Series 3 > Mary Queen of Scots and the Babington plot

INTRODUCTION
xlv
his previous standards, and takes for pure good what
Allen’s college ‘ inveighs against ’ as evil. He even presses
this view on others !
Let us pause before we pass a severe sentence on this
simplicity. We shall find high names in plenty as we
proceed, protestant no less than catholic, of men who
were inveigled into giving confidence to Gilbert, and
afterwards regretted what they had done. Savage sinned
indeed, but amid influential company.
(2) To return to the college of Rheims in 1585. A
college friend of both Gilbert and Savage was Christopher
Hodgson, a priest of the English College, Rome, and now,
like Gilbert, a reader, or tutor as we might say, in phil¬
osophy at Rheims. Like Gilbert he was also miserably
factious, and though he did not fall so low as his com¬
panions, he afterwards became a restless wanderer, a
sacerdotal failure.1
One day, about midsummer, 1585, Hodgson and Savage
were talking about ‘ exploits,’ when they were joined by
Dr. William and also by Gilbert Gifford. The conversa¬
tion turned to the assassination of Elizabeth, and Savage
believed that he was solicited to kill her. Eventually,
after thinking the matter over for three weeks, Savage
agreed and took a vow he would do so, being, it would
seem, distinctly under the impression that Dr. William
Gifford considered this as praiseworthy and meritorious.
I do not myself believe that this was Dr. Gifford’s opinion,2
nor in truth do I feel certain even of the leading facts above
summarised, the evidence for which is liable to very grave
exceptions.
1 Catholic Record Society, ii. pp. 134, 205, and notes. The last we hear
of Hodgson in the correspondence of Gilbert Gifford is that he had possessed
himself of £zooo, belonging to the Earl of Westmorland. R.O., Domestic
Elizabeth, ccxix. 13.
2 Charles Paget says that Dr. Gifford eventually wrote to Walsingham
to protest against Savage’s story.