The learned David Jardine——to whom all students of the Gunpowder Plot will be for ever indebted for his labours in this conspiracy of conspiracies——in his “_Narrative_,” published in the year 1857, and to which reference has been already frequently made in the course of this Inquiry, says,[116] “No contemporary writer alludes to Mrs. Abington as the author of the Letter.” And Jardine evidently does not think that the penmanship of the document can be brought home to this lady. Moreover, if Mrs. Abington had written the Letter of Letters, surely she would have, at least, _shared_ her brother Lord Mounteagle’s reward, which was £700 a year for life, equal to nearly £7,000 a year in our money. For if £700 a year was the guerdon of _him_ that _merely delivered_ this Letter of Letters, what should have been the guerdon of _her_ that actually _penned_ the peerless treasure? But the hypothesis that Mrs. Abington penned the Letter of Letters has absolutely no foundation in contemporary evidence. For there is not the faintest echo of an echo of testimony, nor the merest shadow of a shade of proof that _either_ she _or_ Mr. Abington had the remotest previous knowledge of the Gunpowder Treason Plot. And the mere fact that Mr. Abington, although the harbourer of Fathers Garnet and Oldcorne, was spared from undergoing the extreme penalty of the law, in itself tends to disprove the allegation that either he or his wife had been in any way privy to the Plot. For no plotter’s life was spared. Mr. Abington became a celebrated antiquary, especially in regard to his own County of Worcestershire, within the confines of which he was ordered by the King to remain for the rest of his days.——See Jardine’s “_Narrative_,” p. 212.[A] [Footnote A: The splendid Elizabethan mansion known as Hindlip Hall, four miles from Worcester, with a large and magnificent prospect of the surrounding country, was demolished early in the nineteenth century. A picture of this mansion is in the Rev. Ethelred Taunton’s book, “_The Jesuits in England_” (Methuen & Co.). The present Hindlip Hall is the seat of the Lord Hindlip.] In these circumstances, Dr. Nash’s alleged tradition cannot possibly outweigh the inferences that the facts known and inferred concerning the Plot all tend to establish. For these inferences, both in respect of what happened _before and after_ the penning of the Letter, all go to show this: that the conjectures, surmises, and suggestions of this Essay are indeed probable to the degree of moral certitude. And I respectfully submit these same conjectures, surmises, and suggestions cannot be upset, still less broken, by knowledge commensurate with zeal. Jardine mentions the singular hypothesis that this famous Letter was penned by the Honourable Anne Vaux, at the dictation of the Honourable Mrs. Abington.