Page:History of England (Froude) Vol 11.djvu/410

 394 REIGN OF ELIZABETH. [cu. 66. Reports of this kind however were so frequent that on Elizabeth they had ceased to produce much effect. She was personally fearless even to callousness. Disaf- fected English gentlemen had been leaving the realm for many years past, and the Queen had encouraged them by refusing to let the Act of Parliament be put in force, and by allowing them to draw the rents of their estates. Even Sir Francis Englefield, the most restlessly mischievous of all the refugees, had lived in luxury at Brussels or Madrid for twenty-five years on the income of his English property. Those who went abroad merely in search of priests and masses were in no danger of molestation, and all were considered innocent of further ill intentions till they were proved to be guilty. Lord Morley wrote to say that he had gone to join his mother, and his excuse was accepted. Not much else of a posi- tive kind had transpired which could be definitely no- ticed. Orders were given indeed for a more extensive and frequent training of the militia, but the militia was a double-edged weapon, on which the conspirators were calculating. Many a magistrate who would call out men for the defence of the realm was expected by the Jesuits to carry them over to the camp of the invader. At the beginning of October one of the half-dozen plots exploded, which have been already alluded to, for the murder of the Queen. The attempt of Jaureguy, which had so nearly succeeded, had quickened the imagination and spurred the ardour of the would-be regicides. While Guise lingered, one blow boldly struck for Holy Church would place Mary Stuart on