It was no ordinary phalanx of beauty that Darnley had to confront when the venerable seneschal of Wemyss Castle ushered him into the lofty hall, at the end of which, on a portion raised by one step above the level of the floor, was placed the royal lady to whom he had dared to aspire as his bride; her exquisite loveliness only enhanced by the presence of the four prettiest women in Scotland who stood behind her. But ‘faint heart never won fair lady,’ and Darnley’s was by no means one of those dispositions which are prone to fail from a retiring modesty and too low an estimate of their own advantages. Besides, he was playing a great stake, and playing it with all the reckless audacity of a gambler.
Young as he was, he well knew that the prize now before him represented not only the Majesty of Scotland, but possibly, nay, in all human probability, the eventual succession to the English throne. It was this contingency which made Elizabeth so jealous of all matrimonial overtures to her beautiful cousin; it was this which caused Cecil and Throckmorton, and their agent Randolph, to lay their cunning heads together and devise means for amusing the Scottish Queen with a procession of suitors, none of whom were ever intended to be more than the puppets of the moment, each to prevent the attainment of his object by the other.
The accomplished Warwick, the manly-looking, weak-hearted Norfolk, nay, the prime favourite of the English Queen herself, the selfish, handsome, and utterly unscrupulous Leicester, were successively put forward as appropriate sharers of Mary Stuart’s throne and masters of her hand. But no sooner did the hapless object of all this intrigue and duplicity show the slightest preference for one over the other, the faintest inclination to accede to wishes which seemed so candidly expressed, than instantly, like some scene in a masquerade, the performers all changed characters at once. Elizabeth became the stern monitress, Randolph the delicate adviser, and the belted Earls and noble Dukes, no longer humble suitors and devoted champions of their idol, cooled at a breath into very coy and somewhat unwilling parties to an engagement of political expediency, only binding so long as it received encouragement at Greenwich or Whitehall. Thus was a woman’s heart made an object of cruel traffic and shameful double-dealing, none the less disgraceful because its possession implied the occupancy of a throne. Some day, perhaps, the world may be brought to see that even in the highest places expediency can never justify heartlessness or crime, that not only is ‘honesty the best policy,’ but that chivalrous unselfishness and frank defiance of evil are the surest beacons to success.
In the meantime, it is sad to think, that the life’s happiness and the life itself of Mary Stuart were pitilessly sacrificed by one of her own blood and her own sex. Surely, since the serpent, woman has had no such bitter enemy as woman.
Darnley, put forward at eighteen as the rival of so many distinguished nobles, entered on the contest with all the wilfulness of a Stuart, and all the joyous temerity of a boy. Though a tool in the hands of his seniors, it must doubtless have seemed to the adventurous young nobleman no unwelcome task to woo his beautiful sovereign—the kinswoman whom he had already once seen when they were both mere children, but whose charms even at that early age he had not yet forgotten. Few men would refuse the hand of a queen, even if she were an ugly one; what shall we say of a proposal to try his fortune with such a paragon as Mary Stuart? It was no wonder the lightsome young wooer rode horse after horse to death as he posted northward in the direction to which his star beckoned him; no wonder that he should arrive at Wemyss Castle all alone, far ahead of his scattered escort; no wonder that he should advance into Mary’s presence, under all the disadvantages of haste, fatigue, and travel-stained riding-gear, with the gallant air of a gay young knight who goes forth to conquer, rather than that of a slave who comes to wear a chain. As he walked up the hall, his step was firm, his head erect, and his eye bright and open as that of a man who sees his destiny beckoning him forward fairer and fairer, more and more promising as he approaches.
The colour was very deep in Mary’s cheek, and her eyes were fastened to the ground while he drew near, yet she stole a good look at him somehow, too, or she would not have been a woman. What she saw might have satisfied even her fastidious taste.
Darnley was very tall and slim, but his limbs were so well-proportioned, his hands and feet so small and beautifully shaped, that his excessive height only gave him an air of peculiar grace and distinction above ordinary men. Even in the riding-dress of the period, though we may be sure that the handsome young noble wore one of the richest material, and of the most tasteful fashion such a costume allowed, he betrayed those habits of refinement almost bordering on coxcombry, which, when they accompany a fine manly person, have such an attraction for the other sex. All the details of his toilet had been carefully attended to before he started, and disordered as he now was, at least on his exterior, nature had written gentleman in characters that could not be mistaken. Alas! that her pen can sometimes only trace skin deep.
His face, too, was in accordance with the high-bred beauty of his form. The line of features was soft and delicate as a woman’s, the dark eyes shone out soft and tender from beneath a pair of pencilled eyebrows, the dark hair clustered in silken curls round a fair and open brow, pure and unruffled in the calm spring-time of youth, and though the mouth was that of a voluptuary rather than a hero, the small teeth were so white and regular, the lips so full and red, that, had it not been for the down beginning to shade its contour, it might have belonged to a girl. The whole countenance would indeed have been too effeminate, but for a bold sparkle in the eye, which corresponded well with the manly proportions of the frame.
The subject was not half so much abashed as the sovereign. Darnley advanced confidently up the hall, then kneeling before the Queen and kissing the hand she tendered him, he looked boldly in her face and asked leave to deliver certain packets with which he was charged from his mother and kinsfolk.
‘But your mails have not yet arrived, my lord,’ said Mary. ‘You have outridden your retainers; you are the only one of your party who hath yet reached us here in our hiding-place beyond the Firth.’