Also a “Mr. Wade” mentioned, by Walsingham to Leicester in a letter dated 3rd April, 1587, may have been really “Warde.”——See Wright’s “_Elizabethan Letters_,” vol. ii., p. 335. Again, “_The Calendar of State Papers_,” Domestic Series, 1581-90, gives, page 93, a Thomas Warde, as an examiner for the Privy Council, taking down evidence in the cause of Robert Hungate and wife _v._ John Hoare and John Shawe, in the year 1583.] CHAPTER XXV. Now what is the Evidence to support the preceding paragraphs (1), (2), and (3)? As to paragraph (1), the Evidence is direct. There was a tradition extant that _Mounteagle expected the Letter, told to a gentleman named Edmund Church his confidant_.——See Gardiner’s “_Gunpowder Plot_,” p. 10. Moreover, the fact that the footman was in the street at about seven of the clock when the missive was given to him _is strongly suggestive of the fact that he had been anxiously sent thither by some one, so that he might be ready at hand to receive the document immediately on its arrival_. As to paragraphs (2) and (3), the Evidence is indirect and inferential. It is this:——Thomas Ward was manifestly on excellent terms with Mounteagle on the one hand and with the conspirators on the other. For it is evident that no sooner had Mounteagle arrived back from his errand of mercy on that dark night of Saturday, the 26th day of October, 1605, than he divulged to his servant almost all, if not quite all, that had passed at Whitehall during his never-to-be-forgotten interview with Salisbury, the King’s principal Secretary of State.[A] [Footnote A: The days of the week and the dates of the month run parallel for the years 1605 and 1901. Thus both the 26ths of October are on a Saturday. _What was the condition of the moon on that memorable Saturday night?_] That Lord Mounteagle had imparted to Thomas Ward almost all, if not quite all, that had passed between Lord Salisbury and himself on the delivery to the latter of the peerless document to my mind is clear from the fact _that the faithful Ward, the very next day (Sunday) repaired to Thomas Winter_, one of the principal conspirators, _and told Winter that the Letter was in the hands of Salisbury_!——“_Winter’s Confession._” Assuming that Thomas Ward was a Ward of Mulwith, he would be a family connection of Thomas Winter as well as of Christopher Wright through Ursula Ward and Inglebies, of Ripley, in Nidderdale. Now, what is proved by this very significant fact of _Thomas Ward’s_ so unerringly darting off to _Thomas Winter_, one of the prime movers in this conspiracy of wholesale slaughter, when he (Ward) had all the adult male inhabitants of London and Westminster to make his selection from? Plainly this: that the revealing conspirator (whoever he was) _must have “primed” Thomas Ward by previously telling Thomas Ward that Thomas Winter was one of the chiefest of those involved in the conspiracy_.