please my most merciful Father to lay upon me. But, as God is my witness!"—he seemed to speak with a prophetic denunciation, "from these vile ashes shall a fire-brand come that shall consume and destroy utterly these bloody men and persecutors of God's inheritance!"
So astonished were the bystanders at his audacity, that they did not so much as attempt to stay his tongue or to lay hands upon him, whilst he continued, raising his arm in a threatening attitude—
"Ye killers of the prophets, and destroyers of them whom God hath sent unto you!—Because we reproach you with your evil deeds, and"—
"Blasphemy?" cried out Sir Roger, who was the first to recover his speech: "we will have thy tongue bored for its offence."
"Away with him!" cried the priest, who seemed nothing loath to begin his torments. "Thou shalt to my Lord Derby, and he will know how to deal with such a bitter and foul-mouthed heretic."
All was uproar and confusion. The Justice was even moved from his chair, and swore out lustily that by ten o'clock the day following, unless this blasphemer were delivered at Lathom, he would imprison the whole family of them: such a pestilent fellow being fit, as he said, to infect all the parish with the plague of heresy.
Roger Wrinstone and his crew were preparing to drag him down-stairs; but the Justice, hobbling on his crutch, preceded them, leaning on the arm of his priest. The party, on their entrance into the hall, found Marsh's two kinsmen awaiting the event. They soon found that no favour was intended.
"See to it, knaves," bellowed the knight, "that this fellow is delivered up to my lord at Lathom by to-morrow, or your own carcases shall answer for his."
Then did these poor men pray and beseech their kinsman that he would in some wise conform to the religion of his superiors, or find some way of escape from a cruel and ignominious death.
But Marsh, standing steadfast before them all, cried out with a loud voice—
"Between me and them let God witness!" Looking up to heaven, he exclaimed, as if with a sudden inspiration—"If my cause be just, let this prayer of thine unworthy servant be heard!"
He stamped violently with his foot, and the impression of it, as the general notion is, yet remains, to attest the purity of his cause and the cruelty and injustice of his persecutors.
To this day may be seen the print of a man's foot in the stone, which by many is believed to exist as a memorial of this good confession.
In shape it is much like that of a human foot, except its being rather longer than common. In that part where the sole may have rested is a small dent, as though a man had stamped vehemently on the soft earth, and the weight of his body had borne principally on that place. The impression is of a dark-brown or rather reddish hue, and is very perceptible when damp or moistened by cleaning.
Marsh's subsequent history is soon told. From Lathom, where he was examined before Lord Derby and his council, and found guilty of heretical opinions, he was committed to Lancaster, and from thence to the ecclesiastical court at Chester, where, after several examinations before Dr. Cotes, then bishop of this diocese, he was adjudged to the stake, and burnt in pursuance of his sentence, at the place of public execution near that city, on the 24th April 1555.
FOOTNOTES:
[15] Baines' "Lancashire," p. 540.
[16] Whitaker's "Whalley," p. 424.
[17] "The common net at that time," says Sir Richard Baker, "for catching of Protestants was the real presence; and this net was used to catch the Lady Elizabeth. That princess showed great prudence in concealing her sentiments of religion, in complying with the present modes of worship, and in eluding all questions with regard to a subject so momentous. Being asked at one time, what she thought of the words of Christ, 'This is my Body,'—whether she thought it the true body of Christ that was in the sacrament—it is said that after some pausing she thus answered:—
"'Christ was the Word that spake it,
He took the bread and brake it;
And what the Word did make it,
That I believe, and take it;'
"which, though it may seem but a slight expression, yet hath in it more solidness than at first sight appears; at least, it served her turn at that time to escape the net, which by a direct answer she could not have done."—Baker's Chronicle, p. 320.
[18] Cardinal Pole and others.
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