Page:Salem - a tale of the seventeenth century (IA taleseventeenth00derbrich).pdf/314

 died out—the tide of popular feeling was evidently turning. The faith in the accusers, once so unquestioning, had been lessened: the girls had become too confident and too reckless. Or it might be that possibly a new-born pity was awakened in behalf of the victims; and who could wonder?

In a small community, such as Salem then was, the private history, the affairs and personalities of each of its inhabitants is considered as the joint property of all the rest; consequently Alice's desolate orphan girl-*hood—her entire dependence upon the condemned prisoner, who was her only known relative in the wide world, might have well awakened pity under any circumstances; but, beyond this, the rare beauty of the poor girl, her sweet innocence, and her fearless devotion to her grandmother, had called forth the interest and admiration of many who had never personally known her; and now, instead of the coarse jeers, curses, and bitter invectives with which the howling mob had followed the first sufferers, there was, as they passed along, an awed and respectful silence—broken only now and then by sobs and