Page:History of England (Froude) Vol 10.djvu/522

 502 REIGN OF ELIZABETH. [CH. 61. written the offensive pamphlet, Page, the bookseller, who had sold it, and Singleton the printer of it, were tried for felony, and she wished to hang them. The jury refused to find a verdict. The law could not be manipulated to touch their lives. They were then indicted for conspiring to excite sedition, under an Act which had been passed in the late reign for the pro- tection of the Queen's husband. 1 ' The Queen's hus- band' was construed liberally to cover the Queen's suitor. The Act had been continued for the protec- tion of Elizabeth herself, 2 and she translated the in- sult to her lover into an insult to the Crown. ' Law- yers murmured that the proceedings were erroneous.* Mounson, one of the judges of the Common Pleas, re- signed, rather than be a party to an unrighteous sen- tence. 3 Mauvissiere interceded, but the Queen was the more determined not to be outdone in generosity. Singleton was acquitted ; but on the 3rd of November. - 1 -^ .N ovember, fetubbs and Page were brought from the Tower to a scaffold before the palace at West- minster, and ' their, right hands were struck off with a cleaver driven through the wrist with a beetle.' Page, as the bleeding stump was seared with a hot iron, said proudly, ' I have left there a true Englishman's hand.' Stubbs waved his hat with the hand remaining, cried ' God save Queen Elizabeth,' and fainted from loss of blood. Camden, who was himself present at the scene, saw the surrounding multitude ' altogether silent, either 1 i & 2 Philip and Mary, cap. ii. 8 { Elizabeth, cap. vi. 3 Camden.