The Shasta courier., 1868-03-07
5 SHASTA A COURIER.
The Horrors of Nuremberg Castle.

Mr.: Coffin writes to the Boston Journal
from Nuremberg, Bavaria.
Come with me to this old town, enter some
OF these edifices and look upon the admins
tration OF government as it were in the 10th
and 18th centuries. We enter one of the
castles, descend five steps, and find our
selves In museum, where are preserved the
book OF records, giving history of the past !;
and not only books, but implements and in
struments which show more clearly than
written words the administration of those
days with which the government of the
United States is now compared. Here is a
post four feet high in the centre of the room,
with two curious fixtures on the top, having
some resemblance of gun locks.
What is this? The girl who acts as our
usher raises the hammers, which came up
with q click. She touches a spring, and
down they go, with snap that startles you
forced down by strong springs that would
have crushed your fingers to a Jelly had they
been under the hammer. This finger crush
er, q delicate little instrument used to extort
confessions from reluctant witnesses or sus-
pected criminals. Here are bracelets for the
wrists, not of gold or silver, but of iron, and
the parts that touch the wrists are touched
with needles. Put them on 70 II arm and
turn screw and they close up n the flesh,
the needles piercing through cords, tendons,
flesh and bones. 1t is one degree more ex.
cruciating than crushing the fingers.
Here is head dress-a crown which has
been worn by many men and women. 1t
has sharp knives which cut through the
scalp to the skull Here are chains and
weights, locks and keys. handouts and clasps
for the ankles, stocks for the feet, weights to
hold your feet to the floor, and pulleys to
draw your head at the same time to the cell.
ing. Here is a bench of solid oak, with an
arrugated surface, upon which many men
have been laid. held down by cords, to under
go the kneadlng process, and that rolling pin,
knotty and knobby, also of oak, which lies
upon the table, has been rolled backward and
forward over the naked forms of men and
women, kneading the live flesh to bloody
dough. Time and space would fail me were
L to enumerate the instruments of torture
here. or to set forth their uses. We can
look only at the cradle-a huge trough of oak
on reckers-the bottom and sides thickly set
with pins, in which many victims have been
rocked to death. Think of lying on bed of
oaken pins, rolling to the right, to the left
always against the pins--till the flesh be-
comes iivid jelly. Here is string of beads,
each bead sixteen sided, about as large
as hickory nuts. This was for saving off
legs and arms.
Here is an instrument shaped like a pear.
1T is of iron, but to all appearance harm
less thing. But just take it for moment
into your mouth and let me give gentle pull
at the string attached to the stem of the
pear, and 1T will be no longer a pear but a
full blown lily-an iron lily unfolding its
leaves so suddenly and violently that your
jaws are forced open until the joints crack in
their sockets, while the delicate petals be
come pincers, which grasp your tongue
NO outcry now. No utterance of Words
No screaming to raise the neighborhood. =
Means and sighs only from the sufferer
One twitch of the string and the tongue is
torn out by the roots.
We must leave the museum without men
tioning the hundreds of curiosities. We 20
out into the court yard, stopping a moment
TO pluck leaf from a lime tree which was
IN iuii vigor seven hundred years ago, and
then we enter another door, descend long
Hight OF steps, to dark, dismal dungeons.
where no light ever falls except through
narrow, iron grated windows. Here are
ladders, with windlass and pulleys, ON which
victims were stretched till bones snapped. till
joints leaped from their sockets, and cords
and tendons were torn asunder. Here are
racks and wheels. pillories and stocks. wbins
and manacles. This was the place of tor
ture. We leave these and creep through n
narrow passage, through doorway after door
way, and reach, at last, far underground. far
beneath all sight and sound of the world.
darker dungeon. This is the room of the
Iron Maiden.
Here is the statue or image-a maiden
with hood upon her head, an iron ruffle
around the neck, enveloped in an iron cloak.
Suddenly the folds of the cloak are thrown
apart and by the dim light of the candle you
see that the lining of the garment is set with
sharp spikes. Take one step forward and
the folds enclose you. Iron spikes pierce
your body, and into your eyebals, clear
through to the vertebr5e, they penetrate.-
Not quick embrace, but slowly you are
enioided' Que torn of the screw, Just enough
70 penetrate the flesh, just enough to touch
."e apple OF the quivering eye; then, after
sn age oI anguish, another turn and a hun.
ureu SPIKES reach little nearer to the nerves;
ana tnen heat, a thirst and fever rack the
oeuJ. another gentle turn and another age
~ ~ 'or!ure and then one more advance of
"" 'pAeS toward the ritals, till death comes
~, a'u tnen the maiden, unfolding her
Sa-n S.m' uioPS ner victim through trap door,
down--down-down into unknown dantbs I
W we drop q pebble and hear the faint splash
here is skull. Anatomists say it is the
skullof female. You NAV mt yonr sn'
gers into the holes where the snikes wb;ah
entered the eyes came through Noname.
no record. God only has the book of re,
membrance.
We think of this dungeon as connected
with the barbarism Of the middle ages but
we are now removed from those DAYS of rig.
orous administration of law. Till Napoleon
with bis legions of France came across the
Rhine, oEerthrowing ell obstacles, this iron
maiden held on. her arms to receive often
dors against the law. On the approach of
the French araiy in 1903, the Virgin as it
is Called, with other instruments Of torture,
uer, throw into cart, and dispatched in
haste out Of the town, but fell into the han,..s
of the victorious enemy. Net till then did