cusable,
that the Ministers should have delayed their reply until after the first
act of the awful tragedy had passed, and blood begun to be shed.
Hutchinson expressly says: "The further trials were put off to the
adjournment, the thirtieth of June. The Governor and Council thought
proper, _in the mean time_, to take the opinion of several of the
principal Ministers, upon the state of things, as they then stood. This
was an old Charter practice."--_History_, ii., 52.

It has been regarded as a singular circumstance, that after such pains
had been taken, and so great a stretch of power practised, to put a
Court so suddenly in operation to try persons accused of witchcraft, on
the pretence, too, recorded in the Journal of the Council, of the
"thronged" condition of the jails, at that "hot season," and after
trying one person only, it should have adjourned for four weeks.
Perhaps, by a collation of passages and dates, we may reach a probable
explanation. In his letter to "the Ministers in and near Boston,"
written in January, 1696, after considering briefly, and in forcible
language, the fearful errors from which the Delusion of 1692 had risen,
and solemnly reminding them of what they ought to have done to lead
their people out of such errors, Calef brings their failure to do it
home to them, in these pungent words: "If, instead of this, you have
some by word and writing propagated, and others recommended, such
doctrines, and abetted the false notions which are so prevalent in this
apostate age, it is high time to consider it. If, when authority found
themselves almost nonplust in such prosecutions, and sent to you for
your advice what they ought to do, and you have then thanked them for
what they had already done (and thereby encouraged them to proceed in
those very by-paths already fallen into) it so much the more nearly
concerns you. _Ezek._, xxxiii., 2 to 8."--_Calef_, 92.

Looking at this passage, in connection with that quoted just before from
Hutchinson, we gather that something had occurred that "nonplust" the
Court--some serious embarrassment, that led to its sudden
adjournment--after the condemnation of Bridget Bishop, while many other
cases had been fully prepared for trial by the then Attorney-general.
Newton, and the parties to be tried had, the day before, been brought to
Salem from the jail in Boston, and were ready to be put to the Bar. What
was the difficulty? The following may be the solution.

Brattle