It will occur to the reader to ask whether any sort of evidence was ruled out or objected to. On this point we have but slight knowledge. In reporting the trial of Elizabeth Sawyer of Edmonton in 1621 the Reverend Henry Goodcole wrote that a piece of thatch from the accused woman's house was plucked and burned, whereupon the woman presently came upon the scene.[33] Goodcole characterized this method as an "old ridiculous custome" and we may guess that he spoke for the judge too. In the Lancashire cases, Justice Altham, whose credulity knew hardly any bounds, grew suddenly "suspitious of the accusation of this yong wench, Jennet Device," who had been piling up charges against Alice Nutter. The girl was sent out of the room, the witches were mixed up, and Jennet was required on coming in again to pick out Alice Nutter. Of course that proved an easy matter.[34] At another time, when Jennet was glibly enumerating the witches that had assembled at the great meeting at Malking Tower, the judge suddenly asked her if Joane-a-Downe were there. But the little girl failed to rise to the bait and answered negatively, much to the satisfaction of everybody, and especially of the righteous Mr. Potts.[35] This is all we know directly about any tendency to question evidence at Lancaster in 1612, but a good deal more may be inferred from what is not there. A comparison of that trial with other contemporary trials will convince any one that Justices Altham and Bromley must have ruled out certain forms of evidence. There were no experiments made of any sort nor any female juries set inspecting.[36] This, indeed, is not to say that all silly testimony was excluded. There is enough and more of sheer nonsense in the testimony to prove the contrary. We turn now from the question of evidence to a brief consideration of several less prominent features of Jacobean witchcraft. We shall note the character of the sentences, the distribution of the trials, the personnel and position in life of the accused, and lastly the question of jurisdiction.