"It happens that three children and a man from Boston have hit upon these two prisoners as their victims," went on the speaker, now looking at the judges, "instead of aiming their shafts at you or me. Yet are you or I any more honest than this woman who has befriended others, or this man who teaches and cares for maimed dogs? Are we to be their judges? Then, as we consider the charges against them, let us remember that men might bring charges of evil against us also, and consider whether we know ourselves to be more innocent than they. Look at Mistress Swan! Look at Thomas Appleton! Are these two witches? Why, men of Salem, the very children laugh at such a charge!" The speaker sat down amid a tense silence. The judges withdrew, considered the matter in private, and then, returning, announced that in their opinion the charges of witchcraft against Mistress Swan and Master Appleton had not been proved by the evidence, and that the two prisoners might return to their homes. There was a buzz of excited talk for a few minutes, then neighbors and friends crowded round Mistress Swan and the schoolmaster and said they had never really believed the evil reports of them. So these two innocent people returned to their home, and men and women who had been in doubt before as to whether they should believe the tales of magic now said they had always considered the three "afflicted children" mischievous brats and wondered that their parents hadn't whipped them for telling such monstrous falsehoods. As for Jonathan Leek, when he found that he had no chance to injure Mistress Swan, and knew that people in Salem were beginning to hear the true story of his earlier career in Boston, he departed from Salem in haste, probably to carry his ready-made charges of witchcraft to other towns, where there might be people against whom he cherished grudges. Thomas Appleton returned to his school, and the children liked him better than ever, and brought him so many lame and footsore dogs to care for that he said he should have to take the largest building in town to house them all. The three "afflicted children" didn't go back to school, though no one knew whether that was because their parents thought they wouldn't be popular there after what had happened, or because they still considered that the schoolmaster might bewitch them. Naturally enough it took Mistress Swan and Master Appleton some time to forgive their townsfolk for treating them so badly. But the people did their best to show them how sorry they felt that they had ever suspected them of evil dealings, and in time the two returned to their old attitude of friendliness toward all their neighbors. Neither of them was the kind to cherish a grudge.