The camp at Weston Zoyland presented a strange and animated appearance. Already the news of the defeat and flight of the Duke had reached far and wide, and farmers and gentlemen anxious to propitiate the victors had come crowding out with hogsheads of beer and wine and provisions of all sorts for the soldiers, together with loyal expressions of good-will, and every appearance of delight at the termination of the ill-starred rebellion. Mirth, revelry, and cruelty were reigning rampant; and there were nigh upon a score of trembling prisoners only waiting the word of the Earl to be hanged upon the great oak tree, still known as the Bussex Oak, and called by the peasants "Hangman's Oak."
"String him up with the rest!" cried Lord Feversham, pointing to the man who had won his race, and whose life had been promised to him as the reward; and in spite of his pleading and remonstrance he was dragged off to the tree with the rest. A great fellow with a horrid-looking knife came forward from the group of soldiers, and I knew that his office was to dismember the miserable wretches, probably before they were quite dead, that their heads and quarters might be nailed up in high places, a terror and a warning to others.
But I could not stay to see it done. A sickening horror possessed me. I turned Blackbird's head, and dug my heels into his sides; and unnoticed in the crowd and in the midst of so much revelry and excitement, I galloped off along the near road into Bridgewater, which I reached faint and exhausted some time not long after noon on Tuesday morning.
What a changed place it was from the one I had quitted on the Sunday evening! Then all had been hope and brightness and enthusiasm; now a look of blank terror was seen stamped upon all faces. The people went about as if afraid each man to look at his neighbour; and in many houses the shutters were shut and the windows all shrouded, because the families had fled from the expected vengeance, and were striving to put the sea between themselves and their remorseless enemies.
In the market-place there were still drawn up some bodies of troops, which had fled there with the horsemen on hearing that the Duke had taken flight and deserted his army. Colonel Hucker was there with his troop, and I sometimes think that even then if the Duke had but remained, something might yet have been done to retrieve the fortunes of the day.
It has been reported of Colonel Hucker that he betrayed the cause of the Duke on Sedgemoor, first by firing the pistol which gave the alarm to the foe, and then by flying with his men before defeat had become a fact; but those who thus speak do him an injustice, for he never sought to save himself. It is true that had Taunton been fortified he would have been made governor, and he was anxious that this should be done; but his disappointment on that score never made him disloyal to the cause, as was proved by the fact that he sealed it with his blood, when he had ample opportunity to make good his escape had he been so minded.
The news which I brought of the hangings and massacres on Sedgemoor added to the terror and despair of the people. The bands of soldiers melted away, the poor wretches fearing for their lives, as well they might; and Bridgewater was left defenceless to the fury of the avenger.
All that day, men were at work all along the road betwixt Weston and the city, erecting a row of ghastly gibbets; and before two days had passed, every one of these gibbets bore a horrid burden of human forms—some hung in chains, to remain there for months and years, the last being not removed until the landing of William of Orange.
I think that when I brought the evil tidings to Mistress Mary and my lord, I gave her a blow from which she found it hard to recover. I well remember the white face and wild eyes she turned towards me, and the way in which she wrung her slim white hands together, looking first at me and then at my lord, as she cried out,—
"I brought him into this—and the cause is lost! God has not been on our side. And perhaps he will even have to die for it. And the fault is mine! the fault is mine!"