Here, too, the hand of the white-washer had been busy, and the cells were now made comfortable rooms for the soldiery. The instruments of torture were all carefully removed from the place of torture, and the room bore no marks of the shocking scenes which had here so often transpired. Here poor Ramé, the Frenchman, had dragged out his long imprisonment, and here William Lamport, the unfortunate Irish victim, prepared himself for death. But Lamport's story is worth giving in full, to illustrate the scenes.
STORY OF WILLIAM LAMPORT.
William Lamport was an Irishman by birth, and must have been a Roman Catholic, or he could not have obtained a license to visit Mexico. He was probably one of that large class of Irish Catholics who emigrated to Spain in order to enjoy their religion more freely than they could at home, under English oppression. It was probably two intercepted letters that cost this Irishman his life. His accusation sets forth that he was the author of two writings, in one of which "things were said against the Holy Office, its erection, style, mode of process, &c., in such a manner that, in the whole of it, not a word was to be found that was not deserving of reprehension, not only as being injurious, but also insulting to our holy Catholic faith." The Prosecuting Attorney (fiscal) says of the other writing "that it contained detestable bitterness of language, and contumelies so filled with poison as to manifest the heretical spirit of the author, and his bitter hatred against the Holy Office." Let his fate be a warning to all traveling letter-writers who are disposed to criticise too severely "the erection and style" of a very awkward-looking building, and