"I expected nothing else," replied Mary calmly. "This is the manner in which you generally proceed with regard to persons of my quality, and who are nearly related to the Crown, so that none may live who aspire to it. For long I have known that you would bring me to this in the end. I have loved the Queen and the country, and have done all that I could for the preservation of both. The offers which I have made are the proof of this, as Beale can bear me witness. I do not fear death, and shall suffer it with a good heart. I have never been the author of any conspiracy to injure the Queen. I have several times been offered my freedom, and have been blamed for refusing my consent. My partisans have abandoned me and troubled themselves no further with my affairs. To prevent this I have attempted to obtain my deliverance by gentle means, to my great disadvantage, till at last, being repulsed on one side and pressed on the other, I placed myself in the hands of my friends, and have taken part with Christian and Catholic princes, not, as I have before declared, and as the English themselves can bear witness by the papers which they have in their possession, through ambition nor the desire of a greater position; but I have done it for the honour of God and His Church, and for my deliverance from the state of captivity and misery in which I was placed. I am a Catholic,--of a different religion from yourselves; and for this reason you will take care not to let me live. I am grieved that my death cannot be of as much benefit to the kingdom as I fear it will do it harm; and this I say not from any ill-feeling or from any desire to live. For my part, I am weary of being in this world; nor do I, or any one else, profit by my being here. But I look forward to a better life, and I thank God for giving me this grace of dying in His quarrel. No greater good can come to me in this world; it is what I have most begged of God and most wished for, as being the thing most honourable for myself and most profitable for the salvation of my soul. I have never had the intention of changing my religion for any earthly kingdom, or grandeur, or good, whatever, nor of denying Jesus Christ or His name, nor will I now. You may feel well assured that I shall die in this entire faith and with my goodwill, and as happy in doing so as I was ever for anything that has come to me in my life. I pray God to have mercy on the poor Catholics of this kingdom, who are persecuted and oppressed for their religion. The only thing I regret is, that it has not pleased God to give me before I die the grace to see them able to live in full liberty of conscience in the faith of their parents, in the Catholic Church, and serving God as they desire to do. I am not ignorant that for long certain persons have been plotting against me; and to speak plainly, I know well it has been done at the instance of one who professes to be my enemy. But I have spoken