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20 Catesby was conceived the Gunpowder Plot. The writer of the warning letter sent to Lord Mounteagle by which the Plot was frustrated has never been positively identified, but Wood asserts that it was none other than Mary Habington. On the very day which had been set for the Gunpowder affair—the fifth (or possibly the fourth) of November, 1605—her son William was born. It was in truth a troublous world upon which the future poet opened his infant eyes. England, from her vacillating King to her intensely Puritan Commons, had fallen into a panic over the Plot. Catholics were in worse repute than ever, and upon the Jesuits burst the main torrent of popular fury. In this crisis, Father Garnett, their Provincial, (he who had sailed with Robert Southwell to the unhappy island some twenty years before) fled for shelter to the home of the Habingtons. Hindlip was admirably adapted to the situation, containing no less than eleven secret chambers, and having served before this as refuge for the persecuted priesthood. But the Government was watching. In January, 1606, after a search of eleven nights and twelve days, Garnett was discovered: a few months later he, too, was executed. And while the elder Habington's life was spared, it was on condition that he never subsequently put foot outside of Worcestershire.

After that, Hindlip Hill was tranquil enough. William's childhood passed uneventfully amid its beautiful surroundings, while the father continued his antiquarian researches concerning the cathedrals of Worcester, Chichester, etc. At least two characteristics of the poet's later life—his fervent and enlightened catholicity and his love of peace—may be traced to the environment of these early years. For bloody and turbulent memories were a thing of the past to Hindlip: little by little the