"Next morning--for morning comes even to such wretches as my companion and me--we were dragged to the hall of justice. The king did not preside as we had expected. But cruel judges, male and female, headed by his Lordship P'haya Promè P'hatt and her Ladyship Khoon Thow App. Not knowing what charge to make, they read the copy of my letter over and over again, hoping to guess the name of the gentleman to whom it was sent. Failing to do this, they subjected Boon to a series of cross-questionings, but succeeded only in eliciting the one uniform reply, 'What can a poor slave know, my lords?' "Her feet were then bastinadoed till the soles were raw and bleeding. She still said, 'My lords, be pitiful. What can a poor slave know?' "After a little while, Khoon Thow App begged Boon to confess all and save herself from further suffering. Boon remained persistently silent, and the lash was applied to her bare back till it was ribbed in long gashes, but she confessed not a word. At last the torture was applied to her thumbs until the cold sweat stood in great drops on her contorted and agonized brow; but no word, no cry for mercy, no sound of confession, escaped her lips. It was terrible to witness the power of endurance that sustained this woman. The judges and executioners, both male and female, exhausted their ingenuity in the vain attempt to make her betray the name of the man to whom she had carried the letter; and finally, when the lengthening shadows proclaimed the close of day, they departed, leaving me with poor Boon bleeding and almost senseless, to be carried back by the attending Amazons to our cell. "I tried to comfort poor Boon. She hardly needed comfort; her joy that she had not betrayed her husband was even greater than her sufferings. "Another day dawned upon us. Boon was borne in a litter, and I crept trembling by her side, to the same hall of justice. Boon was subjected once more to the lash, the bastinado, and the thumb-screws, till she fell all but lifeless on the ground. It was all in vain; that woman possessed the heart of a lion; if they had torn her to pieces, she would not by the faintest sound have betrayed the only man she had loved in her sad life.