On the 1st of February, the Court being then at Greenwich, Lord Howard (Lord High Admiral) sent for Davison by order of the Queen. The latter arrived in haste, and after a few words with the Admiral, returned to fetch the warrant, which he brought to the Queen placed, as if by accident, with other papers. Elizabeth commenced by speaking of indifferent matters, such as the beauty of the weather, and then demanded what he held in his hand. Davison replied that he had brought some documents which required the Queen's signature, and among them a certain paper which he had fetched by order of Lord Howard. Elizabeth signed the papers one after the other, including the warrant, which she feigned not to perceive, and threw it carelessly on the table with the rest. Her first intention, apparently, had been to pretend that she had signed the warrant by inadvertence, but suddenly changing her mind, she turned to Davison and told him that she had only delayed so long in order to show her extreme reluctance to sign the warrant. "Are you not distressed to see me do this?" she said. To this curious question Davison replied that he preferred the death of a guilty person to that of an innocent one, and that he could not regret that Her Majesty had taken the only means of protecting herself from the designs of her enemies. Elizabeth smiled, and presently told Davison to take the warrant to the Lord Chancellor that he might attach the great seal to it, and transmit it to those designed to preside at its execution. The Queen added that this must be done as secretly as possible, as, if the matter were known before the day of execution, it might be dangerous for her. "On the road," she added, with a sinister smile, "you will visit Walsingham to show him the warrant. Ill as he is, I fear the pain it will cause him will kill him outright." After this bitter jest the Queen told Davison that the execution could not be in public; it must not be even in the courtyard at Fotheringay, she said, but must take place in the great hall on the ground-floor, and added that she would be troubled no more about the matter. She desired to hear nothing more till all was over. "For my part," added Elizabeth, "I have done all that can be required of me by law or reason."[94] While, however, Davison was collecting the papers before retiring, the Queen spoke again, and for the first time disclosed in full her real wishes. After complaining of the want of zeal of Paulet and her other advisers, she thus continued: "Ought they not better to understand the spirit of the association of which they are members, and so relieve me of this enormous responsibility? Would it not be better for me to risk personal danger than to take the life of a relation? But if a loyal subject were to save me from the embarrassment by dealing the blow, the resentment of France and Scotland might be disarmed. Sir Amyas Paulet and Drury are members of