“Revealed out of conscience to Andreas ab Habernfeld by an agent sent from Rome into England by Cardinal Barberini, as an assistant to Conn, the Pope’s late Nuncio, to prosecute this most execrable plot (in which he persisted a principal actor several years), who discovered it to Sir William Boswell, his Majesty’s agent at the Hague, 6th September 1640.  He, under an oath of secrecy to the Archbishop of Canterbury, among whose papers it was casually found by Mr. Prynne, May 31, 1643, who communicated it to the king, as the greatest business that ever was put to him.”

Events had succeeded each other with alarming significance.  Nothing was too wild for the Puritans to invent or to believe, and it had been found impossible to uphold Conn in the position of papal envoy to the Queen.  After nearly three years’ service, he had consequently been withdrawn, and in August 1639, Count Carlo Rosetti was sent to lead the forlorn hope of the English Catholics.  His first impression of the state of the country and of the future of Catholicism in England was hopeful.  “I have found,” he wrote to Cardinal Barberini, “in all persons a better disposition and a readiness towards the affairs of religion in general, and an obedience full of reverence towards the particular person of his Holiness our Sovereign, and of your Eminence.”  Windebank was fairly amenable, but Laud had pinned his faith to the Church of England, and was no more favourable to the Catholics than to the Puritans.  He opposed Rosetti in every possible way, burned Catholic books publicly, and threw all his weight and influence in Parliament on the side that favoured the enforcing of the penal statutes.  Meanwhile, the Queen was not idle, and had pleaded successfully with the King for her persecuted coreligionists, so that Rosetti was able to report, “Through the grace of God, all the priests and Catholics are at last released from prison, to their extreme consolation.”

Nevertheless, there was scarcely any further talk of the nation’s return to the bosom of the Church; all that was now hoped for was, that if the King could be got to act with some degree of firmness and consistency, the cause of the unhappy Catholics might not yet be altogether lost.  Rosetti drew, as far as it went, a life-like portrait of Charles in one of his letters: 

“The King,” he says, “is very high-minded; but having no sincere, experienced, and capable persons to assist him, he is often either agitated or changeable, and undecided in the administration of affairs.  He has great parts, and much benevolence, is by nature gentle and moderate, and with regard to morals, is singular among princes.  It is not possible to exaggerate his love of justice; in the exercise of this virtue he is little accessible to compassion, but at the same time, he is no friend of capital punishment.  Honesty is one of the strongest points in his character, but not being surrounded with trustworthy ministers, it often happens that he neglects the interests of the State, and gives himself up to hunting, which is his favourite occupation and amusement.”