Curiosities of Olden Times
was taken into the public square, where there was a caldron of boiling oil, into which was thrust the arm which had dealt the blow. On the morrow this arm was chopped off, and it fell at his feet. He calmly moved it with his foot, and pushed it before him down from the scaffold. On the third day his breast and the front of his arm were plucked with red-hot pincers; on the following day his back and the back of his arm, and legs, were treated in the same manner. This was continued for eighteen days, and after each torture he was conducted back to prison, he all the while enduring his sufferings with great constancy. The greatest torture of all that he endured, except death, was when he was bound naked in the middle of the square, and around him at a little distance waggon-loads of charcoal were set on fire, and thus he was wrapped in flame. The poor sufferer bore the roasting for a long while, and then at last he lost patience and cried out; whereupon he was removed. For the final torture he was broken on the wheel, but he did not die at once, for they had only broken his legs and arms, so as to make him linger. Thus he lived for six hours, imploring some one to bring him a drop of water, but no one had the courage to give it him. At length the officer was entreated to put an end to this scene, and to strangle him, lest he should die in despair, and so his soul perish. The executioner approached, and when close to him asked how he felt. The tortured man replied, 'As you left me.'
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