"Assure yourself," said Catesby to him, "that such of the nobility as are worth saving shall be preserved, and yet know not of the matter."[214] As to the remainder of the lords, he declared that he regarded them as "atheists, fools, and cowards, and that lusty bodies would be better for the commonwealth than they."[215] There was considerable wrangling as to which of the peers were to be saved, and there was some diversity of opinion on the question--whether this or that Protestant lord was well-enough disposed towards Catholics and their religion to be worth rescue. For instance, some would have it that the Earl of Northumberland was likely to become a Catholic; but his relative, Percy the conspirator, said that[216] "for matters of relligion" he "trobled not much himselfe." Notwithstanding this statement, Percy earnestly begged that he might be one of the peers to be spared,[217] which was indeed only fair, considering that his rents were to be stolen for the purposes of the plot. Francis Tresham pleaded for his two brothers-in-law, Stourton and Mounteagle, both of whom were Catholics; Keyes for his great friend, Mordaunt; Fawkes for Montague, several for Arundel, and so on. [214] Digby's Exam., 2nd Dec. 1605. S.P.O. Jardine's _Gunpowder Plot_, pp. 75-6. [215] Keyes' Exam., 30th Nov. 1605. S.P.O. Jardine, p. 75. [216] Cal. Sta. Pa., 1603-10, p. 262. [217] Jardine, p. 74. As to the plan of proceedings, when the explosion should have taken place with success, the great principle was to be to rally the Catholic gentry with their servants and retainers for a general rising in a central district. Gothurst was considered too far east for this purpose, and Warwickshire was selected as the base of operations for the volunteer Catholic army. It was true that that army did not yet exist; that the number of men at present initiated into the conspiracy was very small; and that the spirit in which the Catholics would receive the news of the wholesale massacre of the King and his Parliament remained to be proved; but Catesby and his confederates, Sir Everard apparently among the number, were very sanguine. Catesby, the originator, organiser, and leader of the whole proceeding, was to have the management of the grand explosion and the conduct of matters in London immediately afterwards, while Digby was to have the charge of the rising in Warwickshire, where Catesby was to join him, as occasion might serve. As a nucleus of his hoped-for army, Sir Everard was to take so many of his retainers as he could muster, with a quantity of arms in carts, to Dunchurch, a place very near Rugby, and to invite a large number of his trustworthy friends, likely to join in the cause, to come there with their horses and servants for a great "hunting-match" on Dunsmoor Heath.