Brought into the royal presence, he with difficulty controlled himself. And nothing but the conviction that such a step would effectually defeat his design, prevented him from pouring forth the most violent threats against the queen. As it was, he loudly lamented her adherence to the faith of Rome, entreating her to abjure it, and embrace the new and wholesome doctrines,—a course, which he predicted, would ensure her a long and prosperous reign, whereas, a continuance in her present idolatrous creed would plunge her kingdom in discord, endanger her crown, and, perhaps, end in her own destruction.
Regarding him as a half-crazed, but harmless enthusiast, Mary paid little attention to his address, which was sufficiently wild and incoherent to warrant the conclusion that his intellects were disordered. Pitying his miserable appearance, and inquiring into his mode of life, she ordered him better apparel, and directed that he should be lodged within the palace.
Underhill would have refused her bounty, but, at a gesture from Mary, he was removed from her presence.
This interview troubled him exceedingly. He could not reconcile the queen’s destruction to his conscience so easily as he had heretofore done. Despite all his reasoning to the contrary, her generosity affected him powerfully. He could not divest himself of the idea that she might yet be converted; and persuading himself that the glorious task was reserved for him, he resolved to make the attempt, before resorting to a darker mode of redress. Managing to throw himself, one day, in her way, as she was proceeding along the grand gallery, he immediately commenced a furious exhortation. But his discourse was speedily interrupted by the queen, who ordered her attendants to remove him into the court yard, and cudgel him soundly; directing that any repetition of the offence should be followed by severer chastisement. This sentence was immediately carried into effect. The Hot-Gospeller bore it without a murmur. But he internally resolved to defer no longer his meditated design.
His next consideration was how to execute it. He could not effect his purpose by poison; and any attempt at open violence would, in all probability, (as the queen was constantly guarded,) be attended by failure. He therefore determined, as the surest means, to have recourse to fire-arms. And, being an unerring marksman, he felt certain of success in this way.