No one could blame King James for putting Monmouth to death. He had been guilty of high treason in taking up arms against the government, and had justly forfeited his life. But nothing could excuse the barbarous cruelty exercised toward his followers, almost all of whom were simple country people, who had been influenced chiefly by personal attachment to the duke. In Somersetshire alone two hundred and thirty persons were put to death. Their bodies hung in chains, or their heads and mangled corpses, hoisted upon poles, poisoned the air of every market-place and village-green in the County. One poor half idiot, who had been long supported by charity, was treated in this way. And two aged women, one in Hampshire and one in London, were sentenced to be burned alive, merely for sheltering and assisting with food and money some of the wretched fugitives. Both were persons of the best character, noted for their piety and their active benevolence. By the urgent intercession of certain of the king's own party, the sentence of Alice Lisle was changed from burning to beheading, but Elizabeth Gaunt perished in the flames, meeting her death with a patience and courage worthy of an ancient Christian martyr. At the time when my story commences, Master David Evans lived near a little hamlet called Holford, about nine or ten miles from Bridgewater. He was a yeoman, that is to say, he farmed his own land, which had belonged to his family for several generations. Master Evans had received more education than most of his neighbors, even those of higher rank than himself, and possessed what in that time and place was esteemed quite a library, that is to say, he had besides his great Bible and Prayer-book, "The Whole Duty of Man," Foxe's "Martyrs," and a couple of odd volumes of Hackluyt's "Voyages." He was not rich, for his land was none of the best, and scientific farming was unknown in those days. But he had always enough and to spare, and no poor person applying to him for help was sent empty away. His principal profits were derived from his orchards and cider presses, for which then as now Somersetshire was famous, and from the horses he raised for the London market. His elder son had been apprenticed to a shipwright in Bristol, and was now in business for himself. The younger was captain of a fine vessel sailing from the same port, while his wife Magdalen lived with her father-in-law, kept his house, and attended to the dairy and poultry yard.