RECAPITULATION OF PROOFS, ARGUMENT, AND CONCLUSIONS.

(1) The revealing plotter cannot have been Tresham or any one of the other eight who were condemned to death in Westminster Hall; otherwise he would have pleaded such fact.

(2) The revealing plotter must have been amongst those who survived not to tell the tale: that is, either Catesby, Percy, John Wright, or Christopher Wright.

(3) Christopher Wright, a subordinate conspirator introduced late in the conspiracy, was the revealing conspirator.

(4) Father Edward Oldcorne, S.J., was the Penman of the Letter.

(5) Thomas Ward was the diplomatic Go-between common to both.

All these three were Yorkshiremen.

(6) Ralph Ashley was the messenger who conveyed the Letter to Lord Mounteagle’s page, who was already in the street when the Letter-carrier arrived.

Perhaps a Yorkshireman.

(7) Mounteagle knew a letter was coming. Known to Edmund Church, Esq., his confidant.

(8) Thomas Ward, on Sunday, the 27th October (the day after the delivery), told Thomas Winter, one of the principal plotters, that Salisbury had received the document; and on Sunday, the 3rd November, that Salisbury had shown it to the King.

(9) Christopher Wright, who was at Lapworth when the Letter was delivered, and within twenty miles of Father Oldcorne, saw Thomas Winter some little time subsequent to the delivery of the Letter.

(10) Christopher Wright is said to have been the first who ascertained that the Plot was discovered.

(11) Christopher Wright is said to have counselled flight in different directions.

(12) Christopher Wright announced to Thomas Winter, very early on Tuesday, the 5th of November, the capture of Fawkes that morning.

(13) Father Oldcorne’s handwriting to-day resembles that of the Letter; by comparison of documents, certainly one of which is in Oldcorne’s handwriting.

(14) Oldcorne was accused by the Government of sending “letters up and down to prepare men’s minds for the insurrection.”

(15) Brother Ashley, his servant, was accused of carrying “letters to and fro about this conspiracy.”

(16) Father Henry Garnet, Oldcorne’s Superior, mysteriously changed his purpose expressed on the 4th October, of returning to London; and on the 29th October went from Gothurst to Coughton, in Warwickshire. (I think Garnet’s main reason for going to Coughton was in order to meet Catesby, and endeavour to induce him to discard Percy’s counsel and to seek refuge in flight.)

(17) Father Oldcorne evaded giving a direct answer as to the Plot, when questioned by Littleton, after November 5th.

(18) Hence, the facts both before and after the delivery of the Letter are consistent with, and indeed converge towards, the hypothesis sought by this Inquiry to be proved.

(19) The circumstance that Christopher Wright displayed a strangely marked disposition to “hang about” the prime conspirator, Thomas Winter, after the sending of the Letter, is a suspicious fact, strongly indicative of a consciousness on Christopher Wright’s part of a special responsibility in connection with the revelation of the Plot; as showing anxiety for personal knowledge that the train of revelation lighted by himself had, so to speak, taken fire.

(20) Christopher Wright lived not to tell the tale.

(21) Hence, the hypothesis is a theory established, with moral certitude, mainly by Circumstantial Evidence, which latter “mosaics” perfectly.

(22) Finally, the crowning proof of the theory sought by this Book to be established is found in these nine words of the post scriptum of 21st October, 1605, to letter dated 4th October, 1605, under the hand of Father Garnet to Father Parsons, in Rome[A]: “This letter being returned unto me again, FOR REASON OF A FRIEND’S STAY IN THE WAY, I blotted out some words purposing to write the same by the next opportunity, as I will do apart:” — The word “stay” here being used to signify “check.” Cf., Shakespeare’s “King John,” II., 2: and see Glossary to Globe Edition (Macmillan).