Page:Salem - a tale of the seventeenth century (IA taleseventeenth00derbrich).pdf/129

 Noyes died of sudden and violent internal hemorrhage, bleeding profusely at the mouth, what wonder if it were long a commonly received tradition that the frantic words of the wronged and dying woman were thus fearfully verified?

The only record we find remaining of Tituba, the Indian woman, is that she afterward testified that her master did beat and otherwise abuse her, to make her confess, and accuse the others; and that what she had said in confessing and accusing others was in consequence of such usage from him; that he refused to pay her prison fees, and take her out of jail, unless she would stand to what she had said; and that consequently she remained in jail, until she was finally "sold for her fees."

If this is true, and there seems no reason to doubt it, it bears a fearful testimony against Mr. Parris, her master, as having been the unseen but moving power of this great tragedy.

The fearful delusion had now reached its height; its lamentable effects were wide-*spread, and the whole country felt its hor