other known document, avowed its object not appear that his last moments betrayed to be murder,) was subscribed on the 1st of a glimpse of natural compunction. March; and on Saturday the 9th of the same During the tumult the queen remained month, between seven and eight o'clock in for a long time in the closet, interceding the evening, in the palace of Holyrood for her favorite, who was probably then House, it was carried into execution. Per- dead. She asked her husband how he could haps it was hastened by the impatience and be the author of so foul an act. The reimportunity of Darnley, as well as by the crimination was too coarse for historical reapproach of the parliament, which was sum-lation. “It was,” he said, “as much for moned to meet on the 12th, for the attain your honor as for my own satisfaction."* der of the lords. Darnley conducted Ruth-The nature of her defence; her retort on ven and other assassins through his private Ruthven; her lothsome assent to Darnley's staircase, by the use of his own key, into a desire of resuming all the usual exterior small room where the queen was at supper of living together, with her backwardness with Rizzio, her natural sister the countess and her evasions about such intercourse af of Argyle, and some other favorites. Ruth- ter such a 'scene, are conclusive and disven rose from a sick bed, to which he had gusting proofs that the highest-born beaubeen for three months confined by a pain- ties of the court of Catherine de Medicis ful, and, as it soon proved, a mortal, illness. threw but a thin veil over their frailties, He was now in armor; though he could only and deported themselves with so little delicome into the apartment by the support of cacy as to render jealousy somewhat extwo men. The paleness of his haggard cusable, however ungenerous or unwarcountenance, sometimes flushed by guilty rantable. After this offensive conversation, passions, formed a gloomy contrast with the she sent one of her ladies to learn the fate glare of his helmet. Rizzio had his cap on of Rizzio. The lady quickly returned with his head as Ruthven entered; and Darnley tidings that she had seen him dead. The hung on the queen's chair with his hand queen, with a spirit that never forsook her, round her waist. That unhappy lady was said, "No more tears; I must think of rein the sixth month of her pregnancy by her venge." She wiped her eyes, and was contemptible husband. Ruthven called to never seen to lament the murdered man. her-"Let Rizzio leave this privy chamber, To complete the narrative of an event where he has been too long." It is my sufficient to dishonor a nation, and to charwill he should be here," said the queen. acterize an age, it may be added, that the "It is against your honor," answered Darn-earl of Morton, lord chancellor of Scotland, ley. "What hath he done?" said the queen. commanded the guard who were posted at "He hath offended your honor," replied the entrances of the palace to protect the Ruthven, "in such a manner as I dare not murderers from interruption.† speak of." The queen rose up; and David ran behind her, laying hold of the plaits of tered into a vehement suspicion of David having *This we find for certain, that the king had enher gown. Ruthven lifted up the queen, committed something which was most against the and placed her in the arms of Darnley, who queen's honor, and not to be borne by her husband." -Letter from Bedford and Randolph, 27 Mar. ii. disengaged Rizzio's hands from the hold Ellis, 208. "Marie Stuart reine d'Ecosse avait un which he had taken of her garments. Sev-beau mari, et delectabatur turpibus adulteris. eral persons here rushed in, and overset Lorsque j'y étois, elle étoit eu mauvais menage avec son mari, à cause de la mort de ce. David. the table with the supper and lights. Riz-L'histoire de Buchanan est très vrai ; elle ne parloit zio was pushed out to the antechamber; at point avec son mari. C'étoit une belle créature! the front of which he fell under fifty-five in the dispatches, it is clear that Castelnau was the -Scaligerana, 149. From the mention of Mauvissier wounds, in one of which Darnley's dagger ambassador whom Joseph Scaliger accompanied. was found, whether employed by himself or circumstance for which they are quoted, is confirm The universal prevalence of these rumors, the only by one of his accomplices is neither certain ed by the language of the accurate Dutch histonor important. Ruthven is said to have rian, Van Metteren, who resided, during a great part of his life, in England. "Henri par jalousie aimed a stab at the victim over the queen's fit oter de sa table et massacrer David Rizzio, musineck. He seated himself, and called for a cien Piedmontois, qui étoit dans la bonne grace de cup of wine, which drew a spirited reproof a Royne."-Metteren, Hist. de Pays Bas, liv. iii. of his familiarity from Mary. He appealed The principal contemporary accounts of the to his illness as an excuse. Though worked murder of Rizzio are Knox, Buchanan, and Melup by the contemplation of a crime into Randolph at Berwick (printed by Dr. Robertson in ville, together with the dispatch from Bedford and ruffianly paroxysm of distempered vigor, he his appendix, and by Mr. Ellis in his letters); the speedily relapsed into the feebleness inci- letter written on the 2d of April in the queen's name to the archbishop of Glasgow, the minister dent to his malady. He expired about two at Paris, (Keith, 330-334.); and the narrative sent months afterwards. He left behind him to Elizabeth by Morton and Ruthven from Berwick, a narrative of his crime, written in a tone which appears in Keith without subscription or adin the latter end of April, (Keith's App. 119. 129.) of undisturbed impartiality; and it does dress, but was probably the same which is referred a p. 266. Bothwell and Huntly, the most obnox-Such was the displeasure of the contemptious of the Catholic ministers, made their ible youth, her husband, that, in his despair, escape in the night of the murder. On he conceived the wild project of leaving Monday the 11th, the banished lords came Scotland; and had actually prepared a vesto Edinburgh. On the entrance of Moray sel to convey him to the continent, either to into the palace, Mary embraced and kissed appeal to the compassion of foreign princes, him, declaring" that if he had been at home, or to escape from the odium which surhe would not have allowed her to be so rounded him. On the 5th of August the discourteously handled; which so moved earl of Bedford informed Cecil, that "the him that the tears fell from his eyes." ."*king and queen agree worse than before. She informed the archbishop of Glasgow, She eateth seldom with him, and does not that " Moray, seeing our condition, was keep company with him; nor loveth any moved by natural affection towards us." such as love him. It cannot, for the sake of The attractions of Mary prevailed over the modesty, nor consistently with the honor of fidelity of Darnley towards his accomplices: a queen, be reported what she said of she obtained the discharge of the guard, him.”** On the 15th of September he under the specious pretext of showing the came to the queen at Edinburgh, to make liberty of the king and queen after their known to her his chimerical scheme for hearty reconciliation. He was content to leaving Scotland: he refused to enter, bedisavow in public whatever he had written cause he found that she was in council with or sworn; and she carried him towards three or four lords. She, however, condeDunbar, after stealing out of Holyrood scended so far as to meet him without the House at midnight. The particulars of the palace, and conducted him to her own remainder of this year belong to the histo- apartment, where he passed the night. Afrians of Scotland. To us only pertains such ter much conversation, in which he denied an account of them as may explain the that he had any discontent, he said, " Adieu, policy of England; of which, however, the madam; you shall not see my face for a ascendant of the Protestant party in Scot- long time." A project so absurd died out land continued to be the main object. The of itself. Meantime, Mary gave suspicious birth of a prince on the 19th of June was marks of her partiality for Bothwell, in the deemed by Moray and Castelnau an event course of journeys towards the borders, of sufficiently auspicious to revive the habits which he was warden. That lord being of conjugal intercourse between the queen wounded in one of the accustomed affrays and her husband; the reconciliation was, by a border laird named Elliot, the queen however, only apparent; the just indigna- made a journey of twenty miles on horsetion of Mary against Darnley continually back to visit him; and returned on the same broke out. "I could perceive nothing," said day to Jedburgh, where the assizes were Melville, “but a great grudge that she had held. It was then generally suspected that in her heart. He moves about alone; few her visit was prompted by passion, and her dare to bear him company." return hastened by shame. On the 17th of The unpopular influence of Bothwell October, the day after her return, she was increased: he, with Huntly and the bishop seized with a dangerous fever in conseof Ross, labored to undermine the reviving quence of her violent exertion. Bothwell ascendant of Moray, the sole stay of public came to her as soon as he could travel. quiet. Darnley complained to his wife that "Darnley followed her about," says Melhe was not trusted with authority; that no ville, "wherever she went; but he could one attended him; and that the nobility get no good countenance.”††—“ As soon," shunned his society. Bothwell," says says a contemporary writer, "as he underKilligrew, the new English minister, "is stood her visitation, he addressed himself thought, and said, to have more credit with with expedition towards her, although he the queen than all the rest. Leslie, bishop was not welcomed as was fit."‡‡ of Ross, doth manage all her state affairs."]] 66 to as about to be sent in a dispatch of the 2d of † Keith, 332. Cecil's Diary, Cal. b. ix. 217. and Keith's App. 169. T Privy council of Scotland to the queen-mother of France. Edinb. 8th Oct. 1566. Lecroc to archbishop of Glasgow, 15th Oct. 1566. Jedburgh. Keith, 345. 350. Historie of James VI. 4th ed. Edin. 1825. Crauford of Drumsoy, historiographer of Scotland in the reign of queen Anne, had so falsified this work, to suit the politics of a Stuart reign, as to render his publication of it in all important particulars a forgery; which was indeed intimated by Keith, and almost owned by Whitaker; but was first completely detected by my excellent friend, Mr. Laing, Mr. Chalmers's observations on the delay of a few days in the journey to Hermitage are very satis factorily obviated by the account of this writer. The queen, on her recovery, went to ever depraved, should, so soon after a hurCraigmillar Castle, near Edinburgh, in ried and superficial reconciliation, trust November, where she showed such marks each other so far as to consult together of despondency and depression as often to about a project for the most hazardous of cry out, "I wish that I were dead."* The murders. In order to make Moray a party lords who attended her had so little doubt to a black project, blind zeal has representof the source of this despairing language, ed this conversation as a proposal to put that they proposed to her their assistance Darnley to death, without adverting to the in obtaining a divorce. In answer to Leth- improbabilities now mentioned, and withington she said, that she might consider out considering that such a supposition such a proposition, if it were to be carried brings on the queen the imputation of havon lawfully, and without prejudice to the ing patiently listened to a plan for the murrights of her son. "Think not," said Leth- der of her husband. "The ington, "that we, your principal nobles, But the conversation at Craigmillar, would not find the means to be quit of him though it did not contemplate violence, is without damage to the prince; and though a decisive proof of the daring hopes of my lord of Moray be little less scrupulous Bothwell, and of the irrecoverable alienafor a Protestant than your grace is for a tion of the queen from her undeserving Papist, I am sure he will look through his husband. On the 2d of December, Le fingers to our doings, saying nothing to the Croc despairs of a good understanding besame." The queen hinted at scruple and tween Darnley and Mary, without a spereluctance. Lethington concluded,—“ Let cial interposition of Providence. us guide the matter, and you shall see king," says he, "will not humble himself nothing but what is approved in parlia- enough; and the queen cannot see a single ment." This conversation was natural, if nobleman speak to him without suspecting applied in its literal meaning to a legal a contrivance." The baptism of the young divorce, which it was commonly believed prince was performed at Stirling on the that Thornton had been sent by the queen 17th day of December, with due solemnity to solicit at Rome. That it related solely and magnificence, before the earl of Bedto such a proceeding, is apparent from the ford, who was sent by Elizabeth, and the number of persons who were present; from count de Brienne, who was chosen by the scruples spoken of, as founded on two Charles IX., to represent their sovereigns opposite systems of religion; and from the at this august ceremony, which deeply inreference to a parliamentary ratification. terested nations. Darnley alone, though It was necessary, for the honor of the mocked with the royal title, was excluded queen, that the proposition to which she from the christening of his son, by the dispatiently listened, and to which she annex-couraging treatment which he received ed serious conditions, should have been in from the queen, and the universal alienaits nature innocent. Mary's objection to a tion of the nobility: he desired an interlegal divorce was, by either system of re- view with Le Croc three times on the day ligion, very forcible: for, on Catholic prin- of the baptism; but Le Croc answered, ciples, there could hardly be any dissolu- that, "seeing he was in no good correstion of marriage except as a consequence pondence with the queen, the ambassador of a sentence pronouncing its original nul- was instructed by the most Christian king lity, which would bastardize the prince; to have no conference with him."¶ while, according to the creed of the Scot- While Darnley was thus degraded in tish reformers, a divorce, allowing the the eyes of his country and of Europe,— innocent party to marry, was scarcely al- while he was treated as one who had forlowed; and the capital punishment of the feited the outward distinctions of a husoffender was proposed as a preferable rem- band and a father, to say nothing of his edy. The reference to parliament demon- dignity as a titular king,-Bothwell had strates that a legal divorce only was con- been chosen to receive the two ambassatemplated at Craigmillar, and indeed it is dors, and to direct the ceremonial of the not credible that men of sound mind, how- christening; a choice which displeased the nobility. Darnley left Stirling privately, "Understanding the certainty of this accident, she and without taking leave of the queen, on was so highly commoved in mind, that she took no the evening of the 24th of December, to repose in body till she saw him." p. 2. * Le Croc, Disp. 2d Dec. 1566. Keith's pref. vii. take shelter from such public affronts in Keith's App. 138. This is the account laid by the his father's house at Glasgow. At the queen's friends, Huntly and Argyle, before Elizabeth. Randolph to Cecil, 25th April, 1566. Robertson's App. xvi. § Knox's Confession of Faith, 1560, article "Marriage." Spottiswood, 172. Le Croc evidently ascribes the estrangement as much, at least, to the queen as to Darnley. ¶ Le Croc's dispatch, 23d Dec. 1566. ** Sir John Foster to Cecil, 4th Dec. 1566. Robertson's App. xvii. same time, Mary passed the festive season guage must be found in the glimpse of her of Christmas at Drummond Castle and succeeding misfortunes which shoots across Tullibardine, the residences of two noble the story of her transgressions, and checks families in the neighborhood. On hearing the pen about to relate them in more adethat her husband was attacked by the small-quate language. pox, she sent her physician to him.* The On the 31st of January, 1567, Mary visit which she at length made to him oc- brought her husband to Edinburgh. Reprecurred at a remarkable moment. Her first senting Craigmillar as too distant, and known separation from Bothwell was in the Holyrood House as too noisy a dwelling end of January, 1567. About the 20th of for an invalid, she placed him in a lone that month, we learn from lord Morton's house, called the Kirk of Field, situated in dying confession, that Bothwell went to the fields to the southward of the city, not Wittingham, and proposed to Morton to far from the spot which the south-east take a part in the murder of the king; angle of the university now occupies. Afwhich Morton refused without a written ter his arrival, Darnley (says Sir James order of the queen, from whom Bothwell Melville) suspected that the earl of Bothalleged that he had a verbal authority to well had some enterprise against him.ý propose this crime. On the 20th of Jan- Here Mary paid him frequent visits, and uary, Mary speaks to her minister at Paris caused a bed-chamber to be fitted up for of her husband in the following terms:- herself under his apartment, where she "For the king our husband, God knows sometimes slept. our part towards him, and his behavior and On the evening of Sunday the 9th of thankfulness are likewise well known to February, being attended by Bothwell and God and the world: our subjects see it, and other courtiers, she remained there till afin their hearts doubtless condemn it." ter ten o'clock, when she returned to the Within a day of writing this letter Mary palace to be present at a masque given on went to Glasgow, to persuade her husband occasion of the marriage of Margaret Carto accompany her to Edinburgh, necessarily wood, one of her attendants, to Bastien, a with the appearance of perfect reconcilia- French servant. Between two and three tion, and probably with those professions of o'clock the inhabitants of Edinburgh, then affection which, in so close a relation, were a small town, were suddenly awakened by necessary to obliterate all the angry re- a tremendous shock, as it seemed to them, membrances of a long and apparently eter- of thunder and earthquake. As soon as the nal quarrel. It may be doubted whether day dawned, it was discovered that the there be any instance of heartfelt forgive- king's house had been blown up, and his ness by a proud and beautiful queen, who body carried to a little distance from it, had suffered such indignities as Darnley where it was found without any external poured on her during the murder of Rizzio. marks of violence.|| But if she abstained from retaliation, and On the 10th the privy council published had silenced vindictive passion, the merit a proclamation, offering a reward of 20000. of her magnanimity would be rather tar- sterling to any one who would discover the nished than brightened by an affectation murderers. In six days after, a bold plaof tenderness for the assassin of her min- card was affixed on the walls throughout ister and the slanderer of her own honor. the city, charging the murder on Bothwell Such forgiveness was rendered more diffi- and those among his followers who were cult by the innumerable proofs of displea- afterwards ascertained to have shared his sure which seemed so many public pledges guilt, and expressly accusing the queen as of her steadiness. If she ever remitted her having been a party to this deed of blood. dissatisfaction, it seems only to have been The privy council required the accusers when she had a purpose to serve. Within to come forward. The anonymous writer a few weeks of the day when the French minister pronounced her resentment to be inflexible, she gave marks of reconciliation. If she was really reconciled, the striking appearance of hypocrisy in her conduct was afterwards thought more probable that he was renders her the most unfortunate of wo- which was designed to conceal the manner of his suffocated, and carried out before the explosion; men; if she feigned reconciliation for sin- death. Mr. Hume inclines to the former opinion, ister ends, it must be owned that her fault which has the difficulty of supposing that a body thrown on the ground by such a shock should have had no extenuation, and that the only ex-received no outward hurt. On the other hand, it cuse for speaking of her in lenient lan § Melville, 174. The first account ascribed the death of Henry to the explosion, (letter of Mary to the archbishop of Glasgow, 11th Feb. 1567. Keith. pref. viii.) It does not seem that the explosion could conceal the suffocation, or indeed answer any purpose. Perhaps the most reasonable explanation is, that some part *There was then only one medical practitioner of what is attributed to deep design ought to be in Scotland.-Scaligerana, 236. f State Trials, i. t Keith. ascribed to the confusion incident to a criminal enterprise. was James Murray,* a brother of Sir Wil- taken, it appears to me better in this world liam Murray, of Tullibardine; and he re- that you had lost life and all. Alas! madam, plied, in a second placard, that he was all over Europe there is no subject so comready to appear on the following Sunday, mon as your majesty and your realm; and with four witnesses, if the money were de- it is for the most part interpreted in the posited in safe hands, and if Bastien and most sinister sense. I beseech you to esJoseph Rizzio were apprehended and com- tablish that reputation which has hitherto mitted to prison: so general and imme- prevailed of your virtue: otherwise I fear diate was the outcry against Bothwell, that this is but the first act of a tragedy; and so early did it extend to Mary. The which I pray God to avert."|_ Had it been council did not choose to risk an answer. possible that a woman of Mary's underThe earl of Lennox wrote a letter to Mary, standing was only an instrument in the demanding the trial of the murderers of hands of her secret enemies, the honest his son, almost on the same day with Mur- voice of her faithful servant must have ray's second placard; and soon after desired awakened her to a sense of her danger. that a meeting of the nobility and of the The tidings of the murder were accomother estates should be held at the time of panied at London by the imputation of the the trials. On the 17th of March, after crime to Bothwell.§ The unexpected rean evasive and unfriendly correspondence, serve of Robert Melville, the Scotch envoy, Lennox required the apprehension of Both- excited suspicions among the English minwell, with his partisans Balfour, Chalmers, isters. Cecil mentions to Norris, then at and Spence; to whom were added three Paris, some days later, that the placards of the queen's servants, Bastien, Bordeaux, involved the queen, in language which the and Joseph Rizzio, the brother of David. wary statesman held best to be suppressed.|| On the 24th, she answered this letter un-"Common speech," he adds, "touches satisfactorily, passing over in silence the Bothwell and Huntly, who remain with the requisition to commit the accused, and in- queen;" and, on the 21st of March, he informing Lennox that the trial was to be forms the same minister, that "common held on the 12th of April; which was ac- fame in Scotland continueth upon Bothwell, cordingly done fourteen days after, in an and the queen's name is not well spoken age when it was the common course to of." On the 9th of March, Lennox so give forty days' notice to all parties of a strongly felt his helpless situation as to trial for treason. A fortnight was thus left implore the aid of Elizabeth, whom he had to a father to prepare for the prosecution little reason to consider as a friend.** Elizaof the assassins of his son; while Both- beth, when she discerned that there was an well, the known leader of these assassins, intention to defeat his just resentment by sat in the council which appointed the day a pretended trial, and to consummate the of trial, and lived openly in the residence dishonor of the queen of Scots by an un of the queen, whether at Seaton or at hallowed marriage, addressed a letter to Edinburgh. Her servants, who were pub- Mary, which does credit to the writer, and licly charged as his accomplices, were at aggravates the guilt of her to whom it was large in the palace: there seemed little written in vain:-"For the love of God, hope of even a semblance of justice in a madam, exert your prudence and sincerity, prosecution thus hurried on against culprits so that the world may with reason clear so powerful or so protected. you of a crime so enormous that, if you Yet Mary was not left without warning: were guilty, it would degradett you from her faithful servant, archbishop Beaton, in the rank of a princess. Speaking to you as a letter to her from Paris, on the 9th of I should to a daughter, I declare that I March (which must have been before her should rather prefer for you an honored when she fixed the collusive trial) address-grave than a spotted life." Nor was this ed her in language of affectionate fervor, to Keith, pref. ix., somewhat modernized, and || Ibid. the following effect:-" Madam,-You are with the omission of what seems unimportant. wrongfully calumniated as the prime § Cabala, 125. Cecil to Sir Thomas Smith at Paris, mover of all the evil done in Scotland, 20th February, 1566. which is said to be by your command. From what your majesty writes to me yourself, I can conclude nothing but that, since God has preserved you to take a rigorous vengeance, if it be not actually * James Murray, of Purdoves.-Douglas's Peer. of Scotland (Wood's ed.) i. 146. T Ibid. ** His letter is in the State Paper Office. tt The letter is written in French. The word rendered "degrade," is" esboyer;" which, according to an ancient French dictionary, is derived from boyaux," and must have signified ejection, in a coarse sense. But how far its original grossness may have been mitigated by the usage of that age, it is impossible now to determine. Elizabeth to Mary, after alluding to her letters † See the list of privy counsellors present on that by Le Croc about three weeks before, which, from day, in Anderson's Collections, i. p. 50.; extracted verbatim from the records of the Scottish privy council. the allusion, must have been of the same tendency, though perhaps less decisively expressed. Robertson's App. xix. |