B.--_The Account sent by Salisbury to the Ambassadors abroad, and the Deputy in Ireland, November 9th, 1605._
1. The letter was received about _eight_ days before the Parliament.
2. Upon perusal thereof, Salisbury and Suffolk, the chamberlain, "both conceived that it could not be more proper than the time of Parliament, nor by any other way to be attempted than with powder, while the King was sitting in that Assembly." With this interpretation other Lords of the Council agreed; but they thought it well not to impart the matter to the king till three or four days before the session.
3. His Majesty was "hard of belief" that any such thing was intended, but his advisers overruled him and insisted on a search, not however till the last moment.
4. About 3 o'clock on the afternoon of Monday, November 4th, the Lord Chamberlain, Suffolk, visited the cellar, and found in it only firewood and not Faukes.
5. The lords however insisting, in spite of the king, that the matter should be probed to the bottom, Knyvet was despatched with orders to "_remove all the wood, and so to see the plain ground underneath_."
6. Knyvet, about midnight, "going unlooked for into the vault, found that fellow Johnson [_i.e._, Faukes] _newly come out of the vault_," and seized him. Then, having removed the wood, he perceived the barrels.
C.--_The Account furnished by Salisbury for the information of the King of France, November 6th, 1605. (Original draft, in the P.R.O.)_
1. The letter was received _some four or five days_ before the Parliament.
2. This being shown to the king and the lords, "their lordships found not good ... to give much credit to it, nor yet so to contemn it as to do nothing at all."
3. It was accordingly determined, the night before, "to make search about that place and to appoint a watch in the old Palace, to observe what persons might resort thereabouts."
4. Sir T. Knyvet, being appointed to the charge thereof, _going by chance, about midnight, into the vault, by another door, found Faukes within_. Thereupon he caused some few faggots to be removed, and so discovered some of the barrels, "_merely, as it were, by God's direction, having no other cause but a general jealousy_."[263]
Never, assuredly, was a true story so hard to tell. Contradictions like these, upon every single point of the narrative, are just such as are wont to betray the author of a fiction when compelled to be circumstantial.