pointed towards mee that lay under the bed, and shewed me to Panthia.
This is hee, quoth she, which is his Counsellor, and perswadeth him to
forsake me, and now being at the point of death he lieth prostrate on
the ground covered with his bed, and hath seene all our doings, and
hopeth to escape scot-free from my hands, but I will cause that hee
will repente himselfe too late, nay rather forthwith, of his former
intemperate language, and his present curiosity. Which words when I
heard I fell into a cold sweat, and my heart trembled with feare,
insomuch that the bed over me did likewise rattle and shake. Then spake
Panthia unto Meroe and said, Sister let us by and by teare him in
pieces or tye him by the members, and so cut them off. Then Meroe
(being so named because she was a Taverner, and loved wel good wines)
answered, Nay rather let him live, and bury the corpse of this poore
wretch in some hole of the earth; and therewithall shee turned the head
of Socrates on the other side and thrust her sword up to the hilts into
the left part of his necke, and received the bloud that gushed out,
into a pot, that no drop thereof fell beside: which things I saw with
mine own eyes, and as I thinke to the intent that she might alter
nothing that pertained to sacrifice, which she accustomed to make, she
thrust her hand down into the intrals of his body, and searching about,
at length brought forth the heart of my miserable companion Socrates,
who having his throat cut in such sort, yeelded out a dolefull cry, and
gave up the ghost. Then Panthia stopped up the wide wound of his throat
with the Sponge and said, O sponge sprung and made of the sea, beware
that thou not passe by running river. This being said, one of them
moved and turned up my bed, and then they strid over mee, and clapped
their buttocks upon my face, and all bepissed mee until I was wringing
wet. When this was over they went their wayes, and the doores closed
fast, the posts stood in their old places, and the lockes and bolts
were shut againe. But I that lay upon the ground like one without
soule, naked and cold, and wringing wet with pisse, like to one that
were more than half dead, yet reviving my selfe, and appointed as I
thought for the Gallowes, began to say Alasse what shall become of me
to morrow, when my companion shall be found murthered here in the
chamber? To whom shall I seeme to tell any similitude of truth, when as
I shall tell the trueth in deed? They will say, If thou wert unable to
resist the violence of the women, yet shouldest thou have cried for
help; Wouldst thou suffer the man to be slaine before thy face and say
nothing? Or why did they not slay thee likewise? Why did they spare
thee that stood by and saw them commit that horrible fact? Wherefore
although thou hast escaped their hands, yet thou shalt not escape ours.
While I pondered these things with my selfe the night passed on, and so
I resolved to take my horse before day, and goe forward on my journey.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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