n to, before the Court. Further, as no Counsel was
allowed the Prisoners, the Trials were quite summary affairs. Hutchinson
says, no difficulty was experienced; and the results were quickly
reached, in every case but that of Rebecca Nurse.

These two stages in the proceedings became confounded in the public
apprehension, and have been borne down by tradition, indiscriminately,
under the name of Trials. It was the succession, at brief intervals,
through a long period, of these Examinations, that wrought the great
excitement through the country, which met Phips on his arrival; and
which is so graphically described by Cotton Mather, as a "dreadful
ferment." He says he was not present at any of the Trials. Was he
present at any of the Examinations? The considerations that belong to
the solution of this question are the following:

When the special interest he must have taken in them is brought to mind,
from the turn of his prevalent thoughts and speculations, exhibited in
all his writings, and from the propensity he ever manifested to put
himself in a position to observe and study such things, it may be
supposed he would not have foregone opportunities like those presented
in the scenes before the Magistrates. While all other people, Ministers
especially, were flocking to them, it is difficult to conclude that he
held back. That he attended some of them is, perhaps, to be inferred
from the distinctive character of his language that he never attended a
_Trial_. The description given, in his _Life of Phips_, of what was
exhibited and declared by the "afflicted children," at the Examinations,
exhibits a minuteness and vividness, seeming to have come from an
eye-witness; but there is not a particular word or syllable, I think, in
the account, from which an inference, either way, can be drawn whether,
or not, he was present at them, personally. This is observable, I
repeat, inasmuch as he was careful to say that he was _not_ present at
the _Trials_.

The Examinations, being of a character to arrest universal attention,
and from the extraordinary nature of their incidents, as viewed by that
generation, having attractions, all but irresistible, it is not
surprising that, as incidentally appears, Magistrates and Ministers came
to them, from all quarters. No local occurrences, in the history of
this country, ever awakened such a deep, awe-inspiring, and amazed
interest. It can hardly be doubted that he was attracted to them. Can