William Nugent himself underwent the utmost misery. He lay in the fields without covering at night, and his friends were afraid to attract attention by bringing him as much canvas as would make a shelter-tent. His wife--the Janet Marward, whose abduction has been already related--was with her mother, Mrs. Nicholas Nugent, but his two boys were in his own keeping. Nicholas Nugent might have made his peace with the Government had he been able to get hold of the eldest; but William said the brother, wife, and child were over many hostages. Give him back his wife, and the children should be sent in exchange. The poor mother, who was half-crazed with her troubles, supported her stepfather's request that the child should be given up, in hopes, probably, that she might thus see him. All the while John Cusack was the active agent who swore in confederates for the 'holy cause,' and took the lead generally. William ultimately escaped to Scotland, and thence to Italy, and his wife, after some delay, was allowed to receive the profits of her own property. Ormonde warmly supported her cause, and reminded Burghley that she had been married by force. The only charge against her was that she had sent some shirts to her destitute husband, but she was imprisoned for a whole year. 'If any fault were,' it was urged on the Lord Treasurer, 'the dutiful love of a wife to a husband in that extremity may, I trust, procure some remorse towards her in your Lordship's honourable opinion.' The desire of the informers to get her land probably caused the harsh treatment. She was at one time on the point of starvation, and yet was accused of offering a bribe for her own safety, and fined 500_l._ She had, she pleaded, nothing to give, and though she had friends, 'who perhaps would have given all they had in the world rather than see her life lost,' yet they had given nothing with her knowledge.[91] [Sidenote: Raleigh sides with Ormonde,]