“Is there among ye any who profess the faith of the Holy Catholic Church?”
Two of the prisoners answered in the affirmative.
“Take these Christians away, and let their bonds be removed. The Holy Father, Salvandi, will examine them in the faith of Mother Church. For the rest, are there any among ye, who, seeing the error of your ways, will renounce the heresy of Luther, and seek once more communion with the only true church?”
A drear silence followed. The captives looked mournfully at each other, and at the Adelantado; but in his face there was no encouragement, and nothing but despair was expressed in the aspects of their fellows.
“Be warned!” continued the Adelantado. “To those who seek the blessings of the true church, she generously openeth her arms. To those who turn away, indifferently or in scorn, she decrees death temporal and death eternal. Hear ye!—and now say.”
The silence was unbroken.
“Are ye obdurate? or do ye not comprehend that your lives rest upon your speech? Either ye embrace the safety which the church offers, by an instant renunciation of that of the foul heretic Luther, or ye die by the halter!”
One sturdy soldier advanced from the group—a bold, high-souled fellow—his brows lifted proudly with the conscious impulse which worked within his soul.
“Pedro de Melendez, we are in your power. You are master of our mortal bodies, but with the death before us that you threaten, know that we are members of the reformed Church of Christ, which ye name to be of Luther—that, holding it good to live in this faith, we deem it one in which it will not be amiss to die!”
And the speaker looked round him, into the faces of his fellows, and they lightened up with a glow of cheerfulness and pride, though no word was spoken.