And now began Mary’s long captivity of nineteen years. She was moved about from castle to castle, and at first was permitted as much liberty as was consistent with the safe custody of her person. We read that she had a stud of sixteen horses, and frequently went hunting. She amused herself with needlework, in which she was very skilful, and kept dogs, turtle doves, and Barbary fowls. She practised her religion with great devotion, and she did not fail to charm all who came in contact with her by her gracious condescension. But all the while she was ceaselessly plotting and intriguing, not only with Elizabeth’s disaffected subjects, but with her French friends, the King of Spain, and the Pope. Elizabeth’s life was in hourly danger, and her councillors constantly warned her that Mary was a terrible menace to her safety. In 1569 news arrived that the Pope was about to depose Elizabeth, and declare Mary Queen of England. Almost immediately there was a great rising of the Catholics of the north. The Earls of Northumberland and Westmorland marched into Durham, and mass was once more said in the cathedral. The insurgents, however, received but little support, and some of the leaders perished on the scaffold. Next year the long expected Bull of Deposition arrived. While most of the Catholics remained loyal, some of the more violent schemed to depose and even murder Elizabeth. One of the plots, known as the “Ridolfi Plot” from the name of an Italian banker who played an important part in it, was headed by the Duke of Norfolk, an ambitious noble of thirty-two, who undertook to seize Elizabeth and marry Mary, who had now obtained a divorce from Bothwell. Norfolk was the leader of the English Catholics, and had the support of many noblemen in the northern counties. Some of his papers, however, fell into the hands of Burleigh, and the whole plot was exposed. Norfolk, who said truly that nothing done for Mary ever prospered, paid the penalty with his head on Tower Hill. Both Houses of Parliament now petitioned that the Queen of Scots should share his fate, but Elizabeth replied that “she could not put to death the bird that had fled to her for succour from the hawk.” Henceforth Mary was more strictly confined.