CHAPTER XXIII.

_TERRIBLE DAYS._

How is it possible for me to make any understand the unspeakable horror of the days that followed? Were I even gifted like the great Shakespeare himself, methinks I should scarce succeed in drawing a picture of those days and nights of fear, which were prolonged till men became almost dead to a sense of the peril in which they stood, until some fresh panic and new report set all hearts quivering with fresh affright.

Soldiers were scouring the country. Miserable fugitives from the army taken in barns and ditches and cabins were either hung up then and there by the soldiers, or brought before the officers to be judged and condemned by them. And these fared even worse than those butchered by the troopers, for they received the horrible sentence of traitors, and had their hearts torn out before their faces or ever the breath had quite left them, and their members and heads dispersed throughout the country to be exposed to public view.

How well do I remember seeing the first consignment of these ghastly trophies passing along the road, and the inn-keepers and such like being forced to nail them up before their doors as a warning and terror to the village. Sometimes the air was rendered foul and pestilential for miles by the hanging corpses and horrid trophies. Women kept within their doors for weeks together, being so filled with horror at the sight; and the whole country was filled with stories of marvellous hairbreadth escapes, or of captures of innocent persons, who were treated with the same cruelty as those who had been in arms--the soldiers scarce taking the trouble to listen to their protests, and brutally telling them that since so many deserving death had escaped, they must needs die in their stead.

What fearful days to fall upon England, who had called herself a free country, and whose people had always believed that the innocent were protected from violence by the strong arm of the law! Alas! we were soon to find that the most fearful things of all were enacted by those who came in the name of Justice and Law.

I forget exactly what day it was that news reached us that the Duke had been captured, and was now on his way to London, where, as all men said, nothing could save him from the wrath of the King. Some said that had he not proclaimed himself King he might have had a chance for his life, but that having done this he had nothing to hope, and would end his life upon the scaffold.

Yet there were numbers of people who declared that he had got off safe to Holland in disguise, and that he who was on his way to London was not the Duke himself, but some follower whose outward aspect was very like, and who had changed clothes with the Duke and allowed himself to be taken, that his lord might safely escape and live in retirement for a while, and then appear again in his kingdom and fight more successfully for his crown. This belief was held by hundreds and thousands of people in our western counties for years and years, and I remember how long it was before the expectation of again seeing the Duke died out. Some maintained to the end of their lives that he still lived, and that he would have come again to save England had not the tyrant monarch been forced to fly, whilst the just William of Orange ruled (with and in right of his wife) in his stead.

But we in Taunton had other things more near and personal to think of than whether or not it was the Duke who was taken. The bloody victors were at our very gates, and none in the town knew who would escape when once inquisition for blood was about to be made. Was it not in Taunton that the Duke had been proclaimed King? Was it not in Taunton that he had received such royal honours, and such help in money and men? Were not many of his leading officers Taunton men? And if such signal vengeance had been taken already on the innocent rabble, who had acted ignorantly, how should the citizens of Taunton hope to escape?

Well do I remember that Thursday morning when we heard the people in the streets shouting out,--

"Colonel Kirke is coming! Colonel Kirke is coming! God have mercy upon us! Kirke and his Lambs are on their way!"

I rushed out into the streets to hear the news, and even as I did so I met a horseman riding into the yard of the inn, as though he came from the army. But I stayed not to ask news of him, for the people were crying out that twenty men were to be hanged in the city that day, and that Master John Mason was of that number.

All the town was in a terror and tumult, for Master John Mason was a man of most excellent repute, and though he had taken arms in the Duke's cause, he had only fought at Sedgemoor; and that he of all men should be a victim was a thing not to be borne.

At our inn, so near to the open Cornhill, all was hurry and confusion; for Colonel Kirke and his officers were to lodge there, and a banquet was to be prepared for them at the very hour at which the victims were to be slain. The town stood aghast at the horror of the thing, and awful stories were whispered of Kirke during his governorship of Tangiers. Some believed that he had caused miserable Jews to be burned alive there; but others said that he had not burned them himself, but had sent them to the Inquisition in Spain to be burned there--which seemed not much better. His soldiers were called Lambs, but whether in derision because of their fierceness, or (as some said) because when in Tangiers their banner bore the sign of a lamb, I cannot tell. But at least at the thought of their coming all men's hearts shook with fear, whilst the ladies of the town resolved that they would so petition for the life of Master Mason that even Colonel Kirke would not have the heart to slay him.

There was one, Mistress Elizabeth Rowe, a beautiful and godly matron, blending the graces of youth with the dignity and softness of maturity, and well known to every resident in Taunton. There was also a legend in that city, that a "white woman or woman in white" could always obtain pardon for a condemned criminal; and good Mistress Elizabeth declared that she would be that woman, and that she would intercede for the life of Master Mason. On hearing that there was great joy, for it seemed to all as though not even the bloody Colonel Kirke could resist so much goodness and beauty; and as we toiled at our preparations for the ghastly feast, we spoke in whispers of the appeal to be made, and wondered whether it would succeed.

What a terrible day that was! The memory of it is yet as clear before my mind as when it was but a week old.

It was afternoon when we heard the sound of martial music, fifes and drums, and the marching of many feet. All Taunton rushed to window and balcony to look out, and beheld the dark-faced Colonel riding along at the head of his troops. What a difference from the last triumphal entry into Taunton, when all the town was decked with boughs and garlands, and every face beamed with joy! Now almost all faces were grey with fear and grief. Hardly a citizen but trembled for his liberty or life, or for that of some near and dear one. The few voices raised in acclamation as the Colonel rode through the streets sounded hollow and faint. The drums and fifes and martial strains of their own men kept the silence from being too ominous.

At the Three Cups all was hurry and confusion. A great banquet was being prepared in the long upper chamber with the balcony which looked up the Fore Street and towards the Cornhill. But we scarce dared look out of the window ourselves, for just outside, a little to the right, where the space was wide and free, soldiers were hastily setting up a scaffold and gibbet. Close beside this gibbet had halted a cart filled with groaning and wounded prisoners, amongst whom was good Master Mason; and a whisper had already run through the crowd that they were to be hanged and dismembered that very day as an accompaniment to the Colonel's banquet.

I am proud to say that no Somersetshire man could be found to do the hideous work of executioner here. The Colonel had had to send for the executioner from Exeter to do his horrid work. This functionary, whose gigantic frame and scowling face were enough to inspire terror in the hearts of all beholders, was already preparing for his bloody task. He had a great axe and two or three sharp long butcher's knives laid out before him, and he was calling to the people to bring faggots and billets for the making of a great fire.

We knew not for what the fire was intended, but we were to know all too soon.

Sounds of revelry and mirth soon arose from the upper chamber where the Colonel and his officers were feasting. Little recked those fierce men of the horror and terror and agony that reigned in Taunton. They had come to punish rebellion, and to strike terror into the hearts of all who had been concerned in this thing; and Taunton above all places had been most deeply implicated.

How shall I speak of the horrors of that day? When the carouse was at its height, the Colonel, inflamed with wine, appeared upon the balcony, and his half-drunk officers with him, and gave the signal to the executioner to commence his task. Already a row of twenty gibbets had been erected, and the twenty white and wounded prisoners upon the carts had been set in order beside them. Master John Mason, whom all Taunton knew and loved, was kneeling devoutly, praying for himself and his fellow-sufferers, and heeding nothing of what was passing. Some of those near to him followed his words with tears and ejaculations, and most of these were calm and resigned; though some, seeing their dear ones weeping in the crowd, could not keep back their own tears, though all striving to face death bravely.

Then before our eyes in that upper balcony appeared a white-robed figure, and those of us--there were not many--who were in the secret of the petition held our breath to listen, whilst good Mistress Elizabeth upon her knees pleaded for the life of the righteous citizen. Now I was very near to the balcony, being, in fact, just under it, and the parley lasted so long that I feared respite, even if granted, would come too late; for the halters were about the necks of all the prisoners, and the cart was about to be pushed away from under their feet.

Suddenly I heard a harsh voice above me saying, "It is granted, madam;" and then in another tone the same voice said, "Go you, Bushe, and see to it. Tell the executioner to cut the fellow down."

The next moment one of the younger officers came swaggering half drunk from the inn door, and went up to the executioner and spoke to him. There was a brief parley, and he cut one of the halters through. A man leaped from the cart and dashed away in the crowd, and immediately the rest were swung into the air, and remained hanging betwixt heaven and earth.

"Give them music to their dancing!" cried the voice of the Colonel, as the legs of the dying men twitched and moved in their last agony; and the drums and pipes struck up a jubilant strain, which was continued all through the final scenes of that horrid spectacle.

Why did I wait and watch? In truth, I was paralyzed by the awful horror of it. One by one the dead or half-dead wretches were cut down, the fierce executioner cleft the senseless trunks asunder by a blow of his axe, and seizing the heart of the victim, tore it from his body and flung it into the fire, exclaiming as he did so, "There goes the heart of a traitor;" and at each repetition of the words the martial music struck up again, as though some jubilant and joyful thing were being done.

Yet after all good Master Mason perished with the rest. The Lieutenant Bushe sent by his Colonel to save the prisoner had not the least idea of which one the lady had spoken, and on reaching the gallows had said to the executioner, "Cut down that fellow." "Which fellow?" had been the question, since twenty were there, and Bushe had no idea which it was. Master Mason, absorbed in his prayers, took no heed of what had been passing in the balcony; but another man had seen the whole, and when the executioner and lieutenant paused in doubt what to do, he looked up and said that he was the man for whom the lady in white had pleaded. So the executioner cut the rope, and he sprang away and vanished in the crowd, as we saw; and in the confusion it was not known till afterwards that good Master Mason had perished, although his life had been granted to him at the instance of Mrs. Elizabeth Rowe.

Such things are too often done in the bloody days of war.

Twenty victims (save one) perished that day, and thirty upon the day following, each time the Colonel holding a great feast, and turning off on the second occasion ten victims with each of his three great toasts--one for the King, one for the Queen, and one for "the great Lord Chief-Justice Jeffreys, who is shortly coming to finish the work that I have just begun."

As those words were heard, a shudder and a shiver passed through all who heard them, and a groan went up that was not altogether a groan of compassion for the last of the batch of victims who were being butchered in cold blood almost in sight of the revellers. We all knew what terrible days would follow the appearance of the Lord Chief-Justice amongst us. We had heard enough of his ferocity and brutality before now; what would it be like when we were forced to drink to the dregs the cup of his wrath?

Acts of singular ferocity and brutality were daily perpetrated under our very eyes. One man was hanged whilst in a dying state, unable to move hand or foot, scarce living when he was swung into space. Another was hanged three times, and three times cut down to ask if he repented of his crime; but he boldly answered that were he to have his life given him to live again, he would do just the same. He was at last hanged in chains, and left upon the gallows, like several more, till the coming of William of Orange.

But amongst all these tales of brutality and horror, I must not omit to mention one incident which reflects credit if not honour upon the cruel and bloodthirsty Colonel Kirke; and this thing I was witness of with mine own eyes, so I can testify the truth of it right well.

In spite of all the horrors of that time, business went on at mine uncle's house as before; and it so chanced that whilst the Colonel was in the town, and his soldiers more or less ravaging the whole country side, an order arrived from Bishop's Hull (the home of Mistress Mary Bridges) to send thither a hogshead of beer without loss of time.

Now with the Colonel and his officers quartered in our house, we were not a little pressed in those days; and my uncle not knowing how to get this hogshead sent, I asked if I might not take the cart and drive it over. I had two reasons for this. One was that I desired if possible to get speech with young Mistress Mary about Mistress Mary Mead; another was that I sometimes felt as though I should go mad with the fear and horror of the sights of Taunton Town. For day by day and all day long the black-browed executioner, and an assistant whom the townsmen called "Tom Boilman," were engaged in boiling in pitch the quarters of the victims of the rebellion; and the whole place reeked of the awful brew, and turned me sick with horror every time I passed that way. I felt I must get out into the green fields, if only for a few hours. I had been too busy to be spared all this while; but this errand was in my uncle's service, and I went gladly.

It was not a long journey to Bishop's Hull; but the cart travelled at a slow pace, and I did not hurry the horse. It was a relief to leave the streets of the city and the careworn faces of the inhabitants behind, and to see the smiling meadows and innocent, careless life of bird and beast, unshadowed by the horrors that had fallen upon the land.

But one could not forget even here that a reign of terror ruled. Bands of soldiers still scoured the country, seeking after fugitives; and in almost every principal house in the country round men were quartered, to keep watch both upon the inhabitants and upon any flying to them for succour.

I knew that there had been soldiers living at free quarters at Bishop's Hull, and doubtless it was for these that the ale was needed. I drove my cart into the great yard of the house, and delivered its contents to the servants there. But being anxious to obtain speech of Mistress Mary, I did not immediately go away, but tied up the horse to a ring, and entered into talk with the men of the place.

Sir Ralph was away, I heard. He had been summoned to meet the Duke of Albemarle, it was thought, or Lord Churchill, and before he left he had arranged for the removal of the soldiers who had lived for some time in his house. But to-day some of these had come back and demanded their old quarters, and some perplexity reigned in the place as to what was to be done with them. There was confusion in the house, and one of the servants to whom I spoke, asking news of Mistress Mary, answered,--

"Methinks she is somewhere in the great hall. Go in, lad, and fear not. There be too many coming and going to-day for thy appearance to be noted. Go seek her for thyself; I have no time to go with thee."

And in truth every servant about the place seemed flying hither and thither. I followed the command given me, and made my way towards the hall of the house, coming upon a scene as strange as any it has been my lot to witness.

Seated in a high-backed chair beside the great empty hearth, that was in this summer season decked with green boughs and great spikes of foxglove--Mistress Mary's hand in every inch of it--was the stately lady of the house, surrounded by some frightened-looking maidens, who were gathered together behind her chair, and seemed to be shrinking in terror from something or somebody. As I advanced a few steps further into the hall, I saw that it was half filled by swaggering and tipsy soldiers, who appeared to be clamouring for something which the lady of the house was not willing to grant, and whose scowling and angry looks were the cause of the fright in the faces of the maids.

A few paces away from her mother, standing at the other side of the hearth, her slight, strong figure drawn to its full height, her face in a quiver of anger and scorn, was little Mistress Mary, such a light in her eyes as I had never seen there before, her hands locked together, and her whole figure instinct with suppressed passion. What had passed before I know not. I think the men had been demanding free quarters again, and that the lady had been telling them that they had been withdrawn by their officer, and that they had no right to come again in such a fashion, or to take that tone with her in absence of her husband, the master of the house and a loyal servant to the King. However that may have been, I can answer at least for what happened next; for as I appeared upon the scene, one great tipsy fellow, who seemed to be the foremost of the band, came lurching forward, and offered so great and gross an insult to the stately lady sitting there, that my pen refuses to put it on paper. But mark what followed. Almost ere the words had passed the fellow's lips, with a bound like that of a young tiger Mistress Mary had sprung forward; and ere any man of us knew or guessed what she was about to do, she had seized the fellow's sword from its sheath, and had run it through his heart as he stood, so that he fell dead at her feet without a groan. A deep silence fell upon us all as we saw this deed; and Mistress Mary, her face as white as death, but with her eyes still flaming fire, faced round upon the rest of the soldiers and said, pointing first to the corpse and then to the door,--

"Take him, and go!"

Mechanically the men obeyed her; but some half-dozen, more sober than the rest, lingered behind and said, firmly but respectfully,--

"Mistress, you must answer for this deed before the Colonel. You must come with us at once."

"I am ready," answered Mistress Mary, with heroic firmness. "The sooner the better; I fear none of you!"

And indeed she spoke no more than the truth. And never have I seen a more dauntless mien than was carried by that brave child as she rode beside her mother into Taunton that day, guarded by a band of soldiers, and followed by me in my cart; for I felt I must see the end of this thing, and bear my testimony, if I might be heard, when the tale was told to the fierce Colonel.

He was, as was usual at that hour of the day, in his room at the Three Cups; and upon hearing that a prisoner had been brought to be tried by court-martial, he at once summoned his officers to the long banqueting-room and ordered the prisoner before him.

When his eyes fell upon the tender maiden, not more than twelve years old, with the dauntless mien and steady eyes, his face changed and even softened as I had never thought that face could do; and he sternly asked his men why they had brought a woman before him, and she scarce more than a child.

When he heard that it was a military offence with which she stood charged, he bent upon her a searching look, and commanded that all should be told him. Then the men who had brought her told the tale, not indeed extenuating the offence of their dead fellow, but putting the case fairly enough. There was no need for me to speak; there was no need for Mistress Mary to defend herself. When the Colonel heard the words which had been addressed to the dignified matron standing just behind her brave young daughter, and recognized in her the wife of one of the King's loyal supporters, and the mistress of a house where much kindness and hospitality had been shown to His Majesty's soldiers, his face took an expression of mingled sternness and approval which it is hard to describe; and he said, looking round upon the men who stood by,--

"Where is the sword with which the deed was done?"

One of the men had chanced to bring it, and it was handed to the Colonel. The stain of blood was yet upon it, although it had been wiped clean from blood-drops. The Colonel took it and rose up in his seat. He made a low bow to Mistress Mary, and handed the sword to her.

"Mistress Mary Bridges," he said, "you are acquitted of the crime laid to your charge. The action you performed was not only pardonable; it was legitimate and noble, and does you every honour. Would that there were more such women in this land to become the mothers of a soldier race! Take this sword, fair maiden, take it and keep it; and let it pass down in times to come to other Mary Bridges of your name and race. May your house never want such a Mary as you have shown yourself, to act with such courage and resolution in the hour of need.--Madam, farewell!" (this to Lady Bridges). "A brave mother makes a braver daughter. Guard well your child, and honour her as she deserves to be honoured. A maid who will risk her life for her mother's protection is one to grow up the pride and glory of her house.---Mistress Mary, I salute you. Farewell; I could almost wish that you had been born a boy, that I might have numbered you among my own picked soldiers!"

And stooping his dark head the Colonel saluted Mistress Mary on the cheek, and bending low before her, as did also all his officers, saw her pass from the room, holding the sword in her hands.

A burst of cheering greeted her as she appeared in the streets clasping the trophy of victory. Her face was flushed now, and her eyes sparkling betwixt excitement, triumph, and tears. Her mother's face was quivering now that the peril was past as it had never quivered whilst her daughter stood arraigned before the fierce Colonel.

"Dicon, Dicon, I cannot face all these people with my sword!" cried Mistress Mary, a girlish shrinking suddenly possessing her, showing that she was still a maid, though she could act with the courage of a man when need was. "Take me to Miss Blake's! Take me to Mistress Mary; I must see her ere I go back!"

Lady Bridges was willing enough to get out of the cheering crowd, and quickly we found ourselves beneath the shelter of the next roof. Mistress Mary, hearing the tumult, came down the stairs to see what it meant; and the younger Mary, rushing into her arms, and dropping the sword upon the floor, cried out, betwixt laughter and tears,--

"Mary, Mary, I have done it! I have slain, with mine own hands, one of your Duke's foes!"