Yes, something more.An island, with the sea Breaking all round it, like a blooming hedge.
What land is this?
TITUBA.
It is San Salvador, Where Tituba was born.What see you now?
MARY.
A man all black and fierce.
TITUBA.
That is my father.
He was an Obi man, and taught me magic,--Taught me the use of herbs and images.
What is he doing?
MARY.
Holding in his hand A waxen figure.He is melting it Slowly before a fire.
TITUBA.
And now what see you?
MARY.
A woman lying on a bed of leaves, Wasted and worn away.Ah, she is dying!
TITUBA.
That is the way the Obi men destroy The people they dislike! That is the way Some one is wasting and consuming you.
MARY.
You terrify me, Tituba! Oh, save me From those who make me pine and waste away!
Who are they? Tell me.
TITUBA.
That I do not know, But you will see them.They will come to you.
MARY.
No, do not let them come! I cannot bear it!
I am too weak to bear it! I am dying.
Fails into a trance.
TITUBA.
Hark! there is some one coming!
Enter HATHORNE, MATHER, and WALCOT.
WALCOT.
There she lies, Wasted and worn by devilish incantations!
O my poor sister!
MATHER.
Is she always thus?
WALCOT.
Nay, she is sometimes tortured by convulsions.
MATHER.
Poor child! How thin she is! How wan and wasted!
HATHORNE.
Observe her.She is troubled in her sleep.
MATHER.
Some fearful vision haunts her.
HATHORNE.
You now see With your own eyes, and touch with your own hands, The mysteries of this Witchcraft.
MATHER.
One would need The hands of Briareus and the eyes of Argus To see and touch them all.
HATHORNE.
You now have entered The realm of ghosts and phantoms,--the vast realm Of the unknown and the invisible, Through whose wide-open gates there blows a wind From the dark valley of the shadow of Death, That freezes us with horror.
MARY (starting).
Take her hence!
Take her away from me.I see her there!
She's coming to torment me!
WALCOT (taking her hand.
O my sister!
What frightens you? She neither hears nor sees me.
She's in a trance.
MARY.
Do you not see her there?
TITUBA.
My child, who is it?
MARY.
Ah, I do not know, I cannot see her face.
TITUBA.
How is she clad?
MARY.
She wears a crimson bodice.In her hand She holds an image, and is pinching it Between her fingers.Ah, she tortures me!
I see her face now.It is Goodwife Bishop!
Why does she torture me? I never harmed her!
And now she strikes me with an iron rod!
Oh, I am beaten!
MATHER.
This is wonderful!.
I can see nothing! Is this apparition Visibly there, and yet we cannot see it?
HATHORNE.
It is.The spectre is invisible Unto our grosser senses, but she sees it.
MARY.
Look! look! there is another clad in gray!
She holds a spindle in her hand, and threatens To stab me with it! It is Goodwife Corey!
Keep her away! Now she is coming at me!
Oh, mercy! mercy!
WALCOT (thrusting with his sword.
There is nothing there!
MATHER to HATHORNE.
Do you see anything?
HATHORNE.
The laws that govern The spiritual world prevent our seeing Things palpable and visible to her.
These spectres are to us as if they were not.
Mark her; she wakes.
TITUBA touches her, and she awakes.
MARY.
Who are these gentlemen?
WALCOT.
They are our friends.Dear Mary, are you better?
MARY.
Weak, very weak.
Taking a spindle from her lap, and holding it up.
How came this spindle here?
TITUBA.
You wrenched it from the hand of Goodwife Corey When she rushed at you.
HATHORNE.
Mark that, reverend sir!
MATHER.
It is most marvellous, most inexplicable!
TITUBA.(picking up a bit of gray cloth from the floor).
And here, too, is a bit of her gray dress, That the sword cut away.
MATHER.
Beholding this, It were indeed by far more credulous To be incredulous than to believe.
None but a Sadducee, who doubts of all Pertaining to the spiritual world, Could doubt such manifest and damning proofs!
HATHORNE.
Are you convinced?
MATHER to MARY.
Dear child, be comforted!
Only by prayer and fasting can you drive These Unclean Spirits from you.An old man Gives you his blessing.God be with you, Mary!
ACT II
SCENE I.-- GILES COREY's farm.Morning.Enter COREY, with a horseshoe and a hammer.
COREY.
The Lord hath prospered me.The rising sun Shines on my Hundred Acres and my woods As if he loved them.On a morn like this I can forgive mine enemies, and thank God For all his goodness unto me and mine.
My orchard groans with russets and pearmains;My ripening corn shines golden in the sun;My barns are crammed with hay, my cattle thrive The birds sing blithely on the trees around me!
And blither than the birds my heart within me.
But Satan still goes up and down the earth;And to protect this house from his assaults, And keep the powers of darkness from my door, This horseshoe will I nail upon the threshold.
Nails down the horseshoe.
There, ye night-hags and witches that torment The neighborhood, ye shall not enter here!--What is the matter in the field?--John Gloyd!
The cattle are all running to the woods!--John Gloyd! Where is the man?
Enter JOHN GLOYD.
Look there!
What ails the cattle? Are they all bewitched?
They run like mad.
GLOYD.
They have been overlooked.
COREY.
The Evil Eye is on them sure enough.
Call all the men.Be quick.Go after them!
Exit GLOYD and enter MARTHA.
MARTHA.
What is amiss?
COREY.
The cattle are bewitched.
They are broken loose and making for the woods.
MARTHA.
Why will you harbor such delusions, Giles?
Bewitched? Well, then it was John Gloyd bewitched them;I saw him even now take down the bars And turn them loose! They're only frolicsome.
COREY.
The rascal!
MARTHA.
I was standing in the road, Talking with Goodwife Proctor, and I saw him.
COREY.
With Proctor's wife? And what says Goodwife Proctor?
MARTHA.
Sad things indeed; the saddest you can hear Of Bridget Bishop.She's cried out upon!
COREY.
Poor soul! I've known her forty year or more.
She was the widow Wasselby, and then She married Oliver, and Bishop next.
She's had three husbands.I remember well My games of shovel-board at Bishop's tavern In the old merry days, and she so gay With her red paragon bodice and her ribbons!
Ah, Bridget Bishop always was a Witch!
MARTHA.