issue. And so, perhaps, in the main, they did. But at times some
lingering sense of outraged dignity, some fitful gleams of old
sympathies, 'the hectic of a moment,' came back upon her, and prevailed
over the deadening stupor of her grief. Then she shone for a moment
into a starry light--sweet and woful to remember. Then----but why
linger? I hurry to the close: she was pronounced guilty; whether by a
jury or a bench of judges, I do not say--having determined, from the
beginning, to give no hint of the land in which all these events
happened; neither is that of the slightest consequence. Guilty she was
pronounced: but sentence at that time was deferred. Ask me not, I
beseech you, about the muff or other circumstances inconsistent with
the hostile evidence. These circumstances had the testimony, you will
observe, of my own servants only; nay, as it turned out, of one servant
exclusively: _that_ naturally diminished their value. And, on the
other side, evidence was arrayed, perjury was suborned, that would have
wrecked a wilderness of simple truth trusting to its own unaided
forces. What followed? Did this judgment of the court settle the
opinion of the public? Opinion of the public! Did it settle the winds?
Did it settle the motion of the Atlantic? Wilder, fiercer, and louder
grew the cry against the wretched accuser: mighty had been the power
over the vast audience of the dignity, the affliction, the perfect
simplicity, and the Madonna beauty of the prisoner. That beauty so
childlike, and at the same time so saintly, made, besides, so touching
in its pathos by means of the abandonment--the careless abandonment and
the infinite desolation of her air and manner--would of itself, and
without further aid, have made many converts. Much more was done by the
simplicity of her statements, and the indifference with which she
neglected to improve any strong points in her own favor--the
indifference, as every heart perceived, of despairing grief. Then came
the manners on the hostile side--the haggard consciousness of guilt,