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1566

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mands of Knox that the Queen of Scots should abjure CHAP X her own religion, and afterwards to retreat from her position with ignominious and dishonourable evasions. Yet the perplexity of a sovereign whose chief duty at such a time was to prevent a civil war, deserves or demands a lenient consideration. Had Elizabeth declared war in the interest of Murray and the Protestants, she would have saved her honour, but she would have provoked a bloody insurrection; while it would have become more difficult than ever to recognize the Queen of Scots, more hopeless than ever to persuade her into moderation and good sense. If Elizabeth's conduct in its details had General been alike unprincipled and unwise, the broader bearings of Eliza of her policy were intelligible and commendable; her policy. caprice and vacillation arose from her consciousness of the difficulties by which she was on every side surrounded. The Queen of Scots herself had so far shown in favourable contrast with her sister of England: she had deceived her enemies, but she had never betrayed a friend. The greater simplicity of conduct however was not wholly a virtue: it had been produced by the absence of all high and generous consideration. Ambition for herself and zeal for a creed which suited her habits, were motives of action which involved and required no inconsistencies. From the day on which she set foot in Scotland she had kept her eye on Elizabeth's throne, and she had determined to restore Catholicism; but her public schemes were but mirrors in which she could see the reflection of her own greatness, and her creed was but the form of conviction which least interfered with her selfindulgence: the passions which were blended with her policy made her incapable of the restraint which was necessary for her success; while her French training had taught her lessons of the pleasantness of pleasure, for

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CHAP X which she was at any time capable of forgetting every other consideration. Elizabeth forgot the woman in the Queen, and after her first mortification about Leicester preserved little of her sex but its caprices. Mary Stuart when under the spell of an absorbing inclination, could fling her crown into the dust and be woman all.

Prospects of

of Scots.

Could she have submitted to the advice so consistently the Queen pressed upon her by Philip, Alva, Melville, Throgmorton, by every wise friend that she possessed, the impatience of the English for a settlement of the succession would have rendered her success certain. She had only to avoid giving occasion for just complaint or suspicion, and the choice of the country notwithstanding her creed--or secretly perhaps in consequence of it-would have inevitably at no distant time have been determined in her favour. Elizabeth she knew to be more for her than against her. The Conservative weight of the country party would have far outbalanced the Puritanism of the large towns.

But a recognition of her right to an eventual inheritance was not at all the object of Mary Stuart's ambition; nor in succeeding to the English throne did she intend to submit to trammels like those under which she had chafed in Scotland. She had spoken of herself, not as the prospective, but as the actual Queen of England ;' she had told the lords who had followed her to Dumfries that she would lead them to the gates of London; she would not wait; she would make no compromise; she would wrench the sceptre out of Elizabeth's hands,

1That Queen the other day was
in a merchant's house in Edinburgh
where was a picture of the Queen's
Majesty; when some had said their
pinions how like or unlike it was to

Eli. Queen's Majesty of England,
the," said she, "it is not like, for I

am Queen of England." These high words, together with the rest of her doings and meanings towards this realm, I refer to others to consider.'Bedford to Leicester, February 14, 1566. PEPYSIAN MSS. Cambridge.

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1566

with a Catholic army at her back as the first step of a CHAP X Catholic revolution. Even here so far had fortune favoured her she might have succeeded could she but have kept Scotland united, could she but have availed herself skilfully of the exasperation of the Lords of the Congregation when they found themselves betrayed and deserted, could she have remained on good terms with her husband and his father, and kept the friends of the house of Lennox in both countries true to her cause. That opportunity she had allowed to escape. It remained to be seen whether she had learnt prudence from the catastrophe from which she had so narrowly escaped; whether she would now abandon her more dangerous courses, and fall back on moderation; or whether, if she persisted in trying the more venturous game, she could bring herself to forego the indulgence of those personal inclinations and antipathies which had caused the tragedy at Holyrood. If she could forget her injuriesif she could bury in Ritzio's grave her desire to revenge his murder—if she avoided giving open scandal to the Catholic friends of Darnley and his mother, her prospects of an heir would more than re-establish her in the vantage-ground from which she had been momentarily shaken.

Elizabeth, either through fear or policy, seemed as anxious as ever to disconnect herself from the Congregation. The English Government had been informed a month beforehand of the formation of the plot; they had allowed it to be carried into execution without remoustrance; but when the thing was done, and Murray was restored, the Queen made haste to clear herself of the suspicion of having favoured it. Sir Robert Melville was residing in London, and was occupied notoriously in gaining friends for the Scotch succession. Elizabeth

ELIZ. II.

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CHAP X sent for him, and when it was too late to save Ritzio, she revealed to him the secret information which had been supplied by Randolph; nay, in one of the many moods into which she drifted in her perplexities, she even spoke of Argyle and Murray as rebels pretending reformation of religion.' There were too many persons in England and Scotland who were interested in dividing the Protestant noblemen from the English court. The Queen's words were carried round, to rend still further what remained of the old alliance; and Randolph, discredited on all sides, could but protest to Cecil against the enormous mischief which Elizabeth's want of caution was producing.1

Elizabeth takes Mary

Stuart's side.

It appeared as if the Queen had veered round once more, and was again throwing herself wholly into Mary Stuart's interests. She replied to the letter which the Queen of Scots addressed to her from Dunbar by sending Melville to Scotland with assurances of sympathy and help; she wrote to Darnley advising him to please the Queen of Scots in all things,' and telling him that she would take it as an injury to herself if he offended her again; she advised Murray 'to be faithful to the Queen his sovereign,' under pain of her own displeasure.2 As to the second set of fugitives who had taken shelter in England-Morton, Ruthven, and the restshe told Bedford that she would neither acquit nor condemn them, till she was more fully informed of their conduct, and that for the present they might remain under his protection; but she insisted that they must move to a distance from the frontier, and Melville was allowed to?

Randolph to Cecil, June 17. The letter is addressed significantly 'to Mr. Secretary's self, and only for himself.'-BURLEIGH Papers, vol. i.

2 Sir R. Melville to Elizabeth, April 1.- -Scotch MSS. Rolls House. Elizabeth to Bedford, April 2.— MS. Ibid.

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promise Mary Stuart that they should meet with nothing CHAP X but rigour.'

De Silva informed Philip that the terror of the scene through which she had passed had destroyed the hope which the Queen of Scots had entertained of combining her subjects against the Queen of England. 'She had found them a people fierce, strange, and changeable-she could trust none of them ;1 and she had therefore responded graciously to the tone which Elizabeth assumed towards her.' In an autograph letter of passionate gratitude, Mary Stuart placed herself as it were under her sister's protection; she told her that in tracing the history of the late conspiracy she had found that the lords had intended to imprison her for life, and if England or France came to her assistance they had meant to kill her; she implored Elizabeth to shut her ears to the calumnies which they would spread against her, and with engaging frankness she begged that the past might be forgotten; she had experienced too deeply the ingratitude of those by whom she was surrounded to allow herself to be tempted any more into dangerous enterprises; for her own part, she was resolved never to give offence to her good sister again; nothing should be wanting to restore the happy relations which had once existed between them; and should she recover safely from her confinement she hoped that in the summer Elizabeth would make a progress to the north, and that at last she might have an opportunity of thanking her in person for her kindness and forbearance.2

This letter was sent by the hands of a certain

1566 April

1 De Silva to Philip.-MS. Simancas.

2 The Queen of Scots to Elizabeth, April 4.-Scotch MSS. Printed by LABANOFF, vol. vii. p. 300.

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