What Could Be a Cause of a Man's Illness?

The winter after Mary Webster's return from Boston, Philip Smith began to look ill. He had frequent seizures and seemed delirious most of the time. Some young men in Hadley thought Mary Webster was behind the man's illness. In their minds, there was only one way to find out. One of the men stayed with Smith while the others went to Mary's home. Three or four times they knocked on her door and bothered her,. thinking that if she was indeed casting a spell over Smith, this would break her concentration. When she stopped moving, the men cut her down. The details of the events surrounding Philip Smith's illness are rife with superstition and fear.