"'This, at the least,' said I, 'was not papistical, for 'twas lighted on the fifth of November, and the people had burned—for so I heard, being myself too late to see it—the effigies of the Pope of Rome.'
"Then another Commissioner had his turn at me. 'We have heard that you suffer your children to play at cards for pins. Is this so?'
"'Am I bound,' said I, 'to answer any question to my own damage?' (For I was minded to have a little sport with them.)
"'We shall know how to interpret your silence,' says Master President.
"'Nay, then,' said I, 'if I must answer, I will. Children I have not, but one child only, a babe of six months only, who, I warrant you, so careful a mother has he—has never so much as had a pin in his fingers. And as for cards, he knows no more of such things than you yourself, Master Commissioner,' at which speech he reddened, having been not so long since, till he found his account in other ways, a noted card player and gamester. To make a long matter short, they made out no case against me, for all that they brought every good-for-nothing fellow in the whole country side to give testimony against me. But I build not on this; I know right well that sentence was passed on me before ever I came into court."
And so indeed it turned out. Two days after my brother was summoned by the Commissioners to appear before them, and received sentence of deprivation, but to have as a solatium one fifth part of the proceeds of the living. This fifth part, I should here say, he never received, for the intruding minister alleged that he had some temporal means of his own, and that he had but one child (which was true, but scarce relevant, seeing that one child must eat as well as two), and that he himself could scarce get anything of tithes; which also I believe, for the farmers, who love not paying tithes at any time, were more especially set against them when they were to be received by the intruding minister.
My brother had angered some of the Commissioners by the freedom of his answering, and receiving warning that he had best be absent when the sentence was executed, went into hiding in a neighbour's house. The next day comes the constable, with some soldiers at his back, with a warrant to apprehend his person, and was greatly enraged when he found that the bird was flown. He and his fellows had at the best but little civility in them, and this they had done their best to banish by too plentiful cups, and indeed they behaved themselves more like savages than Christian men. They searched the house through for my brother, the constable running his sword two or three times through the bed from which my sister was but newly risen (for they came before seven o'clock in the forenoon), pretending that he might be there hidden. All the stores in the house they wasted most cruelly, spoiling that which they could not carry away. Indeed, they were bent on insult rather than plunder. Thus the troopers pulled the bridles off their horses, and whipped them round the garden to tread all under foot. After that they brake open the barn door and turned them into the sacks of corn to fill their bellies. Indeed, they would have burned the barn and all the hay and corn, but that the neighbours hindered them, fearing the fire for their own stack-yards. Nor would these suffer them to profane the church, which they would have done under cover of destroying papistical ornaments. Verily, I know not what these savages would have left undone but for the singular affection which the people had for my brother, who, indeed, had well discharged his priest's office among them since his coming into the parish, ministering without wearying both to their souls and bodies. Many of his brethren suffered worse things than he, especially in the cruelties that were wrought upon their wives and children, for these poor creatures were ofttimes driven out of their homes in the very depth and severity of winter, and forced to find such shelter as they could in barns and stables, and to live upon any broken victuals which they could beg or pick up, robbing the very swine. I know that the clergy which suffered such things were not blameless. Some had borne themselves haughtily and wantonly in the day of their prosperity, as lords of God's heritage rather than as shepherds of the flock; and some had been careless livers, or worse, tippling at ale-houses, or wandering about the country to bull-baiting, and village feasts, and church ales, where they brought the name of the Church into great disrepute. That these were rightly dispossessed I deny not. Such men are not worthy to labour in the garden of the Lord. But many pious men also suffered for nought else than that they kept that which they had vowed and promised. And when they who are now trodden under foot shall get the upper hand, as I doubt not they will—before we that are now young are come to middle-age—they, I fear me, will use the same cruelty. So does wrong beget wrong, and hatreds are stored up for the time to come that many generations shall not exhaust. I pray God that He may give my countrymen a better mind.
CHAPTER XXI.
OF MY ADVENTURES AT SEA.
It was but some three weeks after these things that my dear mother died. I would not lay her death to the door even of these cruel men, for 'tis certain that she had declined from the very beginning of her widowhood; but I cannot doubt that her end was hastened by grief and trouble. Notwithstanding, she passed away in great peace and comfort, having as lively a faith in the world to come—and in her meeting again with those whom in this world she had lost—as was ever seen in Christian woman. After her death, which took place in the house of the worthy neighbour who had given shelter to my brother's family at the first, my sister and her child took up their dwelling with John Vickers, which worthy man, whose kindness and truth I cannot sufficiently praise, most hospitably entertained her. Notwithstanding, she judged it best for her greater safety from molestation to lay aside her estate as a gentlewoman and to labour with her hands in the house and dairy. She told me afterwards that the good John was much troubled and distressed at her so humbling herself, and would doff his cap and show other courtesy to her which did contrast very strangely with her lowly dress, till by slow degrees and with much unwillingness he learnt to behave himself in a more suitable fashion.