of all families, whether princely or plebeian. For thirty years
past, neither town-record, nor gravestone, nor the directory,
nor the knowledge or memory of man, bore any trace of Matthew
Maule's descendants. His blood might possibly exist elsewhere;
here, where its lowly current could be traced so far back, it had
ceased to keep an onward course.

So long as any of the race were to be found, they had been
marked out from other men--not strikingly, nor as with a sharp
line, but with an effect that was felt rather than spoken of--by
an hereditary character of reserve. Their companions, or those
who endeavored to become such, grew conscious of a circle round
about the Maules, within the sanctity or the spell of which, in
spite of an exterior of sufficient frankness and good-fellowship,
it was impossible for any man to step. It was this indefinable
peculiarity, perhaps, that, by insulating them from human aid,
kept them always so unfortunate in life. It certainly operated
to prolong in their case, and to confirm to them as their only
inheritance, those feelings of repugnance and superstitious terror
with which the people of the town, even after awakening from their
frenzy, continued to regard the memory of the reputed witches.
The mantle, or rather the ragged cloak, of old Matthew Maule had
fallen upon his children. They were half believed to inherit
mysterious attributes; the family eye was said to possess strange
power. Among other good-for-nothing properties and privileges,
one was especially assigned them,--that of exercising an influence
over people's dreams. The Pyncheons, if all stories were true,
haughtily as they bore themselves in the noonday streets of their
native town, were no better than bond-servants to these plebeian
Maules, on entering the topsy-turvy commonwealth of sleep.