The 'several persons' there, she said, were 'an elderly
woman and two young ones.' Her stays were cut by the old woman. She
was then thrust upstairs into a room, wherein was _hay_, _a pitcher of
water_, and bread in pieces. Bread may have been brought in, water
too, while she slept, a point never noted in the trials. She 'heard
the name of Mother Wills, or Wells, mentioned.'
Now Scarrat, in 1754, said that he, being present on January 29, 1753,
and hearing of the house, 'offered to bet a guinea to a farthing that
it was Mother Wells's.' But Mrs. Myers believed that Elizabeth had
mentioned hearing that name earlier; and Mrs. Myers must have heard
Scarrat, if he suggested it, before Elizabeth named it. The point is
uncertain.
Mrs. Woodward was in Mrs. Canning's room a quarter of an hour after
Elizabeth's arrival. The girl said she was almost starved to death in
a house on the Hertfordshire road, which she knew by seeing the
Hertford coach, with which she was familiar, go by. The woman who cut
her stays was 'a tall, black, swarthy woman.' Scarrat said 'that was
not Mrs. Wells,' which was fair on Scarrat's part. Elizabeth described
the two young women as being one fair, the other dark; so Scarrat
swore.
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