Life of Mary Queen of Scots Volume I Part 10

[12] Whittaker, vol. iv. p. 144.

[13] Mezeray, Histoire de France, tom. iii. p. 50.

[14] Miss Benger's Memoirs, vol. i. p. 189, et seq.

[15] Melville's Memoirs of his own Life, p. 12.

[16] In transcribing dates it may be proper to mention, that we do not observe the old division of the year. Down till 1563, the French began the year at Easter; but it was then altered to the 1st of January, by the Chancellor L'Hopital. In Scotland till 1599, and in England till 1751, the year began on the 25th of March. Thus, in all the State Papers and letters of the age, written between the 1st of January and the 25th of March, the dates invariably belong to what we should now consider the preceding year.

It is useful to be aware of this fact; though it is unnecessary for a writer of the present day, to deviate from the established computation of time.--Anderson's Collections, vol. i.--Preface, p. li.; and Laing, vol.

i. p. 266.

[17] Keith, p. 73.

[18] Goodall's Examination, vol. l. p. 159, et seq. The motto which Goodall put upon his t.i.tle page,

"Pandere res alta terra et caligine mersas,"

he has in more than one instance amply justified.

[19] Mezeray, Castelnau, Brantome, Thua.n.u.s, Chalmers, Miss Benger.

[20] This picture originally belonged to Lord Robert Stuart, Earl of Orkney, one of Mary's natural brothers, and is now in the possession of William Trail, Esq. of Woodwick, Orkney, into whose family it came, together with other relics of the Earl, by the marriage of an ancestor of Mr Trail, to one of his descendants. _Vide_ APPENDIX A.

[21] It is to the kindness of John Watson Gordon, Esq. deservedly one of the most eminent portrait-painters in Scotland, that we are indebted, both for the use of the painting from which the engraving has been made, and for several of the facts we have stated above. Mr Gordon has executed three copies of the picture--all of them exceedingly beautiful and accurate--possessing the merits, without any of the dusky dimness, which time has thrown over the original.

[22] The coat of arms borne by Francis and Mary is worth describing. The coat was borne Baron and Femme;--The first contained the coat of the Dauphin, which took up the upper half of the shield, and consisted of the arms of France. The lower half was impaled quarterly. In _one_ and _four_ the arms of Scotland, and in _two_ and _three_ those of England. Over the whole was half an escutcheon the sinister half being obscured or cut off, to denote that the English crown was in the possession of another, to the bearer's prejudice. Under the arms were four lines in French, thus wretchedly translated by Strype, in his "Annals of Queen Elizabeth."

"The arms of Mary Queen Dauphiness of France, The n.o.blest lady in earth for till advance, Of Scotland Queen and of England, also Of France, as G.o.d hath providet it so."

Keith, p. 114. Chalmers, vol. 2d, p. 413. A painting (probably a copy) containing these arms, and the above motto, is preserved in Mary's apartments at Holyroodhouse.

[23] Miss Benger, Vol. II. p. 7.

[24] Miss Benger, vol. ii. p. 43.

[25] Miss Benger erroneously antedates the death of Francis, on the 28th of November. See her _Memoirs_, vol. ii. p. 74. Chalmers, who is the very historian of dates, gives a copy of the inscription on the tomb of Francis, which of course settles the point, vol. ii. p. 124. Miss Benger does not appear to have seen this inscription.

[26] Conaeus in Jebb, vol. ii. p. 19.

[27] Keith, p. 157 and 160.

[28] Keith, p. 160, & seq.

[29] Keith, p. 165, et seq.

[30] Keith, p. 167, et seq.

[31] Robertson says, that the amendment would not have been approved of by "_either_ Queen." He alleges that Mary had only "suspended" the prosecution of her t.i.tle to the English Crown; and that "she determined to revive her claim, on the first prospect of success." That Robertson has, in this instance, done injustice to Mary, is evident, from the exact consistency of her future conduct, with what will be found stated in the text.--_Robertson_, _Vol._ ii. _p._ 200.

[32] Keith, p. 170. et seq. Robertson says, that at the period of these conferences, Mary was only in her eighteenth year; but, as they both took place in 1561, she must have been in her nineteenth year, which Keith confirms, who says (page 178), "The readers having now perused several original conferences, will, I suppose, clearly discern the fine spirit and genius of that princess, who was yet but in the 19th year of her age."

[33] Brantome in Jebb, vol. ii. p. 82.

[34] Keith, p. 175. Throckmorton writes, "Thereto the Queen-mother said, The King, my son, and I, would be glad to do good betwixt the Queen, my sister, your mistress, and the Queen, my daughter, and shall be glad to hear that there were good amity betwixt them; for neither the King, my son, nor I, nor any of his Council, will do harm in the matter, _or show ourselves other than friends to them both_."

[35] Keith, p. 164.

[36] Keith, Appendix, p. 92.

[37] Robertson, Appendix, No. 5.--from the Cotton Library.

[38] Keith, p. 178.--Chalmers, vol. ii. p. 418--Stranguage, p. 9--and Freebairn, p. 19.

[39] Brantome in Jebb, vol. ii. p. 483, et seq.--Keith, p. 179--and Freebairn, p. 16 et seq.

[40] Several translations of this song have been attempted, but no translation can preserve the spirit of the original.

Adieu, thou pleasant land of France!

The dearest of all lands to me, Where life was like a joyful dance-- The joyful dance of infancy.

Farewell my childhood's laughing wiles, Farewell the joys of youth's bright day; The bark that bears me from thy smiles, Bears but my meaner half away.

The best is thine;--my changeless heart Is given, beloved France! to thee; And let it sometimes, though we part, Remind thee with a sigh of me.

Mary was not the only one who commemorated in verse her departure from France. Numerous _Vaudevilles_ were written upon the occasion, several of which are preserved in the _Anthologie Francaise_.

[41] Jebb, vol. ii. p. 484. Keith, p. 180. Miss Benger, vol. ii. p. 125.

In an anonymous French work, ent.i.tled, "Histoire de Marie Stuart, Reine d'Ecosse et de France," &c. respectably written on the whole, there is an amusing mistake concerning the locality of Holyroodhouse. In tom. i. p.

181, it is said, "The Queen landed at Leith, and then departed for L'Islebourg," (the name anciently given to Edinburgh), "a celebrated Abbey a mile or two distant. In this Abbey Mary remained for three weeks, and in the month of October 1561 took her departure for Edinburgh." This departure for Edinburgh alludes to the visit which Mary paid, a short time after her arrival, to the Castle.

[42] The day that his present Majesty George IV. arrived at Leith, in August 1822 (whose landing and progress to Holyroodhouse, though much more brilliant, resembled in some respects that of his ancestor Mary), was as wet and unfavourable as the weather so piously described by Knox. Was this a "forewarning" also of the "comfort" our gracious Sovereign brought into the country? If Knox believed in _warnings_, there is no telling to what conclusions these warnings might have led.

[43] M'Crie's Life of Knox, vol. ii. p. 22.

[44] Miss Benger (vol. ii. p. 132) erroneously supposes, that the Archbishop of St Andrews had died before Mary's return to Scotland. She should have known that it was he who presided at the baptism of James VI., of which ceremony she gives so particular an account. See Keith, p. 360, and Chalmers, vol. i. p. 196.

[45] Jebb, vol. ii. p. 486. Chalmers, vol. ii. p. 202.

[46] Buchanan's Detection, in Anderson's Collections, vol. ii. p. 52 and 58.

[47] This is apparently the first time Mary had ever expressed to Knox her sentiments regarding this pamphlet. He had been treated less ceremoniously by Elizabeth. But knowing the respect in which she was held by the Protestants, he saw it for his interest to attempt to pacify her, and wrote to her several conciliatory letters. Elizabeth put a stop to them, by desiring Cecil, to forward to Knox the following laconic epistle, which merits preservation as a literary curiosity:--"Mr Knox! Mr Knox! Mr Knox!

there is neither male nor female: all are one in Christ, saith Paul.

Blessed is the man who confides in the Lord! I need to wish you no more prudence than G.o.d's grace; whereof G.o.d send you plenty. W. CECIL."

Chalmers, vol. ii. p. 494. Knox himself gives a somewhat different edition of this letter, (Hist. of the Reformation, p. 212.) Where Chalmers found the above, he does not mention.

[48] Knox's History of the Reformation, p. 287, & seq.--Keith, p. 188. It is worth observing, that Knox is the only person who gives us any detailed account of these interviews, and he, of course, represents them in as favourable a light for himself as possible. "The report," says Randolph, "that Knox hath talked with the Queen, maketh the Papists doubt what will become of the world."--"I have been the more minute in the narrative of this curious conference," says M'Crie, "because it affords the most satisfactory refutation of the charge that Knox treated Mary with rudeness and disrespect." Different people have surely different modes of defining rudeness and respect.

[49] Keith supposes erroneously, that this disturbance took place in the Chapel at Holyrood. Randolph, his authority, though his expressions are equivocal, undoubtedly alludes to the Royal Chapel at Stirling. Keith, p.

189 and 190.