"Assembling by sound of horn at Littleport, they sacked some of the houses of the most prosperous, levied contributions on others, and then marched on Ely in formidable force, armed with guns, pistols, scythes, etc., and under cover of a waggon, on which they had mounted four punt-guns. These formidable weapons, used for wild-fowl shooting, with barrels eight feet long, whose charge was no less than a pound of gunpowder, projected over the front of the vehicle to clear the way if needful. But though the leading inhabitants of Ely had hastily armed themselves, and been sworn in as special constables they were not prepared to face this artillery, and the town passed without resistance into the power of the mob, who repeated their Littleport doings on a larger scale, though with little bodily hurt to anyone. Unhappily the mob soon got out of hand, and the movement rapidly degenerated into a mere drunken riot, the chief sufferers in which were, as usual, those who had done most for the relief of the poor--the local shopkeepers, who had aided them by credit, and the local clergy, who had organised soup-kitchens for them. "At the first approach of the military force sent for to suppress them, the rioters retreated in good order, still under cover of their armed waggon, to Littleport, where, however, only a handful made any sort of stand when the soldiers actually arrived."[235] The rest dispersed in panic, and not a blow was struck in defence of those, some eighty in number, who were selected to be made an example of. A special commission was held for the trial of these unhappy men. "In spite of strong testimony to character, five were hanged, and five more transported for life, the rest undergoing various terms of imprisonment; all to the accompaniment of ecclesiastical rejoicings, the Bishop entering the cathedral in solemn procession, to the strains of the triumphal anthem, "Why do the heathen rage?", with his Sword of State borne before him (by his butler!), and escorted by fifty of the principal inhabitants, carrying white wands. No fewer than three hundred of these wand-bearers guarded the execution of the five rioters; yet the sympathy for them was so strong that the bishop could not get a cart to carry them to the gallows under five guineas for the trip." [Footnote 235: From my _History of Cambridgeshire_.] Such was the last serious exercise of the Bishop's long-descended secular jurisdiction over the Isle. From the Girvian Princes to the Abbesses of Ely, from the Abbesses to the Abbots, from the Abbots to the Bishops that Palatinate jurisdiction had been handed on for twelve hundred years;--and this was its sordid close. It died none too soon.