black man." A Wiltshire man, whom they
paid to show them the way over the plain,
betrayed them to Colonel Penruddock, who
early the next morning discovered Hickes
hidden in the malthouse, and Nelthorpe in a
hole in a chimney. Lady Lisle's defence was
that she knew Hickes to be a Nonconformist
minister against whom a warrant was issued,
but she did not know he had been with the
Duke of Monmouth. As for Nelthorpe, she
did not even know his name; she had denied
him to the soldiers, only from fear, as they
were rude and insolent, and were with
difficulty restrained from plundering the house.
Lady Lisle then avowed that she abhorred the
Monmouth plot, and that the day on which
King Charles was beheaded she had not gone
out of her chamber, and had shed more tears
for him than any woman then living, as the late
Countess of Monmouth, my Lady Marlborough,
my Lord Chancellor Hyde, and twenty persons
of the most eminent quality could bear witness.
Moreover, she said, her son had been sent by
her to bear arms on the king's side, and it was
she who had bred him up to fight for the king.
Jeffreys, eager to spill blood at the first case
of treason on the circuit, and seeing the jury
waver, roared and bellowed blasphemy at
Dunne, who became too frightened to speak.

"I hope," cried this model judge, "I
hope, gentlemen of the jury, you take notice
of the strange and horrible carriage of this
fellow, and withal you cannot but observe
the spirit of this sort of people, what a
villanous and devilish one it is. A Turk is a
saint to such a fellow as this; many a Pagan
would be ashamed to have no more truth in
him. Blessed Jesus, what a generation of
vipers! Dost thou believe that there is a
God? Dost thou believe thou hast a precious
and immortal soul? Dost——"

"I cannot tell what to say, my lord,"
stammered poor tormented Dunne.

Jeffreys: "Good God, was there ever such
an impudent rascal! Hold the candle up that
we may see his brazen face."

Dunne: "My lord, I am so baulked I do not
know what I say. Tell me what you would
have me say, for I am shattered out of my
senses."

Placid Judge: "Why, prithee, man, there is
nobody baulks thee but thy own self. Thou art
asked questions as plain as anything in the
world can be; it is only thy own haughty
depraved heart that baulks both thy honesty
and understanding, if thou hast any; it is thy
studying how to prevaricate that puzzles and
confounds thy intellect; but I see all the pains
in the world, and all compassion and charity is
lost upon thee, and therefore will say no more
to thee."

The jury were long in discussion, and three
times brought in Alicia Lisle not guilty, but they
succumbed at last to the judge's threats and
denunciations. The poor charitable woman
was condemned to be burnt to death on the next
day. The clergy of Winchester Cathedral
remonstrated against the cruel haste, and Jeffreys,
not wishing to destroy the sociability of his visit,
postponed the execution for five days. In the
mean time there was great intercession made.
The only mercy James had the heart to show was
to commute the sentence from burning to
beheading. On the afternoon of September the
2nd she suffered death on a scaffold in the
market-place, and underwent her fate with
serene courage and Christian resolution. Her
last words were forgiveness to all who had
done her wrong. In the first year of William
and Mary the attainder was reversed, and Lady
Lisle's two daughters, Triphena and Bridget,
were restored to all their former rights.

Winchester Castle was destroyed by Cromwell.
The hall (formerly called the chapel)
now only remains. The famous Round Table,
framed by Merlin, still hangs on the east end.
Henry the Eighth and Charles the Fifth came
to see this relic, whose date is uncertain. There
are bullet marks on it, said to be the work of
Cromwell's relic-despising musketeers.

The crow skims to Southampton, and alights
on the Bar-gate, just above the sullen figures of
Sir Bevis and Ascapart. This Ascapart was
a loathly giant whom Sir Bevis subdued with
sword and spear, and coerced into more or less
patient bondage. Only half tamed, however,
this Caliban mutinied on one occasion in the
absence of his master, and carried off Josyan
the Bright, wife of Sir Bevis, whose knights soon
tracked out and slew the foul felon. Sir Bevis
lived on the mount three quarters of a mile
above the Bar. This noble paladin, after much
fighting, died on the same day with his loving
wife, Josyan, and his horse Arundel. The
Venice galleys that in the middle ages brought
to the Hampshire coast Indian spices, Damascus
carpets, Murano glass, and Levant wine, no
doubt took back with them English cloth and
English legends. Mr. Rawdon Brown tells us
that to this day the "History of Sir Bevis of
Hampton," is a stock piece at the Venetian
puppet-show theatres.

The crow must not forget that it was on the
shore near Southampton (not at Bosham as
Sussex antiquaries insist on having it) that
Canute, to rebuke his Danish courtiers, who
beheld in him a monarch feared by the
English, Scotch, Welsh, Danish, Swedes, and
Norwegians, commanded the tide to recede, and
respect its sovereign. Indeed a daring
Southampton man has satisfactorily settled the site
of the story by erecting a public-house near
the Docks called "The Canute Castle."

Our bird rejoices in Southampton, not
because it was once a depôt for Cornish tin;
because Charles the Fifth embarked from
here; because Richard the First here assembled
his fleet for the crusades, and took on board
eight hundred protesting Hampshire hogs,
and ten thousand horse-shoes; or because our
army for Crecy embarked here, but because
it is eminently a Shakesperean place, like
many others he has visited. Here, as the
depôt for Cordovan leather, Alexandrian sugar,
and for Bordeaux and Rochelle wine, the
favourite place of embarcation indeed for