r enters and gives him a letter. He reads hastily--communicates
its intelligence in whispers to those beside him, and hurries out. No
time is lost. Pym and his party could not trifle now though they would,
and would not though they could. Waller and Tomkins are seized that
night in their houses, and overwhelmed with fear, confess everything. It
is suspected that Waller was betrayed by his sister, Mrs. Price, who was
married to a zealous parliamentarian. A strange story is told, that one
Goode, her chaplain, had stolen some of his papers, and would have got a
hold of them all, had not Waller, having DREAMED that his sister was
perfidious, risen and secured the rest. Clarendon, on the other hand,
says that the discovery was made by a servant of Tomkins, who acted as a
spy for the parliament. At all events, they were found out, and, in
their terror and pusillanimity, they betrayed their associates. The Duke
of Portland and Lord Conway were instantly arrested. Lady Aubigny, too,
was imprisoned, but contrived to make her escape to the Hague. Even the
Earl of Northumberland was involved in the charges which now issued in a
trembling torrent from the lips of the detected conspirator, who
confessed a great deal that could not have been discovered, and offered
to reveal the private conversations of ladies of rank, and to betray all
and sundry who were in the slightest degree connected with the plot.
Tomkins had somehow got possession of Crispe's commission of array,
which he had buried in the garden, but which was now, on his
information, dug up. Never did a conspiracy fall to pieces more rapidly,
completely, and, for the conspirators, more disgracefully.

This discovery proves a windfall to the parliamentary party. Pym hies to
the citizens and apprises them, in one breath, at once of their danger
and their signal deliverance. The Commons draw up a vow and covenant,
expressing their detestation of all such conspiracies, and appoint a day
of thanksgiving for the escape of the nation. Meanwhile Waller and
Portland are confronted, when the one repeats his charge and Portland
denies it. Conway, too, maintains his innocence, and as Waller is the
only evidence against either him or Portland, both are, after a long
imprisonment, admitted to bail. Tomkins, Chaloner (the agent of Crispe),
Hassel (the king's courier between Oxford and London), Alexander Hampden
(Waller's cousin), and some subordinate conspirators, are arraigned
before a Co