career of Bothwell is found in the consideration that he was the most powerful man on the Scots side of the border, and in the solution of the question, how he used the power he so possessed?

Bothwell had, both from his wide territories and his triple wardenship, a preponderating influence on the border. His castle of Hermitage was as much beyond the strength of the border peel towers or bastles, as a

John of the Parke

Rypes kist and ark-for all in wark,
He is richt meet."

This John of the Park seems to have been the man who wounded Bothwell.

Sir Davd Lindsay, writing perhaps some twenty years earlier, gives us the changing features of the mosstrooper with his peculiar touches of sarcasm and individuality. In the satire of "The Three Estates," "Common Theft " lets out his propensities. He is met by "Oppression," who is described so indistinctly as to give the impression that the satirist could only venture on distant hints. We may suppose him to be a potentate in the Highlands, since he is to be found in Balquhidder, and swears by St Fillan. He gets the better of poor Common Theft, who finds him in durance seated in the stocks, and on the promise of "ane couple of kye in Liddesdale," he gets Common Theft to change places with him, and makes off to his own fortresses. Before this calamity comes on him, Common Theft monologues in this manner :—

---Sibbald, ii. 314. "The Struther" is Anstruther, and so the mosstrooper of Ewesdale, temptingly close to England, is obliged to turn northward and transact business in Fifeshire.

fortress that will stand a siege compared to the strong private man's house that may hold out against a band of robbers. In the most remote and inaccessible wilds of the Scots border, it looked upon England some eight miles distant. Thus, either for good or evil, the Earl Bothwell was supreme in this critical district. But he was in bad repute, and the preponderance of opinion was that the use he put his power to was evil. The public opinion of his class-the great border proprietors -had outgrown, as we have just seen, the spirit of the riever. To countenance him or have dealings with him resembled what it was in Queen Anne's reign for the members of some worshipful county family to be tainted with a suspicion of connivance with highwaymen.1 If such dealings were discreditable among the higher order of border potentates, the reproach fell with double force on that one among them who was intrusted with the ruling and ordering of the others. In a variety of shapes there occur bitter remarks on Bothwell's character and designs.2

1 Doings of the kind are the object of Lord Howard's rebuke in the 'Lay of the Last Minstrel: '

"It irks, high dame, my noble lords,

'Gainst ladye fair to draw their swords;
But yet they may not tamely see,
All through the western wardenry,
Your law-contemning kinsmen ride,
And burn and spoil the border-side;
And ill beseems your rank and birth
To make your towers a flemens-firth."*

-Canto iv. 24.

It happens that his rebuke is imagined as addressed to a lady who was on peculiarly intimate terms with Bothwell.

2 On the 21st of March 1561, Sir John Forster writes to Cecil,"For that the Liddelsdale men came into Hexamshire on the 19th instant and there made open reif; yet they were so hastily pursued that there are sundry of their horses won, and they themselves went very streightly away on their feet through the mosses on the high land, where no horseman could pursue them." He finds that "they have taken encouragement by reason of Lord Bothwell's arrival," and he "desires to understand the Council's pleasure, whether he may have liberty to do such displeasure to the Liddlesdale men as he is able, seeing he cannot be answered for them."-Calendar of State Papers (Foreign),34. On the 28th of February 1563, Randolph says: Since the apprehension of Bothwell the thieves have no less spared Scotland than England. They take it here to be done by his advice; they know that he

* An asylum for outlaws.

It appears that in the eyes of the substantial English statesmen, among the elements of disreputability in his condition, one was that for all his power and his wide territories, he was ever destitute of money. Among many

has continual conference with the veriest thieves in the country. But that it stands with Queen Elizabeth's pleasure, it is judged that that liberty which he has can tend but to small effect."-Calendar of State Papers (Foreign), 168.

Randolph again, on the 19th of September 1565, in the crisis of the contest with Murray: "Such order is in this country that no honest man is sure either of his life or goods. To amend these matters it is told that Earl Bothwell is arrived, whose power is to do more mischief than ever he was minded to do good in his life; a fit man to be a minister to any shameful act, be it either against God or man."— Ibid., 467.

On the days of " trew" or truce, as they were called, the wardens and their followers on either side of the border met for an equitable adjustment of counter-claims for injuries. The claims were rendered in "bills,” and the whole process reminds one of those questions of "proving on cross bills" in bankruptcies, that have distracted lawyers. In these complex and delicate adjustments, Forster, who was warden of the English middle marches, writes to the Privy Council of England about his arrangements "for the performance of certain bills for the attemptates of both realms :" "Sent his Warden-serjeant with a roll of twentythree attemptates, to be delivered by Lord Borthwick at the Hermitage on 25th February; when such as kept the house flatly denied either to receive any letter or rolls, and said that they kept the house for Lord Bothwell and no other, and took the officer prisoner and spoiled him of his horse and all that he had, and caused him to find surety to enter whenever they called upon him. It is supposed that they have got some encouragement to do so by reason of Lord Bothwell's arrival in Scotland." He called on the Scots warden for redress, "who says that he will desire the assistance of the Council of Scotland now at Edinburgh, for otherwise he is unable to redress it, or other attempts of Liddlesdale.”—Calendar of State Papers (Foreign), 1561, p. 10.

Bedford, going to a day of "trew" well armed, is rather apprehensive about the peace between the two parties, "because Bothwell is with such a rout of thieves and lawless people so near. I assure you he is as naughty a man as liveth. Whatsoever countenance of justice that queen pretendeth outwardly, yet is she thought to favour him much, and if she punish him not, then will I think she is not so bent to do justice as I supposed."-6th April 1565; ibid., 327.

These are casual estimates of his merit as a keeper of order and administrator of justice on the border. A collection from the correspondence of the day, of the passages announcing evil opinions of his character and intentions, would be tiresome. A passage in a letter from Bedford to Cecil at the time of the great trial of strength with Murray has an odd casual aptness to the tenor of subsequent events :—

allusions to this, one by Throckmorton may suffice, in reference to the question whether he should be permitted, in the early part of the year 1564, to return to Scotland, or be left in England, "where, if he remain in beggary, my sovereign shall be forced for pity to supply his necessity, for all is sold here to the uttermost penny." 1

There is observable through all the comments of the day on Bothwell's restless and criminal career, a strange curiosity and anxiety about Queen Mary's intention regarding him is she favourable and inclined to help him out of his difficulties? is she implacable and determined to hunt him down? Even if there had never been the cause there afterwards was for connecting their names together, these traces of a belief that a sovereign had a strong personal interest in an erring subject would be peculiar. The first question that naturally occurs is, whether these symptoms of interest point to the awakening of that which afterwards

"The length of time and the easyness of his bond maketh me to think that the queen there doth secretly favor him. If he get fair weather on his back, he may chance to wax wanton and work them some trouble before they catch him."

There is, in a postscript to this letter, the following personal intimation to Cecil, who was well accustomed to such warnings, and seems to have taken them with quiet courage: "Bothwell had this talk of you in France, that he meant not to kill any in England so soon as you, and one Riveley. You may think yourself happy that such an unhappy man doth bear you evil will, which is for no other cause but doing justice and loving your country."-1565; Calendar of State Papers (Foreign), 320.

1 Randolph to Cecil, 21st February 1564; Calendar of State Papers (Foreign), 57. There are other passages in this correspondence that unfortunately do not fully interpret themselves: "Such as have written --and I among the rest-in favour of my Lord Bothwell-saving the queen and Mary Fleming-repent their haste." A month later Sir Henry Percy writes to Cecil that Bothwell is recommended by the queen of Scots to Queen Elizabeth, and solicits Cecil's patronage for him, "being young, and not left so well to maintain his estate as the same requires."-Ibid., 83. So also an interpreter would be welcome to the following passage in a letter another month later, attributed to Kirkcaldy of Grange, and addressed at Perth to Randolph: "In the mean time I wad such as ye knaw I have always done, that the Earl of Bothwell were keeped [in England] still, for our queen thinks to have him at all times ready to shake out of her pushet [French, pochette] against us Protestants.”—Laing's edition of Knox, vi. 540.

became a guilty passion? The answer to this is, that nothing in the tone of the passages referred to warrants the conclusion that this was in the minds of the writers. The tenor of their suspicions, when they are suspicious, seems rather to be that she cherished Bothwell as that desperate and remorseless enemy of her brother Murray who might be counted on for working his ruin.1

There is still an opening to a higher motive for any partiality felt by Queen Mary towards this man before the great scandal arose. She may have expected to find him a trusty warrior in the impending contest-for that there should be a great European war, with England on one side

1 Randolph, for instance, explaining to Cecil that in the pursuit of Murray and his followers she is waiting for money: "Thereafter she will herself again to the fields and pursue them wheresoever she finds them. There comes a great host out of the north with Lord Gordon, who imputes the overthrow of his father to Murray-which is approved by the queen. Bothwell takes great things upon him and promises much-a fit captain for so loose a company as now hangs upon him. Whatsoever she is able to do by authority, suit, request, favour, or by benefit, all is one so it may serve to the overthrow of them that she is offended with.”—1565; Calendar of State Papers (Foreign), 478.

The

On the question of the appointment of a "lieutenant-general,' Captain Cockburn writes to Cecil on 2d October 1565: "She and the king have been at great strife for chosing a lieutenant. king would have his father to be lieutenant, and she would have Bothwell, by reason he bears evil will against Murray, and has promised to have him die an alien-and for that cause she makes him a lieutenant."-Ibid., 477.

The literary history of a passage expressive of the queen's enmity to her brother reveals a new peril to mankind, in any lack of carefulness in the citation of words of disparagement attributed to Queen Mary-there is no such peril on the other side. The words are: "There is no talk of peace with that queen, but that she will first have a head of the duke or of the Earl of Murray." The scolding administered to the English historian of the period for a careless use of this passage, thundered as it has been across the Atlantic, is one of the curiosities of literature.-See 'Mary Queen of Scots and her latest English Historian,' by James F. Meline (New York, 1872), p. 77-89. When we come to her exultation at the news of the murder of her brother, we may judge how lightly she would herself have taken the imputation of any amount of enmity to him, unless it had been made at an inopportune moment-as when she walked between him and her husband, holding a hand of each, after the murder of Rizzio.