[figure description] Page 025.[end figure description]

As these were times when jails were apt to be
crowded, Harold was deposited in the same room with
the preacher, who, at the instance of the Justice, announced
himself as Israel Baneswright, of Boston, in
Lincolnshire, at which his worship rubbed his hands,
and exclaimed:

“O ho! I've heard of you before. You are famous
among the elect for abusing his sacred Majesty
through the nose, and dubbing the bishops wolves in
sheep's clothing. Instead of calling the Pope anti-Christ,
as every good Christian should do, you bestow
that title on our great defender of the faith, Archbishop
Laud, who I honor next the king himself. You are
the man for faith without works, but, i'faith, I'll work
you. I see you've lost your ears, but, by good luck,

[figure description] Page 026.[end figure description]

your nose is still amenable to the law, and as all your
treason and blasphemy escapes through that organ, it
is but just it should suffer the penalty.”

“Say your say, and do your worst, Master Justice,”
replied Israel Baneswright, “I am prepared to suffer
in the good cause, sustained as I am by a power superior
to the archbishop or the king.

“Hear him!” cried the Justice, in wrath; “Hear
him—'Slife, I'll teach the Crop-ear who is the strongest
before I have done with him. Clap him in irons,
and see that he does not escape by a miracle.”

“Angels have sometimes ministered to the relief of
the saints in time of sore jeopardy,” replied Israel, reverently,
“and one thing I know, that whatever I am
doomed to suffer by the divine will, that will shall enable
me to bear.”

“Hear him again,” cried the Justice, appealing to
his officials. “The blasphemer has the presumption
to question the power of the head of the church, and
place his conscience above the authority of the king.
Gag the Crop-ear, that he may spout no more treason
in the face of the representative of majesty and justice.”

The officials obeyed with orthodox alacrity, and
Master Shorthose departed with his followers, locking
the door, and leaving the two delinquents alone.
Without thinking of, or perhaps not caring for the consequences,
Harold forthwith removed the gag, and the
first use Israel made of the recovery of speech, was to
thank him for his kindness. Gradually they fell into

[figure description] Page 027.[end figure description]

discourse, and Harold perceiving that Israel took it for
granted he was one of his followers, immediately undeceived
him, by relating the manner in which he
had become involved in the same predicament with
himself.

“You came to scorn us then,” said Israel, with a
look and tone of mingled disappointment and displeasure.

“No,” rejoined the other, “not in scorn; I came
by accident, and remained from curiosity.”

Israel paused a few moments, as if communing
with the inward man, and seemed somewhat in doubt
and perplexity. But proselytism is the invariable
concomitant of zeal. In all this world of seeming inconsistencies,
there is not such a jumble as that mass
of motives which prompts the actions of men and
shapes their course of life, which often seems directed
by the mere waywardness of the will. Hence many
things appear extraordinary and beyond belief, though
in reality there is nothing improbable in this world,
but actions without motives.

Israel Baneswright was the son of a clergyman of
the established church, who, besides fattening at a
stall in the Cathedral of Durham, held a plurality of
livings in various parts of the country, so distant from
each other that it was physically impossible for him
to perform the duties of shepherd of the flock to all of
them. He was both loyal and orthodox in the highest
degree, as in duty bound, and having the advowsion
of one of his best livings for this his only son,

[figure description] Page 028.[end figure description]

had educated him accordingly in the strictest tenets
of the Pharisees, as the Crop-ears irreverently called
them. After going through the necessary preparation
he was sent to the university, where he studied
diligently, at times, though his conduct was occasionally
not a little irregular. He was exceedingly
self-willed, and often took the bit between his teeth,
when neither tutor nor proctor could restrain him.

Among his fellow students was Oliver Cromwell,
whose youth little indicated his future character and
destiny, he being at that time more famous for his
pranks than his prayers. Similarity of tastes and
habits produced a college intimacy between the future
Protector and the future field preacher, cemented by
various frolicks that subjected them to various degrees
of punishment. It is recorded that they once performed
together in a play, got up in honor of King James
the First, on a visit to the university, called “The
Marriage of the Arts,” which, according to an old
chronicler, “was too grave for the king, and too scholastic
for the auditory, (or, as some have said, that the
actors had taken too much wine before they began.)
His Majesty being heartily tired, after divers yawns
offered to withdraw. At length being persuaded by
some that were near to him, to have patience till it
was concluded, least the young men should be disheartened,
he sat down much against his will.
Whereupon these verses were made by a certain
scholar:

[figure description] Page 029.[end figure description]

The profane career of Israel was, however, suddenly
arrested. About this time, Puritanism began to show
itself in this stronghold of orthodoxy, and more than one
student became infected with the heresy. Among these
was Israel, who, through the native ardor of his character,
suddenly passed from one extreme to the other.
He at once adopted the Puritan creed, dress, deportment
and every other peculiarity of these extraordinary people,
who seemed expressly formed for bearing the bright
torch of Christianity, civilization, and liberty, into the
wild recesses of a new world. He caused his hair to
be cropped, accommodated his dress to the severe simplicity,
and his deportment to the staid, sober self-denial
of the strict models of the sect, and talked openly
of the downfall of anti-Christ's kingdom, the creation
of a new heaven and a new earth, new churches, and
a new commonwealth together.

Expulsion naturally followed such bold defiance of
the statutes of the university; and the worthy Pluralist,
his father, indignant at this enormous backsliding,
on his return home, proffered him the alternative of
the thirty-nine articles, or disinheritance. Parental
affection and parental authority, kindly exerted, and
pursued with perseverance, might, perhaps, have restored
Israel to his mother church. But, unhappily,
it but too often happens, that in the enforcement of

[figure description] Page 030.[end figure description]

what they believe to be the truth, men lose sight of
those unchangeable and eternal truths which constitute
the basis of our most sacred duties. Men may
differ on speculative points, but it is believed that no
one in this latter age would think it either Christian
or humane to banish a son for differing in opinion with
his father.

Israel was obstinate, his father inexorable; and
thus one of the holiest of all human ties was severed
forever. They parted never to meet again, and Israel
became a houseless wanderer on the face of the earth.
Impelled by zeal—perhaps aided by necessity, he
turned field preacher, trusting to the pious gratitude
of his followers for food and raiment. He became
accustomed in time to rely on the immediate intervention
of Providence for the relief of his wants; and
finally, in the temerity of his faith, married one of his
female disciples, at the moment that he was without a
home, and destitute of every hope save that which
animated his enthusiastic spirit.

That he was a firm believer in the faith he preached,
and that all his deeds and doctrines were the result of
conviction, cannot be reasonably doubted, for this was
demonstrated by the sufferings he endured for their
sake. It is not in human nature to sustain what has
been so often inflicted for difference of opinion on
points of faith, without being braced by that inward
conviction which seems to spring from the secret whisperings
of the divinity himself, and is the only test of
truth to which mankind can directly appeal.

[figure description] Page 031.[end figure description]

Hypocrites never become martyrs. This grand tribunal of
conscience is, without doubt, sometimes, nay often,
perhaps always, subject more or less to the influence
of self-love, the great moving principle, which is most
directly assailed by persecution. What costs us most,
is most dear to us; and that for which we sacrifice all,
is everything.

The faith of Israel Baneswright had grown up
against wind and tide, and the force by which it was
assailed only increased its power of resistance. It
passed the bounds of zeal, and had grown into a
rigid, inflexible bigotry, amounting to uncompromising
intolerance. Persecution makes bigots, and bigots
make persecution. Though his humanity might have
revolted from inflicting on others the sufferings he
himself encountered for a difference of opinion, still he
shrank with pious abhorrence from the idea of permitting
to others that toleration which he demanded for
himself and his followers. Stimulated at once, by the
ardor of conviction, the hope of being instrumental in
the conversion of a sinner, and of adding to his flock
one of somewhat higher rank than most of those who
as yet composed it, he at once with all that enthusiasm
which alone achieves miracles, commenced an attack
on the High-Church principles of his fellow prisoner.

The design of this tale is not to enter into polemical
discussions, which too often end in biting sarcasms
or bitter denunciations, equally unbecoming
the subject and the occasion. Suffice it to say, that
at the end of a long controversy, Harold remained

[figure description] Page 032.[end figure description]

unchanged, and Israel spent his eloquence in vain. As
usual in such cases, that feeling of fellowship which
arises from community in misfortune, subsided into a
coolness approaching dislike. Harold looked on his
companion as a bigoted exclusionist, and Israel, on
the other hand, considered him one of his persecutors.

Yet was Harold not a man who suffered his feelings
to be embittered so far as to make him forget the
common offices of humanity, which were never more
necessary than in behalf of these unhappy conventiclers.
The jailer was a dependent on Justice Shorthose,
and sought to gain his favor by adding insult to
the hardships he daily inflicted; and the petty underlings
followed their leader. Like all persons of little
and ignoble minds, they were over-zealous in emulating
their betters; and it is notorious that of all
tyrants there is none so intolerable as the slave.
These miserable tools who, after all, give the sharpest
sting to that whip of scorpions wielded by persecution,
were, or pretended to be, devotedly attached to
church and king, under whose broad mantle they
sheltered their petty malignity.

Harold soon perceived that the anxieties of his companion
were less for himself than his wife and daughter,
of whose destiny he could learn nothing since
their separation. He never failed to inquire of the
jailer and turnkeys as opportunity offered, but was
answered, for the most part, by bitter taunts, or significant
hints of what would happen on the return of
his worship the justice, who was absent hunting the

[figure description] Page 033.[end figure description]

Crop-ears. He could gain no information, but such as
served to increase his solicitude. There was in his
bosom a feeling still more powerful than that of enthusiasm.
He was devotedly attached to his wife and
daughter, who had shared his disgraces and sufferings,
and who merited his affection by their tenderness,
patience and devotion. He pined for their society,
and all his prayers were for them.

Nor was Harold without his troubles. On being
lodged in prison, he debated within himself whether to
apprise his aged father, who was laboring under the
weight of years, as well as of a long protracted infirmity
which was dragging him by inches down to the
grave. The good man had lost his buxom helpmate,
years before our history commences. The decayed old
trunk had outlived the verdant vine that twined around
it, and now stood bare and desolate, nodding to its
fall. Though aware that his sudden disappearance
would excite the most painful apprehensions, at home,
Harold also knew that such was the bigoted devotion
of his father to church and state, that he would never
forgive his son for attending a conventicle. After long
reflection, however, he decided to send to his father,
partly to relieve his worst apprehensions, partly in the
hope his interference might procure his release.

For some days he could procure no messenger, it
being contrary to directions of Justice Shorthose for
any one to carry a letter or message from a Crop-ear.
Nearly a fortnight elapsed, and his anxiety to hear
from home had become in the highest degree painful,

[figure description] Page 034.[end figure description]

when one day, on repeating his solicitations to be
allowed to send a message to his father, the jailer
informed him with a grin, the messenger would have
a long way to go, for his father on hearing he had
become a Crop-ear, had sunk under his afflictions
of mind and body, and been laid in his grave, a
martyr to the backslidings of his only son. Regardless
of the shock which this information occasioned, he
proceeded to inform him with a look of peculiar satisfaction,
that Master Justice Shorthose, having communicated
his apostacy to the proper authorities, a
heavy fine had been laid on the estate by the High
Commission Court, and a pursuivant, under special
supervision of his worship, was now in possession of
the house, till the fine was paid. Such were the consequences
resulting from accident, and the indulgence
of a mere whim of curiosity. Well may man humble
himself in the dust when he every day sees himself
the sport of trifles in themselves less than nothing.

Harold Habingdon, though abstractedly a stern
devotee of passive obedience and non-resistance, was
one of those men that cannot be crushed, and never
fall of themselves. Whatever might be his feelings,
he gave them no utterance; and when Israel attempted
to console him, he could scarcely perceive that he
required consolation. He remained unruffled as before.
But his outward seeming belied the spirit within. He
felt the death of his father, which left him, as it were,
alone in the wilderness of mankind; and the wrongs
inflicted on himself became more galling, from the

[figure description] Page 035.[end figure description]

reflection that they had shortened the days of his only
parent. It was now, for the first time in his life, that
he began to question in his inmost mind, the truth of
that creed which sanctioned such injustice, as well as
the legitimacy of the authority by which it was inflicted.
He had previously met with some of those famous
declarations of Parliament which so ably asserted the
rights of the people; and though they came directly
in conflict with the principles he had imbibed from his
earliest youth, still they had imperceptibly undermined
his prejudices without his being as yet conscious of
their operation. But having never heretofore suffered
from the practical consequences of these arbitrary
principles, their intrinsic deformity was not brought
home to him, and he had continued to bow implicitly
to the slavish doctrine of passive obedience and non-resistance.
Now, however, he began to feel the galling
of the chain, and what his reason had refused to sanction,
was realized by actual suffering.

Previous to his capture and imprisonment, he would
have shrunk from the idea of any limitation to the
authority of the king, but that of his own will, and
promptly taken arms in its defence, if necessary.
But now all the long cherished series of hereditary
impressions descending from generation to generation,
gathering new strength by the way, and centering in
his person, together with the precepts as well as example
of his father, and all those with whom he associated,
were gradually swept away. The conviction
was at length brought home to his door by sad

[figure description] Page 036.[end figure description]

experience, that as man is a being of imperfect virtue and
wayward will, that will should be circumscribed by
impassible barriers. He had not as yet become quite
a Republican; but the course of his reasoning as well
as feelings, was calculated to lead to that result in the
end.

His High-Church principles, too, were sensibly
shaken by the same personal experience of the consequences
arising from their practical application; since
he could not but perceive that the hardships they inflicted
on himself and others, were the joint issue of a
domineering church, and a despotic king, mutually
aiding each other in oppressing the people. He became
at length aware of what all history demonstrates,
that the worst species of tyranny is that which arrogates
to itself the sanction of Holy Writ, and seeks to
sway the reason of mankind by the infliction of corporeal
suffering, or the withholding of civil rights.
Of all despotisms that of ecclesiastical bigotry supported
by civil and military power, is the most rigid and
unrelenting.

While this mental metamorphosis was imperceptibly
going on, events bearing closely on the future destinies
of Harold had taken place. Master Justice
Shorthose had during this period been looking through
a perspective at the end of which stood tho old manor
house of Habingdon. The powers of this class of officers
had been greatly extended for the purpose of more
effectually executing the severe laws against the Puritans,
and they had become for the most part the petty

[figure description] Page 037.[end figure description]

despots of the fireside, entering houses, seizing persons,
and inflicting punishments on the lower orders
with as little regard to their rights, as the Star Chamber
and High Commission Courts paid to those of a
more dignified class.

The Justice had already attracted the favorable
notice of these renowned tribunals by his zeal and activity,
and received some of the crumbs that fell from
the great men's table. Thus his fervor was quickened
by the hope of gain, as well as power, the love of
which is, perhaps, more insatiable in the petty official
than the higher functionary. From the period of the
infliction of the heavy fine on Harold, Justice Shorthose
had thought he perceived a fair prospect of obtaining
possession of Habingdon, and in order to pave
the way to the gratification of his wishes, now changed
his deportment entirely towards his prisoner. He
took frequent occasion to express his deep regret at
having so precipitately seized and conveyed him to
prison, and at the failure of all his efforts to procure
his release. He insinuated the inflexible rigor of the
higher powers towards persons of his degree when in a
similar predicament, and the absolute necessity of
paying his fine as a preliminary to his release from
prison. He offered from pure regard to the memory
of his deceased father, for whom he had always
cherished the sincerest regard, to advance the necessary
sum, in case Harold found it difficult to raise it,
on the spur of the occasion; and finally, with the appearance
of great candor, advised him not to make

[figure description] Page 038.[end figure description]

himself more obnoxious to those who had the power
as well as the will to crush him to the earth, should
he prove refractory.

With a view to soften the cool rigidity of Harold towards
him, he was somewhat offensively officious in
pressing upon the young man various little indulgences;
and perceiving the strong interest he now began
to take in the misfortunes of Israel Baneswright
and his family, permitted his wife and daughter to
pass the day in the room allotted to himself and the
preacher. This arrangement of course brought Harold
into the society of Mistress Baneswright and her
daughter; and as usual, similarity of situation, aided
by community in misfortune, produced a more than
ordinary cordiality. Harold had never before paid
any special attention to the appearance of the latter,
and was not now particularly struck with her appearance.

Her face had little remarkable in its features, and
her figure, clothed in garments neither fashionable or
costly, presented in its sober simplicity an outline that
though not ungraceful, was without any special attraction.
Her complexion was very pale, and its expression
sad and touching. It was impossible to look
at her, without an inward conviction that she had been
inured to suffering. Her eyes were black, and though
glazed with sorrow, still at times lightened up with
sparkling flashes; and her hair, though disposed after
the ungraceful manner of her sect, was glossy as well
as exuberant. Perhaps the most touching of her

[figure description] Page 039.[end figure description]

attributes was a voice of mournful melancholy, sweet
as the sighing breeze; and when, after a few days'
association she spoke to Harold of the long series of
hardships her family had endured, it was with a sad,
touching pathos, exquisitely affecting. She was
pious, but never declaimed; devout without ostentation;
and resigned without insensibility.

For the first few days, she spoke but little, and
that little addressed to her parents. But soon perceiving
the deep interest Harold took in their misfortunes,
and at the same time sympathising with his
own, they gradually fell into an easy intercourse, like
that of brother and sister. They usually conversed
on the subject of their situation, which naturally led
to a communion of feeling, as their fortunes seemed to
have thus become strangely associated. In the course
of these conversations, Susan Baneswright perceived
with a sigh which she believed, and perhaps she was
right, originated entirely in spiritual considerations,
that Harold, though imprisoned as an accomplice, was
not one of her faith. Accordingly, by a tacit understanding,
they mutually avoided the rock on which
so many good feelings have been wrecked, and refrained
from all attempts to convert each other.

But with one whose zeal, like that of Israel Baneswright,
had been quickened instead of quelled by
persecution, it was next to impossible to be thus
domesticated day by day, without occasional allusions
to the cause of his sufferings. Without directly
addressing himself to Harold, he would speak of the

[figure description] Page 040.[end figure description]

persecutions himself and family had suffered, for following
the dictates of their conscience, and guiding
others into the path of righteousness. In the course
of his conversations he would sometimes enter into
details of miserable petty oppression, and wanton outrages
inflicted under color of law, that awakened all
the sympathies of his heart in behalf of these helpless
women, and excited the deepest indignation against
those who, under pretence of vindicating the gospel of
peace, outraged every principle of Christian benevolence.
By frequently listening to these revolting
relations, and at the same time associating with these
victims of ecelesiastical tyranny, his previous impressions
became greatly strengthened, and he at length
arrived at the conclusion that a persecuting church
was an instrument of man, not of his Maker.

As the time passed away, Harold began to find it
gradually becoming less irksome and oppressive. He
no longer pined for his lonely home, for he had now a
gentle, pleasing companion by day, and a subject for
nightly contemplation, when, as often happened, his
memory would recall the placid yet affecting countenance
of Susan, earnestly gazing on him with a look of
saintly sorrow, as if lamenting that though joined
together by accident and misfortune, they were separated
by their creeds. His latter days had been so
lonely and contemplative, and his thoughts so full of
abstractions, that hitherto those affections that form a
part of the very nature of man, had only been awakened
in imagination. It is scarcely to be wondered at,

[figure description] Page 041.[end figure description]

if being thus daily associated with a young woman,
who although not beautiful, was by nature fair, as
well as attractive, and whose situation called forth his
deepest sympathy; who by her sufferings had excited
his pity, and by her patient endurance called forth his
admiration—he should gradually be awakened to a
feeling more profound and lasting. He at last became
conscious of his situation, and would probably have
disclosed himself to Susan, but that being confined to
the same small apartment, and perpetually in the presence
of her parents, he could do nothing more than
resort to that universal language which seems equally
understood by all civilized, as well as savage beings—
by childhood, youth, and old age.

Meanwhile, Justice Shorthose had been sedulously
at work to induce Harold to permit him to advance
the money to pay his fine, on the security of a mortgage
on the estate of Habingdon. But he found the
young man every day becoming apparently more
indifferent about the affair, and on one occasion being
more earnestly pressed for a decision, Harold declared
with bitter solemnity, that he would rather rot in jail
than voluntarily submit to such illegal exactions, by
doing which he should virtually acknowledge their
justice. Master Shorthose who had only remitted his
zeal for a purpose he now perceived was unattainable,
hereupon resolved to bring matters to extremity. According
he caused Harold and the Baneswrights to
be brought before him for judgment, trial being out of
the question, as he judiciously observed, he himself

[figure description] Page 042.[end figure description]

having witnessed their delinquency. This is called
Lynch Law.

It was a scene at which humanity might weep, and
justice shut her eyes, had she not already been blind.
Harold and Israel stood stiff and lofty, while the wife
and daughter, with folded arms and downcast eyes,
awaited the result with pious resignation. The Justice
sat in all the stateliness of awkward dignity,
surrounded by his subordinate officers, grinning in
mockery, and having directed his clerk to read the law
against conventicles, gravely observed that being himself
a witness to the offence no other proof was required.
Here he was interrupted by Israel, who declared
no proof was necessary, as he acknowledged,
nay, gloried in his vocation, which he was fully
assured were imposed upon him by Divine ordination.

“Silence!” cried the Justice—“I must at least go
through the forms prescribed by statute, and sanctioned
by His Grace the Archbishop of Canterbury,
who is not only Primate of England, but Primate of
all England. I don't want your confession unless
accompanied by atonement and amendment. 'Slife,
Master Crop-ear, do you mean to insult the King's
representative, by pretending to confess what he saw
with his own eyes? Do you mean to insinuate that
I am blind and deaf too, that I did not see and hear
you? Your confession is an additional offence, and
shall be remembered in your punishment. But to the
point. Here, clerk, give me the book. So, now, most
reverend apostle, you say you are a preacher of the

[figure description] Page 043.[end figure description]

gospel. Will you promise to read this to your congregation—
that is to say if you have any next Sunday,
if I let you go?”

Israel took the volume, opened it, and finding it to
be “The Book of Sports,” as it was called, so obnoxious
to the rigid Puritans, hurled it from him with
indignation, at the same time exclaiming—

“Read it—read that accursed work of abominations—
the book of Satan, which converts the holy
Sabbath into a holiday for sinners! I'd rather read
one of those profane stage plays, some of which, and
these among the most abominable, are written by men
who call themselves ministers of the gospel. Let it
be read at Bartholomew Fair, for verily I will not pollute
my lips with such scum of iniquity.”

“Silence!” again roared the Justice, “or, though it
be not in the statute, I will, by virtue of that discretion
which appertains to me as being the representative
of both church and king, order that foul tongue of
yours to be cut off, that it may utter no more blasphemy.
Silence, I say, and listen to your sentence, as
becomes a contumacious sinner.”

“I will not be silent,” answered Israel, “it is my
calling to speak, and I will speak while I have breath
to declare the word of truth, and protest against the
devices of the ungodly. Lift not your beseeching
eyes to me, my poor shorn lambs,” said he, glancing at
his wife and daughter, “for I am called to fight the
good fight, and have girded my loins for the combat.
Be not afraid; a little while longer we may be hunted

[figure description] Page 044.[end figure description]

like wild beasts of prey; a little while longer we may
be insulted, buffetted, striped, imprisoned, and exposed
to worldly shame. But hold up your heads, my darlings,
and look to Heaven for that justice which yet
for a time, a very brief time, I trust, is banished from
this land which boasts of its freedom, while it seeks
to enslave the mind. He who is justice itself will
not forever permit injustice to triumph, for that would
carry with it the utter degradation of His creatures.

“Yea,” cried he, as his feelings gradually waxed
into enthusiasm—“Yea, verily the time is coming; it
is close at hand; it is already come. England is
about to smoke with blood—the blood not of bulls,
and goats, and sheep, but of men. For every wrong
shall be a victim; for every pang inflicted on the flock
of the Shepherd, He shall smite the aggressor with fire
and sword. For every drop of blood that hath been
drawn by stripes and mutilations, rivers shall flow
over the devoted land. For every earthly good we
must pay the purchase. But when the welfare of the
immortal soul is at stake—when not alone the salvation
of the present, but of countless generations yet to
come, is in imminent jeopardy; when our greatest
good—that which is as high above all sublunary blessings
as heaven is above earth—is to be attained, the
price, like the benefit, is inestimable. Their must be
martyrs to seal with their blood the sincerity of their
faith. Every sacred drop that flows from their veins
into the ground, nourishes some goodly seed of piety
into a stately tree that casts its shadow afar. Blood

[figure description] Page 045.[end figure description]

is the great libation of man, the seal of his bond of
faith.

“In times like these one martyr will not suffice.
When nations sin, nations must atone. There must
be hecatombs, thousands, yea tens of thousands of
victims, not as heretofore wasting on the burning pile,
or quivering on the rack, but offering up their lives on
the field of battle where alone the great contest is to
be decided, and crimes of rulers expiated by the blood
of their people. As for me, I am but a worm, and
they may tread on me if they will. If I am not
worthy of martyrdom, stripes may suffice. I am
ready, Master Justice. Be quick. The past has been
yours, the future is in stronger hands than those of
the archbishop and the king.”

This was poured forth with a vehemence and rapidity,
that for the time not only silenced the Justice, but
caused him to quail before the despised Crop-ear. He
soon, however, rallied his dignity, and as is natural to
little and malignant minds, revenged himself for his
temporary awe by exercising that discretionary power
the law allowed him, in the infliction of a severer
punishment on the person who had subjected him to
the mortification of being cowed by a Crop-ear, in the
presence of his officials.

“What!”—he at length exclaimed—“you are a
prophet as well as a priest? 'Slife, I suppose you will
set up for a king soon. Can your reverence, in the
spirit of prophecy, predict what is going to happen to
yourself, as you have what is going to befall the

[figure description] Page 046.[end figure description]

nation? Constable, take him to the Great Hall of the
Prison; give him thirty-nine lashes well laid on; slit
his nose, as his ears are non est; and then let him depart
in peace on his mission of grace.”

It may be as well to remark here, in explanation of
the choice of the prison hall, instead of the market
place, or some equally public situation, for the punishment
of Israel Baneswright, that of late the Justice
had been greeted with very significant tokens of public
dissatisfaction, on occasions of similar exhibitions of
Christian benevolence. Or, perhaps, he might have
become a convert to the opinion that appeals to the
imagination are much more effectual than to the
senses, and private executions far more effectual in
preventing crimes than public examples.

“But what shall I do with the women, your worship?”
asked the constable, grinning.

“O! I had forgot the flock in providing for the
shepherd. Let me see—hem—aye—yes—they shall
have the pleasure of looking on while the ceremony is
performing, and be punished by sympathy. Justice
should be tempered with mercy. As for you, Master
Harold, you will remain in jail till your fine is paid,
or the prophecy of the inspired preacher fulfilled.
Away with them.”

The wife and daughter of the unfortunate field
preacher remained throughout the whole of this wicked
mockery of justice in the dead silence of resignation,
or despair. They had undergone a long series of
suffering; and if providence does not always temper

[figure description] Page 047.[end figure description]

the wind to the shorn lamb, it often makes amends by
tempering the shorn lamb to the winds. They neither
wept, nor wrung their hands, nor cried aloud, though
their hearts were bleeding, and their limbs scarcely
able to support them. Yet amid all their sufferings,
and they suffered much, it was apparent that there
was within some potent influence which sustained
them in the hour of sore trial. Pale as the ghostly
shadow conjured up by fear or superstition; helpless
as the dove in the claws of the hawk, they awaited
the execution of the sentence.

Harold was almost maddened by mingled love and
indignation; but the conviction that his interference
would only serve to provoke the Justice to new inflictions
of petty malice, choked him into silence. He
looked on while the preparations were making, with a
terrible serenity, ever and anon casting a glance at
Susan Baneswright, which, even at this sad extremity,
sunk into her heart, and was long afterwards remembered.
Israel awaited the infliction of the sentence
with manly resignation; casting his eyes towards
heaven, and clasping his hands together, he exclaimed:

“Lord, Lord! how long wilt thou suffer this?”

The preparations were made; the scarred shoulders
of Israel exposed; the executioner brandished his cato'-nine
tails, and eagerly awaited the order to begin,
while the two desolate females placed their hands before
their eyes, that they might not behold what they
were thus compelled to witness.

At this moment a confused hum of many voices,

[figure description] Page 048.[end figure description]

followed by loud shouts mingled with angry threats,
and equally angry expostulations, was heard without
the prison. Anon, the sound of heavy blows, and the
tugging of men engaged in hot contention, succeeded
this war of words. In a few minutes the outer door
was assailed with thundering violence, and finally
yielding, gave entrance to a band of rustics armed
with iron crows, scythes, stakes, flails, bill-hooks, and
other rural weapons. Justice Shorthose was at first
struck dumb at this unceremonious intrusion; but
soon recovering his self-importance, demanded in a
tone of authority mitigated by a slight fit of trembling,
what they wanted, and how they dared approach his
presence accoutred in this manner. A stern-looking
man, bearing an appearance of plain respectability,
thus answered—

“We are come to release these poor harmless prisoners,
the victims of laws enacted by bigotry, and enforced
by tyrants. It depends on your present conduct
whether we are not likewise come to punish the
miserable instrument of oppression, though our object
is higher game.”

“'Slife!” answered the Justice, a little relieved
from the immediate apprehension of personal violence,
“'slife, sir, don't you know you are flying in the face
of the law and insulting the dignity of his sacred Majesty,
together with his Grace the Lord Archbishop of
Canterbury, by whose authority these pestilent Crop-ears
have been apprehended?”

“The king's most sacred Majesty,” said the other,

[figure description] Page 049.[end figure description]

with a grim smile, “and his Grace of Canterbury,
are by this time, I opine, flying from the face of an
injured people.”

“What mean you by that, sirrah? Do you dare to
spout treason against the king, in the presence of his
representative. I'll commit you, sirrah—you shall be
carted, whipped, ridden through the streets on a rail,
pilloried at the market place, lose your ears, and
be hanged, drawn and quartered into the bargain.”

A low, menacing murmur, accompanied by a suppressed
laugh, was the response to this outbreak of
the Justice, who was not a little daunted at the ill
success of his harangue, as well as the look of cool defiance
with which it was met by the person to whom
it was addressed. He valued himself not only for his
eloquence, but his singular acuteness in detecting a
culprit by his physiognomy, and often boasted he
could tell a rogue from sheer instinct. The confession
of the face, he maintained, was more conclusive
than that of the tongue. On this occasion, however,
he was altogether at fault. The intruders, with the
exception of their spokesman, were plain country people,
with ruddy cheeks, and faces expressive of nothing
but honest simplicity.

The person who appeared to be the leader of the
band paid no further attention to the Justice, but
quietly directed his followers to release all the prisoners
without exception, as it was impossible to distinguish
the innocent from the guilty. Accordingly
the keys were demanded of the jailer, who called all

[figure description] Page 050.[end figure description]

present to witness that he acted under durance. A
detachment being sent on this errand, Justice Shorthose
employed the interim in a last effort in behalf of
his majesty and the archbishop.

“'Slife, Master Crop—I say—that is to say—
what was I saying? I say Master What-d'ye-call'em,
do you know what you are about? You are
breaking the laws in twenty different places—the law
spiritual, the law temporal, the law civil, and the law
military. You are violating Magna Charta which
saith—hem—I say—what was I saying?”

“It matters little what you say,” quoth the other,
as the party detached for that purpose came in with
the prisoners, “we are but of the commonalty, yet
were always good, peaceable subjects, who respected
the law while it afforded us protection against authority
unjustly assumed, and exercised without mercy.
The despotism of the law may be as oppressive as that
of the will; and had not mankind sometimes resorted
to those rights which belong to our nature, and cannot
be alienated, the whole world would long since have
been inhabited only by slaves.”

“'Fore heaven, this is a new doctrine,” grumbled
the Justice, “it sounds very much like treason,
sprinkled with a little heresy, I think.”

“Treason? Know, Master Shorthose, when a
whole people rise against oppression there are neither
rebels nor traitors.”

The indignation of the Justice at the bold annunciation
of these doctrines overcame his fears. He

[figure description] Page 051.[end figure description]

denounced the intruders by every epithet of opprobrium
he could muster on the spur of the moment, and
his catalogue was pretty extensive; summoned the
posse comitatus in vain; and adjured his most sacred
Majesty to witness his total incapacity to resist these
lawless intruders. Little attention was paid to his
harangue, and the prisoners, among whom, of course,
were Israel and his family, quietly departed under the
escort of their deliverers. Harold, too, was offered his
liberty, but declined it coldly, not being able thoroughly
to overcome his reverence for the law, though
smarting under its infliction. As Israel left the hall,
he emphatically said to him, “assuredly we shall
meet again.” His wife bade him a warm, but chastened
farewell, but the daughter was silent. A single
look passed between Susan and Harold, as they parted,
whether ever to meet again depended on the chapter
of accidents, in which is contained a large portion
of the history of man.

p316-065

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