beth. And here began her difficulties-and very genuine ones they were throughout, though not always creditable ones. Her feelings and principles were entirely opposed to rebellion, under any circumstances. She was sincerely shocked at the thought of deposition—it was a personal question with her; and also at subjects standing up in judgment on their princes' faults. On the other hand, all respect for Mary must have been at an end; it was not possible to regard as sacred the rights of such a woman, and it would never do to allow France to get so powerful a hold upon Scotland as was threatened. So Mignet, after reflections on her tortuous policy, and on actions rarely corresponding with words, concludes with Cecil's promise to the lords, to make his mistress's feelings subordinate to her interests, and to lead her, slowly but surely, to adopt those resolutions which were least agreeable but most advantageous. Mary at first despised the threatened danger, but was soon compelled to view it in a more serious light; and just a month from the date of her marriage, we find her taking the field in person, 'mounted on horseback, preceded by the royal standard of Scotland, and 'dressed in a red gown which reached only to her knees.' The confederates hearing of her intrenching herself on Carberry hill, advanced from Edinburgh to give her battle, bearing a banner on which was painted the body of the murdered King lying under a tree, with the young Prince kneeling beside it, and underneath, the motto, Judge and avenge my cause, O Lord!' The sight of this banner greatly moved the people, animated the confederate soldiers, and affected the loyalty of the Queen's men. At this crisis Du Croc attempted to effect a compromise, but he found the Queen very resolute and animated, and not at all willing for a compromise, though she promised pardon on their submission. Then followed proposals for settling the affair by single combat. Bothwell was ready to fight for his cause, and on the other side there were contentions for the office of champion; but in the meanwhile desertion began amongst her own troops, and Mary at length found herself forced to treat with her rebel subjects; and she agreed to deliver herself up to the confederates if they would allow Bothwell to escape; they in their turn promising, on condition of his dismissal, to return to their allegiance. And thus Mary took leave of her husband, probably with the hope of soon being rejoined by him. They were observed to speak together with much agitation, and then to separate with great anguish and grief.' Bothwell asked the Queen whether she would keep the promise ' of fidelity which she had made to him, of which she assured him, and gave him her hand upon it. Thereupon he mounted his horse, with a small company of about a dozen of his friends,

' and went off at a gallop, taking the road to Dunbar.' She never saw him again.

Mary's love was not of a nature to bear a long absence, nor was he an object for pure attachment; yet for a few weeks or months she clung obstinately to him, after which time his remembrance, for all we know, passed away from her. She got engaged in other plots, and had new objects, to whom she must at least pretend to give her interest. He disappears from the scene till, eight or nine years after, we again come upon the mention of his name. Our readers will remember Bothwell's fate;—that he turned pirate, was captured by a Norwegian vessel, and kept prisoner in Norway till 1576, when he died mad. However, there was a rumour of a confession, and Mary thus writes on the event to her ambassador at Paris:

I have been informed of the death of the Count of Bothwell, and that before his decease he made an ample confession of his faults, and declared himself the author and guilty of the assassination of the late king my husband, of which he frees me, expressly swearing upon the damnation of his soul for my innocence, &c.'-Laing, vol. ii. p. 307.

He

She bids Beton, therefore, try to procure this confession. in his turn, coldly answers that he had heard of it long ago, and that it had given her son great joy, but that he could not procure an authentic copy without money for the messenger's journey, to which Mary (who really never wanted money) replies coolly enough-It seems to me that the journey of Monceaux (her messenger) is not necessary for this purpose, 'as from what you tell me the Queen-mother has sent and so the authentic copy never came.' But this is a peep into the cold future. Mary, after this parting, gave herself up to the confederates, from whom she received a loyal and courteous reception; but on seeking to communicate with the Hamiltons, who had collected a body of men in her cause, she found herself no longer a queen, but a prisoner. The confederates feared a renewal of the war, and the recal of Bothwell, and would not permit her to hold correspondence with her partisans. Upon this she first realized her position, and giving way to most impolitic but not unnatural anger, exhibited all the rage, resentment, and despair,' especially attributed to

'Youthful kings in battle seized alive,

and for once forgot both policy and dissembling. She called for Lindsey, and bade him give her his hand. He obeyed.

1 Upon this Laing is certainly justified in saying The testament is a shallow forgery, of which Mary and Beton were both conscious; and Bothwell himself, as he died mad, was incapable of a genuine confession at his death.'-Laing, vol. ii. p. 51.

By the hand,' said she, which is now in yours, I'll have your head for this.' Morton and Athol she threatened to hang and crucify,' with other impotent threats which only served to widen the breach by showing the use she would make of power should she ever be suffered to regain it. However, Mr. Fraser Tytler admires her spirit, quoting her really effective promise of vengeance to Lindsey, and keeping in the background the wilder fury of her threats of crucifixion. He thus describes her miserable entrance into her capital. He is disgusted with her people's reception of her, and their indignation expresses itself no doubt in a sufficiently barbarous mode. The passage is remarkable to us as containing some evidence of remorse. It was the consciousness of her crime alone which caused her despair. A most wretched picture it is:

It was now evening, and the Queen, riding between Morton and Athol, was conducted to the capital, where she awoke to all the horrors of her situation. She was a captive in the hands of her worst enemies. The populace, as she rode through the streets, received her with yells and execrations; the women, pressing round, accused her in coarse terms as an adulteress stained with her husband's blood; and the soldiers, unrestrained by their officers, kept constantly waving before her eyes the banner on which was painted the murdered King, and the Prince crying for vengeance. At first they shut her up in the provost's house, where she was strictly guarded. It was in vain she remonstrated against the breach of faith; in vain she implored them to remember she was their sovereign; they were deaf to her entreaties, and she was compelled to pass the night, secluded even from her women, in solitude and tears. But the morning only brought new horrors. The first object which met her eyes was the same dreadful banner, which, with a refinement of cruelty, the populace had hung up directly opposite her window. The sight brought an agony of despair and delirium, in the midst of which she tore the dress from her person, and forgetting that she was almost naked, attempted in her frenzy to address the people.'-Tytler, vol. vii. 113.

But we will not pursue the familiar course of history-her imprisonment at Lochleven, her obstinate adherence to Bothwell, the discovery of the casket, the threatened trial by her own subjects, from which she was preserved by Elizabeth; the forced abdication, drawn from her, there is good reason to believe, by the knowledge of the fatal evidence that existed against her; -her escape, the final battle, her flight into England, and the life of imprisonment which followed. Mary's history had events enough in it to furnish excitement for a very long life; what then must have been the tumult of existence in which her six years in Scotland were past? Within seven years she had had three husbands, and had been queen of two kingdoms; had headed campaigns in person; had suppressed insurrections and outwitted statesmen, subdued enemies, fought battles; had found time in these severe occupations for all the delights of society and for every form of amusement; she had had innumerable

admirers, and had experienced every gradation of sentiment, from simple coquetry to the most enthralling passion; she had known too the darkest excitements of conspiracy and crime:always changing scene, and place, and occupation; riding, hunting, dancing, fighting, alternating from failure to triumph, from success to despair, and sustained through all by high spirits, reckless courage, and indomitable pride. What recollections, what habits, what dispositions and character were these with which to plunge suddenly into the monotony of a lifelong imprisonment!

That truly must have been a strong spirit which never once failed or yielded under the trial,-which for twenty years planned, and schemed, and flattered, plotted, conspired, cajoled, and we must add, lied with unabated energy and unflagging hope; and this under the consciousness of a great crime, and the, to her, heavier consciousness that all with whom she had to deal knew and were fully persuaded of her guilt. What bold bad woman was it who said, Une femme comme moi n'est jamais compromise?' This must have been Mary's confidence, a trust in resources which could not be exhausted-a belief that if she could only see men, she could win them-a knowledge of the power of her very remarkable position and her lofty pretensions. There was another thing, too, to sustain her in captivity.

Writers talk much of Elizabeth's hatred of Mary. We believe Mary's feeling towards Elizabeth was a much deeper one. Elizabeth hated Mary,' (we take it for granted, as so many say so,) because she was a thorn in her side, the pretender to her throne, her prisoner whom she dare not set at liberty, and yet could plead no just right to detain; one who was perpetually putting her to difficulties; a load on her fears, on her conscience, and on her credit. But Mary hated Elizabeth, because

Mr. Frazer Tytler quotes a reported message of Elizabeth to Cecil at the time when Mary was a prisoner at Lochleven, and in danger of her life from the vengeance of her subjects, which we think points to her general state of mind towards her, and proves that her 'hatred' was not proof against pity for her condition, nor against the accusings of conscience for her own want of strict integrity in her dealings with her. Tell Cecil that he must instantly write a letter, in my name, 'to my sister, to which I will set my hand, for I cannot write it myself, as I have 'not used her well and faithfully in these broken matters that be past. The purport of it must be to let her know that the Earl of Murray never spoke defamedly of her for the death of her husband, [it was before any commuInication could have reached Elizabeth from him on the subject of the casket,] never plotted for the secret conveying of the Prince into England, never con'federated with the lords to depose her: on the contrary, and in my sister's misery 'let her learn from me this truth, and that is, that she has not a more faithful and 'honourable servant in Scotland.'-Tytler, vol. vii. p. 130.

There is nothing mysterious or unfathomable in this. rival's misery, but a natural revulsion of feeling towards her.

No triumph in her

she knew she was known and despised by her, because her crimes had put her in her power, and even more because she was something to think of, and some one on whom to lay the blame for her misfortunes, diverting the train of bitter thought from herself. She was an object for revenge, some one to plot against, to hope against, to ruin if she could. Elizabeth in the multiplicity of her affairs could think only occasionally of Mary. Elizabeth was the barrier, the ultimate end and thought of every scheme of Mary's.

We have already alluded to the examination of Mary's letters to Bothwell. Our limits forbid our entering into the really interesting details of their production. All the astutest wits of the two kingdoms were engaged on this question. It was an encounter of wits, and all parties, it must be admitted, showed more cleverness than honesty ;-Mary and her commissioners scheming, promising, negotiating, to prevent their being produced, Murray and his party, alive to the advantages which might accrue to them by acceding to this wish, wise, cautious, guarded, alert,-Elizabeth and her ministers, on whom Mignet heaps an endless amount of virtuous vituperation, more than a match for both parties, and selfishly alive to the advantages to be derived to her cause by bringing them to the light. All those who are most lavish of abuse on Elizabeth, are candid at least in the admission of the extreme difficulty and peril of her situation. It must never be forgotten that Mary had asserted her right to the throne of England, and that there were foreign powers to support her right at any fitting opportunity. France and Spain only needed a favourable moment on their side, or a crisis in English affairs, to interpose in the Catholic cause. was only Elizabeth's matchless genius and vigilance which preserved her country from such a crisis. What, then, was to be done with Mary? She could not be sent back to Scotland without an army to support her cause, and surely none who believes in Mary's guilt requires this from Elizabeth's generosity. And if she had been permitted to retire to France, it was giving the party most opposed to Elizabeth on religious grounds a weapon of which persons perhaps hardly realize the importance. Mary's gifts of person and mind also made her all the more formidable. Elizabeth, on her arrival in England, had sent envoys to receive her, whose report of the beautiful fugitive was somewhat of the same character and import as that of the spies of old times: We found her,' they said, in her answers to have an eloquent tongue and a discreet head; and it seemeth by her doings that she hath strict courage and liberal heart 'joined thereto.' This was an alarming account of the woman who had asserted superior claims against her, and whom she

It