_Of the first trial, and what came thereof._
Next morning, as I walked up and down in the court, seeing that I had many times asked the constable in vain to lead me to my child (he would not even tell me where she lay), and for very disquietude I had at last begun to wander about there; about six o'clock there came a coach from Uzdom, [Footnote: Or Usedom, a small town which gives its name to the whole island.] wherein sat his worship, Master Samuel Pieper, _consul dirigens_, _item_, the _camerarius_ Gebhard Wenzel, and a _scriba_, whose name, indeed, I heard, but have forgotten it again; and my daughter forgot it too, albeit in other things she has an excellent memory, and, indeed, told me most of what follows, for my old head well-nigh burst, so that I myself could remember but little. I straightway went up to the coach, and begged that the worshipful court would suffer me to be present at the trial, seeing that my daughter was yet in her nonage, but which the sheriff, who meanwhile had stepped up to the coach from the terrace, whence he had seen all, had denied me. But his worship Master Samuel Pieper, who was a little round man, with a fat paunch, and a beard mingled with grey hanging down to his middle, reached me his hand, and condoled with me like a Christian in my trouble: I might come into court in God's name; and he wished with all his heart that all whereof my daughter was fyled might prove to be foul lies. Nevertheless I had still to wait full two hours before their worships came down the winding stair again. At last towards nine o'clock I heard the constable moving about the chairs and benches in the judgment chamber; and as I conceived that the time was now come, I went in and sat myself down on a bench. No one, however, was yet there, save the constable and his young daughter, who was wiping the table, and held a rosebud between her lips. I was fain to beg her to give it me, so that I might have it to smell to; and I believe that I should have been carried dead out of the room that day if I had not had it. God is thus able to preserve our lives even by means of a poor flower, if so He wills it!
At length their worships came in and sat round the table, whereupon _Dom. Consul_ motioned the constable to fetch in my child. Meanwhile he asked the sheriff whether he had put _Rea_ in chains, and when he said No, he gave him such a reprimand that it went through my very marrow. But the sheriff excused himself, saying that he had not done so from regard to her quality, but had locked her up in so fast a dungeon, that she could not possibly escape therefrom. Whereupon _Dom. Consul_ answered that much is possible to the devil, and that they would have to answer for it should _Rea_ escape. This angered the sheriff, and he replied that if the devil could convey her through walls seven feet thick, and through three doors, he could very easily break her chains too. Whereupon _Dom. Consul_ said that hereafter he would look at the prison himself; and I think that the sheriff had been so kind only because he yet hoped (as, indeed, will hereafter be shown) to talk over my daughter to let him have his will of her.