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Some of the material his own imagination supplied; much else was obtained from irresponsible gossips who had no foundation for their assertions. Miss Stearne was horrified to find, on receiving her copy of the Wednesday "Beacon" that big headlines across the front page announced: "Beverly Harbors a Criminal in Disguise!
Her friends turned the tables by indicting Stearne and some forty others of conspiracy, and apparently succeeded in driving them from the county. In Bury the forces of the opposition had appealed to Parliament, and the Commission of Oyer and Terminer, which, it will be noticed, is never mentioned by the witchfinders, was sent out to limit their activities.
It is not an uncommon statement that thirty thousand witches were hanged in England during the rule of Parliament, and this wild guess has been copied by reputable authors. In other works the number has been estimated at three thousand, but this too is careless guesswork. Stearne himself boasted that he knew of two hundred executions, and Stearne ought to have known.
When put to the swimming test she floated, and is said to have then declared that the Devil "had sat upon a Cross beame and laughed at her." Elizabeth Harris was examined, and gave some damaging evidence against herself. She named several goodwives who had very loose tongues. Stearne, 13, 14.
Almost a twelvemonth later there was a single discovery of witches. It was in the island of Ely; and the church courts, the justices of the peace, and the assize courts, which had now been revived, were able, between them, to hang a few witches. We do not know whether Hopkins participated in the Ely affair or not. It seems certain that his co-worker, Stearne, had some share in it.
For a list of these towns, see below, appendix C, under 1645, Suffolk. Stearne, 45, two instances. Ibid., 37, 39, 45. Thomas Ady, A Candle in the Dark, 135. Stearne, 39. His whole confession reads like the utterance of a tortured man. He had previously been found with a rope around his neck. This was of course attributed to witchcraft. Stearne, 35. Ibid., 11.
At least fifteen other places in Suffolk are mentioned by Stearne in his stories of the witches' confessions. While Hopkins's subordinates probably represented him in some of the villages, we cannot doubt that the witchfinder himself visited many towns. From East Anglia Hopkins went westward into Cambridgeshire. His arrival there must have been during either January or February.
Three days and nights of "watching" brought Elizabeth Clarke to "confess many things"; and when, on the fourth night, her townsmen Hopkins and Stearne dropped in to fill out from her own lips the warrants against those she had named as accomplices, she told them that, if they would stay and do her no hurt, she would call one of her imps. Hopkins told her that he would not allow it, but he stayed.
It was in the eastern counties, where the Eastern Association had flourished and where Parliament, as well as the army, found its strongest backing the counties that stood consistently against the king in those counties it was that Hopkins and Stearne carried on their work. It may seem needless in the light of these facts to suggest any other explanation of the witch crusade.
"Gran'pa Jim," observed Mary Louise, musingly, "always advises me to look on both sides of a question before making up my mind, because every question has to have two sides or it couldn't be argued. If Miss Stearne wishes to keep you away from the pictures, she has a reason for it; so let's discover what the reason is." "To spoil any little fun we might have," asserted Mable bitterly.
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