e had been noised all over Europe. He had
been sentenced to have his ears cut off for some religious
offence, when the Judge was taken ill in the court itself, and,
the infection travelling with marvellous rapidity, the greater
part both of the bench and of the jury were stricken down with
gaol fever, and two judges, twelve justices, and other high
officials, almost the whole jury, and many others, died within
the space of two days.[7]

In mentioning Jenks's new troubles Hartley probably did not
realize the extent of the danger to the whole party which they
portended. Persons had in fact employed the very servant who had
now turned traitor, to bind a number of books for him at his
house near Bridewell Church, London, which with all its contents
was thus in a perilous condition. Early next morning an express
messenger was sent in to town with orders to hide or destroy
Persons' papers and other effects. It was already too late: that
very night the house had been searched, and Persons' letters,
books, vestments, rosaries, pictures, and other pious objects,
had all fallen into the hands of the pursuivants. Worse still,
Father Alexander Briant, afterwards a martyr, and one of the
brightest and most lovable of the missionaries, was seized next
door, and hurried off first to the Counter, then to the Tower,
where he was repeatedly and most cruelly racked to make him say
where Persons might be found.

Information about his torture was brought to the Jesuits at
Stonor, and one can easily see how grave and disturbing such
bad news must have been. "For almost the whole of one night,"
says Persons, "Campion and I sat up talking of what we had
better do, if we should fall into their hands. A fate which
befell him soon after."

The Registers of the Privy Council inform us that their Lordships
gave orders to have Jenks sent up to London on the 28th of April.
This settles approximately the date of the beginning of the
printing at Stonor, and the book was not finished till nearly the
end of June. So the work lasted about nine weeks, a fairly long
period when we consider the smallness of the Latin book, here
reproduced. It will, however, be shown from intrinsic evidence,
that the stock of type was very small. The printers had to set up
a few pages at a time, to correct them at once, and to print off,
before they could go any further. Then they distributed the type
and began again. When all was finished they rapidly stabbed and
boun