CHAPTER VIII.
THE PRIVY COUNCIL.
'Tis noble pride withholds thee—thou disdain'st
Wrapt in thy sacred innocence—these mad
Outrageous charges to refute.
SCHILLER'S MAID OF ORLEANS.
A long table, covered with scarlet cloth, extended from the throne towards the end of the room where Walter stood. Large, red-edged, and massively gilded statute books, docquets of papers, inkstands, and the silver mace (now used by the Lords of Session), lay glittering on the table, while a large silver candelabrum, with twelve tall wax lights, shed a lustre on the striking figures of those personages who composed the select committee of council.
On a low wooden side-bench lay certain fearful things, which (in his present predicament) made the heart of Walter quail; though on the field he would have faced, without flinching, the rush of a thousand charging horse; they were the instruments of torture then authorised by law; the pilnie-winks, the caspie-claws, and the iron-boots—all diabolical engines, such as the most refined cruelty alone could have invented. With these, both sexes, even little children were sometimes tortured until the blood spouted from the bruised and crushed limbs.
The thumbikins were small steel screws like handvices, which, by compressing the thumb-joints, produced the most acute agony; and this amiable and favourite engine (which saved all trouble of cross-examining witnesses), was first introduced by one of the council, whose stern eyes were fixed on Walter Fenton, Lieutenant-General Sir Thomas Dalyel of Binns, a cavalier baronet of great celebrity, whose name is still justly abhorred in Scotland. He had long borne a command under the Russian standard, where his humanity had not been improved by service among Tartars and Calmucks.
The boot was a strong box enclosed with iron hoops, between which and the victim's leg, the executioner, by gradual and successive blows, drove a wooden wedge with such violence, that blood, bone, and marrow were at last bruised into a hideous and pulpy mass.
Walter could scarcely repress a shudder when he surveyed those frightful engines, under the application of which, so many unfortunates had writhed; but he confronted with an undaunted air the various members of that stern tribunal, which had so long ruled Scotland by the sword, and many of whose acts and edicts might well vie with those of the Inquisition, the Star-chamber, or any other instrument of tyranny and misgovernment.
Two earls, Perth, the Lord Chancellor, and Balcarris, the High Treasurer, were present; they were both fine-looking men, in the prime of life, richly dressed, and wearing those preposterous black wigs (brought into fashion by Charles II.), the ends of which rolled in many curls over their broad collars of point lace. The Bishop of Edinburgh, the Lord Advocate, and his predecessor, the terrible Sir George Mackenzie, of Rosehaugh, "that persecutor of the saints of God;"—(he whose tomb was, till of late years, a place so full of terror to the schoolboy,) occupied one side of the council-board. Opposite sat John Grahame, of Claverhouse, colonel of the Scottish life-guards, the horror of the Covenanters, (and to this hour the accursed of the Cameronians,) but the handsomest man of his time. His face was singularly beautiful, and his black, magnificent eyes, were one moment languid and tender as those of a love-sick girl, and the next sparkling with dusky fire and animation. When excited, they actually seemed to blaze, and were quite characteristic of his superhuman daring and unmatched ferocity.
Cruel as the character of the Laird of Claverhouse has ever been held up to us, let us not forget the times in which he lived, and how much room there is for malevolent exaggeration. Even Wodrow allows that at times he showed compunction, mercy, and compassion. Mutual injuries, assassinations, and outrages heightened the hostility of spirit between the Scottish troops and the Scottish people to a frightful extent; but it is a curious fact, that the local militia and vassals of the landholders were, by far, the most severe tools of persecution. The real sentiments of the troops of the line, were powerfully evinced by their joining en masse the banner of the Protestant invader. In making these remarks, let it not be thought we are attempting to gloss over the atrocities of the persecution, the records of which are enough to make one's blood boil even at this distant period of time. The darkest days of our history are those of which the industrious Wodrow wrote; but glorious indeed was the ardour and constancy with which so many of Scotland's best and bravest men gave up their souls to God in the cause of the "oppressed kirk and the broken covenant."
Claverhouse was splendidly attired; his coat was of white velvet, pinked with scarlet silk and laced with gold; over his breast spread a cravat of the richest lace, and on that fell the heavy dark ringlets of his military wig. Near him sat Sir Thomas Dalyel, colonel of the Scots grey dragoons. This fierce soldier was in the eightieth year of his age; he was perfectly bald, and a lofty forehead towered above his keen grey eyes, that shone brighter than his polished gorget in the light of the candelabrum. To his stern features a noble and dignified aspect was imparted by a long white beard, that flowed over his plain buff coat, reaching to the buckle of his sword-belt. There was a very striking and antique expression in the fine face of the aged and detested 'persecutor,' that never failed to impress beholders with respect and awe.