[345] Lennox MSS.
[346] Mr. Frazer-Tytler, who did not enter into the controversy, supposed that Crawford’s Deposition was the actual written report, made by him to Lennox in January 1567. If so, Letter II. is forged.
[347] Mr. Henderson writes (Casket Letters, second edition, p. xxvi): ‘It must be remembered that while Crawford affirms that he supplied Lennox with notes of the conversation immediately after it took place, he does not state that the notes were again returned to him by Lennox in order to enable him to form his deposition.’ How else could he get them, unless he kept a copy? ‘It is also absurd to suppose that Lennox, on June 11, 1568, should have written to Crawford for notes which he had already in his own possession.’ But Lennox did not do that; he asked, not for Mary’s conversation with Darnley, but for Crawford’s with Mary, which Crawford never says that he wrote down ‘at the time.’ Mr. Henderson goes on to speak of ‘the notes having been lost,’ and ‘these documents had apparently been destroyed’ (p. 84), of which I see no appearance.
[348] Goodall, ii. 246. Maitland Club Miscellany, iv. pt. i. p. 119. It will be observed that while Crawford swears to having written down Darnley’s report for Lennox ‘at the time,’ he says that he ‘caused to be made’ the writing which he handed in to the Commissioners, ‘according to the truth of his knowledge.’ Crawford’s Deposition handed in to the Commissioners, in fact, has been ‘made,’ that is, has been Anglicised from the Scots; this is proved by the draft in the Lennox Papers. This is what Crawford means by saying that he ‘caused it to be made.’ There is a corrected draft of the declaration in the Lennox MSS., but Crawford’s original autograph text, ‘written with his hand’ (in Scots doubtless), was retained by the Lords (Goodall, ii. 88).
[349] The Deposition, in Bain, ii. 313, is given under February, 1567, but this copy of it, being in English, cannot be so early.
[350] Historia, fol. 213. Yet the Lennox dossier represents Darnley as engaged, at this very time, at Stirling, in a bitter and angry quarrel with Mary. He may have been in contradictory moods: Buchanan omits the mood of fury.
[351] Maitland of Lethington, ii. 337.
[352] Mary to Norfolk, Jan. 31, 1570. Labanoff, iii. 19.
[353] Labanoff, iii. 62.
[354] The prosecution is in rather an awkward position as to Bothwell’s action when he returned to Edinburgh, after leaving Mary at Callendar, which we date January 21, and they date January 23. Cecil’s Journal says, ‘January 23 ... Erle Huntly and Bothwell returnit that same nycht to Edynt [Edinburgh] and Bothwell lay in the Town.’ The Book of Articles has ‘Bot boithuell at his cuming to Edinburgh ludgit in the toun, quhair customably he usit to ly at the abbay,’ that is, in Holyrood (Hosack, i. 534). The author of the Book of Articles clearly knew Cecil’s Journal; perhaps he wrote it. Yet he makes Mary stay but one night at Callendar; Cecil’s Journal makes her stay two nights. However, our point is that both sources make Bothwell lie in the town, not at Holyrood, on the night of his return from Callendar. His object, they imply, was to visit Kirk o’ Field privately, being lodged near it and not in his official rooms. But here they are contradicted by Paris, who says that when he brought Mary’s first Glasgow Letter to Bothwell he found him in his chambers at Holyrood (Laing, ii. 282).