‘And upon a certain time colonel Fusch came riding by where we were at work, and some Italian lords with him, who were intended for Rome, and he proffered to send me with them if I pleased, or if I would be a Papist, or Calvinist, (i. e. Presbyterian) he would procure my liberty, &c. And many more temptations we had daily, which would be too long here to relate. And often there came officers and asked us, What saith the Spirit now? Hath the Spirit sent you to work? And had he not done better to have counselled you to stay at home? And doth he not yet tell you that you must be Catholics? And when I had done speaking to them, and they not knowing how to defend themselves, they would say, ‘Such heretics ought to be burned;’ and more bad words to the same purpose.
‘And when sixteen weeks were expired of our imprisonment, the Hungarian deputy-governor, a bitter old man, came where we were at work, and said, ‘He must send us to Cæsar;’ for John had before in his paper appealed unto him.
‘Then we went into the garrison, until four soldiers and an interpreter, and letters, were ready, that went along with us, and there were iron-bolts put upon our feet, and we put into a waggon. And the interpreter told us, how he had heard the letter which was come concerning us, but nevertheless, he said, we should not come into England. So that whole night we rode, and arrived the third day at the house of one called his excellency, lord Francis of Nadasti, &c. Judex Curiæ Hungariæ, the Emperor’s majesty’s active privy counsellor and lord chamberlain, &c. to whom the governor of Comora had given us over, it was supposed, partly to make friendship with him, for they had been formerly at variance; and when he came from his worship he caused us to be called, and asked me, If we were Quakers? I said, ‘Yea:’ He said, ‘Very well.’ And in the afternoon his wife looked out of a window, and asked me several questions, and I had much freedom to answer her, which she interpreted to some Hungarians that were with her: and the next morning we were taken to the vice-king’s parlour, where the lords of that kingdom and of the other dominions were set about the table, and John was ordered to go to one end by the secretary, who seemed to be an understanding man, and he was partly reached by John’s answers, and he was forward to repeat them aloud to the archbishop and the rest; and Nadasti asked me several questions, but hastily, about our religion, of which we gave friends an account formerly.
‘And though they had little or nothing to say against our answers, yet they passed sentence upon us, that we should be burned, if we would not be instructed, and embrace their religion; for they had a law, they said, which tolerated but three religions, viz. theirs, the Lutherans, and the Calvinists, and whosoever brought a new religion there, was according to their law, to be burned; and upon that we were sent away. And John told me, The power of the Lord would divide them in their council, as an Irish priest did afterwards tell him, who was sent to require an account of our religion in writing, and when it was done, the Irishman got an English copy of it, and said, ‘He would tell them the contents of it, and help us what he could;’ but we thought it would be the best that I translated it, which accordingly I did, and I gave it Nadasti in his hand.
‘Afterwards they sent the priest to convert us, and there he read out of his catechism, and asked John concerning the creed, pater-nosters, seven sacraments, mass, faith, hope, love, patience, and more such like things, to which John answered him. After that came down some priests, and asked us, If we were come forth to sow our seed? O, said the Irish priest, ‘they cannot speak Latin;’ yet he and others know that I could. And seeing they could not prevail with us there, we were sent to another place, five Dutch miles from [115]Wien, (the Emperor’s seat) with two soldiers, by Nadasti’s command, and when we were come thither, the priests gave order to put us in the hole with the Turks, because they suspected us to be preachers, and by their instigation, and with the consent of the court-master, (who told me, that there should be wood and straw fetched to burn us) did the soldiers take off our coats, and searched our pockets, and took our books and papers, and the next day, because we would not speak Latin, nor take off our hats to their images in their churches (so called) they set others upon us to ensnare us in words, and strove to do it themselves, that they might have occasion to take away our lives, which they often threatened to do, and when they could not prevail with all their cunning baits, nor make us bow to their worship, they manifested their cruelty farther, in causing iron-shackles to be put upon our hands; and though they were so little that I was forced even to cry out, by reason of the extremity of pain, yet with force they thrust on the lock, and beheld it with joy.
[115] Vienna.
‘And in the hole we had scarce room to put forth our feet without touching the Turks, whose feet were in the stocks, and hands in irons, and necks and feet in iron-bands tied to the walls with strong chains. Afterwards the priests being drunk at their feasts, sent for us to examine us farther, and they said ‘They could not believe but John was a preacher, for an husbandman could not answer so readily.’ And one of the chief of them told us, that they had several instruments of cruelty, which they could also let us taste of; that they could burn men under their arms, and put hot iron or copper-plates upon their breasts: and he also told us, that we should be sent down into Hungaria to be burned. I spoke to one of the priests, and desired we might be dealt withal as men or Christians, and might have a little straw or hay to lie upon, for we were worse used than the Turks. ‘Yea,’ said he, ‘we prefer them before you.’ And about that time they proffered us a drink in an urging manner, which it was supposed was made to poison us; and John refusing to take it, one of the priests said, ‘Suspectum est nos.’ One of the priests asked me, If I had a wife? I said, ‘I never knew woman-kind.’ He said, ‘The heretics had not that grace of chastity, neither had I any grace from God.’ The Turks, he said, had some grace, they were good soldiers, and somewhat else he said of them. Another priest asked me, ‘How I had lain in the hole, and how the iron-shackles pleased me?’ And threatened we should be put into the miry-dungeon in the tower, and called me filthy names in the Hungarian tongue, before the people.
‘Howbeit, blessed be the Lord, we had slept well in the shackles, upon the besoms in a corner; yea, better than could be expected, though at the first my wrist-band pained me much. And when the priests and others were seeking much to discourage us, I was upon a time setting musing upon a bench, and thinking Lord help us, what will be the end of this, and whether they shall have power to murder us here, where few may know of it, for in this place are no other sects to be witnesses, as at Comora and Presburgh, and then my mind was turned inwards, and I was as if I had slept; and on a sudden it was as if I had seen a man all clothed in white, sitting on a milk-white horse, riding in post-haste to me-wards, as if he were hastening to rescue me; then I looked up and was pretty much comforted, thinking it was from the Lord to encourage me, lest I should be too much cast down. And the very same day there came tidings from the earl, that he was displeased at what they had done, as he told his barber, to whom he showed the papers which John had writ; and the barber hearing of us, together with his perusing the aforesaid papers, the witness of God was reached in him, which had stirred much in him in the time of his youth, by which he was stirred up to declare against the darkness and deadness of the brethren’s forms aforesaid, among whom he had been educated; neither could he be well satisfied in himself until he came to see me, and after some discourse with us, was yet more convinced, and he told us, how that the earl did judge that the priests had been drunk, which was true, both with rage and wine. Then did the streams begin to turn, and some desired our favour, both the officer and priest began to flatter us, with others who had been high against us; and then they had no more power to put us into the hole to exercise their cruelty upon us, as they had done before, which was no small cross to their wills.
‘After that there came a spiritual lord (so called) an Englishman, from Wien, and he asked John, If we were come to plant our religion? saying, ‘Sects had occasioned much mischief in England, but now they would be rooted out.’ But John said, ‘The love of God can reconcile them again.’ ‘A pox o’ God, take that love,’ said he, with other such unsavory words, whereby he showed himself to be carnal indeed, although he was called spiritual. Another came to us, who was called Frater Valentine, and speaking with us concerning the bible, he said, ‘It had brought many thousands into hell,’ and reading a paper of John’s, which he had writ to the earl and council, wherein John showed, how he was an Englishman, and forasmuch as there was no discord betwixt England and the Empire, he knew not why an Englishman coming into any of the emperor’s dominions, to visit a sort of people, and to spend his money, should be so used, &c. But said the aforesaid Frater, ‘They ought to be beheaded, for if they had done so to Luther at first, said he, there had not been so many Lutherans or heretics at this day.’ Farther he said, ‘We were forerunners of Antichrist;’ and this rumour went through the kingdom and elsewhere, that Antichrist was taken, and was at Nadasti’s court. However, soon after it was thought we might have been set at liberty, but that the priest did so much incense the earl against us, and we having writ according to order for certificates, which in due time came to hand, from friends in Holland, and they were of good service, with the king’s proclamation for setting Friends at liberty; but the earl was taken exceeding sick at Wien, so that the thing was not then effected.
‘In the mean time Adam Bien, the earl’s barber, had desired, unknown to us, that we might have the liberty to come forth, and be in his house, the winter being cold, and we in a cold guard, where the doors stood open all day, and much of the night; and he proffered his own person in our stead, if we should run away. Howbeit, we were not free to be so burdensome to him, though he had obtained the thing, but chose rather to content ourselves where they had appointed us, that the burden might come the heavier upon them, that they might be the sooner weary of us; and what storms and assaults we had from the priests and soldiers, and others with them, and how they sought to ensnare us, would be too long here to relate: but in the mean time we were often refreshed through Adam’s and his wife’s love, together with a sense of the love of God, and of friends who were afar off; and our adversaries might have been the worse to us, but that many of them there stood in pretty much awe of Adam, who stood in his integrity over them, for he having such daily access to the earl, and knowing most of them at court guilty of more or less, they did therefore dread him the more. And sometimes we did go to his house, and had sometimes opportunity to speak with some of the aforementioned brethren, who were warned of that sore desolation which is since come upon many of them. For of nine families there is but one remaining, and the rest were burned, with the value of many thousands in them, and above two hundred of the men were slain and taken captive.