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Although there was no proof of Newcastle’s complicity in this plot, the fact that his appointment to command the army of the North was part of its scheme made the Parliament suspect him more strongly than ever.

The effect of all this was that the Queen was now even more hateful to the Parliament than was the King. The crisis arrived when five members of Parliament began to urge that the Queen, as the prime author of the encroachments upon the liberties of the subjects, should be formally impeached. The King still hesitated; but, according to the well-known story, the Queen said to him:ssss1 “Go, you coward! and pull these rogues out by the ears, or never see my face again”. The Queen told Lady Carlisle of this little episode, Lady Carlisle told Essex, Essex told others, and others told the five members, who made their escape in safety.

ssss1 Gardiner’s History, X, p. 136.

Urged on the one side by his councillors to use the utmost caution, on the other by his Queen to be a man and to put his foot down, the vacillating and nervous King, in a moment of spasmodic courage, threatened the Parliament; whereupon the Parliament threatened the King, who then practically ran away, leaving London on 10 January, 1642.