Part 9

Accordingly, while I wholly ignorant of what had passed at Oxford, was in daily expectation of an agreeable answer to my letter, came a party of horse one morning to my father’s gate, and asked for me.

It so fell out that my father was at that time from home, I think in London; whereupon he that commanded the party alighted and came in. My eldest sister, hearing the noise of soldiers, came hastily up into my chamber, and told me there were soldiers below, who inquired for me. I forthwith went down to them, and found the commander was a barber of Thame, and one who had always been my barber till I was a Quaker. His name was Whately, a bold brisk fellow.

I asked him what his business was with me: he told me I must go with him. I demanded to see his warrant: he laid his hand on his sword, and said that was his warrant. I told him though that was not a legal warrant, yet I would not dispute it, but was ready to bear injuries. He told me he could not help it; he was commanded to bring me forthwith before the deputy-lieutenants, and therefore desired me to order a horse to be got ready, because he was in haste. I let him know I had no horse of my own, and would not meddle with any of my father’s horses, in his absence especially; and that therefore, if he would have me with him, he must carry me as he could.

He thereupon taking my sister aside, told her he found I was resolute, and his orders were peremptory; wherefore he desired that she would give order for a horse to be made ready for me, for otherwise he should be forced to mount me behind a trooper, which would be very unsuitable for me, and which he was very unwilling to do. She thereupon ordered a horse to be got ready, upon which, when I had taken leave of my sisters, I mounted, and went off, not knowing whither he intended to carry me.

He had orders, it seems, to take some others also in a neighbouring village, whose names he had, but their houses he did not know. Wherefore, as we rode he asked me if I knew such and such men (whom he named) and where they lived; and when he understood that I knew them, he desired me to show him their houses. “No,” said I, “I scorn to be an informer against my neighbours, to bring them into trouble.” He thereupon, riding to and fro, found by inquiry most of their houses; but, as it happened, found none of them at home, at which I was glad.

At length he brought me to the house of one called Esquire Clark, of Weston, by Thame, who, being afterwards knighted, was called Sir John Clark; a jolly man, too much addicted to drinking in soberer times, but was now grown more licentious that way, as the times did now more favour debauchery. He and I had known one another for some years, though not very intimately, having met sometimes at the Lord Wenman’s table.

This Clark was one of the deputy-lieutenants whom I was to be brought before; and he had gotten another thither to join with him in tendering me the oaths, whom I knew only by name and character; he was called Esquire Knowls, of Grays, by Henley, and reputed a man of better morals than the other.

I was brought into the hall, and kept there; and as Quakers were not so common then as they now are (and indeed even yet, the more is the pity, they are not common in that part of the country), I was made a spectacle and gazing-stock to the family, and by divers I was diversely set upon. Some spake to me courteously, with appearance of compassion; others ruggedly, with evident tokens of wrath and scorn. But though I gave them the hearing of what they said, which I could not well avoid, yet I said little to them; but keeping my mind as well retired as I could, I breathed to the Lord for help and strength from Him, to bear me up and carry me through this trial, that I might not sink under it, or be prevailed on by any means, fair or foul, to do anything that might dishonour or displease my God.

At length came forth the justices themselves (for so they were, as well as lieutenants), and after they had saluted me, they discoursed with me pretty familiarly; and though Clark would sometimes be a little jocular and waggish (which was somewhat natural to him), yet Knowls treated me very civilly, not seeming to take any offence at my not standing bare before him.

And when a young priest, who as I understood was chaplain in the family, took upon him pragmatically to reprove me for standing with my hat on before the magistrates, and snatched my hat from off my head, Knowls, in a pleasant manner, corrected him, telling him that he mistook himself in taking a cap for a hat (for mine was a montero-cap), and bade him give it me again; which he (though unwillingly) doing, I forthwith put it on my head again, and thenceforward none meddled with me about it.

Then they began to examine me, putting divers questions to me relating to the present disturbances in the nation, occasioned by the late foolish insurrection of those frantic fifth-monarchy men. To all which I readily answered, according to the simplicity of my heart and innocency of my hands, for I had neither done nor thought any evil against the government.

But they endeavoured to affright me with threats of danger, telling me (with inuendoes) that for all my pretence of innocency there was high matter against me, which, if I would stand out, would be brought forth, and that under my own hand. I knew not what they meant by this; but I knew my innocency, and kept to it.

At length, when they saw I regarded not their threats in general, they asked me if I knew one Thomas Loe, and had written of late to him. I then remembered my letter, which till then I had not thought of, and thereupon frankly told them that I did both know Thomas Loe and had lately written to him; but that as I knew I had written no hurt, so I did not fear any danger from that letter. They shook their heads, and said, “It was dangerous to write letters to appoint meetings in such troublesome times.”

They added, that by appointing a meeting, and endeavouring to gather a concourse of people together, in such a juncture especially as this was, I had rendered myself a dangerous person. And therefore they could do no less than tender me the oaths of allegiance and supremacy, which therefore they required me to take.

I told them if I could take any oath at all, I would take the oath of allegiance, for I owed allegiance to the King; but I durst not take any oath, because my Lord and Master Jesus Christ had commanded me not to swear at all; and if I brake His command I should thereby both dishonour and displease Him.

Hereupon they undertook to reason with me, and used many words to persuade me that that command of Christ related only to common and profane swearing, not to swearing before a magistrate. I heard them, and saw the weakness of their arguing, but did not return them any answer; for I found my present business was not to dispute, but to suffer; and that it was not safe for me, in this my weak and childish state especially, to enter into reasonings with sharp, quick, witty, and learned men, lest I might thereby hurt both the cause of truth, which I was to bear witness to, and myself; therefore I chose rather to be a fool, and let them triumph over me, than by my weakness give them advantage to triumph over the truth. And my spirit being closely exercised in a deep travail towards the Lord, I earnestly begged of Him that He would be pleased to keep me faithful to the testimony He had committed to me, and not suffer me to be taken in any of the snares which the enemy laid for me. And, blessed be His holy name, He heard my cries, and preserved me out of them.

When the justices saw they could not bow me to their wills, they told me they must send me to prison. I told them I was contented to suffer whatsoever the Lord should suffer them to inflict upon me. Whereupon they withdrew into the parlour, to consult together what to do with me, leaving me meanwhile to be gazed on in the hall.

After a pretty long stay they came forth to me again with a great show of kindness, telling me they were very unwilling to send me to gaol, but would be as favourable to me as possibly they could, and that if I would take the oaths, they would pass by all the other matter which they had against me. I told them I knew they could not justly have anything against me, for I had neither done nor intended anything against the government, or against them. And as to the oaths, I assured them that my refusing them was merely matter of conscience to me, and that I durst not take any oath whatsoever, if it were to save my life.

When they heard this they left me again, and went and signed a mittimus to send me to prison at Oxford, and charged one of the troopers that brought me thither, who was one of the newly-raised militia troop, to convey me safe to Oxford. But before we departed they called the trooper aside, and gave him private instructions what he should do with me, which I knew nothing of till I came thither, but expected I should go directly to the castle.

It was almost dark when we took horse, and we had about nine or ten miles to ride, the weather thick and cold (for it was about the beginning of the twelfth month), and I had no boots, being snatched away from home on a sudden, which made me not care to ride very fast. And my guard, who was a tradesman in Thame, having confidence in me that I would not give him the slip, jogged on without heeding how I followed him.

When I was gone about a mile on the way I overtook my father’s man, who, without my knowledge, had followed me at a distance to Weston, and waited there abroad in the stables till he understood by some of the servants that I was to go to Oxford; and then ran before, resolving not to leave me till he saw what they would do with me.

I would have had him return home, but he desired me not to send him back, but let him run on until I came to Oxford. I considered that it was a token of the fellow’s affectionate kindness to me, and that possibly I might send my horse home by him; and thereupon stopping my horse I bid him, if he would go on, get up behind me. He modestly refused, telling me he could run as fast as I rode. But when I told him if he would not ride he should not go forward, he, rather than leave me, leaped up behind me, and on we went.

But he was not willing I should have gone at all. He had a great cudgel in his hand, and a strong arm to use it; and being a stout fellow, he had a great mind to fight the trooper, and rescue me. Wherefore he desired me to turn my horse and ride off, and if the trooper offered to pursue, leave him to deal with him.

I checked him sharply for that, and charged him to be quiet, and not think hardly of the poor trooper, who could do no other nor less than he did; and who, though he had an ill journey in going with me, carried himself civilly to me. I told him also that I had no need to fly, for I had done nothing that would bring guilt or fear upon me, neither did I go with an ill-will; and this quieted the man. So on we went, but were so far cast behind the trooper, that we had lost both sight and hearing of him, and I was fain to mend my pace to get up to him again.

We came pretty late into Oxford on the seventh day of the week, which was the market day; and, contrary to my expectation (which was to have been carried to the castle), my trooper stopped in the High Street, and calling at a shop asked for the master of the house, who coming to the door, he delivered to him the mittimus, and with it a letter from the deputy-lieutenants (or one of them), which when he had read he asked where the prisoner was. Whereupon the soldier pointing to me, he desired me to alight and come in, which when I did he received me civilly.

The trooper, being discharged of his prisoner, marched back, and my father’s man, seeing me settled in better quarters than he expected, mounted my horse and went off with him.

I did not presently understand the quality of my keeper, but I found him a genteel courteous man, by trade a linen-draper; and, as I afterwards understood, he was City Marshal, had a command in the county troop, and was a person of good repute in the place; his name was—Galloway.

Whether I was committed to him out of regard to my father, that I might not be thrust into a common gaol, or out of a politic design to keep me from the conversation of my friends, in hopes that I might be drawn to abandon this profession, which I had but lately taken up, I do not know. But this I know, that though I wanted no civil treatment nor kind accommodations where I was, yet after once I understood that many Friends were prisoners in the castle, and amongst the rest Thomas Loe, I had much rather have been among them there, with all the inconveniences they underwent, than where I was with the best entertainment. But this was my present lot, and therefore with this I endeavoured to be content.