It was, indeed, no slight marvel that she was not already there. She had been lowered into that pit of death before noon on the day of her second examination, and, excepting some unwholesome bread and water, according to the custom of the prison, had had no food since she came into the custody of the commentariensis the day before. The order came from the magistrates to bring her out earlier in the morning than was intended, or the prison might have really effected that death which Calphurnius had purposed to pretend. When the apparitors attempted to raise her, she neither spoke or moved, nor could well be seen. “Black as Orcus,” said one of the fellows, “another torch there! I can’t see where she nestles.” “There she is, like a bundle of clothes,” said another. “Madam gets up late this morning,” said a third. “She’s used to softer couches,” said a fourth. “Ha! ha! ’tis a spoiler of beauty, this hole,” said a fifth. “She is the demon of stubbornness, and must be crushed,” said the jailer; “she likes it, or she would not choose it.” “The plague take the witch,” said another; “we shall have better seasons when a few like her are ferreted out.”

They got her out like a corpse, and put her on the ground outside the prison. When she still did not move, two of them took her between them on their shoulders and arms, and began to move forward, the instrument of torture preceding her. The fresh air of the morning revived her; she soon sat up. She seemed to drink in life again, and became conscious. “O beautiful Light!” she whispered, “O lovely Light, my light and my life! O my Light and my Life, receive me!” Gradually she became fully alive to all that was going on. She was going to death, and that rather than deny Him who had bought her by His own death. He had suffered for her, and she was to suffer for Him. He had been racked on the Cross, she too was to have her limbs dislocated after His pattern. She scarcely rested on the men’s shoulders; and they vowed afterwards that they thought she was going to fly away, vile witch as she was.

“The witch, the witch,” the mob screamed out, for she had now come to the place of her conflict. “We’ll pay you off for blight and pestilence! Where’s our bread, where’s the maize and barley, where are the grapes?” And they uttered fierce yells of execration, and seemed disposed to break through the line of apparitors, and to tear her to pieces. Yet, after all, it was not a very hearty uproar, but got up for the occasion. The populace had spent their force, not to say their lives, in the riot in which she was apprehended. The priests and priestesses of the temples had sent the poor wretches and paid them.