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Show Look about him should be treated so. "What's his crime?" the tender voice pierced the a 1 r "He's a Presbyterian," whispered the mother. "It's the book he wrote," snapped someone nearby. As Alexander Leighton's shirt was ripped from his back, the most burly of the guards freed himself from the strictures of his uniform coat and picked up the handle of a crude, leather, knotted, switch. In an instant the raised weapon slashed the air and met the exposed back of heighten, leaving a bloody stripe. Again and again the strap came down, cutting and ripping open the vulnerable flesh. "Spare me thy kind of freedom!" heckled, a watery-eyed fragment of humanity. Leighton clenched his teeth tightly, wincing under the pain of the blows. Perspiration rolled off his brow. There was a twisted agony on his face as he forced out the words, "The Bishops are men of blood...bunchy popish flesh...the trumpery of Anti-Christ." It had been Bishop Laud who had testified for two hours against Leighton in the court of Star Chamber, thus bringing about his sentence. The lash resounded louder and cut more deeply. "That'll teach ya to speak against God's |
