II. 34 BOOK and a dire appeal to the calamitous sword became the most probable contingency." By the middle of July the warfare was so certain, that Elizabeth dispatched sir Henry Sidney to the queen of Scotland, to postpone their interview until the following spring because the Guises had committed new hostilities against the French Protestants, and begun their extermination with demonstrations of menace to all reformation elsewhere;35 measures of alarm which required the fixed attention of the English government, especially as the French were assem 33 In the end of this treaty between these great personages, whereof every man hoped some good issue, the matter is broken off uncompounded, and small hope left now for any composition, but such as the sword shall force.' Lett. Haynes, 387. Among such grave matters it is amusing to read one important ambassador writing to another: 'I pray you, good my lord ambassador! send me two pair of perfumed gloves, perfumed with orange flowers and jassmin; the one for my wife's hand, the other for mine own; and whereinsoever I can pleasure you with any thing in this country, you shall have it in recompence.' ib. Paris must have changed her character greatly since 1562, that perfumed gloves were not to be found in it, but had to be fetched out of Spain, and by an ambassador's despatch. The fitting seems to have been of less consequence than the scent, for no patterns appear to have been inclosed. 34 See the queen's instructions to Sidney, lord president of the council in the marches of Wales,' dated 15th July 1562. Hayn. 391. 35 The queen states, that they had assaulted Blois, and tho the governor had surrendered it, had put the garrison and officers to death, and had proceeded to banish all the reformed, to allow no toleration, and to authorize the mob at Paris to cut in pieces all those who had broken any church, or kept them company. 'An order,' adds the queen, never heard of before, to give to the common people the sword!' by which the vulgar were killing persons daily, without regard of fault known or tried. That soldiers were coming to them from Spain, Savoy and the pope; that no disposition was seen in the duke of Guise and his parties to make any accord, but rather a wilful subversion and destruction of all manner of nations that consent not with them in the rites of the Christian religion.' 'Seeing these extreme strange proceedings in France, our good sister will well understand how unmete it is for us and our council to be so careless of the time as to depart from these parts, and leave our realm unprovided against such accidents as we know the adversaries of our religion could be content should chance to the same.' Therefore wishes, if Mary would so agree, to see her in the beginning of next summer at York, Pomfret, or Nottingham, at any time she shall name between 20th May and the last of August.' Hayn. 391–3. 6 bling great numbers of ships of war;' 39 The first great public measure of Mary was the destruction of the powerful earl of Huntley, in her summer progress of 1562. It benefited lord James,3 and is therefore imputable to his advice and ambition. But the queen is said to have decided upon it against the advice of her council. She passed thro Stirling to Aberdeen on horseback, with a large train." Declining to visit Huntley in his adjoining castle, she passed on through Elgin to Inverness.42 36 Haynes, 394. 40 37 The instructions to Woodhouse, of 4th August, express this apprehension. Haynes, ib. 38 See orders of 30th July to the lord admiral, to send four ships and a bark under vice-admiral Woodhouse, to lay off the Norman coast, and guard the seas. Haynes, p. 394. He was also to obtain intelligence from Dieppe and Newhaven, how the matters proceeded, and in what terms each party stood, but to offend neither, yet, to shew appearance of good will to the party persecuted, and that you mean well and favorably to them.' ib. 395. 39 Chalmers enumerates seven beneficial appointments which he obtained by it, v. 3. p. 380. But that he converted it to his advantage, is not alone the deciding proof, tho it justifies the suspicion, that he therefore planned or procured it. When the ambitious play opposing games, væ victis! 40 Randolph's remarks to Cecil, on 10 August, were, 'It is rather devised by herself, than greatly approved by her council, a terrible journey both for horse and man; the countries are so poor and the victuals so scarce.' Lett. 1 Chalm. 119. 41 Sir James Ogilvie's diary, quoted by Chalmers, notes her stages, and that she travelled always after dinner. She left Edinburgh on 11 August; was at Stirling on the 12th, accompanied by Randolph, and followed by John Knox. On 27th reached Aberdeen. Randolph wrote, Her journey is cumbersome, painful, and marvellous long; the weather extreme foul and cold; all victuals marvellous dear, and the corn never like to come to ripeness." 1 Chalm. p. 126-8. 42 She reached it on 11 Sept. Randolph mentioned that he went to Huntley Castle, on his invitation, with Argyle, and stayed two nights. СНАР. XX. II. BOOK The castle of this highland capital was in the keeping of lord Gordon's deputy, who refused to deliver it; an act of fidelity to his feudal lord, but of treason against his sovereign. The country assembled round the queen, and the clan of the Gordons came out in arms, but finding their force inferior, the castle was surrendered, after a resistance that allowed Mary to display her military disposition." 43 This achievement completed, she returned thro Fochabers, with a little army of Highlanders, increasing, as she approached the ford of the Spey, to three thousand men. As she had begun a local warfare, she journeyed with some apprehensions of retaliating attack." But her attending force deterred it; she ascertained this fact as she advanced, but her resolution was prepared to have stood the encounter. She was welcomed loyally into the new 'His house is fair, best furnished that I have seen in this country. His cheer is marvellous great. His mind, then, as it appeared to us, such as ought to be in any subject to his sovereign.' 43 It had but thirteen able men within it. The captain was hanged, and his head set upon the castle. Some others condemned to perpetual imprisonment; and the rest received mercy.' Rand. 1 Chalm. 133. "In all these garbulles, I assure your honour, I never saw the queen merrier; never dismayed. I never thought that stomach to be in her that I find. She repented nothing, when the lords and others at Inverness came in the morning from the watch, but that she was not a man, to know what life it was to lie all night in the fields; or to walk upon the causeway, with a jack and a knapsack, a Glascow buckler and a broad sword.' Rand. letter, 18 Sep. Chalm. 133. 45 As she rode forward, divers reports were brought to her. Some told her she would be attacked as she passed the river. Others said she would be assailed from the woods, which skirted the roads within a short distance of the river; and it was said by others, that there had been in that wood a thousand men the night before.' Lett. Rand. 24 September, p. 134. 46 Not one was found when proper persons were sent to discover them. Of this the queen was assured before she approached the Spey; so that she rode forward without fear. Yet at no time nor at any thing were they discouraged, tho we neither thought nor looked for other than to have fought on that day, or never.' Lett. ib. 135, XX. town of Aberdeen," and then proceeded to make CHAP. that part of the country obedient to her, and therefore to subvert the power and family of earl Huntley, against whom she had inherited or imbibed her mother's enmity.48 We cannot now determine the degree of the danger, the necessity of the rigor, or the true causes of exerting it. In what she did, she had the concurrence of the other great chieftains of the country, and of the people; and therefore no mere personal spleen in her mind, or ambition in Murray's, without some misconduct in Huntley, will account for such determined and precipitated destruction of him and of his house." Her measures were peremptory and unsparing. Huntley offered his submissions,50 but would not venture on a personal attendance. He was sum 47 The good mind of the inhabitants was shewn in spectacles, plays, interludes, and others, as they could best devise. They presented her with a cup of silver double gilt, well wrought, with 500 crowns in it. Wine, coals, and wax were sent in, as much as will serve her while she remains here.' Rand. 24 Sept. 137. 48 Her mother, when queen regent, had called Huntley to account for not subduing some of the Highland clans, and on her death-bed had blamed him for his advises. 3 Chalm. p. 152. The charge on her progress, against Huntley, was a secret conspiracy against lord James and her government, as Knox and Buchanan intimate. Robertson accredits them, and I see no adequate reason for counteracting his opinion, tho I will not undertake to give any decision of my own on the subject. As lord James was now made earl of Murray, I shall henceforth call him by that name. 49 Her determination is to remain here forty days at least; within which time she trusteth to put this country in good quietness. Her noblemen remain with her, and more daily come in. Rand. p. 137. ⚫ Consultations were now held, day after day, how to reform this country, and to make it obedient to their sovereign.' Rand. 30 Sept. 137. As Randolph wrote on the spot, he must have seen whether the country was in a state of legal submission or insubordination; and if he had observed any incongruity between its civil condition and the pretext for these daily councils, it is most probable that he would have noticed it to the English state secretary. 50 See the particulars in Robertson; and more fully in Chalmers, with a favorable pen to Huntley, v. 3. p. 169-174. JI. BOOK moned to appear on a very brief notice,31 and declared rebel for not presenting himself. But he had the ill judgment, or the desperate irritability, to assemble his friends and adherents in arms on a hill fifteen miles from Aberdeen." Murray, by a rapid movement, surrounded him with a larger force, and he was taken prisoner with two of his sons, after the slaughter of some of his attendants, and died as he was conveyed from the field of the useless battle and absurd act of rebellious hostility;53 unless it had objects which have been mentioned, but not distinctly disclosed or authenticated." His son, who 51 Act Privy Coun. Keith, 226. On the 15th of October for the 16th, scarcely 24 hours; an abruptness of notification, which, if the danger was not extreme, and her vicinity close, is of itself an expressive injustice. 52 The privy council's act of the earls Errol, Athol, Marshall, and Moreton, and lord Erskine, as well as of Murray and Maitland, of 27 Oct. describe Huntley as then coming forward with determined purpose to pursue our sovereign lady;' and that she, with her true lieges, were to pass forward to meet him on the plane fields.' As if a severe conflict was expected, it directs provisions for the wives and children of those who should fall. Keith, p. 227. 53 Randolph's account to Cecil was, The earl of Huntley, after he was taken, without either blow or stroke, being set upon horseback before him that was his taker, suddenly falleth from his horse stark dead, without a word that he ever spoke after he was upon horseback.' Lett. 28 October. Chalm. 3. p. 176. 54 Sir Robert Gordon, a gentleman of the bed-chamber to James I. and Charles I., in his MS. notes has stated, that' The earl of Huntley gathered these forces at the queen's own desire, to free her from the earl of Murray's power.' Cited by Keith, 229. On this obscure subject we can only collect a few contemporary historical notices, which must rest on the credit of each relater. Knox mentions that lord 'Gordon came to the duke [Hamilton] from the earl of Huntley, requiring him to stir his hands in the south as he should do in the north.' p. 342. Knox affirms that the letters in the earl's pocket, and the prisoners taken, disclosed the treason to be, that the earl of Murray was to have been murdered, and the queen taken and kept at Huntley's devotion. p.347. But the more important intimations are those which connect Huntley's intentions with the Guises in France. Buchanan mentions that the queen received letters from the pope, and from her uncles, the Guises, advising her to entertain well the earl of Huntley, as being the man of greatest power in Scotland, and best inclined towards restoring the ancient form of religion, and to feed him with fallacious hopes of taking to husband one of his sons.' |