o be embowelled: Babington looked on with an undaunted
countenance, steadily gazing on that variety of tortures which he
himself was in a moment to pass through; the others averted their faces,
fervently praying. When the executioner began his tremendous office on
Babington, the spirit of this haughty and heroic man cried out amidst
the agony, _Parce mihi, Domine Jesu!_ Spare me, Lord Jesus! There were
two days of execution; it was on the first that the noblest of these
youths suffered; and the pity which such criminals had excited among the
spectators evidently weakened the sense of their political crime; the
solemnity, not the barbarity, of the punishment affects the populace
with right feelings. Elizabeth, an enlightened politician, commanded
that on the second day the odious part of the sentence against traitors
should not commence till after their death.

One of these _generosi adolescentuli_, youths of generous blood, was
CHIDIOCK TITCHBOURNE, of Southampton, the more intimate friend of
Babington. He had refused to connect himself with the assassination of
Elizabeth, but his reluctant consent was inferred from his silence. His
address to the populace breathes all the carelessness of life, in one
who knew all its value. Proud of his ancient descent from a family which
had existed before the Conquest till now without a stain, he paints the
thoughtless happiness of his days with his beloved friend, when any
object rather than matters of state engaged their pursuits; the hours of
misery were only first known the day he entered into the conspiracy. How
feelingly he passes into the domestic scene, amidst his wife, his child,
and his sisters! and even his servants! Well might he cry, more in
tenderness than in reproach, "Friendship hath brought me to this!"

"Countrymen, and my dear friends, you expect I should speak
something; I am a bad orator, and my text is worse: It were in
vain to enter into the discourse of the whole matter for which
I am brought hither, for that it hath been revealed heretofore;
let me be a warning to all young gentlemen, especially
_generosis adolescentulis_. I had a friend, a dear friend, of
whom I made no small account, _whose friendship hath brought me
to this_; he told me the whole matter, I cannot deny, as they
had laid it down to be done; but I always thought it impious,
and denied to be a dealer in it; but the regard of my friend
cau