prejudiced against medicine.' I wish you would
drop a hint on this subject in your next letter to
her, for the slightest hint from you goes further
than a lecture from me.

“It was very thoughtful in you, Mr. Everell, and
what I once should not have expected, to inquire
so particularly after my health. I am happy
to say, that at this present I am better than
I have been for years, which is unaccountable
to me, as, since the hurry of our preparations
for Boston, I have forgotten my pills at night,
and my tonics in the morning.

“I wish you to present many thanks to Lady
Amy for assisting you in my commissions. The
articles in general suited, though the pinking of
the flounces was too deep. My gown was a
trifle too dark—but do not mention that to
Lady Amy, for I make no doubt she took due
pains, and only wanted a right understanding of
the real hue, called feuille morte, which, between
you and I—sub rosa, mind—my gown would not
be called, by any person skilled in the colours of
silk. Hope thought to convince me I was wrong
by matching it with a dead leaf from the forest.
Was not that peculiar of Hope?

“Now, Mr. Everell, I do not wish to be an old
woman before my time, therefore I will have
another silk of a brighter cast. Brown it must be,
but lively—lively. I will enclose a lock of Hope's

hair, which is precisely the hue I mean. You
will observe it has a golden tinge, that makes
it appear in all lights as if there were sunshine
on it, and yet it is a decided brown; a
difficult colour to hit, but by due inquiry, and I
am sure, from the pains you were at to procure
the articles I requested for Hope, you will spare
no trouble, I think it may be obtained.

“I am greatly beholden to you for the pocket-glass
you sent me; it is a mighty convenient article,
and an uncommon pretty little attention, Mr.
Everell.

“Your present to Hope was a real beauty. The
only blue fillet, and the prettiest, of any colour, I
ever saw; and such a marvellous match for her
eyes—that is, when the light is full on them; but
you know they always had a changeable trick
with them. I remember Lady Amy's once saying
to me before we left England, that my niece
would yet do mischief with those laughing black
eyes of hers. I liked her sister's (poor dear
Mary—God help her the while!) better then, they
were the true Leslie blue. But one word more
of the fillet. Your taste in it cannot be too much
commended; but then, as I tell Hope, one does
not want always to see the same thing; and she
doth continually wear it;—granted, it keeps the
curls out of her eyes, and they do look lovely falling
about it, but she wears it, week-days and Sundays,
feast days and fast days, and she never yet
has put on the Henriette; (do remember a thousand

thanks to Lady Amy for the pattern) the
Henriette, I made her, like that worn by the
queen the first night she appeared in the royal
box.

“I should like to have a little more chit-chat
with you, Mr. Everell, now my pen has got, so to
speak, warm in the harness; but business before
pleasure. I beg you will remember me to all inquiring
friends. Alas! few in number now, as
most of my surviving contemporaries have died
since I left England.

“Farewell, Mr. Everell, these few lines are
from your friend and well-wisher,

“Bertha Grafton.

“N.B. It is a great pleasure to me to think you
are living in a churchman's family, where you
can't but steer clear of—you know what—peculiarities.

“N.B. Hope will have given you the particulars
of poor Master Cradock's miscarriage; his mind
was set a little agee by it, but he appears to be
mending.

“N.B. The enclosed recipe hath marvellous
virtues in fevers, as well as in colds.”