The Story of Prague
bable that the Austrian policy would be a lenient one. But sterner councils soon prevailed at Vienna. In February Slik, Budova, Divis Cernin, Kaplir, as well as Jessenius, the rector of the University, and some of the leading townsmen, were arrested. There was no pretence of conducting the trial according to the ancient legal institutions of the country, which granted great privileges to nobles. A special tribunal was constituted, and its members were instructed to judge with the greatest severity.
The judges arrived from Vienna on March 13, 1621, and the court sat for the first time at the Hradcany Castle on the 15th of that month. The judges did not fail to act according to their instructions. Their decision, which Ferdinand confirmed on May 23, the anniversary of the defenestration, pronounced the confiscation of the estates of all the accused. There were twenty-seven death sentences; of the condemned men twenty-four were to be decapitated, three hanged. In some cases torture was added to the death penalty. Thus Divis Cernin, captain of the Hradcany Castle, who had opened the gates of that castle to the Protestants, Count Slik, Bohuslav Michalovic and others were to have a hand cut off before execution, while the tongue of Jessenius, rector of the Prague University, whom the Bohemians had employed in their negotiations with Transsylvania, and whose eloquence the Imperialists dreaded, was to be cut out. Not many of these additional punishments were, however, actually carried out.
Besides these death sentences many Bohemians were condemned to prison for lengthy periods, while others were expelled from Prague, and it was ordered that they should be whipped with rods till they reached the city gates.
