A STRONG GOVERNMENT - DARNLEY GETS THE TITLE OF KINGPARLIAMENTARY DISPLEASURE WITH THE ASSUMPTION-ARMING OF MURRAY AND HIS SUPPORTERS-THEIR DISPERSAL-PRESENT THEMSELVES TO ELIZABETH-HOW TREATED BY HER-DANGER OF ELIZABETH AND THE PROTESTANT CAUSE- PROJECTS OF THE ROMANIST POWERS-CONFERENCE AT BAYONNE-PHILIP, CATHERINE OF MEDICI, AND ALVA-DARNLEY'S CHARACTER DEVELOPS ITSELF-ODIOUS AMONG THE COURTIERS-HIS WIFE'S APPRECIATION OF HIM— PROGRESS OF RIZZIO'S INFLUENCE- PROJECT FOR PUTTING HIM OUT OF THE WAY-THE BAND FOR HIS SLAUGHTER -ARRANGEMENTS FOR EFFECTING IT-THE SUPPER-PARTY-RIZZIO DRAGGED OUT AND SLAIN INQUIRY AS TO WHEN THE QUEEN KNEW OF HIS DEATH-HER CONDUCT BEFORE AND AFTER THAT KNOWLEDGE-LURES BACK HER HUSBAND-RETURN OF MURRAY AND HIS FOLLOWERS FROM ENGLAND-MURRAY MAKES PEACESECRET ARRANGEMENT OF THE QUEEN AND HER HUSBAND-THEIR ESCAPE TO DUNBAR.

THE world has been so accustomed to treat this marriage as a rash love-match, that what political significance it had is overlooked. This was far less momentous than the questions which a union with Spain or France might have raised, but it was not without importance. Darnley's mother did not forget that she, like Elizabeth, was a granddaughter of Henry VII., with this difference, according to the notion of herself and her religious party, that she was not, like the woman on the throne, tainted with illegitimacy.1

1 For an animated account of the little opposition court presided over by Lady Lennox, in Yorkshire, see Froude, vii. 387, 389.

The new sovereigns began their reign with measures of successful vigour, which seemed to promise a strong and orderly government under the old religion and the old regal authority. A portion of the Protestant barons, including Murray, Glencairn, Rothes, and Kirkcaldy of Grange, resolved to combine against the new order of things. They stated that the laws against idolatry were not enforced, and that the mass and other abominations were tolerated. They stated, further, that the true religion was oppressed; and though this was not according to strict fact, unless the countenance given to Popery were to be set down as oppression, yet it is plain that Protestantism was in imminent danger; for the queen and her supporters were as fully determined to suppress Heresy whenever they were able, as Knox and his party were to suppress Idolatry. But there were other grounds for opposition of a constitutional character. The queen had not ventured to face a Parliament, and ask their sanction to her late doings. She had not only taken to herself a husband without consulting the great Council of the nation -an indecorous and ungracious thing-but she had proclaimed her husband as King of the Scots. It was maintained that this was illegal, since the monarch reigned by the assent of the Estates of the realm, and could not transfer any portion of the sovereign power to another without the intervention of these Estates. The power asserted by the Estates in such constitutional matters was very wide, and there was at least no precedent to support a denial of the claim in question. The portion of the declaration issued by the discontented barons at Dumfries which refers to this matter is extremely valuable, as one of the few lights, other than what the acts of the Estates themselves give us, on the constitutional power claimed for the Parliament of Scotland. They say

"Of the same sinister counsel doth proceed that her majesty, without the advice of her Estates, yea, without the advice of the nobility either demanded or given, hath made and proclaimed a king over us, giving unto him, so far as in her highness lieth, power over our lands, lives, and heritages, and whatsoever is dearest unto us on the earth.

In the which doing the ancient laws and liberties of this realm are utterly broken, violated, and transgressed, and the liberty of the crown and state royal of Scotland manifestly overthrown, that he was made king over us that neither hath the title thereof by any lineal descent of blood and nature, neither by consent of the Estates."1 It was afterwards put by Cecil to the French ambassador Le Croc, as a justification of the conduct of Elizabeth, that the assumption of the title of king without the assent of the Estates was contrary to law; and the Frenchman was reminded that even so illustrious a personage as the queen's first husband, Francis, had not taken the title of King of Scotland until it had been accorded by consent of the Estates, 2

Meanwhile Randolph, with special instructions as to the tone of the English Court on the affair of the marriage, found it expedient to adopt the view of the declaration, and to deny Darnley's right to act as King Henry. His mistress had sent to him, as a coadjutor in his mission, a gentleman of her Court known as Sir John Tamworth, who suffered in the body for a rigid adherence to the principle of non-acknowledgment. Refusing to accept of a safe-conduct in the name of "King Henry," he was detained on his way back to England by the border freebooters, who secured him in Hume Castle, an act which he said had been suggested to them from Holyrood.

Those bound to give suit and military service were repeatedly required to attend the "raid" or array. The absence of important persons from these levies pointed them out as disaffected, and at the same time afforded means of punishing them by feudal forfeitures for default. It was thought fit at the same time specially to cite Murray and a few of the great opposition leaders by public proclamation, with the usual threat of prosecution for treason in case of disobedience. On the 1st of August, Murray was charged to appear under threat of denunciation "to the horn," or by public blast of trumpet; and on the 6th he was denounced accordingly, for, not being a man 2 Teulet, ii. 73.

1 Calderwood, Appendix, ii. 573.

who would voluntarily place himself in the power of his enemies, he did not appear.

He, with the other discontented barons, assembled at Paisley. Those who had joined the royal raid at the same time marched to Glasgow, so that the two forces were close together. The discontented lords, who with their followers made altogether about a thousand horsemen, passed by Glasgow within sight of the royal pair, and took up their position at Hamilton. The duke was their avowed leader; but he had purposes of his own, differing from theirs, to serve, and they did not work well into each other's hands. They left him, and rode on to Edinburgh. There a provost had been chosen from their own party; but, in obedience to a royal letter, the appointment was cancelled, and a nominee of the Court appointed, who, when the cavalcade approached, directed the alarm-bells to be rung, and endeavoured to prevent the strangers from getting within the gates. They succeeded in entering the town, but were fired at from the castle. They issued missive writings, calling on the Protestants to rally round them; but they utterly failed in their endeavour, and gained no recruits. The royal army, about five thousand strong, had in the mean time marched to Hamilton, and was on its way to Edinburgh. Unable to meet it, the malcontents retreated to Dumfries, whence they issued the remonstrance already referred to.

The king and queen now took prompt measures, for indeed the shortness of the service which could be exacted from the feudal levy required that what was done should be done quickly. They were joined at that juncture by Bothwell, an adherent invaluable when daring and promptitude were needed. This was the beginning of the effective services which placed him, although a subject, in the position of one to whom his monarch owed heavy obligations. He came then from France, bringing with him an agent of many of his doings-David Chambers, a scholar and an author, whose naturally dark and subtle spirit was thoroughly trained in the unscrupulous policy of the Court of France. There arrived nearly at the same time from France the Lord Seton, a zealous member of the old faith,

and an able and daring man. He was the head of a house which had been powerful, until the triumph of the Reformation had overwhelmed it; but now, when the day of reaction had come, he returned to re-establish its influence. At the same time George Lord Gordon, the representative of the ruined house of Huntly, who was in law a denounced fugitive, was first relieved from this penal condition, and then step by step restored to the honours and, as far as that was practicable, to the vast possessions which had enabled his father to wage war with the crown. This oc

curred in August. Some months afterwards, as we shall see, Huntly's sister was married to Bothwell; it was a political alliance for strengthening the cause of the queen and her husband.

They seem in the mean time to have pressed pretty hard on the country in exacting the feudal levy. It could not be detained for a period sufficient for a campaign, and an attempt seems to have been made to remedy this by repeated citation. On the 23d of July, before the marriage, the whole feudal army had been cited to appear at Edinburgh, with fifteen days' provisions. On the 6th of August there was another citation of a raid to attend the king and queen on a progress through Fife. On the 22d of August all were again called to Edinburgh, with fifteen days' provision; and on the 17th of September the fencible men of the southern counties were cited to appear at Stirling on the 1st of October. Absence from these raids incurred feudal forfeitures. These had to be levied by the courts of law; and it would depend on the question whether the sovereign or some party among his subjects had the upper hand, how far the penalties would be levied. On the present occasion the crown was triumphant, and the recusants had to fear the worst. Their danger enabled the sovereign to extract aids from them in the shape of compromises, in which the legal proceedings were bought off. Making a progress northward through Fifeshire, money was thus raised from several of the gentry and royal burghs, including a considerable sum extracted from the town of Dundee. Edinburgh was peculiarly disaffected. Certain of the citizens being required to appear at Holyrood, a composition