Diary of the times of Charles II/Volume 1/Mr. Sidney to the Prince of Orange, November 4
MR. SIDNEY TO THE PRINCE OF ORANGE.
November 4.
Sir,
I had writ to you by the last post, but that I was kept a Friday so long at the Council about the examination of the person I told you of at Soesdyke, that I could not have time to write to you, which otherwise I should not have failed of, though I could not hope to have informed you of any thing pleasing. The best news I can tell you is, the King shows great concern for you in every particular, and would be very glad to have you approve the measures he does intend to take, which are not to be written, and, therefore, I am to make haste over, that you may be fully acquainted with every thing.
You will find great changes since I waited upon you at Dieren, and I doubt you will not say they are for the better. I can scarcely forbear writing freely my whole mind, but I must consider the uncertainty of a letter, and defer it till I have the honour to see you, which I hope to do the latter end of the next week; for the present, I will only tell you that the chief business which we apprehended, I am satisfied, is not so bad as we imagined, and I hope never will. The King, I think, is as well in his health as he hath been these many years: he is much abroad, and these last days hath been taken up in the examination of a new plot, which now makes as much noise as the former did. The principal person concerned is one Mr. Willoughby, who saith that my Lord Arundel and my Lord Powys have hired him to kill the King, which he refused; then they offered him £500 to kill my Lord Shaftesbury, and that he undertook: this is believed by a great many, but others will give no credit to it, he being known to be as great a rogue as any in England.