When the court resumed, Bradshaw announced to him the refusal of his request, and proceeded to animadvert in harsh and unfeeling language on the principal events of his reign.  The meek spirit of the prisoner was roused; he made an attempt to speak, but was immediately silenced with the remark, that the time for his defence was past; that he had spurned the numerous opportunities offered to him by the indulgence of the court; and that nothing remained for his judges but to pronounce sentence; for they had learned from holy writ that “to acquit the guilty was of equal abomination as to condemn the innocent.”  The charge was again read, and was followed by the judgment, “that the court, being satisfied in conscience that he, the said Charles Stuart, was guilty of the crimes of which he had been accused, did adjudge him as a tyrant, traitor, murderer, and public enemy to the good people of the nation, to be put to death by severing his head from his body.”  The king heard it in silence, sometimes smiling with contempt, sometimes raising his eyes to heaven, as if he appealed from the malice of men to the justice of the Almighty.  At the conclusion the commissioners rose in a body to testify their assent, and Charles made a last and more earnest effort to speak; but Bradshaw ordered him to be removed, and the guards hurried him out of the hall.[1]

[Footnote 1:  See the Trial of Charles Stuart, with additions by Nalson, folio, London, 1735.]

During this trial a strong military force had been kept under arms to suppress any demonstration of popular feeling in favour of the king.  On the first day, when the name of Fairfax, as one of the commissioners, was called, a female voice cried from the gallery, “He has more wit than to be here.”  On another occasion, when Bradshaw attributed the charge against the king to the consentient voice of the people of England, the same female voice exclaimed, “No, not one-tenth of the people.”  A faint murmur of approbation followed, but was instantly suppressed by the military.  The speaker was recognised to be Lady Fairfax, the wife of the commander-in-chief; and these affronts, probably on that account, were suffered to pass unnoticed.[1]

When Coke, the solicitor-general, opened the pleadings, the king gently tapped him on the shoulder with his cane, crying, “Hold, hold.”  At the same moment the silver head of the cane fell off, and rolled on the floor.  It was an accident which might have happened at any time; but in this superstitions age it could not fail to be taken for an omen.  Both his friends and enemies interpreted it as a presage of his approaching decapitation.[2]

On one day, as the king entered the court, he heard behind him the cry of “Justice, justice;” on another, as he passed between two lines of soldiers, the word “execution” was repeatedly sounded in his ears.  He bore these affronts with patience, and on

[Footnote 1:  Nalson’s Trial.  Clarendon, iii. 254.  State Trials, 366, 367, 368, folio, 1730.]