Justice Powell was not to wield the authority of Holt: yet he made one decision the effects of which were far-reaching. It was in the trial of Jane Wenham at Hertford in 1712. The trial of this woman was in a sense her own doing. She was a widow who had done washing by the day. For a long time she had been suspected of witchcraft by a neighboring farmer, so much so that, when a servant of his began to act queerly, he at once laid the blame on the widow. Jane applied to Sir Henry Chauncy, justice of the peace, for a warrant against her accuser. He was let off with a fine of a shilling, and she was instructed by Mr. Gardiner, the clergyman, to live more peaceably.[26] So ended the first act. In the next scene of this dramatic case a female servant of the Reverend Mr. Gardiner's, a maid just getting well of a broken knee, was discovered alone in a room undressed "to her shift" and holding a bundle of sticks. When asked to account for her condition by Mrs. Gardiner, she had a curious story to tell. "When she was left alone she found a strange Roaming in her head, ... her Mind ran upon Jane Wenham and she thought she must run some whither ... she climbed over a Five-Bar-Gate, and ran along the Highway up a Hill ... as far as a Place called Hackney-Lane, where she look'd behind her, and saw a little Old Woman Muffled in a Riding-hood." This dame had asked whither she was going, had told her to pluck some sticks from an oak tree, had bade her bundle them in her gown, and, last and most wonderful, had given her a large crooked pin.[27] Mrs. Gardiner, so the account goes, took the sticks and threw them into the fire. Presto! Jane Wenham came into the room, pretending an errand. It was afterwards found out that the errand was fictitious. All this raised a stir. The tale was absolutely original, it was no less remarkable. A maid with a broken knee had run a half-mile and back in seven minutes, very good time considering the circumstances. On the next day the maid, despite the knee and the fits she had meantime contracted, was sent out on an errand. She met Jane Wenham and that woman quite properly berated her for the stories she had set going, whereupon the maid's fits were worse than ever. Then, while several people carefully watched her, she repeated her former long distance run, leaping over a five-bar gate "as nimbly as a greyhound."