Page:History of India Vol 7.djvu/159

 CONTINUED TORTURE OF ENGLISH AT AMBOYNA 121 him come out, having no doublet on, his shirt all wet, his face swollen and his eyes starting out of his head. ,, From February 15th to 23d the cruel process went on. According to the English statements, the prisoners, even while confessing under the torture, declared in the same breath that they were not speaking truth. In the case of Collins, the " fiscal,' ' or prosecutor, forced leading questions upon him, till one of the Dutch them- selves exclaimed: " Do not tell him what he should say, but let him speak for himself.' ' John Wetheral having been four times tied up, they were at length obliged to read out to him the confessions of the other victims until the poor wretch merely " answered yea to all." He " prayed them to tell him what he should say or to write down what they would; he would sub- scribe it." John Clarke stood the ordeal so bravely that " the tormentors reviled him, saying that he was a devil ... or a witch." So they " cut off his hair very short, as supposing he had some witchcraft hidden therein." They then went on with the torture— burn- ing him with candles on the feet, hands, elbows, and " under the armpits until his inwards might evidently be seen." The English declared that no surgeon was allowed to dress the sores " until, his flesh being putre- fied, great maggots dropt and crept from him in most loathsome and noisome manner." Authority for all these statements may be found in the first pamphlet, " A True Relation." According to the English accounts each confession was wrung forth by torture. The Dutch minutes of