Mary refuses to plead.
When the preparations were made, Mary refused to acknowledge the jurisdiction of the court. She denied that they had any right to arraign or to try her. "I am no subject of Elizabeth's," said she. "I am an independent and sovereign queen as well as she, and I will not consent to any thing inconsistent with this my true position. I owe no allegiance to England, and I am not, in any sense, subject to her laws. I came into the realm only to ask assistance from a sister queen, and I have been made a captive, and detained many years in an unjust and cruel imprisonment; and though now worn down both in body and mind by my protracted sufferings, I am not yet so enfeebled as to forget what is due to myself, my ancestors, and my country."
This refusal of Mary's to plead, or to acknowledge the jurisdiction of the court, caused a new delay. They urged her to abandon her resolution. They told her that if she refused to plead, the trial would proceed without her action, and, by pursuing such a course, she would only deprive herself of the means of defense, without at all impeding the course of her fate. At length Mary yielded. It would have been better for her to have adhered to her first intention.
The commission.
The great hall.
The commission by which Mary was to be tried consisted of earls, barons, and other persons of rank, twenty or thirty in number. They were seated on each side of the room, the throne being at the head. In the center was a table, where the lawyers, by whom the trial was to be conducted, were seated. Below this table was a chair for Mary. Behind Mary's chair was a rail, dividing off the lower end of the hall from the court; and this formed an outer space, to which some spectators were admitted.
Mary pronounced guilty.
Mary took her place in the seat assigned her, and the trial proceeded. They adduced the evidence against her, and then asked for her defense. She said substantially that she had a right to make an effort to recover her liberty; that, after being confined a captive so long, and having lost forever her youth, her health, and her happiness, it was not wonderful that she wished to be free; but that, in endeavoring to obtain her freedom, she had formed no plans to injure Elizabeth, or to interfere in any way with her rights or prerogatives as queen. The commissioners, after devoting some days to hearing evidence, and listening to the defense, sent Mary back to her apartments, and went to London. There they had a final consultation, and unanimously agreed in the following decision: "That Mary, commonly called Queen of Scots and dowager of France, had been an accessory to Babington's conspiracy, and had compassed the death of Elizabeth, queen of England."
Elizabeth's pretended sorrow.
Elizabeth pretended to be very much concerned at this result. She laid the proceedings before Parliament. It was supposed then, and has always been supposed since, that she wished Mary to be beheaded, but desired not to take the responsibility of it herself; and that she wanted to appear unwilling, and to be impelled, greatly against her own inclinations, by the urgency of others, to carry the sentence into execution. At any rate, Parliament, and all the members of the government, approved and confirmed the verdict, and wished to have it carried into effect.
Signing the warrant.
Shuffling of Elizabeth.