t this moment accident revealed suddenly another chasm which
was opening unsuspected at her feet.

Both Philip and she were really wishing for peace. A treaty of peace
between the Catholic King and an excommunicated princess would end the
dream of a Catholic revolution in England. If the English peers and
gentry saw the censures of the Church set aside so lightly by the most
orthodox prince in Europe, Parsons and his friends would preach in vain
to them the obligation of rebellion. If this deadly negotiation was to
be broken off, a blow must be struck, and struck at once. There was not
a moment to be lost.

The enchanted prisoner at Tutbury was the sleeping and waking dream of
Catholic chivalry. The brave knight who would slay the dragon, deliver
Mary Stuart, and place her on the usurper's throne, would outdo Orlando
or St. George, and be sung of for ever as the noblest hero who had ever
wielded brand or spear. Many a young British heart had thrilled with
hope that for him the enterprise was reserved. One of these was a
certain Anthony Babington, a gentleman of some fortune in Derbyshire. A
seminary priest named Ballard, excited, like the rest, by the need of
action, and anxious to prevent the peace, fell in with this Babington,
and thought he had found the man for his work. Elizabeth dead and Mary
Stuart free, there would be no more talk of peace. A plot was easily
formed. Half a dozen gentlemen, five of them belonging to or connected
with Elizabeth's own household, were to shoot or stab her and escape in
the confusion; Babington was to make a dash on Mary Stuart's
prison-house and carry her off to some safe place; while Ballard
undertook to raise the Catholic peers and have her proclaimed queen.
Elizabeth once removed, it was supposed that they would not hesitate.
Parma would bring over the Spanish army from Dunkirk. The Protestants
would be paralysed. All would be begun and ended in a few weeks or even
days. The Catholic religion would be re-established and the hated heresy
would be trampled out for ever. Mary Stuart had been consulted and had
enthusiastically agreed.

This interesting lady had been lately profuse in her protestations of a
desire for reconciliation with her dearest sister. Elizabeth had almost
believed her sincere. Sick of the endless trouble with Mary Stuart and
her pretensions and schemings, she had intended that the Scotch queen
should be included in the treaty with Philip, with an implied
reco