When my husband heard of this defence he snorted like a horse and, said he, “As touching the text in the Book of Ecclesiastes, the Prophet here asks a question but vouchsafes no answer; so also when the Psalmist asks, ‘Why do the heathen so furiously rage together?’ the matter is left unresolved. Yet to this question of Ecclesiastes, the God-fearing man will spontaneously answer: ‘I myself may say to the King, “What dost thou?”’ As for the other matter: those entrusted with framing the Law and Custom of England have never yet been constrained to take cognizance of so rare and uncommon a case as that of a King who ignobly levies war against his own Parliament and people; yet, if one has dared to do so, a perjured traitor to his people he must plainly appear in the eyes of every person of discretion.”
His Majesty having refused to plead, it was threatened that for his contumacy he must be adjudged to have confessed to the crime wherewith he was charged. He continued to dispute the authority of the Court, and was again removed. In his absence, witnesses from every part of the Kingdom testified to divers of his acts in levying war, from the raising of the Standard forward. On the third day the King was recalled and permitted to speak in his own defence, but not in challenge of the Court’s jurisdiction. However, he would not speak, but made a request to confer with the Lords and Commons before sentence were read. This request was refused him, as tending to delay; besides, in the New Year the House of Lords had been abolished, and the Commons, or what remained of them, not above one-eighth part of the whole, had taken all the power into their own hands.
Then the sentence was read: which was that “the said Charles Stuart, as a tyrant, traitor, murderer and public enemy, shall be put to death by the severing of his head from his body.”
The King would then have spoken something, but it was too late; he being accounted dead in Law immediately after sentence was pronounced. His plea was refused and he was led away.
Here was a woeful alteration in His Majesty’s fortune, who not many days before had taken careful thought for his melon-ground at the royal Manor of Wimbledon; which rarity, as my husband told me, was very well trenched and manured and admirably ordered for the growth of musk-melons and melon-pompions, with borders, herbs and flowers valued to be worth £300. His Majesty was destined never again to taste of ripe, sugared musk-melon, or with his silver knife to strip the velvet from that delicate, yellow peach, which he loved, called Melocotony. Yet still he would not believe that this was any better than a stage-show, until it happened that as he passed out with the guard from the Painted Chamber, some soldiers puffed tobacco smoke his way and no officer forbade them: which had never happened to him in his life before, and convinced him suddenly of the peril in which he stood. For he was as queasy in his stomach when tobacco was drunk about him as his father King James had been, who wrote a book against the habit.
On this same day the King was permitted to say farewell to his children, the Princess Elizabeth and the Duke of Gloucester, the others being abroad: and the Princess wept very sore when the King told her what was threatened him. He also warned the little Duke (not believing that England would ever be proclaimed a Republic) against consenting to be crowned King in his stead; for that would be to rob the birthright from his eldest brother, the Prince of Wales, and in the end he would lose his own head too. “I would rather be torn into little pieces,” the child answered.
On the next day, which was a Tuesday, my husband, who had risen even earlier than was his custom, came to my room at about half an hour after five. He bade me rise and put on warm apparel and walk out with him to Westminster, where we should see a sight never before seen in England; and we must be there early before the crowds thickened. I took my Mary with me to suckle by the way, and as we went down the dark streets towards Westminster we ate bread and cheese. It was a clear night, very cold and frosty, and my husband forgot for a while his low opinion of my wits and discoursed proudly upon our country, England: how when she had cast off this devilish incubus of monarchy and risen from sleep and rubbed her eyes, she would find herself free and great—yea, far greater than the Athenian or Roman republics, despite all their wealth of brave commanders, learned scholars, wise counsellors and notable poets. He said that the ancients fell short in two things principally: first, that they had a false and delusive religion, and second that they depended for their welfare upon the unwilling labour of slaves, whereas slavery and serfdom in England were long abolished, and every man here was free, unless perhaps he were bound and confined by his own follies. Then he began to speak rhapsodically of his own part in this glorious revolution, how his pen would confirm what the sword had won, and how a hundred generations should remember him and praise him that he had refreshed their souls with the sweet wine of liberty.
He took great strides and twirled his cane as he spoke, and I could scarce keep pace with him. My child was but three months old, but she was a fat little wag and I had swaddled her well in a fleece, which made no light burden. “Oh, Husband,” I cried, “my legs and arms ache. I envy you the liberty whereof you speak so sweetly.”
He groaned and recited some Greek or Hebrew verse against my inopportune speech and said: “Confess, all the while that I poured out my heart to you, were you not thinking of to-morrow’s flesh-dinner, whether to buy pork or salt-beef, and what herbs to choose for the sauce, and whether there will be leeks in the market?”
“Some person in our household must think of these things,” I answered. “And if your purse will no longer bear the expense of a good cook’s wages, but only of a snivelling little cook-wench, why then, this person is myself.”
We continued in silence, but since, for shame, he could not carry the child for me, as being a gentleman not a common citizen, he was considerate enough to slacken his pace a little. When we came to the neighbourhood of Whitehall Palace, we heard a distant hum and chatter, like a great flock of starlings roosting in a bed of reeds, and the torches and lanterns turned the darkness into day. The crowd was already dense around the Palace, where a scaffold was erected in the open street by the Banqueting Hall, and my husband blamed me for walking so slowly that others had taken up their stations ahead of us. But by good luck we fell in with my brother John, who was now an officer in General Ireton’s own troop, and he offered to escort us to a commanding station; the which he did with loud cries of “Make way, there, citizens, in General Ireton’s name,” whereat the crowd parted on either side of us as the Red Sea parted for Moses when he led the Israelites out of Egypt. We found ourselves standing not many paces distant from the foot of the tall scaffold, which had a railing about it, almost a yard high, with the axe and block in the middle; but we would not see this engine by reason of the black cloths hung upon the railing. Then John saluted us, and departed.
Several men stood upon the scaffold already, wearing black masks, for the task before them was so odious that none durst show his naked face; and the chief executioner and his assistant wore sailors’ trousers to disguise even the shape of their legs. The chief executioner was remarkable for a grizzled wig and a grey beard which, when daylight came, had a false aspect. A company of foot-soldiers and a troop of horse were posted about the scaffold to prevent escape or rescue; we stood close to the foot-soldiers.
I listened to the soldiers conversing together, of whom one asked the other: “Comrade Sim, is this not an awful business? Does your heart quail abominationly, spite of all the strong waters that you have taken, and the strong prayers you have offered up?”
“Yea, Comrade Zack,” answered Sim, “but I hope I shall not flinch from my way of duty—no more than did certain Roman soldiers of old, whom their duty bound to consent in a business more awful by far than this—those I mean who with their swords restrained the mourning crowds at Golgotha. Are we not every whit so stout-hearted as Romans? Lift up your heart, Zack; you showed yourself a bold enough man at Newbury five years since, by the river. I would not have done what you did, no, not for five hundred pound and a jolly wife, that I would not.”
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Says another: “Why, Zack, what did you then? Was it in the battle? I never heard tell that you showed yourself to advantage in the set-to that day? Come, the story!”
“It was a witch for whom I was executioner,” said Zack, “for I take no account of witches, and fear them not, being born a Sunday’s child. I confess that my Sergeant praised me and declared that I acted manfully that day.”
“Ay, so he did, I warrant,” cried Sim. “Those were the times before the reformation of our armies, while we yet lagged at our ease on the march and neglected our commanders. Zack and I were loitering by the way, in gathering nuts and black berries, and disputing together upon some point of doctrine, I know not what, and there were four or five other idle fellows not far from us. Well, Zack in jest pursued me with his sword and I ran from him and climbed up into an oak-tree, convenient for climbing; and I pulled myself up to the top branches and there defied him. It happened, as I waited in a crotch of the tree, that my thumbs began to prick. I looked through the leaves towards the river, being there adjacent, where I espied a sight of horror: there was a tall, lean, slender woman treading of the water with her feet with as much firmness as if she trampled upon the high road. I beckoned softly and called to Zack to come up, which he did, and another with him, and we watched through the leaves of the tree, nor could all our sights be deluded at once—”
Here Zack took up the tale: “Yet she was not walking upon mere water, but sliding on a small plank-board washed over with the water, to which when she came to the bank she gave a push with her foot and back it steered like an arrow to the opposing bank. Then we climbed down hastily, and the other man with us espied Reuben Kett, our Sergeant (who was come back to rebuke us for straggling), and acquainted him with what we had seen. The Sergeant began to sweat, yet he commanded that we search the wood and lay hold on her straight. The others shrank back, but I encouraged Sim and told him a charm sovereign against witches, which was to thrust his hand in his breeches-pocket and there salute the camrado who enlisted with him. Then he and I, running through the woods, found the same woman seated upon a fallen log, doing nothing, but staring before her. Straitway, I seized her by the arms, demanding what she was, but she replied no words unto me, so I hauled her before the Sergeant, who questioned her long. Yet she replied no words to him neither, feigning deafness. Then he shouted and said to her: ‘You are an apparent witch, and we shall deal you death!’ whereat she laughed in his face.”
“Nay,” said Sim, “you are mistaken there, Zack. She laughed not until afterwards, when the Sergeant chose Pious Hitchcocke and Frank Yellows as good marksmen to dispatch her. Then I was chosen to set her against a mud bank by the river, a charge of which you may imagine, good child, whether I was not reluctant. Nevertheless, I performed my duty somehow, and these two gave fire and shot at her, from a distance of not above two pikes’ length; but with deriding and loud laughter she caught the bullets, one in either hand, and tossed them back again, to their huge amazement and terror. Then Sergeant Kett prayed to God to give him strength, for he was as weak as a rush, though in general a middling bold fellow and a powerful preacher—”
“That I deny,” cried Zack. “He never moved us by his preaching, and was a very Levite, so stiff he was in his observances. I remember he would not suffer us to eat blood-pudding or hare’s flesh even in a necessity.”
“Well,” said Sim, “whether he was Levite or Sodomite makes no matter; for he prayed aloud for strength, and strength flowed upon him, and he let off his carbine close to her breast. Yet the bullet rebounded like a child’s ball and took off his leathern hat for him, whereat the witch, though speechless still, yet laughed in a contemptible way of scorn. Then was Zack only not dismayed; for which steadfastness I honour you, Zack. Zack told the Sergeant that to pierce the temples of the witch’s head with steel would prevail against the strongest sorcery imaginable; and straitway Zack was her executioner, were you not, Zack, with your capped Sheffield knife? Yea, you made no more of despatching this vermin than if she had been fox or rat.”
“Spoke she aught before she died?” asked a soldier. “Did she prophesy? Come, Zack, I know well she prophesied. What did she say before you showed yourself so manful?”
Zack looked at Sim and Sim looked at Zack again. Then Sim said: “She spoke at the end, but only to tell him, ‘Nay, Son, it is not much to murder a mad old woman, it is nothing to quail at—but will not your scalp crawl and your bowels be turned to water on the day when you consent in the murder of an anointed King?’”
When Sim had said this, there was silence for awhile in the ranks of the soldiers.
In the civil crowd about us there began to be much mockery and ribaldry, but upon indifferent matters, not upon the great overshadowing event of His Majesty’s execution, of which none spoke but in whispers.
A carpenter’s wife stood not far from me and the carpenter with her. She had a waggish wit and jeered continually at him in dulcet tones, he answering little or nothing except now and then: “In God’s name, Good Puss, cannot you hold your peace?” or “Your prattle is unseasonable, my little pig’s eye!” This woman spoke to me and said: “Hearken now, Gossip! When this dear husband of mine comes home drunken, which is not very often, not above seven nights a week, and blasphemes against the Lord and stumbles upon the stairs—what think you that I then do to him? Riddle me that, Gossip! Do you suppose, Gossip, that I ever speak him a foul word? Nay, nay, I would not so for anything. Instead, I cause his bed to be made very soft and easy that he may sleep the better, and by fair glozing speeches I coax him into bed and draw off his boots for him and stroke his head gently a few times, until he settles upon his lees.”
Here a little black-eyed serving-wench, standing beside me, interrupted and answered for me, saying: “Why, shame on you, Madam, for humouring the wretch! Ah, you weak and willing slaves, you are traitresses to your sex. Must all wives crouch in your manner to their currish and swinish husbands? Devil take me, if I do the like when I marry my Master: for if he behaved himself like a swine, so would I use him like a beast.”
“How! You marry your Master, wench?” cried a seller of brooms. “When is your bridal morning? May I be your brideman and pull the garters off your smooth white legs?”
“For that you must wait a day or two,” replied she, “until my Mistress dies.”
Then two or three asked her, of what was her Mistress expected to die?
“Why, of what else but jealousy?” she answered. “For yesterday she saw my Master’s shirt and my smock hanging close together upon a line, and she has taken to her bed with the mortification of it, and will not touch a morsel of food.”
“Ah women, women, have done with your chatter,” cried a tarry sailor. “You do nothing to recommend marriage to a lively bachelor such as I am. I believe that a good woman is like the single eel put in a bag among a thousand stinging snakes; and if a man luckily gropes out the one eel from all the rest, yet has he at best but a wet eel by the tail.”
At this a bearded old man with a hare-lip, who, for aught I know was a decayed coachman or the like, coughed and said: “Ay, as an honest bishop once dared to tell Queen Elizabeth to her face, in a preachment before her: women for the most part are fond, foolish, wanton flibbergibs, wavering, witless, without counsel, feeble, careless, rash, proud, dainty, nice, tale-bearers, eavesdroppers, rumour-raisers, evil tongued, worse minded, and in every way doltified with the dregs of the Devil’s dung-hill.”
“Was it indeed a bishop said that?” cried the serving-wench. “Then, by God, it is small wonder that the bishops have said their last goodnight. Gorge me that, Goodman Hare-lip, gorge me that!”
Presently they all began to sing together, to the tune of “Ragged and torn and true”:
It never should grieve me much
Though more Excises were:
The only tax that I grutch
Is the farthing a pot on beer.
I never would grieve nor pine
(Whatever you s
ay or think)
If they doubled the price of wine—
For wine I seldom drink,
I found it exceeding cold, waiting for the dawn to come, and I thought I should faint; but the serving-wench, who had played truant, as she said, to see avenged the death of her three brothers (the eldest of whom fell at Taunton in the siege and the two others at Preston)—she charitably relieved me of the burden of my child for an hour or more. And she held up the child for the crowd to see and cried laughing: “See what a goodly child I have now brought forth! Ah, wait until I bring this sweet child home to my Mistress and ask pardon for my fault. If I find her risen from her bed she will fall down in a fit again and die within the hour!”
“And then I will be your brideman,” cried the seller of brooms.
The sun rose and shone upon a vast multitude of people crowding the street from the scaffold as far back as to Charing Cross, and in the other direction almost to the river’s edge by the Abbey of Westminster. My child, that had been wakeful and mewling, slept again. Presently there went a stir through the crowd that the King was come, but it was a headless rumour and there we stood a pretty while longer, until we heard the distant noise of drums and the roaring of the crowd as the King came walking through the Park from St. James’s Palace to Whitehall, with a guard of halberdiers before and behind. It is said, he walked fast and shivered for the cold. Then ensued another delay, for two hours or more, while we continued in our stations. Word went through the crowd that Parliament was passing an Act to forbid the proclamation of any new King, and that the execution must wait upon this. My husband was reading a book that he kept propped upon my shoulders, and seemed insensible of what went on around him; and I heartily wished myself home in my kitchen with a cup of warm caudle on my lap and my feet thrust up against the embers. Yet there was no escape, and if anyone fainted he was kept upon his feet by the pressing together of the crowd, which stank a good deal.
Wife to Mr. Milton Page 39