REBECCA NURSE, SAINT BUT WITCH VICTIM.

By Charles Sutherland Tapley '22. Marshall Jones Company.

The tercentenary year of 1930 brought out a considerable number of new books dealing with the history of Massachusetts Bay during the colonial period. It is not surprising, therefore, that the Salem witchcraft delusion is one of the aspects of colonial life to be thus reviewed. The work at hand is not a mere historical record, but the tribute of a descendent to a victim of this terrible period of fanaticism.

The monograph reminds us of the almost universal belief in witchcraft during the 17th century, and of the influence in this matter, of Cotton Mather, especially in New England. From this general view of the subject, the scene is narrowed to Salem village and to the Nurse family and their neighbors. The reader is impressed by the picture of events which led to the quarrel of Rev. Samuel Parris with his flock, and embittered and poisoned his mind. We may excuse excitable adolescents, neurotics, a Barbadoes negro servant, witnesses at the trial of Mrs. Nurse,—but how about this prosecutor, this educated leader of the Salem flock? The times can not entirely account for the vigor of his malice and unchristian attack on one of the most worthy of his parish.

We are impressed throughout the progress of the story by the figure of the heroine. She seems almost like a passive victim as she sits through the hectic trial, and goes, a Christian martyr, to her death on Gallows Hill, Salem, on July 19, 1792.

Mr. Tapley, in a closing chapter, traces "the return to reason" under Rev. Joseph Green. He also shows us a glimpse of Danvers and the Nurse farm today. Over fifteen thousand descendents of Rebecca and Francis Nurse are classified by families. Perhaps the reader may find (as the reviewer has found) his own name among those on the list.

The book contains a sympathetic introduction by Frank A. Manny, also several illustrations, two of the Nurse farm, and a frontispiece of a descendent posed as Mrs. Nurse at the ancestral home.