[Bor (viii. 628) conscientiously furnishes diagrams of the machinery by aid of which this devilish cruelty was inflicted.  The rats were sent by the Governor himself.—­Vide Letter of the Commissioners to Sonoy, apud Bor, viii. 640, 641.  The whole letter is a wonderful monument of barbarity.  The incredible tortures to which the poor creatures had been subjected are detailed in a business-like manner, as though the transactions were quite regular and laudable, The Commissioners conclude with pious wishes for the Governor’s welfare:  “Noble, wise, virtuous, and very discreet sir,” they say, “we have wished to apprise you of the foregoing, and we now pray that God Almighty may spare you in a happy, healthy and long-continued government”—­It will be seen, however, that the wise, virtuous, and very discreet Governor, who thus caused his fellow- citizens bowels to be gnawed by rats, was not allowed to remain much longer in his “happy and healthy government”]

The holes thus torn in his bleeding flesh were filled with red-hot coals.  He was afterwards subjected to other tortures too foul to relate; nor was it till he had endured all this agony, with a fortitude which seemed supernatural, that he was at last discovered to be human.  Scorched; bitten, dislocated in every joint, sleepless, starving, perishing with thirst, he was at last crushed into a false confession, by a promise of absolute forgiveness.  He admitted everything which was brought to his charge, confessing a catalogue of contemplated burnings and beacon firings of which he had never dreamed, and avowing himself in league with other desperate Papists, still more dangerous than himself.

Notwithstanding the promises of pardon, Nanning was then condemned to death.  The sentence ordained that his heart should be torn from his living bosom, and thrown in his face, after which his head was to be taken off and exposed on the church steeple of his native village.  His body was then to be cut in four, and a quarter fastened upon different towers of the city of Alkmaar, for it was that city, recently so famous for its heroic resistance to the Spanish army, which was now sullied by all this cold-blooded atrocity.  When led to execution, the victim recanted indignantly the confessions forced from him by weakness of body, and exonerated the persons whom he had falsely accused.  A certain clergyman, named Jurian Epeszoon, endeavored by loud praying to drown his voice, that the people might not rise with indignation, and the dying prisoner with his last breath solemnly summoned this unworthy pastor of Christ Jo meet him within three days before the judgment-seat of God.  It is a remarkable and authentic fact, that the clergyman thus summoned, went home pensively from the place of execution, sickened immediately and died upon the appointed day.