made them little presents, he pressed them to come and see him, in fine, he gave himself a great deal of trouble for about two months, without gaining a single child. The contempt in which they held his caresses and his invitations, did not dishearten him. He addressed himself to the savages, asked them questions about their faith, and turned into ridicule the sacraments, invocations of saints, purgatory, the cross, the rosary, and other practices of piety, which are observed in the catholic church.

I thought it my duty to oppose the first seeds of seduction. I therefore wrote a respectable letter to the minister, in which I told him that my savages knew how to believe the truths which the Catholic faith taught them, but they did not know how to dispute about them. That as they did not know how to answer the difficulties he had proposed to them, I supposed he wished them to be communicated to me-that I embraced with pleasure the opportunity which he thus gave me of conferring with him, either by word of mouth or letter-that I had sent him a little memorial upon the subject, which I begged him to read with serious attention. This memorial contained about one hundred pages, proving from scripture tradition and theological reasons, the truth of the articles which he had chiefly attacked with his insipid ridicule. In conclusion, I begged that if he was not satisfied with my proofs, that he would send me a close and accurate refutation of them, and not have recourse to vague reasonings which proved nothing, much less to injurious reflections, which neither became our profession, nor the importance of the subject we were treating. Two other letters passed between us of little importance. But the parson returned to Boston; and thus our little controversy ended in frustrating the design he had formed of seducing my Neophytes from their religion.

A missionary cannot fail to be a subject of hatred to these men. They have often tried to take me away from my flock; and more than once set a price upon my head. My Neophytes feeling for the danger to which I am exposed in the village, have often begged me to retire for awhile to Quebec. But what is to become of the flock, if the shepherd deserts it?

Nothing but death shall ever separate me from them. It is in vain to represent to me, that if I fall into their hands, the least that can happen to me, will be, that I shall have to languish out my days in a prison. I always stop their mouths when they speak to me in this way, with the words of the apostle, which the divine goodness has deeply engraven on my heart. 'Be not uneasy,' I say to them, 'about any thing that regards me. I do not fear the threats of those who hate me without my giving them any cause for their hatred.' "Neither do I count my life more precious than myself, so that I may consummate my course, and the ministry of the word which I received from the Lord Jesus." Beg of Him, my dear nephew, to strengthen in me this sentiment, which can come only from his mercy, that I may be able to live and die without ceasing to labour for the salvation of those abandoned souls which he has redeemed with his own blood, and vouchsafed to commit to my care. I am, &c. &c.

October 15, 1722.

To the Editor of the Catholic Miscellany.

SIR,-As in the late perambulation I have occasionally noticed that various tortures were frequently inflicted upon the conscientious Catholic, during the reign of the persecuting Elizabeth I intend to give you in my present communication, a translation of a Diary kept by Mr. Ruston, during the four years of his confinement in the Tower of London. As the simple details of a co-temporary writer, and an eye-witness of some of the facts, must have greater weight and bring conviction home to the breast of the sceptic, much sooner than the more laboured description of any modern. Edward Ruston was a priest, and sent upon the mission in the year 1580. was, however, soon apprehended, and after a long imprisonment, brought to his trial, with Father Campion and others; and like them, he was condemned to die; but his sentence was afterwards commuted, and he was sent into banishment; and retiring to the continent shortly after, caught the plague and

He

died. He enlarged and published the work of Dr. Sanders, entitled De Schismate Anglicano, at the end of which, he added his Diarium.

December 3, 1823.

W. Y.

“An Index, or Diary, of the transactions which occurred in the Tower of London, on account of the Catholic religion, from the year of our Lord, 1580, to the year 1585; noted and collected by one, who was, during the whole of that period, a prisoner.

THE PREFACE.

"Besides those prisons in the City of London which are applied to other purposes, (of which Ludgate is assigned only for the more respectable citizens who are debtors) there are eleven others, which are quite public and very capacious; into which persons of all descriptions, and of every sex and age are at present thrown for confessing the Catholic faith. The names of these prisons are--The Gate-house, Westminsterthe Fleet-Newgate-Bridewell-the two Counters--the King's Bench-the Marshalsea- Vitlionum-the Clink, and the Tower, or Castle. In the last of these, by a singular providence of God, I was detained for more than four years; for no other reason than because I was a Catholic priest. And suffering various vicissitudes of things, times, and afflictions, I at length received the sentence of death, which was, however, commuted into banishment. It appeared to me, that it would not be altogether useless, nor contrary to the honour of God, if I should give a diary of those things which came under my notice while I was confined in that prison. For hence the christian reader having made comparison of this one prison with the other ten of that City, and again, these eleven with all the rest which are in England; and of those four years in which these things happened, with the twenty-seven years in which Elizabeth has reigned: -the christian reader,—will be well enabled to form a conjecture, how great and how much the Catholics have suffered and have still to suffer in that kingdom for the faith. But that the thing may be better understood, it should be known that it is peculiar to the prison which they

call the Tower, above all others, that every prisoner has a separate apartment or dungeon, and a separate keeper, that he may be always kept locked up and debarred the sight and conversation of others, and that every species of communication, either by letters or by messengers, may be prevented. Therefore from this room he is led out to every other place; whether to suffer the punishments which are inflicted at different times upon Catholics, according to the caprice of the persecutors, or to be examined, or put upon the rack. Seven kinds of punishments or tortures are practised in this prison. The first of these is the Pit, or subterraneous cave, twenty feet deep, without light. The second is a cell, or dungeon, so very confined that it will scarcely hold a man in an erect posture; for the little rest which it affords it is called Little Ease. The third is the rack, in which by certain machines and wooden wheels the members of the body are drawn different ways. The fourth, they call the Scavenger's Daughter; a name probably derived from the inventor, it consists of an iron ring which cmopresses the hands and feet, and the head into a circle. The fifth is Iron Gloves, in which the hands are fastened with excruciating pain. The sixth is Manacles, which are worn upon the arms. Finally, the seventh, is Iron Shackles, which are fitted to the feet. These things being known, the rest which follow in the diary will be easily understood. It is further to be noticed, that in this index I have only included those punishments which were inflicted upon Catholics for religion alone, and what came to my own knowledge, confined as I was seperate from the rest. More will be related in due time by others. Again, Christian reader, may this short narration suffice to excite your charity to pray to God for our very afflicted country. Farewell."

OF THE TRANSACTIONS IN THE TOWER OF LONDON.

Anno Domini 1580-June 15th. William Tirwit, a man of great respectability, the son of a Knight, was apprehended, and thrown into prison upon account of the Catholic religion, because it was said he had assisted at mass at the wedding of his sister.

18th. Robert Tirwit, the brother of William, taken up for the same cause, and although in extreme ill health, he was not able, by any intercession, or by offering bail, to prevent being thrown into the Tower, which soon occasioned his death.

19th. There were at this time in the prison, the following eminent Irish Catholics: the Archbishop of Armagh, the Marquis of Kildare and Clanricade, Baron Delvin; also, Nugent and Meve, gentlemen.

Dec. 5. Rodolph Sherwin, Thomas Cottam, Robert Johnson, Luke Kirby, priests, also Nicholas Roscaroc and Henry Orton, gentlemen, were taken to the Tower from other prisons.

10th. Thomas Cottam and Luke Kirby, priests, suffered compression in the Scavenger's Daughter, for one hour and more, the former of whom bled profusely from the nostrils.

15th. Rodolph Sherwin and Robert Jolinson were severely tortured upon the rack.

19th. Rodolph Sherwin was again put upon the rack.

21st. Geogre Peckham, Knight, was conducted to the Tower from another prison.

23rd. Herram Stephens, a layman, was brought to the same place, for the same reason.

29th. John Bosgrove, S. J. and John Hart, priests, with John Pascal, a gentleman, were changed. from other prisons into this.

31st. The same John Hart, after he had been chained five days to the floor, was led to the rack, as was also Henry Orton.

Anno Domini 1581.-Christopher Thompson, an aged priest, was brought into the Tower, and on the same day was racked, and then confined during fourteen days in the Pit.

14th. Nicholas Roscaroc, gentleman, was tortured upon the rack.

15th. John Pascal and Herram Stephens, laymen, impelled by the fear of torture to profess at a public meeting certain heterodox doctrines, and each separately declaring his willingness to join in the religious worship of heretics, were on the next day set at liberty as an inducement to others.