fter the Parliament should be blown into air.

Parliament being again prorogued from the third of October to the fifth
of November, and the conspirators being uneasy lest their design should
have been found out, Thomas Winter said he would go up into the House of
Lords on the day of the prorogation, and see how matters looked. Nothing
could be better. The unconscious Commissioners were walking about and
talking to one another, just over the six-and-thirty barrels of
gunpowder. He came back and told the rest so, and they went on with
their preparations. They hired a ship, and kept it ready in the Thames,
in which Fawkes was to sail for Flanders after firing with a slow match
the train that was to explode the powder. A number of Catholic gentlemen
not in the secret, were invited, on pretence of a hunting party, to meet
Sir Everard Digby at Dunchurch on the fatal day, that they might be ready
to act together. And now all was ready.

But, now, the great wickedness and danger which had been all along at the
bottom of this wicked plot, began to show itself. As the fifth of
November drew near, most of the conspirators, remembering that they had
friends and relations who would be in the House of Lords that day, felt
some natural relenting, and a wish to warn them to keep away. They were
not much comforted by Catesby's declaring that in such a cause he would
blow up his own son. LORD MOUNTEAGLE, Tresham's brother-in-law, was
certain to be in the house; and when Tresham found that he could not
prevail upon the rest to devise any means of sparing their friends, he
wrote a mysterious letter to this lord and left it at his lodging in the
dusk, urging him to keep away from the opening of Parliament, 'since God
and man had concurred to punish the wickedness of the times.' It
contained the words 'that the Parliament should receive a terrible blow,
and yet should not see who hurt them.' And it added, 'the danger is
past, as soon as you have burnt the letter.'

The ministers and courtiers made out that his Sowship, by a direct
miracle from Heaven, found out what this letter meant. The truth is,
that they were not long (as few men would be) in finding out for
themselves; and it was decided to let the conspirators alone, until the
very day before the opening of Parliament. That the conspirators had
their fears, is certain; for, Tresham himself said before them all, that
they were every one dead men; and, although even he did