lder is who resists a
burglar."

"You dare speak to me!" exclaimed Ginckle. "You shall share their fate.
Every man of you shall be broken on the wheel."

"General Ginckle," Walter said warmly, "hitherto, the foul excesses of
your troops have brought disgrace upon them, rather than you; but, if
this brutal order is carried out, your name will be held infamous, and
you will stand next only to Cromwell in the curses which Irishmen will
heap upon your memory."

The Dutch general was almost convulsed with passion.

"Take the dogs away," he shouted, "and let the sentence be carried out."

Several English officers were standing near, and these looked at one
another in astonishment and disgust. Two of them hurried away, to fetch
some of the superior officers, and directly these heard of the orders
that had been given, they proceeded to Ginckle's tent.

"Can it be true," General Hamilton said, "that you have ordered some
prisoners to be broken on the wheel?"

"I have given those orders," Ginckle said angrily, "and I will not permit
them to be questioned."

"Pardon me," General Hamilton said firmly; "but they must be questioned.
There is no such punishment as breaking on the wheel known to the English
law, and I and my English comrades protest against such a sentence being
carried out."

"But I will have it so!" Ginckle exclaimed, his face purple with passion.

"Then, sir," General Hamilton said, "I tell you that, in half an hour
from the present time, I will march out from your camp, at the head of my
division of British troops, and will return to Dublin; and, what is more,
I will fight my way out of the camp if any opposition is offered, and
will explain my conduct to the king and the British parliament. Enough
disgrace has already been brought upon all connected with the army, by
the doings of the foreign troops; but when it comes to the death by
torture of prisoners, by the order of their general, it is time that
every British officer should refuse to permit such foul disgrace to rest
upon his name."

There was a chorus of assent from the other English officers, while
Ginckle's foreign officers gathered round him, and it looked for a moment
as if swords would be drawn.

Ginckle saw that he had gone too far, and felt that, not only would this
quarrel, if pushed further, compel him to raise the siege and fall back
upon Dublin, but it would entail upon him the displeasure of the king,
still more certainly that of