Immediately, many if not all of the bewitched had grievous fits. Q. Ann Putnam, who hurt you? A. Goodman Procter, and his wife too. Afterwards some of the afflicted cried, there is Procter going to take up Mrs. Pope's feet. And her feet were immediately taken up. Q. What do you say goodman Procter, to these things? A. I know not, I am innocent. Abigail Williams cried out, there is goodman Procter going to Mrs. Pope, and immediately said Pope fell into fits. You see the devil will deceive you; the children could see what you was going to do before the woman was hurt. I would advise you to repentance; for the devil is bringing you out. Abigail Williams cried out again, there is goodman Procter going to hurt goody Bibber; and immediately goody Bibber fell into a fit. There was the like of Mary Walcott and divers others. Benjamin Gould gave in his testimony that he had seen goodman Corey and his wife, Procter and his wife, goody Cloyse, goody Nurse, and goody Griggs in his chamber last Thursday night. Elizabeth Hubbard was in a trance during the whole examination. During the examination of Elizabeth Procter, Abigail Williams and Ann Putnam both made offer to strike at said Procter, but when Abigail's hand came near, it opened; whereas it was made up into a fist before, and came down exceeding lightly, as it drew near to said Procter; and at length with open and extended fingers, touched Procter's hood very lightly. Immediately Abigail cried out, her fingers, her fingers, her fingers burned; and Ann Putnam took on most grievously of her husband and sunk down."

"Upon such senseless jargon as this, many persons of sober lives and unblemished characters were committed to prison; and the public prejudices had already pronounced their doom. Against charges of this nature, thus conducted, no defence could possibly be made. To be criminated was to be found guilty. The very grossness of the imposition seemed to secure its success, and the absurdity of the accusation to establish the verity of the charge.

"The consternation became almost universal. It was soon perceived that all attempts to establish innocence must be ineffectual, and the person accused could only hope to obtain safety, by confessing the truth of the charge, and criminating others. The

extent of crime to be introduced by such a state of things may readily be conceived. Every feeling of humanity is shocked when we learn that to save themselves, children accused their parents; in some instances, parents their children; and in one case, sentence of death was pronounced against a husband on the testimony of his wife.

The examination had commenced in February, and the list of commitments had swelled to a lamentable bulk by June, when the new charter having arrived, commissioners of oyer and terminer were appointed for the trial of persons charged with witchcraft. By this court a considerable number were condemned, of whom nineteen, protesting their ignorance, were executed. It is observed by Mr. Hutchinson, that those who were condemned and not executed, had most probably saved themselves by a confession of their guilt.

"Fortunately for those who were still to be tried, the legisla ture, convened under the new charter, created a regular tribunal for the trial of criminal as well as civil cases, and the court of commissioners rose to sit no more. The first session of the regular court for the trial of criminal cases was to be held in January, and this delay was favourable to reflection and to the recovery of the public reason. Other causes contributed to this event. There remained yet in the various prisons of the colony, a vast number of women, many of whom were of the most reputable families in the towns in which they had resided; and many of the very first rank had been hinted at, and some expressly named by the bewitched and confessing witches. A Mr. Bradstreet, who had been appointed one of the council, and was son to the old governor of that name; but who as a justice of the peace was suspected of not prosecuting with sufficient rigour, was named by the witnesses as a confederate, and found it necessary to abscond. The governor's lady it is said, and the wife of one of the ministers who had favoured this persecution, were among the accused; and a charge was also brought against the secretary of the colony of Connecticut.

"Although the violence of the torrent of prejudice was beginning to abate, yet the grand jury in January, found a true bi against fifty persons, but of those brought to trial, only three were

condemned, and they were not executed. All those who were not tried in January, were discharged by order of the governor, and never, says Mr. Hutchinson, has such a jail delivery been known in Newengland. And never was there given a more melancholy proof of the degree of depravity always to be counted on when the public passions countenance crime."

FOR THE PORT FOLIO.

DUTCH CLEANLINESS AND FEMALE INFLUENCE.

THE cleanliness of the Dutch in their houses is proverbial, and is sometimes curiously contrasted with the neglect of their persons. I have heard of a gentleman, who being introduced into one of their very clean rooms, and having occasion to spit, declared that he saw no place fit for that purpose but the person of the landlord.

Sir William Temple, in his memoirs, during a residence in Holland, relates the following anecdote:

"Dining one day at monsieur Haeft's (at Amsterdam) and having a great cold, I observed every time I spit, a tight hand. some wench (that stood in the room with a clean cloth in her hand) was presently down to wipe it up and rub the board clean: somebody at table speaking of my cold, I said the most trouble it gave was to see the poor wench take so much pains about it: Mr. Haeft told me 'twas well I had escaped so, and that if his wife had been at home, though I were an ambassador, she would have turned me out of doors for fouling her house; and laughing at that humour, said, there were two rooms of his house that he never durst come into, and believed they were never open but twice a year to make them clean. I said, I found he was a good patriot, and not only in the interest of his country, but in the customs of the town, where that of the wife's governing, was, I heard, a thing established. He replied, 'twas true, and that all a man could hope for there was to have an easy governess, and that his wife was so. Another of the magistrates at table, who was a graver man, said, monsieur Haeft was pleasant, but the thing was no more so in their town than in any other place that he knew of. Haeft replied

very briskly, it was so, and could not be otherwise, for it had long been the custom; and whoever offered to break it would have banded against him, not only all the women in the town, but all those men too that were governed by their wives, which would make too great a party to be opposed. In the afternoon upon a visit, and occasion of what had been said at monsieur Haeft's, many stories were told of the strange and curious cleanliness so general in that city, and some so extravagant that my sister took them for jest; when the secretary of Amsterdam, that was of the company, desiring her to look out of the window, said, why madam, "there is the house where one of our magistrates going to visit the mistress of it, and knocking at the door a strapping North Holland lass came and opened it: he asked whether her mistress was at home? she said yes, and with that he offered to go in; but the wench, marking his shoes were not very clean, took him by both arms, threw him upon her back, carried him across two rooms, set him down at the bottom of the stairs, pulled off his shoes, put him on a pair of slippers that stood there, and all this without saying a word; but when she had done, told him he might go up to her mistress, who was in her chamber."

The descendants of the Dutch in this country retain the same fondness for scrubbing. It is said, that in Albany they have their firewood piled in heaps with the smooth ends outwards, which are regularly rubbed and kept clean and bright in the same manner as articles of furniture. Many other stories are told whether true or not, of their "strange and curious cleanliness." This rigid cleanliness, however, is not confined to the Dutch, and I am credibly informed, that there are in this city many worthy gentlemen, who, like Mr, Haeft, are rarely if ever admitted into certain apartments, which are opened only to be cleaned.

It is curious to remark in sir Wm. Temples' Dutch story, as well as in other instances, what a close connexion there appears to be between this virtue of cleanliness, and a certain arbitrary power in the wife. Whether this being among the severer virtues, is naturally allied to sternness of temper and love of rule, or whether the love of dominion be not the cause of this extreme cleanliness, I cannot determine; the latter opinion seems to have been adopted by an ingenious author of an Essay upon White washing, written several years ago, in which he ventures to suggest, that the prac

tice originated in a scheme of the wife to get possession of the house, and to turn the husband out of doors. He observes, that luckily for the rights of man, this practice did not prevail so extensively as formerly, and that the paper-makers had caused a considerable revolution in this matter. However that may be, I rejoice in the belief, that in all the changes of modes, there has been no diminution of female power, and that if their prerogatives have been lessened, their influence has increased. X.

EVENING SOCIETY.

[THE following communications, which, for the sake of perspieuity, we place together, represent a grievance in our society, of which, we understand, all are disposed to complain, though none will exert themselves to remedy it. It is in truth a sad and unnatural state of things, when the only hours devoted to what is termed social intercourse should be precisely those when we are most occupied, and that in our moments of leisure, we shut ourselves up churlishly and will not admit our acquaintances. We much fear that such habits will render our society very dull and insipid. As the matter stands at present, in the morning a whole family is disturbed to argue the weather with visiters who are running against time, and measuring their conversation by a stop-watch, or else, which is the happier alternative for both parties, we must "speak by the card," as Hamlet says. But let that unhappy wight beware, who, trusting to the usages elsewhere, ventures to ring an evening bell in Philadelphia. Him no smiling footman welcomes -but dark inquisitive looks are upon him to ascertain whether he be of the kindred, or of sufficient intimacy to have admission to the mysteries of the fireside, and instead of meeting the fate of Acteon for looking upon these sanctities, he is more likely to have a reception the very reverse of being turned into any thing. An evening visit is, in fact, almost deemed downright housebreaking. "He that by night," says lord Coke, " breaketh and entereth into a mansion-house with intent to commit a felony," is guilty of a high