Then I said, "Speak, Captain Bradden, didst thou see me give him such a blow, and strike him as he saith?" Captain Bradden made no answer; but bowed his head towards me. I desired him to speak up, if he knew any such thing; but he only bowed his head again. "Nay," said I, "speak up, and let the court and country hear, and let not bowing of the head serve the turn. If I have done so, let the law be inflicted on me; I fear not sufferings, nor death itself, for I am an innocent man concerning all this charge."
But Captain Bradden never testified to it; and the Judge, finding those snares would not hold, cried, "Take him away, jailer;" and then, when we were taken away, he fined us twenty marks apiece for not putting off our hats; and sentenced us to be kept in prison till we paid it; so he sent us back to the jail.
At night Captain Bradden came to see us, and seven or eight justices with him, who were very civil to us, and told us they believed neither the Judge nor any in the court gave credit to the charges which Major Ceely had brought forward against me in the face of the country. And Captain Bradden said that Major Ceely had an intent to take away my life if he could have got another witness.
"But," said I, "Captain Bradden, why didst not thou witness for me, or against me, seeing Major Ceely produced thee for a witness, that thou saw me strike him? and when I desired thee to speak either for me or against me, according to what thou saw or knew, thou wouldst not speak."
"Why," said he, "when Major Ceely and I came by you, as you were walking in the Castle-Green, he put off his hat to you, and said, 'How do you do, Mr. Fox? Your servant, Sir.' Then you said to him, 'Major Ceely, take heed of hypocrisy, and of a rotten heart: for when came I to be thy master, and thou my servant? Do servants cast their masters into prison?' This was the great blow he meant you gave him."
Then I called to mind that they walked by us, and that he spoke so to me, and I to him; which hypocrisy and rotten-heartedness he manifested openly, when he complained of this to the Judge in open court, and in the face of the country; and would have made them all believe that I struck him outwardly with my hand.
There came also to see us one Colonel Rouse a justice of the peace, and a great company with him. He was as full of words and talk as ever I heard any man in my life, so that there was no speaking to him. At length I asked him whether he had ever been at school, and knew what belonged to questions and answers; (this I said to stop him).
"At school!" said he, "Yes."
"At school!" said the soldiers; "doth he say so to our colonel, that is a scholar?"
"Then," said I, "if he be so, let him be still and receive answers to what he hath said."