fallen, imputing it solely to the coldness of the Queen, and in no degree to his own ill conduct, and to the general scorn which it inspired. Eager to gain, at all hazards, a share of power, he once more plunged headlong into most foolish and guilty courses; and as his opponents were mostly Protestants, he-though himself professing that faith-began to intrigue with the Romanists. He went so far as to write secretly to the Pope, blaming and lamenting the conduct of the Queen for not having as yet restored the Mass in her dominions. His intrigues being traced, and his letters intercepted, he, instead of contrition for the fault, only expressed anew his complaint at being excluded from the government, and sullenly withdrew to fix his residence at Stirling. There he pined awhile in unpitied solitude, attended only by his own servants or dependants, and forsaken by all the suitors for Court favour. Among the nobles,' says Robertson, 'some dreaded his furious temper, others complained of his perfidiousness, and all of them despised the weakness of his understanding and the inconstancy of his heart.' * Finding himself utterly unable to form any party at home, he embraced the desperate resolution of leaving the kingdom, repairing to some foreign Court, and remonstrating against the cruelty with which he thought himself treated. He communicated this wild design to his father, the Earl of Lennox; and Lennox, for the purpose of preventing it, hastened to impart it by a letter to the Queen. Mary was much alarmed at the tidings. She perceived the disgrace, that her domestic troubles should be thus heralded abroad, and the danger that Darnley might become a pretext or an instrument in the hands of any power that might, either on political or religious grounds, interfere in her dominions. There followed immediately an interview between her and Darnley, with most earnest remonstrances against his intended flight both from herself and from all the Lords of the Council. Her affectionate and endearing expressions, as reported in a letter from the Lords to the Queen Mother of France, are much dwelt on in her favour by several writers, especially by William Tytler, our author's grandfather, and, more recently, by the acute and learned Lingard. There seems, however, great reason to suspect that these expressions were far more highly coloured than the truth would warrant, since we find the Queen's secretary, at this very time, mention the letter not as written but only as required to be signed by the Lords of Council. Thus much only we consider certain-that *History of Scotland, Book iv. History of England, vol. v. p. 238 note, 4to. ed. Lethington to Archbishop Beatoun, the Queen's ambassador at Paris. Jedburgh, Oct. 24, 1566. The letter from the Lords is dated October 8. Mary Mary and her counsellors remonstrated to the utmost against her husband's project-that his replies were short and sullen-but that, before he returned to Stirling, she had prevailed in making him, at least for the time, relinquish it. At In proportion as her husband sunk, the Earl of Bothwell appeared to rise in Mary's favour. This nobleman was the head of the ancient family of Hepburn, and the lord of extensive estates in the south-east of Scotland. Though himself a Protestant, he had in early life warmly defended Mary of Guise, the Queen Regent, when assailed by the Reformers, and was forced to retire into France from his attachment to her cause. He came back to Scotland some months before Mary herself; but in the ensuing year he was accused of a plot against the Earl of Murray's life, and driven into banishment, nor was he permitted to return until Murray, in his turn, became an exile. He then strengthened his interest by a marriage with Lady Jean Gordon, sister of another powerful noble, the Earl of Huntly, and appeared on all occasions zealously devoted to the support of the Royal cause. We have seen how faithful and important were his services to the Queen in the trying crisis of her flight to Dunbar. From her gratitude or from her partiality he received a succession of favours, especially the wardenship of the three marches, till then conferred upon separate persons; and he already held the office of High Admiral by hereditary right. this time he was less than thirty years of age; and his character, from his repeated exiles, almost unknown in his native country. Throckmorton, the English ambassador at Paris, thus describes him in a despatch of November 28, 1560:- The Earl of Bothwell is departed to return into Scotland, and hath made boast that he will do great things, and live in Scotland in despite of all men. He is a glorious (boastful), rash, and hazardous young man.'From a contemplation of his whole career it may be said that undaunted courage appears his only virtue. In him a profligate love of pleasure was joined and made subservient to a restless and aspiring ambition. Bold, active, and, above all, utterly unscrupulous, of frank, soldier-like address and insinuating manners, he was well skilled in every wile that can ensnare the female heart. We find that during his exile he had succeeded in debauching a noble Norwegian lady by a promise of marriage, and also, it is said, two daughters of a lord at Lubeck.* Man's life he regarded as little as woman's honour, whenever it stood between him and his objects; and he drew from his border estates and office of Lord Warden a band of broken and desperate retainers, hardened and * See Laing's Appendix, No. xxxi. murderous murderous ruffians, whose swords or whose daggers were ready at every bidding of their master. It has been argued by Mary's advocates in this controversy, above all by Goodall and Whitaker, that the Queen felt no unworthy fondness for Bothwell; that her confidence was due to his fidelity; that her bounty had been earned by his services; that she never forgot her duty to the King her husband, and that her final union with Bothwell in the ensuing year sprung not from her attachment but from his compulsion. We must confess that, as it seems to us, this theory, already shaken to its foundations by Robertson and Hume, has been utterly and entirely demolished by Mr. Laing in his able Dissertation. We think it incontrovertible that, after the birth of the prince, Bothwell gradually acquired over the heart of Mary a guilty and absolute ascendant. By what insensible steps her gratitude and confidence may have ripened into tenderness, or how soon he might obtain his triumph, is not so easy to determine. Perhaps even the perfidy of her own attendants may have conspired to her ruin. According to her enemies, she afterwards confessed to Murray, at Lochleven, that she was first betrayed to Bothwell on her return to Alloa (in September, 1566), the Lady Reres having, without her sanction, introduced him one night into her chamber.* This alleged fact appears the more entitled to some weight, since we observe that it was brought forward by her worst accusers, not at all as a palliation, but only for a proof of her guilt. It is also much confirmed by the ninth of the love-sonnets ascribed to her, which distinctly alludes to the same transaction; and adds, that it cost her many tears. If this theory be well founded, it must, however, be acknowledged that the tears which Mary mentions did not long continue to flow. But we lay no stress on these conjectures. God forbid that we should argue that any degree of misconduct in her husband, of skill in her lover, or of treachery in her attendants, can justify a woman for dishonour! Nay, if even it could be proved or presumed that Mary had not absolutely yielded until after her husband's death, we should still arraign her of having relinquished to Bothwell the entire mastery of her affections, and direction of her conduct, and of having thus enabled him and other worthless men to perceive that Darnley was the only obstacle between him and her hand. It chanced that about this time disturbances broke out upon *Buchanan's Detection, 6, compared with Keith, p. 445. See a note to Laing's Dissertation, vol. ii. p. 6. Pour lui aussi je jette mainte larme, Premier, quand il se fit de ce corps possesseur the the borders. The presence of the Queen was needed in those districts, and accordingly Mary, attended by her principal ministers, repaired to Jedburgh, where she determined to hold her courts of justice. She was preceded by a considerable force, and by the Earl of Bothwell, as lord warden, who applied himself with his usual daring energy to the restoration of order. On the 7th of October, attempting to seize, and struggling with one of the ruffians, Elliot of Park, he received a sudden thrust from his sword, and was carried off, dangerously wounded, to his castle of the Hermitage. Next day the Queen opened her courts at Jedburgh; and on the 15th she rode forth to the Hermitage to visit Bothwell, a distance of twenty Scotch miles, remaining with him only two hours, in the presence of other statesmen, and returning the same night. The difficulties and haste of her journey are still recorded in the tradition of the country,-how her white palfrey sunk into a morass, which retains the name of the Queen's Moss; and how she was accompanied by only ten attendants. It is possible to explain her visit as only a mark of regard to a subject of high rank, and in high office, who had nearly lost his life in the execution of his duty;' but a more tender motive may be not less probably surmised. Immediately afterwards the Queen was seized with a burning fever, which has been variously ascribed to fatigue of body, or to anguish of mind. For several days her life was despaired of. During the height of her illness, the King never came to see her; and a visit which he paid some time after the peril was over was short and cold. C'est une faute que je ne puis excuser,' writes the French ambassador, De Croc. On her recovery, Mary, still weak from sickness, proceeded by slow journeys to the castle of Craigmillar, very near Edinburgh, where she remained, still attended by her principal ministers, and by Bothwell, who had now recovered of his wound. Her situation at this time is described by an eye-witness, the French ambassador : The Queen is in the hands of the physicians, and I do assure you is not at all well; and I do believe the principal part of her disease to consist of a deep grief and sorrow. Nor does it seem possible to make her forget the same. Still she repeats these words: "I could wish to be dead." You know very well that the injury she has received is exceeding great, and her Majesty will never forget it. The King, her hus * Laing's Dissertation, vol. i. p. 17. But he has altogether confounded the dates, from relying on Buchanan, and mistaking the ambiguous terms of the Diary called Murray's or Cecil's (vol. ii. p. 85). By what I could wring further of her own declaration to me, the root of it is the King. Lethington to Archbishop Beatoun, October 24, 1566. Keith, Appendix, p. 133. band, band, came to visit her at Jedburgh the very day after Captain Hay came away. He remained there but one single night, and yet in that short time I had a great deal of conversation with him. He returned to see the Queen about five or six days ago; and the day before yesterday he sent word to desire me to speak with him half a league from this, which I complied with, and found that things go still worse and worse. I think he intends to go away to-morrow; but in any event I am much assured that he will not be present at the (prince's) baptism. To speak my mind freely to you, I do not expect, upon several accounts, any good understanding between them, unless God effectually put to his hand. I shall only name two. The first reason is, the King will never humble himself as he ought; the other is, the Queen cannot perceive any one nobleman speaking with the King, but presently she suspects some contrivance among them.' At this very time the busy brain and black heart of Lethington were teeming with projects to sever this ill-starred alliance. In conjunction with Bothwell and Murray, he held a conference at Craigmillar with Huntly and Athol, and afterwards laid before the Queen their joint design. This was, to unite their efforts to procure a divorce between her and her husband. Pretexts were not wanting. Darnley's infidelity might be alleged; or his relation within the forbidden degrees of kindred might, notwithstanding the dispensation for it, afford a plausible, or at least in that age no unusual ground. Lethington also stipulated as a preliminary for the pardon of the Earl of Morton and his confederates in England. To these proposals, when laid before her, Mary declared that she was willing to agree, under the conditions that the process of divorce should be legal, and its effect not prejudicial to the rights of her son. It was then remarked, that after the divorce it would be better that Darnley should live in a remote part of the country, at a distance from the Queen, or retire to France. Upon this Mary, relenting, drew back from the proposal, expressed a hope that he might return to a better mind, and declared her own willingness rather to pass into France herself, and remain there, till he acknowledged his faults. Hereupon Lethington made this remarkable reply: Madam, soucy † ye not we are here of the principal of your Grace's nobility and council, that shall not find the mean well to make your Majesty quit of him without prejudice of your son, and albeit that my Lord of Murray, here present, be little less scrupulous for a Protestant than your Grace is for a Papist, I am assured he will look through his fingers, and will behold our doings, and say nothing thereto.' To these words Mary immediately answered the following: Monsieur de Croc to Archbishop Beatoun, December 2, 1566. A French word-se soucier-the meaning here is, mind ye not,' 'do you not consider.' VOL. LXVII. NO. CXXXIV. Y 'I will |