Then the wonderful eloquence of the young man was aroused, his magnificent eyes shot fire, his lip curved, and his thin nostrils dilated; all the strength and fervor of his being was flung into the scathing denunciation which he hurled against the court, and against the people whom this tribunal represented. It was the wild eloquence of despair, for he knew when the jury turned to look upon Winthrop, the chief judge, whose rebuke had crushed the rising pity which might have saved Barbara Stafford, that her doom was sealed. Thus, with the terrible conviction that he was avenging the fate of a doomed woman rather than pleading with a hope, he poured out a wild outburst of passionate eloquence--now appeal--now denunciation--now a wailing lament, that made the jury tremble, and the judges turn white in the face, as if an avenging angel had descended to protect the woman they were about to adjudge to death. This eloquence, native to the Indian, overbore the restraint of education, and as the wild torrent of feeling rushed over the multitude, it fired the superstition, brooding there, into a terrible conviction. A word only was wanting, like a lighted match, to ignite these lurid apprehensions. It came from a far-off corner of the meeting-house, where one of the witnesses stood aghast with wonder, and trembling in all his massive limbs. "It is the man who came with us in the hold of the vessel. He followed her after the storm. He it was who left the heavy boxes in my keeping." A shrewd bystander caught these words as they fell from the white lips of Jason Brown, and he cried out in a voice that rang through the court like a trumpet, "Behold the confederate of her sorcery! The beautiful witch has brought Lucifer himself to plead her cause: mark the fire in his eyes, the breath from his nostrils; see the bronze on his forehead, the proud curve on his mouth!" At these words there rose a tumult in the house. Women shrieked, and pressed forward to the doors; men broke into wild murmurs, or whispered together in low voices; while the judges stood up, pale as a group of statues; and the jury huddled together, looking into each other's faces aghast. In the midst of this turmoil, Barbara Stafford felt a breath on her cheek, and looking suddenly up, met the glance of those eyes, which, a moment before, had frightened the people with their burning passion, now full of determined purpose. He whispered something, but in the tumultuous noise Barbara lost its meaning. The next instant the rush of the crowd carried the noble youth from her sight, and when the court, recovering from its panic, looked around for this emissary of the dark one, who had denounced its proceedings face to face with the august judges, the strange advocate was gone.