Captain Towerson was committed prisoner to his own chamber in the English house, under a guard of Dutch soldiers.  Emanuel Thomson was imprisoned in the castle.  All the rest, namely, John Beaumont, Edward Collins, William Webber, Ephraim Ramsay, Timothy Johnson, John Fardo, and Robert Brown, were distributed among the Dutch ships then in the harbour, and secured in irons.  The same day, the governor sent to the two other factories in the same island, Hitto and Larica, to apprehend the rest of the English residents, who were all brought prisoners to Amboina on the 16th; Samuel Colson, John Clark, and George Sharrock, from the former, and Edward Collins,[2] William Webber,[2] and John Sadler, from the latter.  On the same day, John Pocol, John Wetheral, Thomas Ladbrook, were apprehended at Cambello, and John Beaumont,[2] William Griggs, and Ephraim Ramsay,[316] at Loho; and were all brought in irons to Amboina on the 20th of February.

[Footnote 316:  These four persons are already named, as apprehended at Amboina.—­E.]

On the 15th of February, the governor and fiscal began to examine the prisoners.  John Beaumont and Timothy Johnson were first brought to the castle, John Beaumont being left in a hall under a guard, while Johnson was conducted into another room.  Beaumont soon after heard him cry out very pitifully, then become quiet for a while, and afterwards cried out aloud.  Abel Price, the surgeon, who was first questioned and put to the torture, was brought in to confront and accuse him; but as Johnson refused to confess any thing laid to his charge, Price was soon taken away, and Johnson again put to the question, when Beaumont heard him repeatedly roar under the torture.  At the end of an hour, Johnson was brought out into the hall, weeping and lamenting, all cut and cruelly burnt in many parts of his body, and so laid aside in a corner of the hall, having a soldier to watch him, with strict injunctions not to allow him to speak to any one.

Emanuel Thomson was next brought in for examination, not in the same room where Johnson had been, but in one farther from the hall; yet Beaumont, who still remained in the hall, heard him often roar out most lamentably.  After half an hour spent in torturing him, he was led to another place, but not through the hall where Beaumont was.  Beaumont was then called in for examination, and asked many questions concerning the alleged conspiracy, all knowledge of which he denied with the most solemn oaths.  He was then made fast on purpose to be tortured, having a cloth fastened about his neck, while two men stood ready with jars of water to pour on his head:  But the governor ordered him to be set loose again, saying he would spare him for a day or two, being an old man.