Footnote 287: Ce qui faict juger à beaulcoup de gens que Wyatt ne mourra point, mais que la dicte dame le rendra tant son obligé par ceste grace de luy rendre la vie qu'elle en pourra tirer beaulcoup de bons et grandes services. Ce qui se faict par le moyen dudict ambassadeur de l'Empereur par l'advis duquel se conduisent aujourdhuy toutes les opinions d'icelle dame, et lequele traice ceste composition avecques la femme dudict Wyatt à laquelle comme l'on diet il a asseuré la vie de son dict mari.—Noailles to the Constable of France, March 31. Renard's secrets were betrayed to Noailles by "a corrupt secretary" of the Flemish embassy.—Wotton to the Queen: French MSS. bundle xi. State Paper Office.[(Back to Main Text)]
Footnote 288: Noailles says: Wyatt a esté condamné à mourir; toutesfois il n'est encores executé et avant que luy prononçer sa sentence on luy avoit promis tant de belles choses que vaincu par leur doulces paroles oultre sa deliberation, il a accusé beaulcoup de personnages et parlé au desadvantage de mylord de Courtenay et de Madame Elizabeth.—Noailles to d'Oysel, March 29. The different parties were so much interested in Wyatt's confession, that his very last words are so wrapped round with contradictions, that one cannot tell what they were. It is certain, however, that he did implicate Elizabeth to some extent; it is certain, also, that he did not say enough for the purposes of the court, and that the court believed he could say more if he would, for, on Easter Sunday he communicated, and the queen was distressed that he should have been allowed to partake, while his confession was incomplete. As to Courtenay, Renard said he had communicated enough, "mais quant à Elizabeth l'on ne peult encores tomber en preuves suffisantes pour les loys d'Angleterre contre elle."—Renard to Charles V.: Rolls House MSS.[(Back to Main Text)]
Footnote 289: Holinshed says that a certain lord exclaimed that there would be no safety for the realm until Elizabeth's head was off her shoulders; and either Holinshed himself, or his editor, wrote in the margin opposite, the words: "The wicked advice of Lord Paget."—Renard describes so distinctly the attitude of Paget, that there can be no doubt whatever of the injustice of such a charge against him.[(Back to Main Text)]
Footnote 290: MS. Mary, Domestic, vol. iv. Printed by Ellis, 2nd series, vol. ii. p. 255.[(Back to Main Text)]
Footnote 291: As soon as Noailles learnt that his enclosure formed part of the case against Elizabeth, he came forward to acquit her of having furnished him with it; "jurant et blasphémant tous les sermens du monde pour la justification de la dicte Dame Elizabeth."—Renard to Charles V., April 3: Rolls House MSS.[(Back to Main Text)]
Footnote 292: Renard.[(Back to Main Text)]
Footnote 293: Contemporary Narrative: Harleian MSS. 419. Chronicle of Queen Mary, p. 71. Holinshed.[(Back to Main Text)]
Footnote 294: Renard to Charles V., March 22; Rolls House MSS.[(Back to Main Text)]
Footnote 295: Il me repliqua que vivant Elizabeth il n'a espoir à la tranquillité du Royaulme, que quant à luy si chascun alloit si rondement en besoyn comme il fait, les choses se porteroient mieux.—Renard to the Emperor, April 3: Rolls House MSS. From these dark plotters, what might not be feared? Holinshed says that while Elizabeth was in the Tower, a writ was sent down for her execution devised, as was believed, by Gardiner; and that Lord Chandos (Sir John Brydges, the Lieutenant of the Tower) refused to put it in force. The story has been treated as a fable, and in the form in which it is told by Holinshed, it was very likely untrue: yet in the presence of these infernal conversations, I think it highly probable that, as the hope of a judicial conviction grew fainter, schemes were talked of, and were perhaps tried, for cutting the knot in a decisive manner. In revolutionary times men feel that if to-day is theirs, to-morrow may be their enemies'; and they are not particularly scrupulous. The anxious words of Sussex did not refer to the merely barring a prisoner's door.[(Back to Main Text)]
Footnote 296: Renard.[(Back to Main Text)]