To the worshipful & his very good Friend Master H.S.  
WHereas your worship (at my last being with you) desired me to let you have knowledge of the manner of the end & confessions of BODY and SLADE, two notorious Traitors: I have, according to my promise, sent you the true Discourse thereof: For, I being present thereat (as you know) upon some especial occasions, have set down so near as memory would serve me, the certainty thereof, which you may be bold to declare to your Friends for a very truth: notwithstanding the sundry flying tales rumoured abroad by the Papists, according to their accustomed manner, as their affection serveth them: I have sent you the truth, & nothing but the truth, and thereof you may assuredly persuade yourself. Thus with the continual desire of your welfare, with all yours, I commit you to the heavenly protection.  
From Winchester, by your Friend to use. R. B.   

These Gentlemen and justices of Peace, were present at these Executions.  

M. Robert White, High Sheriff of the Shire.  
S. William Kingsmell, Knight.  
M. john Fisher, justice of Peace.  
M. William Saint-Iohn, justice of peace.  
M. Thomas west, Son to the Lord Delaware.  
M. Francis Cotton, justice of peace.  
M. William Wright, justice of peace.  
M. Benjamin Touchbourne, justice of peace.  
Beside many other Gentlemen of countenance and credit.    

¶ THE EXECUTION AND Confession of john Slade, an obstinate and notorious Traitor, who was drawn hanged, and quartered for high treason against her Majesty, at Winchester, on Wednesday, the thirty. day of Octob. 1583.  
ON wednesday being the 30, of October, john Slade, sometime a Schoolmaster, was drawn upon a Hurdell from the prison in Winchester, to the market place where the execution was appointed: and being come to the aforesaid place, and taken off the Hurdell, he came and kneeled down by the gallows, making a cross with his hand upon one of the posts thereof, and kissed it, using silent Prayers in latin to himself. Afterward, being come upon the ladder, he began in this manner. I am come hither this day to suffer death for my faith, what faith? no rare faith, but even the faith that hath continued from all posterities: Whereupon Sir William Kingsmell Knight, spoke to him, as thus: Slade, do not thus delude the People with plausible speeches, you are come hither to suffer death for high treason against her Majesty, you have been lawfully & sufficiently convicted thereof, & therefore you are brought to endure the punishment that Law hath assigned you. You have denied her majesty to have any supremacy over the Church of Christ in England, both in causes Ecclesiastical and temporal, which fact is high treason: & therefore you are worthy to suffer death, in that you will not give her majesty her duty and your allegiance. Oh Sir William (quoth he) I will give her majesty as much as ever hath been given to any Prince in this Realm, & will show her as much duty, as he that is her most obedient Subject. That do you not (answered Sir William Kingsmell) for you rob her of her Ecclesiastical and temporal government, which all Princes hath enjoyed, and you traitorously take from her: therefore how do you give her as much as any Prince hath had, and how do you show yourself a subject, in this unnatural dealing, to prefer a foreign government, before your own lawful Queen, Sir (said Slade the supremacy hath & doth belong to the Pope by right, even as from Peter, & the Pope hath received it by divine providence: therefore we must not give those things belonging to god, to any other than him alone: and because I will not do otherwise, I may say with the three Children in the fiery Oven, and the first of the Widows seven Sons in the Maccabees. Parati sumus mori, magis quam patrias Dei leges praevaticari. Then M. Robert White (high Sheriff of the Shire) said to him, that he showed himself very undutiful to her Majesty: and therefore willed him to ask her forgiveness: O Master Sheriff (quoth he) you know if Paul and Peter would have obeyed their Princes, they had not suffered death. At these words, M. Doctor Bennet, one of the Chaplains to the right honourable the Lord treasurer, came to him and said: Slade, do not abuse the people thus, with these words: Paul & Peter were put to death for religion, they were commanded not to preach in the name of jesus, are you commanded any such thing? Oh Sir (answered Slade) I would wish you to behave yourself after the manner of a Truant, whose nature is to forget, and so would I have you forget your wicked life, & begin a new. Slade (said M. Bennet) I come as one that wisheth well to thy soul, thou art now at the pits brink, consider how highly thou offendest God, and likewise how thou hast trangressed against her Majesty: I desire thee in the bowels of Christ be not so wilful, lose not that so lightly, which he hath bought with his most precious blood. And if my words may not prevail with thee, yet for the love of thine own soul, forsake this damnable opinion, let not that unworthy Priest be preferred before thine own natural Princess, who is the lawful supreme head of the church, next under Christ. Thou knowest how he hath deprived her of her government by his excommunication, & wilt thou be so wicked as lean to him and forsake her: Sir (answered Slade) you are very busy in words, if the Pope hath done so, I think he hath done no more than he may, and then he ought to do, for I will acknowledge no other head of the church, but only the Pope, and her Majesty hath no authority in temporal causes (likewise) but only what he shall think good to allow her. At these words, the people cried, away with the Traitor, hang him, hung him. Master Sheriff willed him again to ask her Majesty forgiveness. Why should I ask her forgiveness (quoth he) wherein have I offended her? Then M. Bennet desired him to commend his soul to God, and desire the people to pray for him, but he said, they and he were not of one faith, & therefore they should not pray for him, & I desire all blessed people (quoth he) to pray for me, and all the Saints & blessed Company of Heaven. So after he had stayed so long as it pleased himself and had mumbled a many latin prayers silently to himself, he was cast beside the ladder, and afterward was cut down & quartered, according to his judgement.  
Finis.   

❀ ❀ The Execution and Confession, of another Notorious Traitor, named john Body sometime a master of Art in Oxeforde, who was likewise (for high treason against her Majesty) drawn, hang● and quartered at Andover, on Saturday, the. 2. of November. 1583.  
IOhn Body, a Master of Art (sometime in Oxford, & companion to this Slade) was carried from Winchester to Andover, a town ten miles from Winchester, where the Assizes were holden, & where they were condemned. There was he on the Saturday following, drawn on a Hurdell to 〈◊〉 place of execution, and being laid on the Hurdell, he spoke thus. O sweet Bed, the happiest Bed that ever man lay in thou art welcome to me. Then being taken from the Hurdell, he spoke to master Sheriff, as concerning a disputation which had passed between him & Doctor Humphrey, about Constantine th'emperor, & he had written in a sheet of paper certain Articles, in answer to Doctor Humfrey, which he would have read before the people, but because the time was short, he could not read them, but gave them to M. high Sheriff, that Doctor Humphrey might see them▪ When the Hangman put the halter about his neck, he said; Oh blessed Chain, the sweetest: Chain, and richest that ever came about any man's neck, and so kissing it, he suffered the hangman to put it about his neck. There was also present Master Bennet, who laboured very Godly and earnestly to dissuade him from his evil opinion, but all was 〈◊〉 vain, he was so obstinate and wilful. He likewise appealed upon his faith (which he said) was the cause of his death: but S. William Kingsmel, told him, he died for high treason against her Majesty, whereof he had been sufficiently convicted. Indeed (quoth he) I have been sufficiently convicted, for I have been condemned twice, & you may make the hearing of a blessed Mass treason, or the saying of an ave Maria, treason, you may make what you please, treason: but, I have committed no treason, although indeed, I suffer the punishment due to treason. Why (quod M. high Sheriff) you know the Pope hath excommunicated her Majesty, & you forsake her & cleave to him: what say you to this: you deny her, her special authority, and will not acknowledge her for your lawful Queen. Yes (quoth he) in those causes that pertain unto her, I acknowledge her my lawful Sovereign & Queen: but for the special cause, I will abide a thousand deaths before I consent to it: & if the Pope have done well, let him answer it, if he have done ill, let him likewise answer it: I acknowledge her my lawful Queen in all temporal causes, and none other: You shall do well than (said S. William Kingsmell) to satisfy the people in the cause of your death, because (otherwise) they may be deluded by your fair speeches. You shall understand (quoth he) good people all, that I suffer death for not granting her M. to be supreme head of Christ's Church in England, which I may not, and will not grant. Well then, quoth Master Sheriff, ask her majesty forgiveness, & then desire the People to pray for you. In troth quoth he, I must needs ask her Majesty forgiveness, for I have offended her many ways, as in using unlawful games, excess of apparel, and other offences to her laws: but in this matter you shall pardon me. And (for the People) because they & I are different in religion, I will not have them pray for me: But I pray God long to preserve her Majesty in tranquillity over you, even Queen Elizabeth, your Queen and mine, and I desire you to obey none other. At length, saying: jesus, jesus, esto mihi jesu, three times, he was put beside the ladder, and quartered, according to his judgement.  
FINIS.