[157] — Does Greenway’s “Narrative” clearly state how many of these conspirators received from Tesimond the sacraments? If so, what sacraments were they?
The Government would have had a clear case of inciting to open rebellion against Tesimond if they had caught him, but he escaped to Flanders. He was “a very deep dog,” was Master Tesimond, and no mistake. But he was wholly under the finger and thumb (me judice) of Catesby, which shows what a powerful man of genius Catesby must have been.
Father Henry Garnet, at his trial, allowed that Tesimond had acted “ill,” in seeking to rouse the country to open rebellion.
[158] — This lady was Muriel, the widow of John Littleton, who had been involved in the rebellion of Robert Devereux Earl of Essex. She was the daughter of Elizabeth’s Lord Chancellor, Sir Thomas Bromley. — See Aiken’s “Memoirs of the Reign of James I.”
For a true estimate of the second Earl of Essex, see Dr. R. W. Church’s “Bacon” (Macmillan). — See also Major Hume’s “Courtships of Queen Elizabeth (Fisher Unwin) and his “Treason and Plot” (Nesbit).
[159] — How well-grounded Oldcorne’s suspicions of Littleton were, and how soundly he had discerned the man’s spirit, is proved from the fact that after Littleton had been condemned to death for harbouring his cousin, the Master of Holbeach, and Robert Winter, the Master of Huddington, Littleton sought to save his life by telling the Government that Oldcorne had “answered that the [Gunpowder] action was good, and that he seemed to approve of it.” Littleton also said that “since this last rebellion he heard Hall [i.e., Oldcorne] once preach in the house of the said Mr. Abington, at which time he seemed to confirm his hearers in the Catholic cause.” — See Foley’s “Records,” vol. iv., p. 219.
[160] — On the 5th of October, 1900, I saw this Declaration by the courtesy of the authorities at the Record Office, London, and compared it with the Letter to Lord Mounteagle. Miss Emma M. Walford was present the while. — See Appendix.
[161] — This luminous definition is by that great writer, Frederic Harrison.
[162] — It is not less dangerous to indulge in Irony. For an emphatic proof of this see the “Life of Lord Bowen,” p. 115 (Murray), by Sir H. S. Cunningham, K.C.I.E.
Cf. the great Stagyrite’s discountenancing the study by the inexperienced (the young in years or in character) of the fundamental grounds of those moral rules that each man must observe if he would faithfully do his duty from day to day, and “walk sure-footedly” in this life. — See “The Nicomachean Ethics of Aristotle,” book i. See also Professor Muirhead’s “Chapters from the Ethics” (Murray).