A lane was forthwith opened through the crowd of spectators.  Preceded by the beadle, and attended by an irregular procession of stern-browed men and unkindly visaged women, Hester Prynne set forth towards the place appointed for her punishment.  It was no great distance from the prison door to the market-place, and in spite of the agony of her heart, Hester passed with almost a serene deportment to the scaffold where the pillory was set up.

The crowd was sombre and grave, and the unhappy prisoner sustained herself as best a woman might, under the heavy weight of a thousand unrelenting eyes.

One man, small in stature, and of a remarkable intelligence in his features, who stood on the outskirts of the crowd, attracted the notice of Hester Prynne, and he in his turn bent his eyes on the prisoner till, seeing she appeared to recognise him, he slowly raised his finger and laid it on his lips.

Then, touching the shoulder of a townsman who stood next to him, he said, “I pray you, good sir, who is this woman, and wherefore is she here set up to public shame?”

“You must needs be a stranger, friend,” said the townsman, “else you would surely have heard of Mistress Hester Prynne, and her evil doings.  She hath raised a great scandal in godly Master Dimmesdale’s church.  The penalty thereof is death.  But the magistracy, in their great mercy and tenderness of heart, have doomed Mistress Prynne to stand only a space of three hours on the platform of the pillory, and for the remainder of her natural life to wear a mark of shame upon her bosom.”

“A wise sentence!” remarked the stranger gravely.  “It irks me, nevertheless, that the partner of her iniquity should not at least stand on the scaffold by her side.  But he will be known—­he will be known!”

Directly over the platform on which Hester Prynne stood was a kind of balcony, and here sat Governor Bellingham, with four sergeants about his chair, and ministers of religion.

Mr. John Wilson, the eldest of these clergymen, first spake, and then urged a younger minister, Mr. Dimmesdale, to exhort the prisoner to repentance and to confession.  “Speak to the woman, my brother,” said Mr. Wilson.

The Rev. Mr. Dimmesdale was a man of high native gifts, whose eloquence and religious fervour had already wide eminence in his profession.  He bent his head, in silent prayer, as it seemed, and then came forward.

“Hester Prynne,” said he, “if thou feelest it to be for thy soul’s peace, I charge thee to speak out the name of thy fellow-sinner and fellow-sufferer.  Be not silent from any mistaken pity and tenderness for him, for, believe me, though he were to step down from a high place, and stand there beside thee, on thy pedestal of shame, yet better were it so than to hide a guilty heart through life.”

Hester only shook her head.

“She will not speak,” murmured Mr. Dimmesdale.  “Wondrous strength and generosity of a woman’s heart!”