During this trying
scene, his enemies eagerly watched his demeanour. Twice, if we may believe
report, he was heard to sigh, and his eyes occasionally wandered along
the cornice of the hall. But he stood before them cool and collected; no
symptom of perturbation marked his countenance, no expression of complaint
or impatience escaped his lips; he showed himself superior to insult, and
unscarred at the menaces of death.
The same high tone of feeling supported the unfortunate victim to the last
gasp. When the ministers admonished[a] him that his punishment in
this world was but a shadow of that which awaited him in the next, he
indignantly replied, that he gloried in his fate, and only lamented that he
had not limbs sufficient to furnish every city in Christendom with proofs
of his loyalty. On the scaffold, he maintained the uprightness of his
conduct, praised the character of the present king, and appealed from the
censures of the kirk to the justice of Heaven. As a last disgrace, the
executioner hung round his neck his late declaration, with the history of
his former exploits. He smiled at the malice of his enemies, and said that
they had given. him a more brilliant decoration than the garter with which
he had been honoured by his sovereign.
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