WATSON'S ANNALS of PHILADELPHIA VOL. 2 PAGE 31 Published 1868 PENNSYLVANIA INLAND - - GERMANTOWN A person, now 80 years of age, relates to me that he well remembers....The superstition then was very great about ghosts and witches. "Old Shrunk", as he was called, [George S., who lived to be 80,] was a great conjuror, and numerous persons from Philadelphia and elsewhere, and some even from Jersey, came to him often, to find out stolen goods and to get their fortunes told. They believed he could make any thieves who came to steal from his orchard "STAND", if he saw them, even while they desired to run away. They used to consult him where to go and dig for money; and several persons, whose names I suppress, used to go and dig for hidden treasures of nights. On such occassions, if any-one "SPOKE", while digging, or ran, from "TERROR", without "the MAGIC RING", previously made with incantation around the place, the whole influence of the "SPELL" was lost. Dr. Witt, too, a sensible man, who owned and dwelt in the large house, since the Rev. Dr.Blair's, as well as old Mr. Fraley, who also acted as a physician, and was really pretty skilful, were both U_______e doctors, (according to the superstition then so prevalent in Europe,) and were renowned also as conjurors. Then the cows and horses, and even children, got strange diseases; and if it baffled ordinary medicines, or Indian cures and herbs, it was not unusual to consult those persons for relief; and their prescriptions which healed them, as resulting from witchcraft, always gave relief ! Dr Frailey dwelt in a one-story house, very ancient, now standing in the school house lane. On each side of his house were lines of German poetry, painted in oil colours, (some of the marks are even visible now); those on one side have been recited to me, viz: Translated thus: Lass Neider neiden, Let the envious envy me, Lass Hasser hassen; Let the hater hate me; Was Gott mir giebt What God has given me Muss mann mir lassen. Must man leave to me. An idea was very prevalent, especially near the Delaware and Schuylkill waters, that the pirates of Black Beard's day had deposited treasure in the earth. The fancy was, that sometimes they killed a prisoner and interred him with it, to make his ghost keep his vigils there and guard it. Hence it was not rare to hear of persons having seen a SPHOKE or ghost, or of having dreamed of it a plurality of times, which became a strong incentive to dig there. To procure the aid of a professor in the black art, was called HEXING; and Shrunk, in particular, had great fame therein. He affected to use a diviner's rod, (a WITCH-HAZEL) with a peculiar angle in it, which was supposed to be self-turned in the hands, when approached to any minerals; some use the same kind of rod now to FEEL for hidden waters, so as to dig for wells. The late Col. T.F. used to amuse himself much with the credulity of the people. He pretended he could HEX with a hazel rod; and often he has had superstitious persons to come and offer him shares in spoils, which they had seen a SPHOKE upon ! He even wrote and printed a curious old play (a copy of it is in the Atheneum Library), to ridicule the thing. Describing the terrors of a midnight fright in digging, he makes one of the party to tell his wife, "My dearest wife, in all my life Ich neber was so fritened; De spirit come, and Ich did run, 'Twas juste like tunder, mid lightning." ******************************************************************************** Note: the above words in capital letters are in italics in the book... I presume the "magic ring" mentioned is a ring drawn in the dirt. E.