where the Dutch and English had their factories. They were subjected to a most rigorous imprisonment and to very severe treatment, being stripped to their waists with their hands tied behind their backs, and their feet fastened to some small cannon. The Spanish and Japanese Christians in Nangasaqui were greatly grieved when they heard of the imprisonment of the religious; and made plans to rescue them, which came to nothing. The Dutch were desirous of giving their prisoners to the emperor, for they wished, as he did, to root out Christianity from Japon, and at the same time to bring to an end all commerce between the Japanese and the Spaniards, hoping in this way to have the commerce to themselves, and caring nothing for the loss of all these souls.] CHAPTER XIX The many efforts made for the rescue of the prisoners without any good results, and rather to their cost; the martyrdom of the prisoners. [Several of the fathers who were in Japon made efforts to rescue the prisoners. At one time father Fray Pedro de Zuñiga and the two Spaniards were slipped past the guard, but were soon caught again and driven back. When the Japanese sent to ask if they were religious, father Fray Luis sent an answer complaining of the Dutch for plundering the ship and taking him prisoner, and alleging that they were rebels and pirates. The Dutch, in anger, determined to force the father by torture to confess that he was a religious. They bound his body and let water drip upon a cloth over his face until he lost consciousness. The prisoners were afterward actually rescued from prison, but were soon caught again and were beaten. It may be asked how priests were justified in concealing the fact that they were priests. To this it may be answered, as St. Thomas says (22, sec. 3, art 2), that the priesthood is a free state, which may be assumed by anyone who desires; and when they were asked if they were priests or not, they had a right to conceal it, or to deny it in some good sense true according to their own meaning, without following the meaning of him who asked the question--which they were not bound to follow, because the question was unjust. In making this denial they did not deny that they were Christians. Indeed, they expressly confessed that; they denied only that they were fathers, as they were not in the natural sense. This declaration did not scandalize or injure the Japanese Christians. They were satisfied that it was not a lie, but a prudent and lawful artifice. As there is a time to be silent, there is also a time to speak, and as the evidence against father Fray Zuñiga became so strong that the truth could not be denied except to his own discredit, he confessed in December, 1621. Father Fray Pedro was then handed over to the Japanese to be put in prison; and father Fray Luis, seeing that nothing would be gained by further concealment, confessed to the king of Firando that he was a religious of the Order of St. Dominic. The