CHAPTER XXVIII.
The Cruel Doings of the Special Court.
Meanwhile the Special Court of seven Judges--a majority of whom were from Boston, with the Deputy Governor of the Colony, William Stoughten, as Chief-Justice--was by no means indolent.

Of the proceedings of this court, which embodied apparently the best legal intellect of the colony, no official record is in existence.

Its shameful pages, smeared all over with bigotry and blood, no doubt were purposely destroyed.

So far as we are acquainted with the evidence given before it, it was substantially the same as had been given at the previous examinations before the committing magistrates.
That nothing was too extravagant and absurd to be received as evidence by this learned court, is proven by the statement of the Reverend Cotton Mather, already alluded to, relative to a demon entering the meeting-house and tearing down a part of it, in obedience to a look from Mistress Bridget Bishop--of which diabolical outrage the Court was duly informed.

Besides, there could have been no other kind of evidence forthcoming, that would apply to the crime of which all the accused were charged, Witchcraft.