. The punishment was
to take place in the great square, and the troops were out, and a large
concourse of people were assembled. She appeared on the raised platform
upon which she was to suffer, in a genteel undress, which contributed
still more to heighten her extreme beauty. The sweetness of her
countenance obtained for her the commiseration of those who were ordered
and accustomed to execute the will of the despotic and cruel emperor.
Young, lively, and admired, sought for, and caressed by everybody, high
in rank, and rich in worldly wealth, she stood, no longer surrounded by
the attentions and homage due to her talents, her beauty, and her wit,
but surrounded only by stern executioners. She looked at them with
astonishment, seeming to doubt if such preparations could be intended
for her. One of the executioners then pulled off a kind of furred tippet
which covered her bosom; her modesty taking the alarm, made her start
back a few steps; she turned pale and burst into tears. Her clothes were
soon afterwards all stripped off, and in a few moments she was all naked
to the waist, exposed to the looks of a vast multitude, who were all
profoundly silent. One of the executioners then seized her by both
hands, and turning half round, threw her on his back, bending forwards,
so as to raise her feet a few inches from the ground, and the other
executioner, with his rough hands, and without symptoms of remorse,
adjusted her on the back of his companion, in a posture most convenient
for her to receive her punishment. Sometimes he pressed his large hands
brutally upon her head, in order to make her keep it down: at others,
like a butcher handling a lamb, he appeared to soothe her until he had
fixed her in a favourable attitude. He then took the knout, a whip made
of a long strip of leather, prepared for the purpose; he retreated a
few steps, measuring the requisite distance with a steady eye, and
looking backwards, gave a stroke with the end of the whip, so as to
carry away a slip of skin from the neck to the bottom of the back; then
striking his feet against the ground, he took his aim for a second blow,
parallel to the former, so that in a few moments all the skin of her
back was cut away in small slips, most of which remained hanging to her
shift and dress below. I fainted with horror long before the punishment
was over. "Good heavens!" thought I, "I have suffered the bastinado and
the bowstring, but both were merciful compared