"I am constrained to declare, as the result of as thorough a
scrutiny as I could institute, my belief that this dreadful
transaction was introduced and driven on by wicked perjury and
wilful malice."
UPHAM'S LECTURE OX SALEM WITCHCRAFT.
"Is there any cause in nature that makes these hard hearts?"
LEAR.
There seems sometimes to be an element of evil in the heart of a child,
that would almost persuade us to believe in original sin. In the breast
of those who have been favorably born and kindly nurtured, it may sleep
forever; but, when the conscience has been soiled in early childhood, it
awakes the appetite for sin, and the restraint that comes afterwards
curbs without subduing the disposition to evil.
It is true that poor Phoebe had felt a strong affection for her
grandmother; and, without all other moral restraint, it was the only
point in which her heart could be touched. The vagrant life she had led
had also had its influence:
"Happy because the sunshine was her dower,"
she could not always be insensible to the beauty of the heaven that had
so often canopied her sleep, or the grandeur of the ocean where she had
passed whole days playing with the waves. She rebelled against the
restraint that every feminine occupation imposed on this wild liberty.
She quailed, indeed, before Dinah's more resolute spirit; but Edith's
gentleness had failed to touch her heart; and she knew that her forced
obedience to Dinah was only the result of Edith's authority.
When the child appeared, Edith held out her hand with her own grave,
sweet smile; but, the moment the child saw her, she began again to act
her part, and to throw her body and limbs into violent contortions.
Edith was not alarmed: she saw it was feigned; and, drawing her to her
knees, she held both her little hands tightly clasped in hers. Phoebe
became instantly calm; but this was a part of the system of
deception,--that, as soon as the accused touched the afflicted, they
should be calmed and healed.
Edith looked in her face, and said, very kindly, "Tell me, my poor
child, who has persuaded you to do this wicked thing,--to accuse me of
this horrible crime? tell me truly. I shall not be angry with you, I
shall not punish you, if you tell me the truth. Who first spoke to you
about it? What have they promised you for bringing this trouble on me?"
The child, unmoved, said, "You yourself made me do it."
"I! O, my poor Phoebe, how can you be so wicked as to tell this dreadful
lie? Do you not know that God sees you and hears you, and that he will
punish you for it? I may die: you may cause my death; but you will live
to repent; and, O, how sorry you will be in after years, when you think
how much I loved you, and you have caused my death! But, my poor Phoebe,
you know not what you do; you know not what death is."
"My grandmother died," said the child.
"Ah, yes; but she died quietly in her bed, and you were sleeping near;
and when I took you in my arms to look at her, you saw only her peaceful
countenance. But I shall not die thus: I shall be dragged before angry
men, and, with irons on my hands and ankles, I shall be lifted to the
scaffold, and there, before hundreds of angry faces turned towards me,
I shall die alone! not peacefully, as your grandmother did, when with my
own hands I closed her eyes, but horribly, in pain and agony! and you
will have done this,--you that I have loved so"--
Phoebe became very red, and the tears came to her eyes.
Edith thought she had touched the child's heart, and continued: "I knew
you could not be so wicked, so young and looking so innocent. No, my
child; you love me, and you will unsay all you have said, and we will go
home again together."
The child answered, with much violence, "No, no, never! you pricked me
with pins, and you tormented me."
"O, monstrous!" said Edith; "if I could believe in devils, I should
believe you were now possessed. O, it is not natural! so young, and with
a woman's nature! You do not love me, then. I have punished you when you
have done wrong, and you have not forgiven me: you wish to be revenged.
You do not answer. Phoebe! tell me: are you angry that I punished you?
God knows it pained me to do so. But your poor grandmother gave you to
me that I might try to make you a good child; and if I had not punished
you when you did wrong, you would have grown up a wicked woman. God
grant you may not be so now! you are already revenged."
Phoebe said, very sullenly, "You punished me twice."
"Good God! and is it for that you have brought on me this terrible evil?
Can such revenge dwell in so young a heart?"
Edith walked several times across the room, trying to calm her agitated
nerves. The child stood with an expression of obstinate determination in
her whole manner.
At length Edith went to her, and took her, as she had often done at
home, in her arms.
"My dear Phoebe, do you remember the day when your grandmother died? I
was there by her bedside; and you, a poor, deserted child, were crying
bitterly. I took you home to my house. Like myself, you were an orphan;
and I prayed to the orphan's Father that from me your little heart might
never know a pang of sorrow. You fell asleep in my arms; and since then
I have ever loved you almost as though I were indeed your mother, and
you were my own child. And you, Phoebe, you have loved me, have you
not?"
The child was silent.
"Do you remember the fever you had soon after? when you were restless in
your bed, and I took you in my arms, and all night my bosom was your
pillow, and I watched you many nights, and thought not of sleep or
fatigue when I held your little hand, burning with fever, in my own all
night? Ah! you loved me then; you will love me again, and--"
"I never loved you," said the child; "I do not love you now."
Edith put her quickly from her arms, and turning to the man who was
present, "Take her away," she said; "take the poor child away. O, my
God! is it for this I have lavished on her the tenderness of my heart! I
warmed her in my bosom, and she has stung me to the quick. O, had I been
less indulgent, I might have subdued her stubborn nature. Of what avail
has been a life of self-denial, of benevolence? Of what avail that I
have striven to enlighten my own mind and to do good to others? In one
moment, by that child of my own cherishing, but the creature of my own
bounty, I am suspected of a horrible, contemptible crime; humiliated to
the very dust. O, my Father! it is too much." She covered her face with
her hands, and burst into tears.
The person who had witnessed the scene with the child was the same elder
I have mentioned as possessing much tenderness of heart, but too weak a
head to listen to its dictates when opposed to the influence of others.
He had been much affected by her appeal to the child, and came back to
urge her, if she had any friends to espouse her cause, to send for them.
He said the fanaticism was increasing; that the prisons in many villages
were filled with the accused; that the hearts of the people were
hardened against them; and that her own cause had been much injured by
the confession of the old woman: and he ended by entreating her to
confess also, and save her life.
To the last proposal, Edith did not answer. She said she had already
written to the only friend on whom she could rely, and that Paul had
gone himself with her letter. Her cause, she said, seemed already lost,
and all she wished at present was, that Dinah might be permitted to
visit her, and that she might be left alone.
When Edith was alone, she felt the depression that succeeds to great
excitement. She looked back on her life with that sick and heart-broken
feeling that the young experience after severe disappointments. She was
too young to die; and, though her life had been comparatively blameless,
the excess of feeling she had lavished on a few idols seemed now to her
almost like a crime. She had forgotten, she thought, that her duties had
been plain, and simple, and humble, lying all about her path like
unnoticed flowers, while she had longed for something more exciting to
fill her heart.
It is easy for the accused to believe themselves guilty. She trembled
when she thought how many, not weaker than herself, when suspected and
deserted by friends, had yielded to their fears, and even fancied
themselves _guilty_ of crimes which they abhorred; and she mentally
prayed, "Ah, my Father, save me from myself." Then came the thought of
Seymore, of his grief, his desolation! "Ah, who will understand him,"
she said; "who will comfort him when I am gone? But will he remember
me?" thought she; "will he think of me in 'widowhood of heart?'"
Who would die and be wholly forgotten? We long intensely to live in the
hearts that love us now. We would not pass away "like the summer-dried
fountain," forgotten when its sound has ceased. We would have our lowly
grave visited by holy, twilight thoughts, and our image return at the
hour of prayer. How few are thus remembered! Now Edith thought of her
father, and all the yearning of her heart, which her love for Seymore
had stifled, came back, and torrents of tears flowed as she recalled her
happy childhood.
They were checked by the entrance of Dinah. She brought comfort with
her, and a cheerful countenance, for she did not know the result of
Edith's conversation with the child, and she was full of hope that
Phoebe would retract all she had said.
Edith could not bear to undeceive her poor friend, and smiled, and
thanked her as she arranged a nice, clean bed, placed the books she had
brought within her reach, and pressed her to eat of the delicacies she
had prepared. She arranged the little repast with all the neatness of
home, and gave to the gloomy apartment an air of comfort; and Edith
smiled again, and felt lightened of half her load of despondency, by the
presence of this faithful guardian.