There had been a bad harvest, and a dearth, because the Queen’s luxury “provoked God” (who is represented as very irritable) “to strike the staff of bread,” and to “give His malediction upon the fruits of the earth. But oh, alas, who looked, or yet looks, to the very cause of all our calamities!” [{226a}]
Some savage peoples are said to sacrifice their kings when the weather is unpropitious. Knox’s theology was of the same kind. The preachers, says Randolph (February 28), “pray daily . . . that God will either turn the Queen’s heart or grant her short life. Of what charity or spirit this proceeds, I leave to be discussed by great divines.” [{226b}] The prayers sound like encouragement to Jehus.
At this date Ruthven was placed, “by Lethington’s means only,” on the Privy Council. Moray especially hated Ruthven “for his sorcery”; the superstitious Moray affected the Queen with this ill opinion of one of the elect—in the affair of Riccio’s murder so useful to the cause of Knox. “There is not an unworthier in Scotland” than Ruthven, writes Randolph. [{226c}] Meanwhile Lethington was in England to negotiate for peace in France; if he could, to keep an eye on Mary’s chances for the succession, and (says Knox) to obtain leave for Lennox, the chief of the Stuarts and the deadly foe of the Hamiltons, to visit Scotland, whence, in the time of Henry VIII., he had been driven as a traitor. But Lethington was at that time confuting Lennox’s argument that the Hamilton chief, Chatelherault, was illegitimate. Knox is not positive, he only reports rumours. [{226d}] Lethington’s serious business was to negotiate a marriage for the Queen.
Despite the recent threats of death against priests who celebrated Mass, the Archbishop Hamilton and Knox’s opponent, the Abbot of Crossraguel, with many others, did so at Easter. The Ayrshire brethren “determined to put to their own hands,” captured some priests, and threatened others with “the punishment that God has appointed to idolaters by His law.” [{227a}] The Queen commanded Knox to meet her at Lochleven in mid-April—Lochleven, where she was later to be a prisoner. In that state lay the priests of her religion, who had been ministering to the people, “some in secret houses, some in barns, some in woods and hills,” writes Randolph, “all are in prison.” [{227b}]
Mary, for two hours before supper, implored Knox to mediate with the western fanatics. He replied, that if princes would not use the sword against idolaters, there was the leading case of Samuel’s slaughter of Agag; and he adduced another biblical instance, of a nature not usually cited before young ladies. He was on safer ground in quoting the Scots law as it stood. Judges within their bounds were to seek out and punish “mass-mongers”—that was his courteous term.
The Queen, rather hurt, went off to supper, but next morning did her best to make friends with Knox over other matters. She complained of Ruthven, who had given her a ring for some magical purpose, later explained by Ruthven, who seems to have despised the superstition of his age. The Queen, says Ruthven, was afraid of poison; he gave her the ring, saying that it acted as an antidote. Moray was at Lochleven with the Queen, and Moray believed, or pretended to believe, in Ruthven’s “sossery,” as Randolph spells “sorcery.” She, rather putting herself at our Reformer’s mercy, complained that Lethington alone placed Ruthven in the Privy Council.
“That man is absent,” said Knox, “and therefore I will speak nothing on that behalf.” Mary then warned him against “the man who was at time most familiar with the said John, in his house and at table,” the despicable Bishop of Galloway, and Knox later found out that the warning was wise. Lastly, she asked him to reconcile the Earl and Countess of Argyll—“do this much for my sake”; and she promised to summon the offending priests who had done their duty. [{228a}]
Knox, with his usual tact, wrote to Argyll thus: “Your behaviour toward your wife is very offensive unto many godly.” He added that, if all that was said of Argyll was true, and if he did not look out, he would be damned.
“This bill was not well accepted of the said Earl,” but, like the rest of them, he went on truckling to Knox, “most familiar with the said John.” [{228b}]
Nearly fifty priests were tried, but no one was hanged. They were put in ward; “the like of this was never heard within the realm,” said pleased Protestants, not “smelling the craft.” Neither the Queen nor her Council had the slightest desire to put priests to death. Six other priests “as wicked as” the Archbishop were imprisoned, and the Abbot of Crossraguel was put to the horn in his absence, just as the preachers had been. The Catholic clergy “know not where to hide their heads,” says Randolph. Many fled to the more tender mercies of England; “it will be the common refuge of papists that cannot live here . . .” [{228c}] The tassels on the trains of the ladies, it was declared by the preachers, “would provoke God’s vengeance . . . against the whole realm . . ” [{229a}]