thence down into a vault, where was the torture-chamber, wherein were no
windows, so that those without might not hear the cries of the tormented.
Two torches were already burning there when I went in, and although _Dom.
Consul_ would at first have sent me away, after a while he had pity upon
me, so that he suffered me to stay.

And now that hell-hound the constable stepped forward, and first showed my
poor child the ladder, saying with savage glee, "See here! first of all
thou wilt be laid on that, and thy hands and feet will be tied. Next, the
thumb-screw here will be put upon thee, which straightway will make the
blood to spirt out at the tips of thy fingers; thou mayest see that they
are still red with the blood of old Gussy Biehlke, who was burnt last
year, and who, like thee, would not confess at first. If thou still wilt
not confess, I shall next put these Spanish boots on thee, and should they
be too large, I shall just drive in a wedge, so that the calf, which is
now at the back of thy leg, will be driven to the front, and the blood
will shoot out of thy feet, as when thou squeezest blackberries in a bag.

"Again, if thou wilt not yet confess--holla!" shouted he, and kicked open
a door behind him, so that the whole vault shook, and my poor child fell
upon her knees for fright. Before long two women brought in a bubbling
caldron, full of boiling pitch and brimstone. This caldron the hell-hound
ordered them to set down on the ground, and drew forth, from under the red
cloak he wore, a goose's wing, wherefrom he plucked five or six quills,
which he dipped into the boiling brimstone. After he had held them a while
in the caldron he threw them upon the earth, where they twisted about and
spirted the brimstone on all sides. And then he called to my poor child
again, "See! these quills I shall throw upon thy white loins, and the
burning brimstone will presently eat into thy flesh down to the very
bones, so that thou wilt thereby have a foretaste of the joys which await