Page:History of England (Froude) Vol 9.djvu/469

 1571 ] THE RIDOLFI CONSPIRACY. 455 been out in the rebellion compounded for their pardon by betraying their friends, and Cecil had already heard from Flanders that mischief of some kind was in the wind. 1 The Bishop's books unquestionably were meant to cause a stir on the Succession question, besides con- taining ' many manifest lies.' The forged packet was duly sent to him, and no suspicion was at first enter- tained that a trick had been played ; but Charles Baily was committed by Cecil's orders to the Marshalsea, and means were taken to probe something deeper into his secrets. Statesmen who have to grope their way among plots and treasons soil their hands with the instruments which they are compelled to use. Among the persons who had been arrested and sent to London after the rebel- lion was a dissolute cousin of Lady Northumberland, named Thomas Herle. Poor, cunning, and unprin- cipled, and connected by birth with the high Catholic families, this Herle was willing and able to be useful. He was confined under warrant from the council in the Marshalsea, apparently as a political prisoner, his occu- pation in any other capacity being known only to Cecil and himself. He was treated at times with exceptional severity examined often before the council, heavily manacled, and sometimes, to sustain his character with greater completeness, he was threatened by Cecil with the rack and all the time he was employed in winding himself into the confidence of his fellow-prisoners, as a 1 Letters of John Lee to Cecil, February, March, April, 1571: MSS. Flanders.