Page:Papers on Literature and Art (Fuller).djvu/364

178 tragedy, will be at no loss to understand. Mr. Murdoch is labouring to a purpose and with the author. The play is a beautiful example of development, All is elaborately wrought out, the details are numerous, and the result simplicity.

The plot is simply this. A proud woman of great independence and superior education, retires, when age and trouble have begun to set their marks upon her, to the comparative solitude of Salem. She bore trouble in her heart, was among the townspeople, but not of them, loved lonely walks on the hill side, gathered old Indian relics, which she kept out of reverence for the past. “The fee grief due to her single breast” was remorse for an act of pride, by which her husband had fallen in a duel. A word from her might have prevented the calamity, and she had not spoken it.

With such elements, and the material the meddlesome town naturally afforded, and the vile poison of witchcraft already introduced into the land, how easily was this woman implicated. She walked alone and talked much with herself—it was a trick of witchcraft. She possessed little Indian figures, which she called after the names of the local characters of the town—the magistrates and constables, whose religion was to be set at work either through fear or the insult—these were the instruments of incantation, like the waxen images of ancient necromancy. She laughed at the folly of her persecutors—it was of course hardened wickedness. The atmosphere is so choking, that the son yields and for a moment believes his mother’s guilt, but when he listens to her explanation of the silent grief, the lonely walks, he spurns the whole brood in language and acts of unmeasured indignation. This is the triumph of the actor, as well as of the moral element in the fifth act. But evil men have had their counsel and completed their deed. The Witch is condemned to die!

This passage tells much of the story. There are other incidents and personages. The Deacon is strongly marked, so is that feeble little shadow of him and the justice, petty officer Pudeater. The Deacon is described