And where was Manasseh? What said he? You must remember, that the stir
of the outcry, the accusation, the appeals of the accused, all seemed
to go on at once amid the buzz and din of the people who had come to
worship God, but remained to judge and upbraid their fellow-creature.
Till now Lois had only caught a glimpse of Manasseh, who was apparently
trying to push forwards, but whom his mother was holding back with word
and action, as Lois knew she would hold him back; for it was not for
the first time that she was made aware how carefully her aunt had
always shrouded his decent reputation among his fellow-citizens from
the least suspicion of his seasons of excitement and incipient
insanity. On such days, when he himself imagined that he heard
prophetic voices, and saw prophetic visions, his mother would do much
to prevent any besides his own family from seeing him; and now Lois, by
a process swifter than reasoning, felt certain, from her one look at
his face, when she saw it, colourless and deformed by intensity of
expression, among a number of others all simply ruddy and angry, that
he was in such a state that his mother would in vain do her utmost to
prevent his making himself conspicuous. Whatever force or argument
Grace used, it was of no avail. In another moment he was by Lois's
side, stammering with excitement, and giving vague testimony, which
would have been of little value in a calm court of justice, and was
only oil to the smouldering fire of that audience.

'Away with her to gaol!' 'Seek out the witches!' 'The sin has spread
into all households!' 'Satan is in the very midst of us!' 'Strike and
spare not!' In vain Dr. Cotton Mather raised his voice in loud prayers,
in which he assumed the guilt of the accused girl; no one listened, all
were anxious to secure Lois, as if they feared she would vanish from
before their very eyes; she, white, trembling, standing quite still in
the tight grasp of strange, fierce men, her dilated eyes only wandering
a little now and then in search of some pitiful face--some pitiful face
that among all those hundreds was not to be found. While some fetched
cords to bind her, and others, by low questions, suggested new
accusations to the distempered brain of Prudence, Manasseh obtained a
hearing once more. Addressing Dr. Cotton Mather, he said, evidently
anxious to make clear some new argument that had just suggested itself
to him: 'Sir, in this matter, be she witch or not, the end