xxiv - PREFACE. 
fail in their ends, to have even ‘drawn blood from herself.’ 
The gatherings at Essex House had attracted the attention 
of the Court, and on Saturday the 7th of February Essex was 
summoned before the Privy Council. He refused to go; and 
in the evening, fearing that the Lords knew more than they 
did, proposed to make the attack. But the guards were 
doubled at Whitehall, and next morning Charing Cross and 
Westminster were barricaded. There was nothing now left 
but to raise the City. At ten o’clock on Sunday morning, 
the Lord Keeper, the Earl of Worcester, Sir William Knollys, 
and the Lord Chief Justice repaired to Essex House. Essex’s 
men had been running hither and thither all night to summon 
his friends, and by this time wellnigh three hundred were 
assembled. The arrival of the Lord Keeper precipitated 
their action. Essex cried out that he should be murdered 
in his bed, that his enemies had forged his name, and that 
he was armed in self-defence. The Lord Keeper promised 
that he should have justice done, but it was now too late. 
Essex left him and his companions prisoners, and rushed out 
with some two hundred followers on foot, crying hysterically 
that plots were laid against his life, and that the country was 
sold to the Spaniard. Not a man stirred in his defence. The 
conspirators marched through the City as far as Fenchurch 
Street to the house of Sheriff Smith, and there Essex showed 
signs that his nerve had forsaken him, Making their way 
back to Ludgate Hill, they found the street closed against 
them. A fight ensued, in which one or two were slain on 
either side, Essex was shot through the hat, Blount wounded 
and taken prisoner. The Earl, with some fifty followers, es- 
caped by water to Essex House, and by ten o’clock in the 
evening surrendered. And so ended this miserable and ‘ fatal 
impatience.’ But there was evidently a mystery which the 
Court had not penetrated, and to unravel it Bacon with others 
of her Majesty’s counsel was employed. They soon dis- 
covered the true nature of the plot. Judgement followed 
swiftly upon the offenders. On the 19th of February Essex 
and Southampton were arraigned. The evidence against 
