Charged with plotting a general conflagration of the villages and farmhouses, in conjunction with an invasion by Hierges and other Papist generals, they indignantly protested their innocence; but two of them, a certain Kopp Corneliszoon, and his son, Nanning Koppezoon, were selected to undergo the most cruel torture which had yet been practised in the Netherlands.

Sonoy, to his eternal shame, was disposed to prove that human ingenuity to inflict human misery had not been exhausted in the chambers of the Blood Council, for it was to be shown that Reformers were capable of giving a lesson even to inquisitors in this diabolical science.

Kopp, a man advanced in years, was tortured during a whole day.

On the following morning he was again brought to the rack, but the old man was too weak to endure all the agony which his tormentors had provided for him.

Hardly had he been placed upon the bed of torture than he calmly expired, to the great indignation of the tribunal.