efforts having been at length completely triumphant, that he sent Perez to the torture, with a foregone determination of killing him with the sword of justice, as a slanderous traitor, who could not adduce a tittle of proof to support his falsehood. But the wit of Perez was as penetrating as Philip's, and had avoided the snare. Retaining adroitly, in authentic documents, ample materials for his own defence, and the inculpation of the king, Perez fought undauntedly and successfully his battle, on the charge of Escovedo's murder, before the tribunals of Aragon, which were either ignorant of, or indifferent to, the scandals and personal criminalities inseparably mixed up with the case at Madrid. The retributive justice which had overwhelmed Perez in his person and circumstances in Castile, now descended on the reputation of Philip in Aragon, who was likewise not only obliged to hear of the acquittal of his detested foe by the supreme court there, but necessitated, by the tremendous statements promulgated by Perez as his justification, founded on unimpeachable writings in his possession, to drop and relinquish all legal proceedings. The bitterness of the cup of woe, however, it had still been in the power of the fierce despot otherwise to deepen. Infuriated by the flight of Perez, the king caused the wife, then pregnant, and the children of the fugitive, to be arrested and cast into the public prison, dragging them "on the day when it is usual to pardon the very worst of criminals, at the very hour of the procession of the penitents on Holy Thursday, with a reckless disregard of custom and decency, among the crosses and all the corteges of this solemnity, in order that there might be no lack of witnesses for this glorious action." These words we have cited from a famous narrative subsequently published by Perez in England, from which we are also tempted to extract, in relation to the same occurrence, the following passage, full of that energetic eloquence which contributed, among other causes, to win over general commiseration to the writer:--