House of Torment

There was a silence, broken only by the sobbing of women and a low murmur of sympathy from the rough men-at-arms.

Sir John Shelton heard it and glanced quickly at the muffled figure of the King.

It was a shrewd, penetrating look, and well understood by His Highness. This natural emotion of the escort, at such a sad and painful scene, might well prove a leaven which would work in untutored minds. There must be no more sympathy for heretics. Sir John gave a harsh order, the guard closed in upon Dr. Taylor, there was a loud cry from the Archdeacon's wife as she fell fainting into the arms of the sturdy servant, and the cavalcade proceeded at a smart pace. John looked round once, and this is what he saw – the tall figure of Elizabeth Taylor, fixed and rigid, the lovely face set in a stare of horror and unspeakable grief, a star of sorrow as the dawn reddened and day began.

And now, as they left London, the progress was more rapid, the stern business upon which they were engaged looming up and becoming more imminent every moment, the big man in the centre of the troop being hurried relentlessly to his end.

And so they rode forth to Brentwood, where, during a short stay, Sir John Shelton and his men caused to be made for Dr. Taylor a close hood, with two holes for his eyes to look out at, and a slit for his mouth to breathe at. This they did that no man in the pleasant country ways, the villages or little towns, should speak to him, nor he to any man.

It was a practice that they had used with others, and very wise and politic.

"For," says a chronicler of the time, "their own consciences told them that they led innocent lambs to the slaughter. Wherefore they feared lest if the people should have heard them speak or have seen them, they might have been more strengthened by their godly exhortations to stand steadfast in God's Word, to fly the superstitions and idolatries of the Papacy."

All the way Dr. Taylor was joyful and merry, as one that accounted himself going to a most pleasant banquet or bridal. He said many notable things to the Sheriff and the yeomen of the guard that conducted him, and often moved them to weep through his much earnest calling upon them to repent and to amend their evil and wicked living. Oftentimes, also, he caused them to wonder and rejoice, to see him so constant and steadfast, void of all fear, joyful in heart, and glad to die. At one time during their progress he said: "I will tell you, I have been deceived, and, as I think, I shall deceive a great many. I am, as you see, a man that hath a very great carcase, which I thought would have been buried in Hadley churchyard, if I died in my bed, as I well hoped I should have done; but herein I see I was deceived. And there are a great number of worms in Hadley churchyard, which should have had a jolly feed upon this carrion, which they have looked for many a day. But now I know we are to be deceived, both I and they; for this carcase must be burnt to ashes; and so shall they lose their bait and feeding, that they looked to have had of it."

Sir John Shelton, who was riding by the side of Commendone, and who was now sober enough, the wine of his midnight revels having died from him, turned to Johnnie with a significant grin as he heard Dr. Taylor say this to his guards.

Shelton was coarse, overbearing, and a blackguard, but he had a keen mind of a sort, and was of gentle birth.

"Listen to this curtail dog, Mr. Commendone," he said, with a sneer. "A great loss to the Church, i' faith. He talketh like some bully-rook or clown of the streets. And these are the men who in their contumacy and their daring deny the truth of Holy Church – " He spat upon the ground with disgust.

Commendone nodded gravely. His insight was keener far than the other's. He saw, in what Bishop Heber afterwards called "the coarse vigour" of the Archdeacon's pleasantry, no foolish irreverence indeed, but the racy English courage and humour of a saintly man, resolved to meet his earthly doom brightly, and to be an example to common men.

Johnnie was the son of a bluff Kentish squire. He knew the English soil, and all the stoic hardy virtues, the racy mannerisms which spring from it. Courtier and scholar, a man of exquisite refinement, imbued with no small share of foreign grace and courtliness, there was yet a side of him which was thoroughly English. He saw deeper than the coarse-mouthed captain at his side.

The voices of those who had gathered round the porch of St. Botolph's without Aldgate still rang in his ears.

The Sheriff and his company, when they heard Dr. Rowland Taylor jesting in this way, were amazed, and looked one at another, marvelling at the man's constant mind, that thus, without any fear, made but a jest at the cruel torment and death now at hand prepared for him.

The sun clomb the sky, the woods were green, the birds were all at matins. Through many a shady village they passed where the ripening corn rustled in the breeze, the wood smoke went up in blue lines from cottage and manor house, the clink of the forge rang out into the street as the blacksmiths lit their fires, the milkmaids strode out to find the lowing kine in the pastures. It was a brilliant happy morning as they rode along through the green lanes, a very bridal morning indeed.

When they were come within two miles of Hadley, Dr. Taylor desired for a while to light off his horse. They let him do it, and the Sheriff at his request ordered the hood to be removed from him.

The whole troop halted for a minute or two, and the Doctor, says the chronicler, "leaped and set a frisk or twain as men commonly do in dancing. 'Why, Master Doctor,' quoth the Sheriff, 'how do you now?' He answered, 'Well, God be praised, good Master Sheriff, never better; for now I know I am almost at home. I have not pass two stiles to go over, and I am even at my father's house.'

"'But, Master Sheriff,' said he, 'shall we not go through Hadley?'

"'Yes,' said the Sheriff, 'you shall go through Hadley.'

"'Then,' said he, 'O good Lord! I thank Thee, I shall yet once more ere I die see my flock, whom Thou, Lord, knowest I have most heartily loved and truly taught. Good Lord! bless them and keep them steadfast in Thy word and truth.'"

The streets of Hadley were beset on both sides of the way with women and men of the town and the country-side around, who awaited to see Dr. Taylor.

As the troop passed by, now at walking pace, when the people beheld their old friend led to death in this way, their voices were raised in lamentation and there was great weeping.

On all sides John Commendone heard the broad homely Suffolk voices, lifted high in sorrow.

"Ah, good Lord," said one fat farmer's wife to her man, "there goeth our good shepherd from us that so faithfully hath taught us, so fatherly hath cared for us, so godly hath governed us."

And again, the landlord of the "Three Cranes" at Hadley, where the troop stopped for a moment to water their horses at the trough before the inn, and the country people surged and crowded round: "O merciful God; what shall we poor scattered lambs do? What shall come of this most wicked world! Good Lord! strengthen him and comfort him. Alack, dear Doctor, may the Lord help thee!"

The great man upon his horse, towering above the yeomen of the guard who surrounded him, lifted his hand.

"Friends," he said, "and neighbours all, grieve not for me. I have preached to you God's word and truth, and am come this day to seal it with my blood."

Johnnie would have thought that the people who bore such an obvious love for their rector, and who now numbered several hundreds – sturdy country-men all – would have raised an outcry against the Sheriff and his officers. Many of them had stout cudgels in their hands, some of them bore forks with which they were going to the fields, but there was very little anger. The people were cowed, that was very plain to see. The power of the law struck fear into them still; the long, unquestioned despotism of Henry VIII still exercised its sway over simple minds. Now and again, as the horses were being watered, a fierce snarl of anger came from the outskirts of the crowd. Commendone himself, with his somewhat foreign appearance, and the tall, muffled figure of the King, excited murmurs and insults.

"They be Spaniards," one fellow cried, "they two be – Spaniards from the Queen's Papist husband. How like you this work, Master Don?"

But that was all. Once Sir John Shelton looked with some apprehension at the King, but the King understood nothing, and though the sturdy country-folk in their numbers might well have overcome the guard, a rescue was obviously not thought of nor was the slightest attempt at it made.

All this was quite homely and natural to Johnnie. He felt with the people; he had spent his life in the country. Down at quiet, retired Commendone his father and he were greatly loved by all the farmers and peasants of the estate. His mother – that graceful Spanish lady – had endeared herself for many years to the simple folk of Kent. Old Father Chilches had said Mass in the chapel at Commendone for many years without let or hindrance. Catholic as the house of Commendone had always been, there was nothing bigoted or fanatical in their religion. And now the young man's heart was stirred to its very depths as this homely rustic folk lifted up their voices in sorrow.

Even then, however, he questioned nothing in his mind of the justice of what was to be done. Despite the infinite pity he felt for this good pastor who was to die and his flock who grieved him so, he was yet perfectly loyal in his mind to the power which ordained the execution, part of whose machinery he was. The Queen had said so; the monarch could do no wrong. There were reasons of State, reasons of polity, reasons of religion which he himself was not competent to enter into or to discuss, but which he accepted blindly then.

And so, as they moved onwards towards Aldham Common, where the final scene was to be enacted, he moved with the others, one of the ministers of doom.

And through all the bright morning air, through the cries and tears of the country-folk, he heard one voice, the voice of a girl, he saw one white and lovely face ever before his eyes.

When they came to Aldham Common there was a great multitude of people gathered there.

"What place is this?" Dr. Taylor asked, with a smile, though he knew very well. "And what meaneth it that so much people are gathered together?"

The Sheriff, who was a stranger to this part of the country, and who was very agitated and upset, answered him with eager and deprecating civility. "It is Aldham Common, Dr. Taylor, the place where you must suffer; and the people are come to look upon you." The good man hardly knew what he was saying.

Dr. Taylor smiled once more.

"Thanked be God," he said, "I am even at home," and alighted from his horse.

Sir John Shelton, who also dismounted, snatched the hat from the Doctor's head, which was shown to be clipped close, like a horse's back in summer time – a degradation which Bishop Bonner had caused to be performed upon him the night before as a mean and vulgar revenge for the Doctor's words to him at the ceremony of his degradation.

But when the people saw Dr. Taylor's reverent and ancient face and his long white beard, they burst into louder weeping than ever, and cried, "God save thee, good Dr. Taylor! Jesus Christ strengthen thee, and help thee; the Holy Ghost comfort thee," and many other suchlike godly wishes.

They were now come into the centre of Aldham Common, where already a posse of men sent by the Sheriff of the county were keeping a space clear round a tall post which had been set into the ground, and which was the stake.

Sir John Shelton, who now assumed complete command of the proceedings, gave several loud orders. The people were pressed back with oaths and curses by the yeomen of the escort, and Dr. Taylor was hurried quickly towards the stake.

The long ride from London had not been without a certain quiet and dignity; but from this moment everything that was done was rude, hurried, and violent. The natural brutality of Shelton and his men blazed up suddenly. What before had been ineffably sad was now changed to horror, as John Commendone sat his horse by the side of the man whose safety he was there to guard, and watched the final scene.

Dr. Taylor, who was standing by the stake and disrobing, wished to speak to the people, but the yeomen of the guard were so busy about him that as soon as he opened his mouth one or another of these fellows thrust a fist or tipstaff into his mouth. They were round him like a pack of dogs, snarling, buffeting him, making him feel indeed the bitterness of death.

This was done by Sir John Shelton's orders, no doubt committed to him from London, for it was obvious that any popular feeling in the martyr's favour must be suppressed as soon as possibly could be done.

If Dr. Taylor had been allowed to speak to the surging crowd that knew and loved him, the well-known voice, the familiar and beloved exhortations might well have aroused a fury against the ministers of the law which they would be powerless to withstand.

Dr. Taylor himself seemed to recognise this, for he sat down upon a stool which was placed near the stake and did not offer to speak again. He looked round while three or four ill-favoured fellows in leather were bringing up bundles of furze and freshly cut faggots to the stake, and as he was obviously not about to address the people, the guard was a little relaxed.

He saw pressing on the outskirts of the crowd an old countryman, with a brown wrinkled face.