Uncle Joe's Stories

by Baron Edward Hugessen Knatchbull-Hugessen Brabourne

Paraphernalia went so far as to suggest cutting off all her hair, and spoiling her beauty by burning or otherwise marking her face; but the others had hardly come to such a state of wickedness and malice as this, although they joined in making the poor girl more miserable than she would otherwise have been, and showed a want of consideration and good feeling which was much to be blamed.

The discomfort and misery of all the ladies were, as may be supposed, considerable; nor was their condition at all improved by the news that Famcram had resolved that the parents of the three families, Binks, Chinks, and Pigspud, should be executed in the public market place within three days. This news, conveyed to them by some of those officious persons who always like to bring unpleasant tidings, if only that they may watch their effects upon the people they are likely to make unhappy, plunged all six ladies into the deepest sorrow.

Nor was the next piece of news at all calculated to lighten the burden of affliction which weighed them down. Famcram sent a special messenger to inform the captives that they should all suffer the extreme penalty of the law also. At first he had declared that they should be publicly whipped in the square opposite the palace, and afterwards be beheaded, but upon an earnest representation being made to him by a deputation from the anti-flogging society, who were numerous in the city, he consented to forego that part of the punishment, and to have them sewn up in sacks and thrown into the river, which was a form of punishment much in vogue in that part of the world.

Resolved, however, to make them suffer as much as possible, he directed that their execution should take place upon the day preceding that of their fathers, and that the latter should be obliged to tie the mouths of the sacks, and roll their own children into the water.

The girls heard this doom with horror, but there was no way of averting it. On the morning of the day on which the sentence was to be carried into effect, the daughters of Chinks became more furious than ever against Ophelia, and declared that she ought to be scratched to death in the dungeon, and not share the fate of honourable damsels like themselves. But a better spirit had come over Euphemia and Araminta, the daughters of the late Prime Minister.

They had felt some compunction at the treatment of Ophelia by their friends and prison companions, and had not joined in the personal attack which had been led by Paraphernalia. And when they remembered how Ophelia had behaved as queen, and saw how meekly she bore the cruel insults now heaped upon her by the others, they spoke out boldly, and interfered to prevent further violence.

So the hours passed by until the afternoon arrived, and all six ladies, having a thick coarse white sheet cast round each of them, as if about to stand and do penance, were led forth from the palace dungeons and taken to the appointed place of execution.

Everything had been arranged under the direct orders of the tyrant himself. Marshalled two and two between their guards, the poor girls found that they had to pass through a crowd of gaping and staring people, and to walk over the mud and stones upon their bare feet.

Their beauty attracted general notice, but Ophelia's form and bearing made by far the greatest impression upon the bystanders.

Side by side she walked by Euphemia Binks, but the latter's beauty was entirely eclipsed by that of the late queen. The daughter of Pigspud walked with a royal air—upright, majestic in figure, with a look of resignation and yet contempt of fate—she excited an universal feeling of pity and admiration.