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,
the drooping tone, the bravado and fierce strut which sought to
dissemble all this. Not one amongst all the witnesses, assembled on
that side, had (by all agreement) the bold natural tone of conscious
uprightness. Hence it could not be surprising that the storm of popular
opinion made itself heard with a louder and a louder sound.
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