h; but she held it her duty, and she did not shrink. On
September 14, 1659, she was condemned to banishment or death, if she did
not leave within two days; but it was no desire to escape the ultimate
penalty that led her on this occasion to return to her Rhode Island
home, for on October 8th she once more appeared in Boston. She was at
once arrested and with two other Friends was condemned by the Court "to
suffer the poenalty of the lawe (the just reward of their transgression)
on the morrow." One sees a twinge of conscience in the clause in
parentheses, as excusatory of themselves to posterity. Mary Dyer,
however, though included in the original sentence, was, on the
intercession of her son, reprieved from death and her sentence commuted
to banishment, "to be forthwith executed if she returned. In the
meanwhile she was to go with the other two condemned to the place of
execution, and to stand upon the gallows with a rope about her neck till
her companions were executed." She went to her ignominious punishment
"as to a Wedding Day" and heartened her companions for their
trial--though they needed no encouragement. Moreover, she did not wish
to accept her own life at the hands of those who had made the unjust law
under which her companions suffered, she probably believing that the
already large number of Quaker sympathizers would be enlarged by the
spectacle of a woman put to death for her faith. Probably, too, she was
of the same enthusiastic spirit as Anne Hutchinson, that rejoiced in
martyrdom. At all events, though once more banished, she reappeared in
Boston, and in little more than six months from the date of her last
sentence she was once more before the Court upon the charge of
"rebelliously returning into this jurisdiction, notwithstanding the
favour of this Court towards her," and she was sentenced to die on June
1st. On that day she accordingly went to her death, as calmly and
triumphantly as to the crown of her life, as indeed the moment probably
seemed to her.

It is difficult to gauge the character of Mary Dyer, who may be taken as
the type of the New England Quaker of her day, even though she was of
alien birth. That she was a woman of pure and holy spirit there can be
no doubt; and though her persistent affronting of death may seem to
savor of fanaticism, it was fanaticism, if at all, of that sort which
inspired the early Christian martyrs. She was utterly sincere; and
sincerity may plead forgiveness for a