"Apart from the hearsay reports, Father Gerard seems to base his computations on the statement that a barrel of gunpowder contained 400 pounds. This is an error. The barrel of gunpowder contained 100 pounds;[185] the last, which is rightly given at 2,400 pounds, contained twenty-four barrels. The quantity of powder stored in the cellar is repeatedly said, both in the depositions and the indictment to have been thirty-six barrels--that is, a last and a half, or about one ton twelve hundredweight; and this agrees very exactly with the valuation of the powder at 200_l._ In 1588, the cost of a barrel of 100 pounds was 5_l._ But to carry, and move, and stow, a ton and a half in small portable barrels is a very different thing from the task on which Father Gerard dwells of moving and hiding, not only the large barrels of 400 pounds, but also the hogsheads that were spoken of."[186] I will merely add that Father Gerard's surprise that the disposal of so large a mass of powder is not to be traced is the less justifiable, as the Ordnance accounts of the stores in the Tower have been very irregularly preserved, those for the years with which we are concerned being missing. Having thus, I hope, shown that the traditional account of the mine and the cellar are consistent with the documentary and structural evidence, I pass to the question of the accuracy of the alleged discovery of the conspiracy. CHAPTER V THE DISCOVERY In one way the evidence on the discovery of the plot differs from that on the plot itself. The latter is straightforward and simple, its discrepancies, where there are any, being reducible to the varying amount of the knowledge of the Government. The same cannot be said of the evidence relating to the mode in which the plot was discovered. If we accept the traditional story that its discovery was owing to the extraordinary letter brought to Monteagle at Hoxton, there are disturbing elements in the case. In the first place, the Commissioners would probably wish to conceal any mystery connected with the delivery of the letter, if it were only for the sake of Monteagle, to whom they owed so much; and, in the second place, when they had once committed themselves to the theory that the King had discovered the sense of the letter by a sort of Divine inspiration, there could not fail to be a certain amount of shuffling to make this view square with the actual facts. Other causes of hesitancy to set forth the full truth there may have been, but these two were undeniably there.