She was very calm, but as determined as Purcas.
“Come hither, Mistress!” said Boswell, roughly. “Why, what have we here in the charge-sheet? ‘Agnes Silverside, alias Smith, alias Downes, alias May!’ Hast thou had four husbands, old witch, or how comest by so many names?”
“Sir,” was the quiet answer, “my name is Smith from my father, and I have been thrice wed.”
The Commissioners, having first amused themselves by a little rough joking at the prisoner’s expense, inquired which of her husbands was the last.
“My present name is Silverside,” she replied.
“And what was he, this Silverside?—a tanner or a chimney-sweep?”
“Sir, he was a priest.”
The Commissioners—who knew it all beforehand—professed themselves exceedingly shocked. God never forbade priests to marry under the Old Testament, nor did He ever command Christian ministers to be unmarried men: but the Church of Rome has forbidden her priests to have any wives, as Saint Paul told Timothy would be done by those who departed from the faith: (see One Timothy four 3.) thus “teaching for doctrines the commandments of men.” (See Matthew fifteen verse 9.)