The sports and races of Royal Oak Day were to be held on the "New
Field" (so called), adjoining the plantation of Barry Upper Branch.
The stocks had been moved from their usual station to this place to
remind the people in the midst of their gayety that the displeasure
of the King was a thing to be dreaded, and that they were not their
own masters, even when they made merry.
On the morning of that day came my brother John's man-servant to
shave and dress me, and the physician to attend to my wounds. It was
a marvel that I was able to undergo the ordeal, and indeed, my
brother had striven hard to urge my wounds as a reason for my being
released. But such a naturally strong constitution had I, or else so
faithfully had the physician tended me, with such copious lettings
of blood and purges, that except for an exceeding weakness, I was
quite myself. Still I wondered, after I had been shaven and put into
my clothes, which hung somewhat loosely upon me, as I sat on a bench
by the window, however I was to reach the New Field.
It was a hot and close day, with all the heaviness of sweetness of
the spring settling upon the earth, and my knees had knocked
together when my brother's man-servant and the physician, one on
each side of me, led me from the bed to the bench.
So very weak was I that morning, after my feverish night, that,
although the physician had let a little more blood to counteract it,
I verily seemed almost to forget the stocks and what I was to
undergo of disgrace and ignominy, being principally glad that the
window was to the west, and that burning sun which had so fretted
me, shut out.
The physician, long since dead, and an old man at that date, was
exceeding silent, eyeing everybody with an anxious corrugation of
brows over sharp eyes, and he had always a nervous clutch of his
hands to accompany the glance, as if for lancets or the necks of
medicine-flasks, never leaving a patient, unless he had killed or
cured. He had visited me with as much faithfulness as if I had been
the governor, and yet with no kindness, and I know not to this day,
whether he was for or against the King, or bled both sides
impartially. He looked at me with no compassion, and I might, from
his manner, as well have been going to be set on a throne as in the
stocks, but he counted my pulse-beats, and then bled me.