termed villein services. This distinction is frequently lost sight of, and the general term villein confusedly bestowed upon both classes indiscriminately, especially by authors who have written since the former class has gradually slipt out of existence. This is not so in the older books. Villeinsproper are distinctly recognised in 'The Mirrour' as villeins who are slaves.

They can purchase nothing but to the lord's use; they know not in the evening what service they shall do in the morning, nor any certainty of their services; the lords may fetter, imprison, beat, or chastise them at their pleasures, saving to them their lives and members; they may not fly or run from their lords, so long as they find them wherewith to live; nor is it lawful for others to receive them without their lord's consent."9 In the Booke of Olde Tenures' they are included under the general title of Villeins, and it is laid down that the lord may despoil, scourge, and chastise them at pleasure."'10

more precise. "We will that no one be put in irons, except those who are taken for felony, or for trespass in parks or vivaries, or those who are found in arrearages upon accounts, and we forbid that any otherwise they be punished or tormented;"12 and Fleta removes all doubt by informing us that in cases of gaol-breach a diligent inquiry is to be made whether it was occasioned by any aggravation of punishment, as suspension of the body by the feet, cutting of the nails, a weight of iron, or torments of that description, and in that case the keepers are to be held punishable as in cases of homicide."13 Fortescue impressed the barbarity of torture upon Prince Edward, son of Henry the Sixth, for whom his book was written; and appealed to an instance of its fallaciousness which had recently occurred within the Prince's knowledge, probably in France, where Fortescue and the Prince were then residing.14 Coke declared it to be contrary to Magna Charta ;15 Sir Thomas Smith denounced it as cruel, servile, and abhorrent to the feelings of Englishmen; and, finally, the judges, being consulted by Charles the First as to the legality of putting Felton to the rack, to their honour declared unanimously, "that he ought not by the law to be tortured by the rack, for no such punishment is known or allowed by our law."-(Jardine, p. 12.)

viuers" for vivers, vivaries, places for the keeping of live creatures.

13 Selden's Fleta, p. 39. This is evidently the origin of our Coroner's Inquests upon persons who die in prison. 14 Fortescue de laud. cap. 22.

15 Third Inst. cap. 2.

16 De republica, cap. 27.

the civil law allowed torture. An instance is referred to by Henry, as having taken place in the court of the Constable in the year 1468;17 and the application of torture in the Admiralty Courts is considered to be proved by the preambles of the Statutes of 27 Henry VIII. c. 4, and 28 Henry VIII. c. 15, in both which it is recited, that certain offenders "many tymes escape unpunysshed because the triall of their offences hath heretofore ben ordered, judged, and determyned after the course of the civil lawes, the nature wherof is, that before any judgement of Death canne be yeven ayenst the offendours, either they must playnly confesse their offences (which they will never doo without torture paynes), or els their offences be❞ proved in a particular manner. condly, Torture was occasionally practised under colour of the royal prerogative. Whether such an infliction could ever be justified as an exercise of prerogative, whether in fact it was a tyrannical usurpation or not, is a question into which we will not at present enter. It is clear that the courts of common law disclaimed any right to put a prisoner to the torture; it is equally clear that during a certain period of our history such a right was assumed and exercised on the part of the Crown under the authority of royal warrants and orders of the Privy Council.

or

Se

Although principally limited in practice to cases of treason, affairs of state, and very peculiar or heinous offences, no such limitation was admitted or recognised; but, as far as we have seen, the authority was considered to be one which might be exercised at the royal pleasure in any case whatever. Coke has preserved a traditional story that the Duke of Exeter, who was appointed Constable of the Tower in 1447,19 first introduced the

17 Henry, x. p. 73, referring to W. Wyrcester, 515.

18 Authentic Edition of Stats. 111. 533, 671.

19 Cal. Rot. Pat. 26 Henry VI. p. 292. 3d Instit. p. 34. Stowe says, the brake was "called the Duke of Excester's daughter, because shee was the deviser of that torture."-(Stowe's Chronicle by Howes, p. 420.) For the honour of the sex, as

"rack or brake" into that fortress, and that this abhorred engine was consequently called "the Duke of Exeter's daughter." Whether this be the fact or not, and whether, if the fact, this be the first introduction of prerogative torture or not, does not appear; but we have not met with any evidence of the use of torture in cases triable at the common law, before the year 1467, when Holinshed records that one Hawkins being "cast in the Tower, and at length brought to the brake, called the Duke of Exeter's daughter, by meanes of which paine he shewed manie things, amongst the which the motion was one that he had made to Sir Thomas Cooke, and accused himself so farre, that he was put to death."20 Cooke was tried upon the evidence thus extracted, and, although acquitted, suffered a great deal of persecution and pecuniary loss.

From Edward the Fourth we are not aware of any instance of torture down to the reign of Henry the Eighth. Amongst the cruelties which then became familiar, we find the unscrupulous practice of the rack. George Constantyne, writing of that confession of Mark Smeaton, which has been a sore puzzle to the defenders of Ann Boleyn, says, that "the sayeing was, that he was first grevously racked." Cromwell coolly notes down amongst his remembrances, "to sende Gendon to the Towre to be rakkyd." Damport, one of the witnesses examined respecting Catharine Howard's infidelities, was subjected to torture; 23 and, although Fox has probably been deceived in some portion of his account of the racking of Anne Askew, there is no doubt of the main fact. Burnet relates it upon the authority of an original journal of transactions in the Tower, written by Anthony Anthony;24 and in Johnson's letter, published by Sir Henry Ellis, we read," she hath been rakked sins her condemnacion (as men

well as on account of its greater probability, we will adopt Coke's version. 20 Holinshed, III. 288.

21 Archæolog. vol. xxiii.

22 Ellis's Letters, 2d Ser. 11. 121. 23 State Papers, 1. 698.

24 Reform. 1. part 1, 439.

25 Ellis's Letters, 2d Ser. 11. 177.

say) which is a straunge thing in my understanding. The Lord be mercifull to us all."

From the accession of Edward the Sixth, torture-warrants are occasionally to be found in the Council Books, and from that time, consequently, its existence and application may be traced with some certainty. This is what has been done by the author of the work before us. Having had access to the Council Books he has been enabled to amplify his previous account in the little work entitled " Criminal Trials," (1. 13—22) and to publish in an Appendix a collection of all the original documents he has discovered.

Some two or three have been published before; but it is advantageous to possess them in a collected form.

They establish, beyond dispute, that torture was practised as a prerogative right from Edward the Sixth down to 1640, when its last victim, John Archer, a glover, "a very simple fellow," was ordered to be racked, with a view to the discovery of some traitorous conspiracy in the attack of the mob upon Lambeth Palace. There were some subsequent instances of the use of torture, by the anti-royal party during the civil war, both in England and Ireland; but they do not seem to have attracted Mr. Jardine's notice.

Within the ninety years to which Mr. Jardine's collection of warrants applies, the most atrocious cruelties were perpetrated under their authority. It is at once disgusting and humiliating to learn the full particulars of the sufferings of Campion; of the agony of the aged Peacham, examined in the presence of Bacon and other distinguished persons, "before torture, in

torture, between torture, and after torture;"26 of the frightful death of Owen, the servant of Father Garnet; and of the sufferings of poor Miagh, who has left a touching memorial of his misery amongst the inscriptions at the Tower. This unfortunate man was sent over

from Ireland in 1580-1, by the Lord Deputy, that he might be examined respecting a suspected treasonable correspondence with the rebels in arms in that country. After an examination by Walsingham he was sent to the Tower, and the lieutenant and Dr.

26 Hailes's Memorials of James I. 58. GENT. MAG. VOL. VII.

Hammond were instructed to examine him again secretly. They reported the result to Walsingham on the 10th March, 1580-1, in the following words :

"We have had twoo severall examinations of Thomas Myaghe, wherein we finde nothing but an improbable tale full of suspicion, not mutche encreased by reporte of

further matter then heretofore he hath declared to your honour, as by the examinations which we sende herewith maie appeare. We have forborne to put him in Skevington's yrons, for that we received chardge from yow to examine hym with secrecie, whiche in that sorte we could not do, that maner of dealinge requiringe the presence and ayde of one of the jaylors all the tyme that he shall be in those yrons, and in this examination; and besides, we finde the man so resolute as in our opinions little will be wroonge out of hym but by some sharper torture. Nevertheless, we are to refer this to your honor's consideration, and wil be reddie tomorowe in the afternoone, or at anie other tyme, to attende upon your direction."-(Jardine, p. 83.)

A week afterwards, these willing instruments of cruelty reported again :

"We have agayne made two severall examinations of Thomas Myaghe, and notwithstanding that we have made triall of hym by the torture of Skevington's yrons, and with so mutche sharpenes as was in our judgement for the man and his cause convenient, yet can we get from hym no farther matter than we have sent herewith in writinge. Of the man we thincke as we dyd before, that he can hardlie be innocent; and the circumstances discovered in this examination, do in our opinion shewe that the colour of his second sendinge to understande the

forces of the enemie is but counterfeit matter, consideringe that the same was well knowen to hym at his first goinge unto them; wherein if he dissembles his knowledge to the Erle, there was little cause whie he shold be reputed a person of truth for aine suche service. Thus trustinge your honour will accept our doinges in good parte, we commende the same to th' Almightie. This 17th of Marche, 1580."—(Jardine, p. 84.)

After a lapse of four months, and the arrival apparently of some further intelligence from Ireland, the sufferings of Myagh were renewed and increased. On the 30th July, 1581, there is a memorandum in the Council Book of the following letter: 4 I

"A letter to Mr. Lieutenant of the Tower and Thomas Norton; that whereas their lordships have appointed Geoffry Fenton, her Majestie's Secretarie for the realme of Irelande, to repaire unto them for the examininge of Thomas Meaghe, heretofore committed to his charge, and to charge him with suche matters as he heretofore hath denied, and now are certified from thence to be verified by depositions of witnesses. They are required, uppon receipt hereof, to call the said Meaghe before them; and in case, being confronted and charged with such matters as the said Fenton shall bringe with him, he shall wilfullie refuse to acknowledge the same, then it is thought meete that they deale with him with the racke in such sorte as they shall see cause. And to advertise their lordships of their doings as soon as convenientlie they may."(Jardine, p. 85.)

The result does not appear, except so far as it is indicated by the following lines cut in the wall of the dungeon in the Tower in which Meagh was confined

"Thomas Miagh, which lieth here alone,
That fayne wold from hens begon;
By torture strange mi trouth was tryed,
Yet of my libertie denied.

1581.

Thomas Myagh."

(Jardine, p. 30.)

"

This instance of wanton cruelty is an illustration of the character of the transactions laid open in this little volume. An impartial recklessness of suffering was exhibited, whatever the station of the prisoner or the character of the presumed offence. The simple glover; the rude but probably cunning Myagh; the learned and eloquent Campion; Thomas Travers, detected in stealing “a standyshe of her Majestie;" William Tompson, a very lewde and dangerous person, charged to have a purpose to burne her Majestie's shipps;" one William Wakeman, alias Oavies, a notoriouse fellon;" and very many others of various classes and characters, are here found indiscriminately consigned to the irons or the rack. In one instance the sufferer is a female. Copies of two feigned visions of a young maiden had been scattered abroad amongst "the popish and ignorant people" in Cheshire. The bishop sent them to the Council, who directed him "to doe his best endevor to syft and bowlt out who be the authors, as well by examining

such as shall be found seised with the copies of the said visions, as by causing the mayden (in case by fayer means she shall not confesse the same) to be secretlie whipped, and so brought to declare the truthe of this imposture.”—(Jardine, p. 86.) This was in

1581.

In considering the different kinds of engines of torture, we are again thrown back to the domestic slavery of the ancients. Mr. Blair remarks, that "a vast variety of engines of torment were used by the Romans; and, in so far as we can judge, from the mention made of them by ancient writers, little new in the modes of inflicting pain was devised by modern ingenuity during any of the religious persecutions, or other too celebrated occa

sions, when such cruelty has been displayed in more recent ages.”—(Blair's Slavery amongst the Romans, p. 63.)

Whether the equuleus of the ancients was the rack of modern days, or the wooden horse, formerly used as a military punishment, and an engraving of which may be seen in Grose's Military Antiquities (11. 199), seems doubtful. Our word "rack" is evidently descriptive. It means simply "a stretcher;" an engine for stretching the frame beyond its natural form. We have seen what is the traditional origin of its name of the "the Duke of Exeter's daughter."

Scavenger's, or Skevington's irons, or the scavenger's daughter, was an invention of Sir William Skevington, or Skeffington, who was Lieutenant of the Tower, and afterwards Governor of Ireland, in the reign of Henry the Eighth. A description of this frightful engine, extracted from Tanner's Societas Europea, is given by Mr. Jardine, in a note at p. 15, and there is also an account of it and of other engines of torture employed at the Tower in a note to Lingard's England (VIII. 521). It was the reverse of the rack, torturing by compression instead of elongation. The prisoner being made to kneel, a hoop of iron, composed of two parts connected by a hinge, was introduced under his legs, and fastened over his back. The victim was gradually compressed by drawing the one end of the hoop over the other.

The manacles, Mr. Jardine thinks, were first introduced at Bridewell,

about 1588.-(Jardine, p. 37, n. and App.) The documents in the Appendix do not exactly prove this, but they seem to shew that this torture was not used at the Tower until about 1598. If the manacles and the iron gauntlets were the same, there is a description of them in Lingard. We cannot concur in Mr. Jardine's notion, that the manacles were the same as the iron collar, an engine which compressed the sufferer's neck down towards his feet. He founds this opinion upon a line in the Tempest-" I'll manacle thy neck and feet together;" the poetical license of which is very obvious. The word occurs several times in Shakspere, and never with any such meaning as Mr. Jardine supposes. There does not seem any good ground for supposing that they were anything more than the manica of the ancients, which are described as chains for the hands.27

There was also a place, or cell, in the Tower used for the torturing prisoners, called "little-ease;" the earliest mention of which that we have met with, is in Holinshed (111. 825) in the reign of Henry the Eighth. At that time it was used by the House of Commons as a place of custody for a person who had committed a breach of their privileges. Lingard describes it as so constructed, that the prisoner could neither stand, walk, sit, or lie in it at full length, but was compelled to draw himself up in a squatting posture. This is probably the same place which was also called Little Hell. A Committee of the House of Commons examined it in 1604, and reported that "it was very loathsome and unclean, and not used for a long time, either for a prison or other cleanly purpose."-(Jardine, p. 15 n.) They found in it the engine called Skevington's daughter.

An apartment something analogous to "Little-ease," was known and de

27 Vide Gronovii Thesaur. Græc. Antiq. VI. p. 3701. The treatise of Laurentius there inserted, contains much information upon this subject generally. After quoting and commenting upon a great many passages relating to the equuleus, he was unable to come to any certain conclusion as to its precise form. "Hæc," he says, "de equelei formâ et usu. Tute cense, Ego in tuam ibo sententiam."

scribed as "the dungeon amongst the rats." This was by the water's edge, and when the tide rose was infested by multitudes of those animals.

This disgusting catalogue might be considerably increased, but we have already exceeded our limits and must forbear. We intended also to have noticed the practice of torture in Ireland and in Scotland, but have not space. The Iron-boot, which was long used in the latter country, has been rendered familiar to all the readers of Walter Scott, by the admirable description of the torturing of MacBriar (Old Mortality, Novels, X. 407, edit. 1830.) The Thumbscrews, or thumbikins, are also introduced into that scene by Sir Walter, but by a poetical license, for they do not seem to have been invented until a few years after the date of the events which are the subjects of that novel. There is an order made by the Scottish Privy Council, on the 23d July, 1684, in the following words :-"Whereas the Boots were the ordinary way to expiscate matters relating to the government, and that there is now a new invention called the Thumbkins, which will be very effectual to the purposes and intent aforesaid, the Lords of his Majesty's Privy Council do therefore ordain, that when any person shall, by their order, be put to the torture, the said boots and thumbkins both be applied to them as shall be found fit and convenient."

-(State Trials, x. 765. n.) In Scotland two cases of torture occurred in the reign of William the Third, and the practice was not finally put an end to until the reign of Anne, when a statute was passed for the purpose. The French had varieties of torture used amongst them; the Brodequin, or buskin, a kind of boot, but made of wood instead of iron, and the torture by water. In the latter case, the mouth of the sufferer was forced or gagged open, and large quantities of water were poured down his throat. Fortescue (de laud. cap. 22) relates the disgusting sequence. An instance of the application of this water-torture in the year 1731, is recorded in the first volume of the Gent. Mag. (p. 225). The Chinese have a torture to extract evidence, which is practised at the present day, and consists in squeezing the ankles of men, or the fingers of women,