Now there is a sentence in the Letter whose wording is peculiar, but
which, I submit, is pre-eminently a wording likely to be used by two
natives of Yorkshire.
I mean the sentence, “I would aduyse yowe as yowe _tender_ your lyf to
deuys some excuse to _shift off_ youer attendance at this parleament,”
meaning thereby, “I would advise you as you _have a care_ for your life to
devise some excuse to _put off_[60] your attendance at this parliament.”
Once more, a comparison of the Letter sent to Lord Mounteagle with a
Declaration not only signed by Father Oldcorne but entirely in his
handwriting, dated the 12th of March, 1605-6,[61] reveals this remarkable
fact that there is, first, a general similarity between the penmanship of
both documents; and, secondly, there is a particular similarity in the
case of the following letters:——the small c/s, l/s, i/s, b/s, w/s, r/s,
long s/s (as initials), and short s/s (as terminals); also the m/s and n/s
are not inconsistent with being written by one and the same hand. The
handwriting in the Letter is, for the most part, not in round hand, but in
roman character. The letters do not all lean at the same angle to the
horizontal. Evidently the writer had endeavoured “painfully” to disguise
his handwriting, but conscientious carefulness and a disciplined will
emphatically characterise both documents.[62] See Appendix.
Now Thomas Ward, the gentleman-servant of Lord Mounteagle, was, I
maintain, the intermediary——the diplomatic intermediary——through whom
Christopher Wright (_ex hypothesi_) acted in communication with
Mounteagle. And this, with the express knowledge and consent of Father
Edward Oldcorne, who was, almost certainly, well acquainted with Thomas
Ward.[63]
In short, the revelation was a curvilinear triangular movement.