(9) Lennox does, and Moray does not, mention the phrase ‘wishing him then in her arms,’ which occurs in Casket Letter II. The fact does not strengthen the case for the authenticity of Letter II.

As to order of sequence in these nine items, they run,

1. Moray 1. Lennox 1.
2. Moray 2. Lennox 2.
3. Moray 3.(an error) Lennox 0.
4. Moray 4. Lennox 0.
5. Moray 8.==Lennox 5.
6. Moray 6. Lennox 6.
7. Moray 7. Lennox 7.
8. Moray 5.==Lennox 8.
9. Moray 0. Lennox 9.

Thus, in four out of nine items (Moray 3 being a mere error in reporting), the sequence in Moray’s description is the same as the sequence in that of Lennox. In one item Moray gives a fact not in Lennox. In one Lennox gives a fact not in Moray. In the remaining items, Moray and Lennox give the same facts, but that which is fifth in order with Lennox is eighth in order with Moray.

Mathematicians may compute whether these coincidences are due to a mere fortuitous concurrence of atoms of gossip, possessing a common basis in the long Glasgow Letter II., and in the facts of the murder, and accidentally shaken into the same form, and almost the same sequence, in the minds of two different men, at two different times.

My faith in fortuitous coincidence is not so strong. Is it possible that the report of Lennox and the report of Moray, both of them false, as far as regards Letter II., or any letter ever produced, have a common source in a letter at one time held by the Lords, but dropped by them?

The sceptic, however, will doubtless argue, ‘We do not know the date of this discourse, in which Lennox describes a letter to very much the same effect as Moray does. May not Lennox have met Moray, in or near London, when Moray was there in July, 1567? May not Moray have told Lennox what he told de Silva, and even more copiously? What he told was (by his account) mere third-hand gossip, but perhaps Lennox received it from him as gospel, and sat down at once, and elaborated a long “discourse,” in which he recorded as fact Moray’s tattle. By this means de Silva and Lennox would offer practically identical accounts of the long letter; accounts which, indeed, correspond to no known Casket Letter, but err merely because Moray’s information was hearsay, casual, and unevidential.’ ‘Why,’ my inquirer goes on, ‘do you speak of Lennox and Moray giving their descriptions of the Letter at two different times?’

The answer to the last question may partly be put in the form of another question. Why should Lennox be making a long indictment, of seven folio pages, against Mary, in July, 1567, when Moray was passing through town on his way from France to Scotland? Mary was then a prisoner in Loch Leven. Lennox, though in poverty, was, on July 16, 1567, accepted as a Joint-Regent by Mary, if Moray did not become Regent, alone.[242] On July 29, 1567, James VI. was crowned, a yearling King, and it was decided that if Moray, who had not yet arrived in Scotland, refused to be Regent alone, Lennox should be joined with him and others on a Commission of Regency.[243] Moray, of course, did not refuse power, nor did Lennox go to Scotland. But, even if Lennox had really been made a co-Regent when Moray held his conversation about the Letter with de Silva, he would have had, at that moment, no need to draw up his ‘discourse’ against Mary. The Lords had subdued her, had extorted her abdication, and did not proceed to accuse their prisoner. Again, even if they had meant to try her at this time, that would not explain Lennox’s supposed conduct in then drawing up against her an indictment, including the gossip about her Letter, which (on the hypothesis) he had, at that hour, obtained from Moray, in London. This can easily be proved: thus. The document in which Lennox describes the Letter was never meant for a Scottish court of justice. It is carefully made out in English, by an English scribe, and is elaborately corrected in Lennox’s hand, as a man corrects a proof-sheet. Consequently, this early ‘discourse’ of Lennox’s, with its description of the murderous letter, never produced, was meant, not for a Scottish, but for an English Court, or meeting of Commissioners. None such could be held while Mary was a prisoner in Scotland: and no English indictment could then be made by Lennox. He must have expected the letter he quoted to be produced: which never was done.

Therefore Lennox did not weave this discourse, and describe the mysterious Letter, while Moray was giving de Silva a similar description, at London, in July, 1567. Not till Mary fled into England, nearly a year later, May 15, 1568, not till it was determined to hold an inquiry in England (about June 30, 1568), could Lennox construct an indictment in English, to go before English Commissioners. Consequently his description of the letter was not written at the same time (July, 1567) as Moray described the epistle to de Silva. The exact date when Lennox drew up his first Indictment, including his description of the Letter described by Moray, is unknown. But it contains curious examples of ‘the sayings and reports’ of Mary’s own suite, as to words spoken by her in their own ears. Therefore it would seem to have been written after June 11, 1568, when Lennox wrote to Scotland, asking his chief clansmen to collect ‘the sayings of her servants and their reports.’[244] Again, as late as August 25, 1568, Lennox had not yet received permission from Elizabeth to go to the meeting of the Commission of Inquiry which it was then intended to hold at Richmond. Elizabeth ‘flatly denied him,’ though later she assented.[245] Thus Lennox’s composition of this indictment with its account of the mysterious epistle, may be provisionally dated between, say, July 1 (when he might have got a letter of information from Scotland in answer to his request for information) and August 25, 1568.

But an opponent, anxious to make the date of Lennox’s knowledge of the poisonous letter seem early, may say, ‘Probably Lennox, in July, 1567, when Moray was in London, met him. Probably Moray told Lennox what he would not tell Elizabeth. Probably Lennox then wrote down Moray’s secondhand hearsay gossip about the letter, kept it, and, later, in 1568, copied it into his discourse to go before English Commissioners. Moray’s verbal report is his only source, and Moray’s was hearsay gossip. We have, so far, no proof that the letter described by Lennox and Moray ever existed.’