“How must I lie?” he then asked. “Will anyone show me? I never yet saw any man’s head cut off.”
Then, after much delay and bungling on the headman’s part, Lord Derby “laid him down again, and blessing God’s name, he gave the signal by raising his hands.
“The executioner did his work; and no other manner of noise was then heard, but sighs and sobs.”
CHAPTER XV
BEARING THE BURDEN ALONE. THE PARLIAMENTARIANS DEMAND THE ISLE OF MAN. LADY DERBY A PRISONER. CAST ON CROMWELL’S MERCY. FAIR-HAIRED WILLIAM AND HIS FATE. THE TIDE TURNS. “I MUST DEPART.” THE KING HAS HIS OWN AGAIN. MARRIAGE, AND GIVING IN MARRIAGE. PEACEFUL TIMES AT KNOWSLEY. “SWIFT TO ITS CLOSE EBBS OUT LIFE’S LITTLE DAY.” COURT FAIRNESS. THE LAST LETTER. AN HONOURED MEMORY
With the death of the Earl perished the happiest and noblest part of Charlotte of Derby. For all its storms, their married life had been a true union. The alliance, which originally could not have been more than one of consent on the part of a marriageable young man and woman, had developed into a gracious, healthy life which sorrow and death itself had no power to destroy. The bud of the mariage de convenance had proved a more glorious flower than many a passionate love-match has culminated in. But now the noble heart of James Stanley beat no more with its patriotic devotion, and henceforth Lady Derby had to bear the burden of the endless contest alone. That for good or for evil, life in its fullest sense was over for her, she tells her friend of years, the Duchess de la Trémoille, in a letter dated 25th March of 1652. The Duchess’s letters to her are, she says, so full of sympathy and kindness, that if her sorrows could be consoled, Madame de la Trémoille would console them. “But alas! dear sister, I am no longer able to complain or to weep, since all my happiness is in the grave; and I am astonished at myself that I have been able to endure all my misfortunes, and be still in the world; but that has been the will of God, who has helped me so powerfully, that I do not know myself in having survived all my miseries. The last letters of that glorious martyr give me proof of his affection being beyond all that I deserved to hope; and his dying commands bid me live, and take care of his children....”
The body of the Earl of Derby had already been laid by Lord Strange and Mr Bagalay to its rest in the tomb of his ancestors at Ormskirk before Lady Derby knew that the blow had really fallen; and it is doubtful whether the first intelligence of it reached her by the mouth of friend or foe. When the Earl was executed, the Countess was busy fortifying the Castle of Rushen, to defend the last possession left them of all their broad territories.
Castle Rushen contained the insignia of the Stanley sovereignty over the Isle of Man—the leaden crown.
When Captain Young landed from the President frigate, and, presenting himself before her, commanded her to render up the island in the name of Parliament, she refused, saying, as she had ever done, that she waited her husband’s orders.