Highlight words below that convey the mood. There was very much the same solemnity of
demeanour on the part of the spectators; as
befitted a people amongst whom religion and
law were almost identical, and in whose
character both were so thoroughly interfused,
that the mildest and the severest acts of
public discipline were alike made venerable
and awful. Meagre, indeed, and cold, was the
sympathy that a transgressor might look for,
from such bystanders at the scaffold.
- The Scarlet Letter, Nathaniel Hawthorne