At midnight, of the 25th of October, 1578, he was condemned to lose his head, the execution to take place without delay.
The city guards and the infantry under Capres still bivouacked upon the square; the howling storm still continued, but the glare of fagots and torches made the place as light as day.

The ancient advocate, with haggard eyes and features distorted by wrath, walking between the sheriff and a Franciscan monk, advanced through the long lane of halberdiers, in the grand hall of the Town House, and thence emerged upon the scaffold erected before the door.

He shook his fists with rage at the released magistrates, so lately his prisoners, exclaiming that to his misplaced mercy it was owing that his head, instead of their own, was to be placed upon the block.

He bitterly reproached the citizens for their cowardice in shrinking from dealing a blow for their fatherland, and in behalf of one who had so faithfully served them.

The clerk of the court then read the sentence amid a silence so profound that every syllable he uttered, and, every sigh and ejaculation of the victim were distinctly heard in the most remote corner of the square.