Page:Cassell's Illustrated History of England vol 3.djvu/44

30 would have made a first-rate general of the order of Loyola.

The warder in whose custody the Jesuits lay, received an order from the lieutenant of the Tower to assume a friendly demeanour towards them; to express his sympathy for their sufferings, and his respect for their undaunted maintenance of their religious faith. Having satisfied himself that he had made a favourable impression, he proceeded to offer them all the indulgence in his power, consistent with their safe custody. The Jesuits fell into the snare. The warder offered to take charge of any letters that they wished to convey to their friends. The sincerity of the man appeared so genuine that the offer was gladly accepted; a correspondence with several catholics was commenced, and the letters each way were regularly carried to the commissioners, opened, and copied before delivery. Many of the letters being found to have secret notes appended in lemon juice, which only became visible when heated, were retained, and exact copies sent. Some of these letters still remain in the State Paper Office. But this correspondence, notwithstanding the sympathetic ink, was so guarded, that it furnished no new facts, and another plan was adopted. The warder, as if growing more nailing to serve them by longer acquaintance, showed them that by leaving an intermediate door unlocked betwixt their cells, the two Jesuits could meet and converse at freedom. Still confiding entirely in their apparent friend the warder, who recommended extreme caution, Garnet and Oldcorne gladly embraced this opportunity of intercourse. But in secret recesses in the passage were placed Lockerson, the private secretary of Cecil, and Forsett, a magistrate of the Tower, who heard and noted down the conversations of the prisoners. Five times were these treacherous interviews permitted, and the reported conversations of four of them are still preserved.



As might be expected, the conversations chiefly turned on the best mode of conducting their defence. In these conversations Garnet admitted that though he had denied it, he had still been at White Webbs, in Enfield Chace, with the conspirators, and would still maintain that he had not been there since Bartholomew-tide. On another occasion he let fall things which still further betrayed his knowledge of the plot; and he asserted his intention when again examined to demand that the witnesses which the commissioners boasted of having should be produced.

These admissions were deemed sufficient; the prisoners were again separately subjected to examination; and on still denying all knowledge of the conspiracy, their conversations were shown them. They now saw how shamefully they had been betrayed, yet they both protested that they had never said such things. Oldcorne, however, when racked, confessed to them, and this confession was then shown to Garnet. But Garnet still denied the truth of these conversations, saying that Oldcorne might admit them in his agony, but he would not accuse himself. He was then—according