A HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX 



largely in East Ham and Hackney, to protect the queen, and to defend 

 Kent and Essex as need arose. 885 The tense expectation ended at last, 

 the enemy hove in sight, the long-prepared beacons were lighted, and 

 ' high on bleak Hampstead's swarthy moor, they started for the North.' 



We hear little of Middlesex during the rest of Elizabeth's reign, 

 and as little during the reign of her successor. James was given a hearty 

 welcome on his accession, when he journeyed from Scotland to London. 

 At Theobalds (Hertfordshire) he created many new knights, among 

 whom was Sir Vincent Skinner of Middlesex. On his way thence to 

 London (7 May) he was met on the boundaries of the county by the 

 sheriffs of London and Middlesex, and at Stamford Hill by the chief 

 gentlemen of the hundreds. Of these, Sir Thomas Fowler, Sir Hugh 

 Losse, and Sir Arthur Attic were knighted at the Charterhouse on 

 1 1 May.* 36 James took such a fancy to Theobalds, when he stayed 

 there on his way to London, that he took possession of it, giving the 

 Cecils, to whom it belonged, their present estate at Hatfield. In 1608 

 he caused his house at Enfield to be pulled down, and the materials 

 removed to Theobalds, 837 so that Enfield did not see so much of court 

 life as hitherto. 



Some scenes of the conspiracy of 1605 took place in the county, 

 though none of the plotters were Middlesex men. Garnet had lodgings 

 at Enfield, where the conspirators occasionally met. 238 During the ten 

 days before Parliament assembled, Catesby and Fawkes came to White 

 Webbes, a house in Enfield Chase, where they were visited by Thomas 

 Winter. 239 The famous letter by which Tresham conveyed his 

 mysterious warning to Lord Monteagle was received by the latter at 

 his house in Hoxton, where he dined on the evening of 26 October. 840 

 The following morning, Winter went to White Webbes to tell Catesby 

 his suspicions of Tresham, and to entreat him to give up the enterprise, 

 and flee the country. Catesby, however, was cool and firm and decided 

 to wait until the 30 October, when Fawkes would rejoin him, and could 

 be sent to examine the cellar at Westminster. A week later, the con- 

 spirators were riding for their lives along the road from London to 

 Ashby St. Legers Catesby and John Wright first, then Christopher 

 Wright and Percy ; in the afternoon Rokewood overtook Keyes at 

 Highgate, and lastly came Winter. Percy had promised to give all he 

 could get from the earl of Northumberland's rents to the cause, and 

 expected to raise about 4,ooo. M1 For this reason he went to Syon 

 House on 4 November, on the night of which Fawkes was seized in the 

 cellar. Syon House and Isleworth manor had only been granted to 

 Northumberland the preceding year, and he was now ' treated with 

 uncommon rigour by the Star Chamber, for what at most amounted to 

 a presumption of being privy to the Gunpowder Plot.' 84S Feeling ran so 



85 S.P. Misc. (ed. Hardwicke), i, 575. > Nichols, Progresses of James I, i, u*-ij. 



" Cat. S.P. Don. 1603-10, p. 419. '*> Ibid. 247. 



19 Thomas Winter's Confession. * State Trials, ii, 195. 



1 Bishop Williams of Chichester, The Gunpowder Treason, 56. 

 " Lysons, Environs of London (1795), iii, 95. 



36 



