Ch. 6: The Holy Fehm - Page 2

addressed.

"Am I right in supposing you to be Wilhelm, lately of Schonburg, but now of Frankfort?"

"You are right."

"May I ask if you are a member of the Fehmgerichte?"

"I am not. I never heard of it until this afternoon."

"Who was then your informant regarding the order?"

"I refuse to answer."

The examiner inclined his head gracefully as if, while regretting the decision of the witness, he nevertheless bowed to it.

"Do you acknowledge his lordship the Archbishop of Mayence as your over lord?"

"Most assuredly."

"Have you ever been guilty of an act of rebellion or insubordination against his lordship?"

"My over-lord, the Archbishop of Mayence, has never preferred a request to me which I have refused."

"Pardon me, I fear I have not stated my proposition with sufficient clearness, and so you may have misunderstood the question. I had in my mind a specific act, and so will enter into further detail. Is it true that in the Wahlzimmer you entered the presence of your over-lord with a drawn sword in your hand, commanding a body of armed men lately outlaws of the Empire, thus intimidating your over-lord in the just exercise of his privileges and rights as an Elector?"

"My understanding of the Feudal law," said Wilhelm, "is that the commands of an over-lord are to be obeyed only in so far as they do not run counter to orders from a still higher authority."

"Your exposition of the law is admirable, and its interpretation stands exactly as you have stated it. Are we to understand then that you were obeying the orders of some person in authority who is empowered to exercise a jurisdiction over his lordship the Archbishop, similar to that which the latter in his turn claims over you?"

"That is precisely what I was about to state."

"Whose wishes were you therefore carrying out?

"Those of his Majesty the Emperor."

The examiner bowed with the utmost deference when the august name was mentioned.

"I have to thank you in the name of the Court," he went on, "for your prompt and comprehensive replies, which have thus so speedily enabled us to come to a just and honourable verdict, and it gives me pleasure to inform you that the defence you have made is one that cannot be gainsaid, and, therefore, with the exception of one slight formality, there is nothing more for us to do but to set you at liberty and ask pardon for the constraint we regret having put upon you, and further to request that you take oath that neither to wife nor child, father nor mother, sister nor brother, fire nor wind, will you reveal anything that has happened to you; that you will conceal it from all that the