all united to crush a woman, whose deepest fault was a too
enthusiastic belief in her own inspiration.

Winthrop conducted the prosecution, mild and calm in manner, but
resolutely bent upon punishment, and by him sat Dudley, Endicott,
Bradstreet, Nowell and Stoughton; Bradstreet and Winthrop being
the only ones who treated her with the faintest semblance of
courtesy. Welde and Symmes, Wilson and Hugh Peters, faced her
with a curious vindictiveness, and in the throng of excited
listenders, hardly a friendly face met her eyes, even her old friend,
John Cotton, having become simply a timid instrument of her
persecutors.

The building in which the trial took place was thronged. Hundreds
who had been attracted by her power, looked on: magistrates and
ministers, yeoman and military, the sad colored garments of the
gentry in their broad ruffs and high crowned hats, bringing out
the buff coats of the soldiers, and the bright bodices of the
women, who clung to the vanities of color, and defied the tacit
law that limited them to browns and drabs. Over all hung the gray
November sky, and the chill of the dolorous month was in the air,
and did its work toward intensifying the bitterness which ruled
them all.

It is doubtful if Anne Bradstreet made one of the spectators. Her
instinct would have been to remain away, for the sympathy she
could not help but feel, could not betray itself, without at once
ranking her in opposition to the judgment of both husband and
father. Anne Hutchinson's condition was one to excite the
compassion and interest of every woman, but it had no such effect