Life of Mary Queen of Scots Volume II Part 9

[81] Keith, p. 390.

[82] Anderson, vol. i. p. 97.--Keith, p. 390.

[83] Melville, p. 197.

[84] Anderson, vol. i. p. 95.

[85] Anderson, vol. i. p. 95.

[86] Anderson, vol. i. p. 97. et seq. There is something so peculiar in the last pa.s.sage quoted above, and Bothwell's conduct was so despotic, during the whole of the time he had Mary's person at his disposal, that Whittaker's supposition seems by no means unlikely, that the _force_ to which Mary alludes was of the most culpable and desperate kind.

"Throughout the whole of the Queen's own account of these transactions,"

he observes, "the delicacy of the lady, and the prudence of the wife, are in a continual struggle with facts,--willing to lay open the whole for her own vindication, yet unable to do it for her own sake and her husband's, and yet doing it in effect." Vide Whittaker, vol. iii. p. 112. et seq.--Melville is still more explicit upon the subject, p. 177. And in a letter from "the Lords of Scotland," written to the English amba.s.sador, six weeks after the ravishment, it is expressly said, that "the Queen was led captive, and by fear, force, and (as by many conjectures may be well suspected) other extraordinary and more unlawful means, compelled to become the bedfellow to another wife's husband."--See the letter in Keith p. 418.

[87] Vide Laing, vol. i. p. 86, and vol. ii. p. 105, and Whittaker, vol.

iii. p. 116.

[88] Keith, p. 383.

[89] History of James VI., p. 10.--Buchanan's History, Book XVII.--Keith, p. 384.--Whittaker, vol. iii. p. 120.

[90] "I plainly refused," says Craig, in his account of this matter, which still remains among the records of the General a.s.sembly, "because he (Hepburn) had not her handwriting; and also the constant bruit that my Lord had both ravished her and kept her in captivity."--Anderson, vol. ii.

p. 299.

[91] Anderson, vol. ii. p. 280.

[92] Anderson, vol. i. p. 111.--Keith, p. 384.

[93] Anderson, vol. i. p. 87.

[94] History of James VI. p. 10.--Keith, p. 386.--Melville, p.

78.--Whittaker, vol. iii. p. 127. et seq. Upon this subject, Lord Hailes has judiciously remarked:--"After Mary had remained a fortnight under the power of a daring profligate adventurer, few foreign princes would have solicited her hand. Some of her subjects might still have sought that honour, but her compliance would have been humiliating beyond measure. It would have left her at the mercy of a capricious husband,--it would have exposed her to the disgrace of being reproached in some sullen hour, for the adventure at Dunbar. Mary was so situated, at this critical period, that she was reduced to this horrid alternative, either to remain in a friendless and most hazardous celibacy, or to yield her hand to Bothwell."--_Remarks on the History of Scotland_, _p._ 204.

[95] Melville, p. 178.

[96] Letter from the Lords of Scotland to Sir Nicholas Throckmorton, in Keith, p. 417.

[97] Melville, p. 180.

[98] Melville, p. 199.

[99] Keith, p. 394.--Melville, p. 179.--Knox, p. 406.

[100] Anderson, vol. i. p. 131.

[101] Anderson, vol. i. p. 128.

[102] Knox, p. 409.

[103] Laing, Appendix, p. 115.

[104] Laing, Appendix, vol. ii. p. 116. Knox says that it was Bothwell who drew back; but the authority to which we have referred is more to be depended on.

[105] Melville, p. 182.

[106] Laing, Appendix, vol. ii. p. 116.

[107] Keith, p. 402.

[108] Keith, p. 403.--Melville, p. 184.--Knox, p. 409.--Laing, Appendix, vol. ii. p. 117.

[109] Laing, Appendix, vol. ii. p. 119.--Anderson, vol. i. p. 128.--Keith, p. 418.

[110] Anderson, vol. i. p. 134.

[111] Keith, p. 408.

[112] Buchanan's History, Book XVIII.

[113] Keith, p. 406, et seq.

[114] Anderson, vol. i. p. 139.

[115] The above account of Bothwell's adventures and fate, after he left Scotland, is taken princ.i.p.ally from Melville, and the History of James VI.

But an interesting and original ma.n.u.script, ent.i.tled a "Declaration of the Earl of Bothwell," which was made at Copenhagen, in the year 1568, for the satisfaction apparently of the Danish government, has recently been discovered, and an authenticated copy of it having been transmitted to this country in August 1824, a careful translation from the old French in which it is written, was presented to the public in "The New Monthly Magazine," for June 1825. Satisfied as we are of the authenticity of this "Declaration," we have availed ourselves of some of the information it supplies, though, of course, great allowance must be made for the colouring Bothwell has artfully given to the transactions he details. We shall have more to say of this "Declaration" afterwards; at present, it is necessary only to refer to it.

[116] Keith, p. 411 and 414.

[117] Keith, p. 418. It is worth noticing, that no proof of this absurd falsehood is offered--no allusion being even made to the letter which had been shown to Grange, and which, though only the first of a series of forgeries, yet having been hastily prepared to serve the purpose of the hour, seems to have been destroyed immediately.

[118] Keith, Ibid.

[119] Keith, p. 420.

[120] Throckmorton's Letter in Keith, p. 420, et seq.

[121] Melville's Memoirs, p. 197.

[122] Whittaker, vol. i. p. 228.

[123] Throckmorton in Keith, p. 422.

[124] Robertson, Appendix to vol. i. No. XXI.

[125] Robertson, Appendix to vol. i. No. XXII.

[126] Throckmorton, in one of his letters, mentions explicitly, that Mary had given him the very reasons stated above for refusing to renounce Bothwell. But as Throckmorton could communicate with Mary only through the channel of the rebel Lords, who, he says, "_had sent him word_," it is not at all improbable, that her message may have been a good deal garbled by the way. The pa.s.sage in Throckmorton's letter is as follows:--"I have also persuaded her to conform herself to renounce Bothwell for her husband, and to be contented to suffer a divorce to pa.s.s betwixt them. She hath sent me word, that she will in no wise consent unto that, but rather die: grounding herself upon this reason, taking herself to be seven weeks gone with child; by renouncing Bothwell, she should acknowledge herself to be with child of a b.a.s.t.a.r.d, and to have forfeited her honour, which she will not do to die for it. I have persuaded her to save her own life and her child, to choose the least hard condition." Robertson--Appendix to vol. i.

No. XXII. It was, perhaps, this pa.s.sage in Throckmorton's despatch to England, that gave rise to a vulgar rumour, which was of course much improved by the time it reached France. Le Laboureur, an historian of much respectability, actually a.s.serts that the Queen of Scots had a daughter to Bothwell, who was educated as a religieuse in the Convent of Notre Dame at Soissons. _Vide_ Laboureur Addit. aux Mem. de Castelnau, p. 610. Of course, the a.s.sertion is altogether unfounded.

[127] Some historians have a.s.serted, that Lord Ruthven accompanied the two Commissioners mentioned in the text. But this is not the case, for he was present at a conference with the English amba.s.sador, Throckmorton, on the very day the others were at Lochleven. Throckmorton in Keith, p. 426.