The Life Of A Conspirator Part 22

[421] Somers' Tracts.

[422] A footnote says, "Here wants something. _In another hand, erased in Original._"

The hangman now came up to a.s.sist him in his preparations for execution.

Before going to the gallows for hanging and quartering, the condemned man was stripped, with the exception of his s.h.i.+rt. This humiliating process having been completed, with his hands bound, Sir Everard accompanied the executioner to the foot of the ladder, and saying, "Oh!

Jesu, Jesu, save me and keep me," he ascended it, as also did the hangman.

I should like to let the curtain fall here; but, were I to do so, my story would be incomplete.

The punishment of hanging, drawing, and quartering was so horrible, that it was often mitigated by allowing the victim to hang until he was dead.

This might well have been done in the case of Sir Everard Digby. To be hung, partially naked, knowing that his body would afterwards be hacked to pieces in the most disgraceful manner before the eyes of an immense concourse of people, should have been considered a sufficient punishment. But no! Not even was he permitted to be to some extent stupefied by being half-strangled. The executioner had no sooner turned him off the ladder than he cut the rope.[423] Sir Everard "fell on his face and bruised his forehead." Then followed a scene of vivisection and butchery,[424] which would not be tolerated in these days if the subject were a sheep or an ox. Yet even on the awful block, Sir Everard never betrayed his dignity;[425] and, condemn his offences as we may, we cannot fairly refuse to give him credit for having died like a good Christian, a courteous gentleman, and a courageous Englishman.

[423] _Narrative G. P._, Gerard, p. 218.

[424] Wood, in his _Athenae Oxonienses_, Vol. ii. p. 354, says, "when the Executioner pluck't out his Heart (when his Body was to be quartered), and according to the manner held it up, saying, _Here is the Heart of a Traytor, Sir Everard_ made answer, _Thou liest_." This a most famous Author ["_Franc._ Lord _Bacon_" says a footnote], mentions, but tells us not his Name, in his _Historia Vitae et Mortis_.

[425] Narrative G. P., Gerard, p. 218.

No biographer ever felt more genuine sorrow for his subject than have I for Sir Everard Digby. My sympathy for him has been the greater because he was, like myself, a convert to the Roman Catholic Church; because both he and I were received into that Church by Fathers of the Society of Jesus; because, both in his house and in mine, Jesuits have very frequently been welcomed as guests, and because in my private chapel, as in his, they have often acted as chaplains. Moreover, an additional bond between Sir Everard Digby and myself is the fact that he was my ancestor. Nevertheless, I hope that I have not allowed any of these accidents of faith or family to induce me wilfully to conceal an incident important to his history, to gloss over a mistake that he committed, to put a dishonest construction upon one of his actions, or to say an untrue word either about himself, or any other character that has been introduced among these pages. Like his own life, my attempt at recounting it may be disfigured by mistaken zeal, false inferences, and rash conclusions; or possibly my authorities, like his friends, may have led me into error; if so, before laying down my pen, like Sir Everard Digby, before laying down his life, let me admit the offence, but declare that it was prompted by no unworthy motive.

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