On quitting his prison, others confined there kissed his hand and wept; but as to himself, he told them: “You shall hear that I die like a Christian, a man and a soldier.”
He was to be beheaded at Bolton. On his way thither, Bagaley says: “His lordship, as we rode along, called me to him and bid me, when I should come into the Isle of Man, to commend him to the Archbishop there and tell him he well remembered the several discourses that had passed between them there concerning death and the manner of it; that he had often said the thoughts of death could not trouble him in fight or with a sword in hand, but he feared it would something startle him tamely to submit to a blow on the scaffold. But,” said his lordship, “tell the archdeacon from me that I do now find in myself an absolute change as to that opinion.”
At night when he laid him down upon the right side, with his hand under his face, he said: “Methinks I lie like a monument in a church; and to-morrow I shall really be so.”
There was a delay in his execution, for the people of Bolton refused to strike a nail in the scaffold or to give any assistance. He asked for the axe and kissed it. He forgave the headsman before he asked him. To the spectators, he said: “Good people, I thank you for your prayers and for your tears; I have heard the one and seen the other and our God sees and hears both.” He caused the block to be turned towards the church. “I will look,” cried he, “towards the sanctuary which is above for ever.” There were other interesting circumstances attending his execution. With outstretched arms he laid himself down to the block, exclaiming, “Blessed be God’s name for ever and ever. Let the whole earth be filled with his glory.” Then the executioner did his work—“and no manner of noise was then heard but sighs and sobs.”
We are left without any account of the way in which Bagaley delivered the rings; but, imagination can make a picture of a darkened and dismantled mansion, suffering widow and children, with terrified retainers, and Bagaley standing in the midst, weary, heart-sick, tearfully presenting the melancholy remembrances and realizing the truthfulness of the words of his brave, good and gentle master: “Silence and your own looks will best tell your message.”
The French woman Kerouaille, favorite mistress of Charles the Second, and created Duchess of Portsmouth, is said to have secured two valuable diamond rings from the King’s finger while the throes of death were on him. The following graphic description is worth reading:
“I should have told you, in his fits his feet were as cold as ice, and were kept rubbed with hot cloths, which were difficult to get. Some say the Queen rubbed one and washed it in tears. Pillows were brought from the Duchess of Portsmouth’s by Mrs. Roche. His Highness, the Duke of York, was the first there, and then I think the Queen, (he sent for her;) the Duchess of Portsmouth swooned in the chamber, and was carried out for air; Nelly Gwynne roared to a disturbance and was led out and lay roaring behind the door; the Duchess wept and returned; the Princess (afterwards Queen Anne) was not admitted, he was so ghastly a sight, (his eye-balls were turned that none of the blacks were seen, and his mouth drawn up to one eye,) so they feared it might affect the child she goes with. None came in at the common door, but by an odd side-door to prevent a crowd, but enough at convenient times to satisfy all. The grief of the Duchess of Portsmouth did not hinder her packing and sending many strong boxes to the French ambassador’s; and the second day of the King’s sickness, the chamber being kept dark—one who comes from the light does not see very soon, and much less one who is between them and the light there is—so she went to the side of the bed, and sat down to and taking the king’s hand in hers, felt his two great diamond rings; thinking herself alone, and asking him what he did with them on, said she would take them off, and did it at the same time, and looking up saw the Duke at the other side, steadfastly looking on her, at which she blushed much, and held them towards him, and said, ‘Here, sire, will you take them?’ ‘No, madam,’ he said, ‘they are as safe in your hands as mine. I will not touch them till I see how things will go.’ But since the King’s death she has forgot to restore them, though he has not that she took them, for he told the story.” This extract is taken from a letter written by a lady who was the wife of a person about the court at Whitehall and forms part of a curious collection of papers lately discovered at Draycot House near Chippenham, Wiltshire, England.[290]
Jeffreys, the bloody Jeffreys, whose greatest honor was to make a martyr of Sidney, while rising in royal favor and when about to depart for the circuit to give the provinces “a lick with the rough side of his tongue,” (a favorite expression of his,) experienced a mark of regard from Charles the Second. The King took a ring from his own finger and gave it to this besotted wretch of a chief justice. At the same time the monarch bestowed on him a curious piece of advice to be given by a king to a judge: it was, that, as the weather would be hot, Jeffreys should beware of drinking too much.[291] The people called the ring “Jeffrey’s blood-stone,” as he got it just after the execution of Sir Thomas Armstrong. Roger North says: “The king was persuaded to present him with a ring, publicly taken from his own finger, in token of his majesty’s acceptance of his most eminent services; and this by way of precursor being blazoned in the Gazette, his lordship went down into the country, as from the king legatus a latere.” The Lord Keeper North, who, it has been said, hated Jeffreys worse than popery,[292] speaks of the terror to others of the face and voice of the chief justice: “as if the thunder of the day of judgment broke over their heads;” and shows how Jeffreys, who, by this time, had reached the position of Lord Chancellor, was discovered by a lawyer that had been under the storm of his countenance:[293] “There was a scrivener of Wapping brought to hearing for relief against a bummery bond; the contingency of losing all being showed, the bill was going to be dismissed. But one of the plaintiff’s counsel said that he was a strange fellow and sometimes went to church, sometimes to conventicles and none could tell what to make of him and it was thought he was a trimmer. At that the Chancellor fired; and ‘A trimmer,’ said he, ‘I have heard much of that monster, but never saw one. Come forth, Mr. Trimmer, turn you round, and let us see your shape;’ and at that rate talked so long that the poor fellow was ready to drop under him; but, at last, the bill was dismissed with costs and he went his way. In the hall, one of his friends asked him how he came off? ‘Came off!’ said he, ‘I am escaped from the terrors of that man’s face, which I would scarce undergo again to save my life; and I shall certainly have the frightful impression of it as long as I live.’ Afterwards, when the Prince of Orange came and all was in confusion, this Lord Chancellor, being very obnoxious, disguised himself in order to go beyond sea. He was in a seaman’s garb and drinking a pot in a cellar. This scrivener came into the cellar after some of his clients; and his eye caught that face, which made him start; and the Chancellor, seeing himself eyed, feigned a cough and turned to the wall with his pot in his hand. But Mr. Trimmer went out and gave notice that he was there; whereupon the mob flowed in and he was in extreme hazard of his life,” etc., etc. This term “Trimmer” seemed to be very obnoxious to Jeffreys. Once at the council and when the king was present, Jeffreys “being flaming drunk, came up to the other end of the board and (as in that condition his way was) fell to talking and staring like a madman, and, at length, bitterly inveighed against Trimmers and told the king that he had Trimmers in his court and he would never be easy so long as the Trimmers were there.”[294] North gives the interpretation of the word “Trimmer,” which was taken up to subdivide the Tory party, of whom all (however loyal and of the established church professed) who did not go into all the lengths of the new-flown party at court, were so termed.[295]
The name of the great Dundee instantly brings to mind one of the most spirited and characteristic ballads ever written:
“The Gordon demands of him which way he goes—