Chapter XVII: British Victims of the Inquisition

William Lithgow--Elizabeth Vasconellos--John Coustos--Mr. Bower.

Spanish and Portuguese bigotry could not be satisfied with the sacrifice of native subjects. The vengeance of the Inquisition had been wreaked on the helpless of other nations, whom Providence, from time to time, brought within its grasp. To prevent their sufferings had not always been in the power of foreign governments; and even British subjects have been sufferers by this horrid court. The terror of the name of Oliver Cromwell, the Lord Protector of England, compelled the inquisitors to liberate and to honour the English consul, Thomas Maynard. (See Chapter XI.) But how many have been tortured and murdered in the concealment of the Inquisition cannot be ascertained by us before the day of judgment. A few cases of such sufferers may, however, be given, still further to illustrate the intolerance and cruelty of the papacy.

1. WILLIAM LITHGOW.--William Lithgow was a gentleman of Scotland, and while travelling on foot over Europe he came to Malaga, in Spain, in the year 1620, when he was apprehended as a spy connected with the English fleet then in that port. His cruel treatment by the governor and his sufferings in the Inquisition will best appear from his own words, as follows:--

“Upon the knowledge that I was secretly to be incarcerate in the governor’s palace, entered the Mr. Sergeant and begged my money, and license to search it; and liberty granted, he found in my pockets eleven phillipoes or ducatoons; and then unclothing me before their eyes, even to my shirt, and searching my breeches, he found in my doublet-neck, fast shut between two canvasses, a hundred and thirty-seven double pieces of gold. Whereat the corregidor arose, and counting my gold, being five hundred and forty-eight ducats, he said to the sergeant, ‘Clothe him again, and enclose him there in the cabinet till after supper.’ Meanwhile, the sergeant got the eleven ducatoons of silver; and my gold, which was to take me to Ethiopia, the governor seized upon; giving afterwards two hundred crowns of it to supply the new foundation of a Capuchin monastery there, reserving the rest, being three hundred and forty-eight ducats, for his own avaricious ends.

“This done, and midnight come, the sergeant and two Turkish slaves, releasing me from the inferior room, brought me through certain ascending passages to a chamber right above his summer kitchen; where, and then, the sergeants and the two slaves thrust on every ancle a heavy bolt, my legs being put to a full stride, by a strong gad of iron, far above a yard long; upon the ends of which the two bolts depended that were fastened about my legs; insomuch that I could never sit up, nor walk, nor stand, nor turn me, but lay continually on my back, the two irons being thrice heavier than my body. They left me with solacious words, and straight returned with victuals, being a pound of boiled mutton, a wheat bread, and a small pint of wine, which was the first, the best, and the last of this kind that ever I got in that woeful mansion. The sergeant leaving me, never seeing him more till a more unwelcome sight, he directed the slaves that after I had contented my discontented appetite, they should lock the door and carry the keys to Areta, a Spaniard, and keeper of the silver plate. The day following, the governor entered my prison alone, entreating me to confess that I was a spy, and he would be my friend, and procure my pardon; neither in the meantime should I lack any needful thing. But I still attesting my innocence, he wrathfully swore that I should see his face no more till grievous torments should make me do it; and leaving me in a rage he observed too well his condition.

“But withal, in my hearing, he commanded Areta that none should come near me, except the slave, nor any food be given me but three ounces of musted brown bread every second day, and a fuleto, or English pint of water, neither any bed, pillow, or coverlet to be allowed me. ‘And close up,’ said he, ‘this window in his room, with lime and stone; stop the holes of the doors with double mats, hanging another lock on it; and to withdraw visible and sensible comfort from him, let no tongue nor feet be heard near him till I have my designs accomplished. And thou, Hazier, I charge thee, at thy incomings to have no conference with him, nor at thy outgoings abroad to discover him to the English factors, as thou wilt answer upon thy life, and the highest tortures that can be devised.’ These directions delivered, and, alas! too accessory to me in the performance, my room was made a dark drawn dungeon, my body the anatomy of merciless hunger, my comfortless hearing the receptacle of sounding bells, my eye wanting light, a loathsome languishing in despair, and my ground-lying body the woeful mirror of misfortunes, every hour wishing another’s coming, every day the night, and every night the morning. My body grew weak and infirm, insomuch that the governor, after his answers received from Madrid, made haste to put in execution his bloody and merciless purpose before Christmas holyday; lest, ere the expiring of the twelfth day, I should be utterly famished, and unable to undergo my trial without present perishing. By God’s permission, the forty-seventh day after my first imprisonment, and five days before Christmas, about two o’clock in the morning, I heard the noise of a coach in the street; within a while I heard the locks of my prison door opening; whereupon, bequeathing my soul to God, I humbly implored his gracious mercy and pardon for my sins; for neither in the former night, nor in this, could I get any sleep, such was the force of my gnawing hunger, and the portending heaviness of my presaging soul.

“Meanwhile, nine sergeants, accompanied with the scrivan, entered the room without speaking, and carrying me thence, they laid me on my back in the coach, where two of them sat beside me. Baptista, the coachman, an Indian negro, arriving, I was brought westward, almost a league from the town, to a vine-press house, standing alone, where they enclosed me in the room till daylight; for hither the rack had been brought the night before. All this secrecy was used, that neither English, French, or Flemings, should see or get any knowledge of my trial, my grievous tortures, and dreadful despatch. At the break of day the governor, Don Francisco, and the alcaide came, and I, invited to their presence, pleaded for an interpreter, the which they absolutely refused; neither would they suffer or grant me an appellation to Madrid. After new examinations from morning till dark night, finding my first and second confessions run into one, the governor swore, ‘Is it possible he can, in such distress, and so long a time, observe, so strictly, in every manner, the points of his first confession?’

“The governor’s interrogation and my confession being mutually subscribed, he and Don Francisco besought me earnestly to confess my guiltiness in time, saying, ‘Thou art as yet in my power, and I may spare or pardon thee, providing thou wilt confess thyself a spy, and a traitor against our nation.’ But finding me stand fast to the mark of my spotless innocency, he, invective and malicious he, after many tremendous threatenings, commanded the scrivan to draw up a warrant for the chief-justice; which being done, he set his hand to it, and, taking me by the hand, delivered me and the warrant into the alcaide-major’s hands, to be tortured, broken, and cruelly tormented. Whence being carried along to the end of a stone gallery, where the rack was placed, the encarnador, or tormentor, began to disburden me of my irons, which he could not unloose for a long time, whereat the chief-justice being offended, the malicious villain struck away above an inch of my heel with the bolt; whereupon I grievously groaning, being exceeding faint, and without my three ounces of bread and a little water for three days together, the alcaide said, ‘O, traitor, all this is nothing, but the earnest of a greater bargain you have in hand!’

“After this, the alcaide and scrivan, being both chair-set, the one to examine, the other to write down my confession and tortures, I was stripped to the skin, brought to the rack, and mounted to the top of it; where, soon after, I was hung by the bare shoulders, with two small cords, which went under my arms, running on two rings of iron that were fixed to the wall above my head. Then being hoisted to the appointed height, the tormentor descended below, and, drawing my legs through the two sides of the three-planked rack, he tied a cord about each of my ancles; and then ascending upon the rack, he drew the cord upward, and bending forward with main force my two knees against the two planks, the sinews of my two hams burst asunder, and the lids of my knees being crushed, and the cords made fast, I hung so for a large hour. At last, the encarnador informing the governor that I had the mark of Jerusalem on my right arm, joined with the name and crown of King James, and done upon the holy grave, the corregidor gave direction to tear asunder the name and crown, as he said, of that heretic king, and arch enemy of the holy Catholic church. Then the tormentor, laying the right arm above the left, and the crown upmost, did cast a cord over both arms, seven distinct times; and then lying down upon his back, and setting both his feet upon my hollow pinched belly, he charged and drew violently with his hands, making my womb support the force of his feet, till the several cords combined in one place of my arm; and cutting the crown, sinews, and flesh to the bare bones, did pull in my fingers close to the palm of my hands; the left hand of which is lame so still, and will be for ever.

Now mine eyes began to startle, my mouth to foam and froth, and my teeth to chatter like to the doubling of drumsticks. O strange inhumanity of monster men-manglers! surpassing the limits of their national law; threescore tortures being the trial of treason, which I had, and was to endure; yet thus to inflict a sevenfold surplusage of more intolerable cruelties; and, notwithstanding of my shivering lips in this fiery passion, my vehement groaning, and blood springing forth from my arms, broke sinews, hams, and knees, yea, and my depending weight on flesh-cutting cords, yet they struck me on the face with cudgels, to abate and cease the thundering noise of my wrestling voice. At last, being loosed from these pinnacles of pain, I was, handfast, set on the floor, with this their imploration, ‘Confess, confess, confess in time, for thine inevitable ensue;’ when, finding nothing from me but still innocent, ‘O, I am innocent; O Jesus! the Lamb of God, have mercy upon me, and strengthen me with patience to undergo this barbarous murder.’

“Then, by command of the justice, was my trembling body laid above and long, upon the face of the rack, with my head downward, inclosed within a circled hole, my belly upward toward the top of the rack; my legs and arms being drawn asunder, were fastened with pins and cords to both sides of the outward planks, for now was I to receive my greatest torments.

Now, the alcaide giving commission, the executioner laid fast a cord over the calf of my leg, then another in the middle of my thigh; and the third cord over the great part of my arm, which was severally done on both sides of my body, receiving the ends of the cords from the six several places, through the holes made in the outward planks, which were fastened to pins, and the pins made fast with a device: for he was to charge on the outside of the planks with as many pins as there were holes and cords, the cords being first laid next to my skin; and on every one of these six parts of my body I was to receive seven several tortures, each torture consisting of three winding throws of every pin, which amounted to twenty-one throws in every one of those six parts. Then the tormentor, carrying a pot full of water, in the bottom whereof was a hole, stopped by his thumb till it came to my mouth, he did pour it into my belly; the measure being an English pottle. The first and second services I gladly received, such was the scorching drought of my tormenting pain, and I had drunk none for three days before. But at the third charge, perceiving these measures of water to be inflicted upon me as tortures, I closed my mouth; whereat, the alcaide, enraged, set my teeth asunder with a pair of iron cadges, whereupon my hunger-charged belly waxing great, grew drum-like; for it being a suffocating pain, in regard of my head hanging downward, and the water re-ingorging itself in my throat with a struggling force, it strangled and swallowed up my breath from yowling and groaning.

“Between each one of these seven circular charges I was always re-examined half an hour; each half hour a hell of infernal pain; and between each torment a long distance of life-quelling time. Thus lay I six hours upon the rack, between four o’clock in the afternoon and ten o’clock at night, having had inflicted upon me threescore and seven torments. Nevertheless, they continued me a large half hour, after all my torture, at the full bending, my body being all begored with blood, and cut through, in every part, to the crushed and bruised bones; I pitifully roaring, howling, foaming, and gnashing my teeth, with insupportable cries, before the pains were undone and my body loosed. True it is, it passeth the capacity of man either sensibly to conceive, or I patiently to express, the intolerable anxiety of mind and affliction of body, in that dreadful time I sustained. At last, my head being by their arms advanced, and my body taken from the rack, the water regushed abundantly from my mouth; then they, reclothing my broken, bloody, cold, and trembling body, being all this time stark naked, I fell twice in a sounding trance; which they again refreshed with a little wine, and two warm eggs--not done out of charity, but that I should be reserved for further punishment; and if it were not well known that these sufferings are true, it would almost seem incredible to many, that a man, being brought so low with starving hunger and extreme cruelties, could have subsisted any longer, reserving life.

“And now, at last, they charged my broken legs with my former eye-frighting irons, and carried me to the coach, being after brought secretly to my former dungeon, without any knowledge of the town, save to my lawless and merciless tormentors. I was laid, with my head and heels alike high, on my former stones. The latter end of this woeful night, poor mourning Hazier, the Turk, was sent to keep me; and on the morrow the governor entered my room, threatening me with still more tortures, to confess; and so he caused every morning, to make me believe I was going to be racked again, to make me confess an untruth; and thus they continued every day of five days to Christmas.

“Upon Christmas-day, Marina, the ladies’ gentlewoman, got permission to visit me, and with her licence she brought abundance of tears, presenting me also with a dish of honey, sugar, some confections, and raisins in great plenty, to my no small comfort, besides using many sweet speeches, for consolation’s sake. The twelfth day of Christmas expired, they began to threaten me on still with more tortures, even till Candlemas. In all which comfortless time I was miserably afflicted with the beastly plague of gnawing vermin, which lay crawling in lumps, within, without, and about my body; yea, hanging in clusters about my beard, my lips, my nostrils, and my eye-brows, almost inclosing my sight. And for my greater satisfaction to their merciless minds, the governor called Areta, his silver-plate keeper, to gather and sweep the vermin upon me twice in eight days, which tormented me almost to death, being a perpetual punishment; yet the poor infidel, some few times, and when opportunity served, would steal the keys from Areta, and about midnight would enter my room, with sticks and burning oil, and sweeping them together in heaps, would burn the greatest part, to my great release; or, doubtless, I had been miserably eaten up and devoured by them.”

Cruelty more diabolical it appears difficult to imagine, than that exercised upon this unhappy Scotchman. Yet he was preserved for still greater suffering. For being now in the power of the inquisitors, they pretended to be anxious for his soul’s salvation; and therefore they implored him to be converted to the Roman Catholic faith, that he might escape condemnation to the flames as a heretic. When the inquisitor interrogated him as to his difficulties, errors, and misbelief, Lithgow replied, like a North Briton taught by the Bible, that “he was confident in the promises of our Saviour, believing the revealed doctrines of the Gospel, professed by the reformed Catholic church; that these being confirmed by grace, he possessed an infallible assurance in his own soul of the true word of Christ.” “To these words,” as Lithgow observes, “he answered, ‘Thou art no Christian, but an absurd heretic, and, without conversion, a member of perdition.’ Whereupon I replied, ‘Reverend Sir, the nature of charity and religion does not consist in opprobrious speeches: wherefore, if you would convert me, as you say, convince me by argument; if not, all your threatenings of fire, death, or torments, shall not make me shrink from the truth of God’s word in Sacred Scriptures,’ Whereupon the mad inquisitor clapt me on the face with his foot, abusing me with many railings; and if the Jesuits had not intercepted him, he had stabbed me with a knife; where, when dismissed, I never saw him more.”

Lithgow was as little affected by another interview with an inquisitor; he made no confession, and he was sentenced to be again tortured. He says, therefore, “I was condemned to receive that night eleven strangling torments in my dungeon; and then, after Easter holidays, I should be transported privately to Granada, and there, about midnight, to be burnt, body and bones, into ashes, and my ashes to be flung into the air. Well, that same night, the scrivan, sergeants, and the young English priest entered my melancholy prison, where the priest, in the English tongue, urging me all he could, though little it was he could do, and not prevailing, I was disburdened of mine irons, unclothed to my skin, set on my knees, and held up fast with their hands; where, instantly setting my teeth asunder with iron cadges, they filled my belly full of water, even gorging to my throat; then with a garter they bound fast my throat, till the white of mine eye turned upward; and being laid on my side, I was tumbled by two sergeants to and fro seven times through the room, till I was almost strangled. This done, they fastened a small cord about each of my great toes, and hoisting me therewith to the roof of a high loft (for the cords ran in two rings fastened above), they cut the garter, and there I hung, with my head downward, in my tormented weight, till all the gushing water dissolved. This done, I was let down from the loft, quite senseless, lying a long time cold dead among their hands; whereof the governor being informed, came running up stairs, crying, ‘Is he dead? O fie, villains, go fetch me wine!’ which they poured in my mouth, regaining thereby a slender spark of breath.

“These strangling torments closed, and I reclothed and fast bolted again, they left me lying on the cold floor, praising my God, and singing of a psalm. The next morning, the pitiful Turk visiting me with bread and water, brought me also secretly, in his shirt sleeve, two handfuls of raisins and figs, laying them on the floor, amongst the crawling vermin; for having no use of arms, I was constrained by hunger and impotency of time to lick one up with another with my tongue. This charity of figs the slave did once every week or fortnight, or else I had long or then famished.”

Mr. Lithgow’s case became known, by some means, to the English factors at Malaga; and they, therefore, at once united with the consul in an application to the king and council of Spain. Their petition was granted, and the release of the wretched prisoner was ordered, in a warrant to the governor. His generous friends received the injured confessor, treated him with kindness, and procured for him a passage to England in a ship-of-war, in 1621. His case being made known at court, he was visited by many of the nobility, and by King James I., who commanded him to be sent to the Spanish ambassador, then in London. That grandee promised that restitution should be made to him of the money and valuables that had been taken from him at Malaga, and compensation for the injuries that he had sustained in prison. These assurances were not, however, honoured; and Mr. Lithgow, reproaching the ambassador with having deceived him, and, as some say, striking him, under the provocation, he was imprisoned for some months in the Marshalsea, London.

2. ELIZABETH VASCONELLOS.--This lady, having been released from the Inquisition at Lisbon, made the following deposition, in December, 1706:--

“Elizabeth Vasconellos, now in the city of Lisbon, doth on the 10th day of December, Anno 1706, in the presence of John Milner Esq., her majesty’s consul-general of Portugal, and Joseph Willcocks, minister of the English factory at Lisbon, declare and testify,

“That she was born at Arlington, in the county of Devon, and a daughter of John Chester, Esq., bred up in the church of England; and in the eleventh year of her age, her uncle, David Morgan, of Cork, intending to go and settle in Jamaica, as a physician, by her father’s consent, he having several children, took her with him to provide for her.

“In 1685, they went in an English ship, and near the island they were attacked by two Turkish ships; in the fight her uncle was killed, but the ship got clear into Madeira, and she, though left destitute, was entertained by Mr. Bedford, a merchant, with whom, and other English, she lived as a servant till 1696. In that year she was married, by the chaplain of an English man-of-war, to Cordoza Vasconellos, a physician of that island, and lived with him eight years, and never in the least conformed to the Romish church.

“In 1704, her husband being gone on a voyage to Brazil, she fell dangerously ill, and, being light-headed, a priest gave her the sacrament, as she was told afterwards, for she remembered nothing of it. It pleased God she recovered, and then they told her she had changed her religion, and must conform to the Romish church, which she denied, and refused to conform; and thereupon, by the bishop of that island, she was imprisoned nine months, and then sent prisoner to the Inquisition at Lisbon, where she arrived the 19th of December, 1705. The secretary of the house took her effects, in all above £500 sterling; she was then sworn that that was all she was worth, and then put into a strait dark room, about five feet square, and there kept nine months and fifteen days.

“That the first nine days she had only bread and water, and a wet straw bed to lie on. On the ninth day, being examined, she owned herself a Protestant, and would so continue; she was told she had conformed to the Romish church, and must persist in it or burn; she was then remanded to her room, and after a month’s time brought out again, and persisting in her answer as to her religion, they bound her hands behind her, stripped her back naked, and lashed her with a whip of knotted cords a considerable time, and told her afterwards that she must kneel down to the court, and give thanks for their merciful usage of her, which she positively refused to do.

“After fifteen days she was again brought forth and examined, and a crucifix being set before her, she was commanded to bow down to it and worship it, which she refusing to do, they told her that she must expect to be condemned to the flames and to be burnt with the Jews, at the next _auto da fé_, which was nigh at hand; upon this she was remanded to her prison again for thirty days, and being brought out, a red-hot iron was got ready, and brought to her in a chafing-dish of burning coals, and her breast being laid open, the executioner, with one end of the red-hot iron, which was about the bigness of a large seal, burnt her to the bone in three several places on the right side, one hard by the other, and then sent her to her prison, without any plaister, or other application, to heal the sores, which were very painful to her.

“A month after this, she had another severe whipping as before; and, in the beginning of August, she was brought before the table, a great number of inquisitors being present, and was questioned, whether she would profess the Romish religion or burn. She replied, she had always been a Protestant, and was a subject of the queen [Anne] of England, who was able to protect her, and she doubted not would do it, were her condition known to the English residing in Lisbon; but as she knew nothing of that, her resolution was to continue a Protestant, though she were burnt for it. To this they answered, that her being the queen of England’s subject signified nothing in the dominions of the king of Portugal; that the English residing in Lisbon were heretics, and would certainly be damned; and that it was the mercy of that tribunal to endeavour to rescue her out of the flames of hell; but if her resolution were to burn, rather than profess the Romish religion, they would give her a trial of it beforehand. Accordingly, the officers were ordered to seat her in a fixed chair, and to bind her arms and her legs, that she could make no resistance nor motion; and the physician being placed by her, to direct the court how far they might torture her without hazard of life, her left foot was made bare, and an iron slipper red-hot being immediately brought in, her foot was fastened into it, which continued on burning her to the bone, till such time as, by extremity of pain, she fainted away, and the physician declaring her life was in danger, they took it off, and ordered her again to her prison.

“On the 19th of August she was again brought out, and whipped after a cruel manner, and her back was all over torn; and being threatened with more and greater tortures, and on the other hand being promised to be set at liberty, if she would subscribe such a paper as they should give her, though she could have undergone death, yet not being able to endure a life of so much misery, she consented to subscribe as they would have her, and accordingly, as she was directed, wrote at the bottom of a large paper, which contained she knew not what; after which they advised her to avoid the company of all English heretics, and not restoring to her anything of all the plate, goods, or money, she brought in with her, and engaging her by oath to keep secret all that had been done to her, turned her out of doors, destitute of all relief, but what she received from the help and compassion of charitable Christians.

“The abovesaid Elizabeth Vasconellos did solemnly affirm and declare the above-written deposition to be true, the day and year above written.

“JOHN MILNER,

“JOSEPH WILLCOCKS.

“_Lisbon, January 8, 1707_, N. S.”

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3. JOHN COUSTOS.--Mr. Coustos having escaped from the Inquisition, published the narrative of his sufferings, shortly after his return to England in 1744. From his account the following is abridged:--

“I am a native of Berne in Switzerland, and a lapidary. In 1716, my father came and settled in London; and after living twenty-two years in that city, I went to Paris, to work in the galleries of the Louvre. Five years after I removed to Lisbon, in hopes of going to Brazil, to make my fortune; but the king of Portugal being informed of the skill I might have in diamonds, refused my petition, as improper for a foreign lapidary to be allowed in a country abounding with immense treasures.

“I got acquainted with several jewellers and other persons of credit in Lisbon, whose generous offers I accepted, having a prospect of supporting my family and of a competency, could I but have escaped the cruel inquisitors. They have assumed so formidable a power in Spain and Portugal, as to encroach on the privilege of kings, and stop, at the post-office, the letters of all whom they suspect. In this manner I was served a year before the inquisitors ordered me to be seized, in order to discover the secrets of freemasonry. They did not find that it struck at the Romish religion, or tended to disturb the government--still they concluded to seize one of the chief freemasons of Lisbon; and I was pitched upon as master of a lodge, and Mr. A. J. Mouton, a diamond cutter, born at Paris, and a Romanist. He had been six years at Lisbon, a housekeeper in the city, where his integrity gained him the approbation of all.

“We did not know that our art was forbidden in Portugal, and we were discovered by the barbarous zeal of a lady at confession. The officers of the Inquisition engaged a jeweller, a familiar of the Holy Office, to send for Mr. Mouton on pretence of mending a diamond weighing four carats. This was a mere pretence to know the person of Mouton. I happened to be with him, which gave the jeweller the highest joy. He made his report to the inquisitors; and, two days after, Mr. Mouton went alone to fetch the diamond, computed to be worth a hundred moidores. This familiar had five subalterns of the Inquisition with him; and having led him into the back shop, they seized him as a prisoner in the king’s name.

“Being sensible that he had not committed any crime, so as to incur his Portuguese majesty’s displeasure, he gave up his sword, when several familiars fell upon him, and declared that they arrested him in the name of the Inquisition. Forbidding him to murmur, they dragged him to a small chaise at the back-door, and conveyed him to prison in the Inquisition, and spread a report that he was gone off with the diamond. His friends, shocked at the slander, went and offered full payment to the jeweller, who declined the amount, pretending that the owner was very wealthy.

“Four days after, I was betrayed by a Portuguese friend, and nine officers of the Inquisition seized me, March 5, 1743, pretending I had passed my word for the diamond which Mr. Mouton had taken. In vain was my attempt at justification: the wretches took away my sword, handcuffed me, and forced me into a chaise. They commanded me not to open my lips; but I called aloud to a friend. They forced me into the prison, and delivered me to one of the officers of the pretended holy place. This officer bid the guards to search me, and take away all the gold, silver, papers, knives, scissors, buckles, &c., about me. They then led me into a lonely dungeon, expressly forbidding me to speak loud. It was then that, struck with all the horrors of the place, I plunged into the blackest melancholy. I passed a whole day and two nights in these terrors, heightened at every interval by the complaints, the dismal cries, and hollow groans, echoing through these dreadful mansions, of several other prisoners, my neighbours, and which the silence of the night made infinitely more shocking. These threescore hours appeared to me like so many years. However, I endeavoured to arm my soul with patience. I considered that, being a Protestant, I should inevitably feel all that rage and barbarous zeal could infuse into the breast of monks, who cruelly gloried in committing to the flames great numbers of ill-fated victims, whose only crime was differing from them in religious opinions.

“In a few days, after having been shaved, and had my hair cut by their order, I was led, bareheaded, to the president and four inquisitors, who bid me kneel and swear to speak truly to all questions they should ask. They informed me that the diamond was only a pretence to get an opportunity of seizing me. I now besought them to let me know the true cause of my imprisonment; that having been born and educated in the Protestant religion, I had been taught to confess myself to God and not to man. They declared that a confession would be forced from me. They gave orders for my being conveyed into another deep dungeon; I was overwhelmed with grief, and gave myself up entirely for lost.

“During my stay in this dungeon I was taken three times before the Inquisition, and I fell sick. A physician visited me, and another prisoner was sent to attend me in another dungeon, into which some glimmerings of daylight were admitted. Having recovered, I was sentenced to suffer the tortures employed by the Holy Office. I was conveyed to the torture room, where no light appeared but what two candles gave; and, to prevent the dreadful cries and shocking groans of the unhappy victims from reaching the ears of the other prisoners, the doors are lined with a sort of quilt.

“I was seized with horror, when, at my entering this infernal place, I saw myself surrounded by six wretches, who stripped me naked all to my drawers, and laid me on my back. First, they put round my neck an iron collar, which was fastened to the scaffold; they then fixed a ring to each foot; and this being done, they wound two ropes, the thickness of one’s little finger, round each arm, and two round each thigh, passing under the scaffold, through holes, and drawn tight by four men. My pains were intolerable; the ropes pierced through my flesh quite to the bone, making the blood gush out of eight different places. I persisted in refusing to discover any more; the ropes were drawn together four times; but suspended at intervals, by order of the physician and surgeon in attendance.

“While thus suffering, they barbarously declared that, if I died under torture, I should be guilty of self-murder. And the last time of suffering I fainted, and was carried to my dungeon unperceiving it. Finding that the more they made me suffer, the more I supplicated patience from heaven, these barbarians exposed me to another kind of torture. They made me stretch my arms so that the palms of my hands were turned outwards; when, by a rope that fastened them together at the wrist, and which they turned by an engine, they drew them in such a manner that the back of each hand touched; both my shoulders were dislocated, and a considerable quantity of blood issued from my mouth. This torture was repeated thrice, after which, the physician and surgeons, in setting my bones, put me to exquisite pain in my dungeon.

“Two months after, being a little recovered, I was again conveyed to the torture room, where they turned round my body a thick iron chain, which, crossing my stomach, terminated at my wrists. They next set my back against a thick board, at each extremity of which was a pulley, through which there was a rope run, that caught the ends of the chains at my wrists. These ropes, by means of a roller, pressed or bruised my stomach, so that my wrists and shoulders were put out of joint. The surgeons set my bones presently, and the barbarians made me undergo this torture a second time, which I bore with equal constancy. I was remanded to my dungeon, attended by the surgeons, who dressed my bruises; and here I continued till their _auto da fé_.

“Nine different times they put me to the torture, when most of my limbs were put out of joint, and bruised in such a manner that I was unable, during some weeks, to lift my hand to my mouth. I fear that I shall feel the effect of this cruelty so long as I live; being seized from time to time with thrilling pains, with which I never was afflicted till I fell into the merciless and bloody hands of the inquisitors.

“The day of the _auto da fé_ being come, I was made to walk in the procession with the other victims of this tribunal. At St. Dominic’s church my sentence was read, of being condemned to the galleys during four years. Four days after I was conveyed to the galleys; and joined, the next day, in the occupation of my fellow-slaves. However, the liberty I had of speaking to my friends, after having been deprived of the sight of them during my wretched abode in the prison of the Inquisition, the open air, and being freed from the apprehensions which always overspread my mind, made me find the toil of the galley more supportable.

“By the tortures inflicted on me in the Inquisition, I was unfit for the painful labour allotted me, viz., the carrying water to the prisons of the city; but fear of the inhumanity of the overseers caused me to exert myself, and I fell sick. I was then sent to the infirmary for two months; when I was visited by the first friars of the convent of Corpo Santo, who offered to get my release, provided I would turn Roman Catholic. I assured them that I expected my enlargement from the Almighty; and having leisure, I desired a friend to write to my brother-in-law, Mr. Barber, informing him of my deplorable state, and entreating him to address the Earl of Harrington in my favour, he having the honour to live in his lordship’s family. This nobleman spoke to his grace the Duke of Newcastle, secretary of state, supplicating leave from our sovereign that his minister at Lisbon might demand me, as a subject of Great Britain.

“His majesty was so gracious as to interpose in my favour. Mr. Compton, the British minister at Lisbon, demanded my liberty of the king of Portugal, in the name of his Britannic majesty; and I obtained it in the latter end of October, 1744. The officer took me from the galley by order of the inquisitors, and brought me before them, when the president told me that Cardinal de Cunha had ordered my release, but I must return in three days.

“I could perceive that the spies of the Inquisition followed me. I waited upon our envoy, and our consul; and five days after I returned to the inquisitors, when the president declared that the tribunal would not permit me to continue any longer in Portugal, and that I must name the city and kingdom whither I intended to retire. I replied that, ‘as my family is in London, I design to go thither;’ and they bid me embark in the first ship that should sail for England.”

Mr. Coustos was kindly received by the Dutch admiral on board his ship, then in the port of Lisbon, and he permitted him to send for his friend, Mr. Mouton, being affected with the relation of their sufferings. They arrived in London, December 15th, 1744. He adds,

“I here return thanks, with all the power of my soul, to the Almighty, for his having so visibly protected me from that infernal band of friars, who employed their various tortures to force me to apostatise from my holy religion. I return our sovereign, George II., the most dutiful and respectful thanks for his so graciously interposing in favour of an ill-fated galley-slave. I shall retain, so long as I have breath, the deepest sensation of affection and loyalty for his sacred person, and will ever be ready to expose my life for his majesty and his august family.”

MR. BOWER.--Mr. Archibald Bower was not so much a victim as to be subjected to the torture, as he was enabled to escape from the power of the inquisitors; but his biography illustrates the character of the Inquisition. He was born in 1686, near Dundee, in Scotland. His parents being Roman Catholics, sent him, at the age of five years, to an uncle in Italy, for education. First at Douay, and then at Rome, his progress was uncommon. He became a Jesuit, and was appointed professor of rhetoric and logic, in the college of Macerata, in Italy. In this city he became intimate with the inquisitor-general of the Holy Office, from whom he received preferment as a counsellor to the Inquisition. There were twelve counsellors, each of whom had a residence, with about £200 per annum, besides extensive privileges.

On being installed into office, he received a manuscript book of directions for inquisitors, for his private guidance. These rules required the extremes of inhumanity; and his attendance on the trials of the Holy Office he found most agonising, so that he frequently uttered exclamations of horror. Though not suspected, the inquisitor-general, on one occasion, in great warmth, striking the table, remarked, “Mr. Bower, you always object to the evidence.” At another time, looking on the face of a wretched victim undergoing the torture, he perceived symptoms of death, and fainted, when he was carried out of the hall; and on his return he was reproved by the chief-inquisitor, alleging that “what is done to the body is for the good of the soul.” Mr. Bower excused himself, urging “the weakness of his nature, which he could not help.” “Nature!” exclaimed the inquisitor, “you must overcome nature by grace!” But the colloquy ceased, as the miserable victim died at that moment under the torment!

While considering how he might escape from this horrid office, Mr. Bower was required to “conquer nature,” by the arrest of a nobleman, who was a personal friend. His alleged crime was some trifling expression regarding the particular garb of two friars, one of whom denounced him to the Inquisition. Being ordered to arrest his best friend in Macerata, he remonstrated with the inquisitor-general, urging, “My lord, you know the connexion--;” when the inquisitor, with all the sternness of his official character, interrupted him,--“Connexion! what, talk of _connexion_ when the holy faith is concerned?” And, as he withdrew, he ordered, “See that it be done; the guards shall wait without;” adding, “this is the way to conquer nature, Mr. Bower.” Unable to save or to warn his friend, he proceeded with the guards, obtained admittance to his residence and to his bed-room, and found both the nobleman and his lady asleep. The lady awaking, shrieked on seeing the strangers, when one of the ruffian officers gave her a blow on the head, which was followed by blood. The nobleman was astonished at being thus arrested by his friend, but dared not to reproach him; while Bower could not look him in the face, in performing so shameful an act.

Mr. Bower announced the arrest, next morning, as he delivered the key to the chief-inquisitor, who commended him,--“This is done like one who is desirous of conquering the weakness of nature.” The nobleman was soon subjected to torture by the pulley, and died in three days after its infliction. His estates were then confiscated to the Inquisition, a small pension only being allowed to his widow, to whom the inquisitor wrote, desiring her to pray for the soul of her deceased husband, at the same time warning her against complaining of injustice or cruelty against the Holy Office.

Mr. Bower could endure his situation no longer, and he resolved on attempting his escape from Italy. He, therefore, solicited permission to make a pilgrimage to the house of the Virgin Mary, at Loretto; and this being granted by the inquisitor-general, he proceeded with his portmanteau, on horseback, concealing his valuable papers. He took his course through the Adriatic States for Switzerland; but the papers that he had taken with him were soon missed by the inquisitor-general, who offered a reward for his head of about £600 in English money, or £800, if brought alive to the Inquisition. His danger became imminent through this proclamation; as he found in a post-house a copy of it, and two of his countrymen, to one of whom he was known. He challenged the man, and threatened him; and mounting his horse, escaped, so that after many difficulties he reached Calais. At the hotel he found two Jesuits, who wore the red cross of the Inquisition; when he hastily left the room, and found that the packet would be three days before it sailed for England. He applied to a fisherman, who dared not venture to cross the Channel; and he was in agony, especially when on his return he was told by his hostess, in reply to his inquiry for the Jesuits, “Oh, Sir, I am sorry to inform you that they are upstairs, searching your portmanteau.” At that moment he heard voices talking loudly in another room, and, supposing them to be English, he entered, and recognised in one Lord Baltimore, whom he had seen at Rome. He entreated his protection, but that nobleman exclaimed, “Mr. Bower, you are undone; I cannot protect you: they are searching your apartment.” However, he and his friends guarded him to their boat; and, with four pairs of oars, soon reached a yacht that was taking a short cruise; and the wind being fair, they conveyed him safely to Dover.

Mr. Bower now relinquished his former religion, conformed to the church of England, and married. He became tutor in the family of Lord Aylmer, and found a generous patron in Lord Lyttleton. Numerous enemies from among the Catholics brought grievous accusations against him; but he vindicated himself from their slanders, and gained himself a high reputation by several literary works, especially his “Lives of the Popes,” in seven volumes quarto. He died in England, in the year 1766, as is believed, a sincere Protestant.