rcy._ Your worship, it may have been Minister Parris's shadow
falling across the platform.

_Corwin._ This is but levity, and hath naught to do with the trial.

_Hathorne._ We will proceed with the examination. Widow Eunice
Hutchins, produce the cape.

[Widow Hutchins _comes forward, holding the cape by a corner._

_Hathorne._ Put it over your daughter's shoulders.

_Hutchins._ Oh, your worships, I pray you not! It will kill her!

_Ann._ Oh, do not! do not! It will kill me! Oh, mother, do not! Oh,
your worships! Oh, Minister Parris!

_Parris._ Why put the maid to this needless agony?

_Corwin._ Put the cape over her shoulders.

[Widow Hutchins _approaches_ Ann _hesitatingly, and throws the cape
over her shoulders._ Ann _sinks upon the floor, shrieking._

_Ann._ Take it off! Take it off! It burns! It burns! Take it off!
Have mercy! I shall die! I shall die!

_Hathorne._ Take off the cape; that is enough. Olive Corey, what
say you to this? This is the cape you gave Ann Hutchins.

_Olive._ Oh, mother! mother!

_Martha_ (_pushing forward_). Nay, I will speak again. Ye shall not
keep me from it; ye shall not send me out of the meeting-house!
(_The afflicted cry out._) Peace, or I will afflict ye in earnest!
I _will_ speak! If I be a witch, as ye say, then ye have some reason
to fear me, even ye most worshipful magistrates and ministers. It
might happen to ye even to fall upon the floor in torment, and it
would ill accord with your offices. Ye shall hear me. I speak no
more for myself--ye may go hang me--I speak for my child. Ye shall
not hang her, or judgment will come upon ye. Ye know there is no
guile in her; it were monstrous to call her a witch. It were less
blasphemy to call her an angel than a witch, and ye know it. Ye know
it, all ye maids she hath played with and done her little kindnesses
to, ye who would now go hang her. That cape--that cape, most
worshipful magistrates, did the dear child earn with her own little
hands, that she might give it to Ann, whom she loved so much.
Knowing, as she did, that Ann was poor, and able to have but little
bravery of apparel, it was often on her mind to give her somewhat of
her own, albeit that was but scanty; and she hath toiled overtimes
at her wheel all winter, and sold the yarn in Salem, and so gained a
penny at a time wherewithal to buy that cape for Ann. And now will
it hang her, the dear child?

Dear Ann, dost thou not remember how thou and my