The Golden Grasshopper | Page 6

a loud voice thundering anathemas on the heads of heretics, and threatening the vengeance of Heaven on those who sheltered them, or refused to give them up into the hands of the Inquisitors. Sometimes the crowd appeared to be violently agitated, and here and there persons were seen moving among them, as if to urge them forward in an attempt to rescue those about to suffer; but the stern looks of the well-trained Spanish troops kept them in awe. The sermon--if a fierce harangue composed of invectives against simple Christianity could so be called-- was brought to a conclusion; and now, in a loud voice, the presiding Inquisitor asked the accused for the last time whether they would recant and make confession of their sins, promising them absolution and a sure entrance into heaven, with a more easy death than the terrible one to which they were condemned. The gag was removed from the mouth of the chief prisoner that he might give his answer.
"No, no!" he exclaimed, "I accept not such mercy as you offer. I hold fast to a simple faith in Christ's meritorious death, and that alone is sufficient to secure my salvation. I look upon the sacrifice of the Mass as an act dishonouring Him. I believe that no human person has power to absolve me from sin; that all must enter the kingdom of heaven here who are to belong to it hereafter, and thus that masses for the dead are a deceit and fraud; that Christ hears our prayers more willingly than any human mediator or being who has once dwelt on earth; that His mother was honoured among women, but not above women; that her heart was less tender than His; and that she can no more hear prayers or intercede with Him than can any other person of the seed of Adam requiring, like all others, to be cleansed by His blood."
"Off with him to the stake! to the stake!" shouted the priests as these words were uttered.
A female--a graceful lady--was next asked whether she would recant.
"I hold to the opinion my dear husband has uttered," she answered.
Master Gresham turned pale when he heard her speak, for he recognised the features of one he had seen but a short time before. At that moment the little boy, who had been eagerly watching the scene, uttered a loud shriek.
"Oh! my father! my dear mother!" he cried out; "let me go to them--let me go to save them!"
With difficulty the groom held him on his horse, for he struggled desperately to be free. "There's kind Bertha, my nurse; and honest, good Gunter too! Let me go, I say, that I may help them!"
The English party were too far off to allow those on the stage to observe them. Even the servants refused to recant, though promised their lives and liberty if they would do so.
Karl Van Verner and his wife were led down from the platform by the steps towards the two stakes, which stood close to each other. And now the members of the brotherhood on whom had been imposed the sad office of executing the victims, rushed forward with faggots, which they piled up round them. Two professional executioners, who had been summoned for the purpose, secured the victims by the chains to the stakes. While fire was set to the piles, the members of the brotherhood burst forth into a melancholy miserere, which rose up even above the groans and sighs of the people.
Master Gresham ordered his attendants to try and force their way out of the crowd. At length, many persons, unwilling to witness the suffering of the victims, retired along the various streets leading into the Mere, thus giving an opportunity to the English party to retreat. Once more the young boy cast a terrified glance towards the horrible spectacle, when the groom, in mercy, throwing a cloak round his head, pushed on through the crowd, the whole party making their way as rapidly as they could towards the royal merchant's residence.
For days, for months, for years even, did that dreadful spectacle occur again and again to the mind of the child. Thus perished his parents, with their two faithful attendants, their only crime that of reading God's Word, singing His praises, and holding together family prayer.
Theirs was no solitary fate. Every week, every day almost, victims were offered up to the papal Moloch by those who thus hoped to stamp out the very existence of Protestantism from the land. Vain efforts! The seed of religious truth, scattered far and wide, was springing up and bearing fruit--sometimes bitter enough, it must be owned--but such as was not to be destroyed by Roman Pontiff or Spanish King.
CHAPTER THREE.
NEWS FROM ENGLAND.
For several days the young Ernst did not recover from the