A Convention is held at Stirling: 10th September 1559.
As we have already said, a Convention was appointed to be held at Stirling on the tenth day of September. To this repaired the most part of the Lords of the Congregation, ... and in the meantime came assured word that the Frenchmen had begun to fortify Leith. This action more evidently disclosed the Queen's craft, and so deeply grieved the hearts of the whole nobility that, with one consent, they addressed a letter to the Queen on the subject. This letter was signed by my Lord Duke, the Earls of Arran, Glencairn and Menteith, by the Lords Ruthven, Ochiltree and Boyd, and by divers other barons and gentlemen....
The Lords of the Congregation agree to take up arms against the French Invasion.
The Duke and Lords, understanding that the fortification of Leith was still proceeding, directed their whole forces to convene at Stirling on the fifteenth day of October, that from thence they might advance to Edinburgh, for redress of the great enormities committed by the French upon the whole country, which was so oppressed by them that the life of every honest man was bitter to him.[143]...
The Protests of the Congregation are scornfully rejected.
There came from the Queen Regent, on the twenty-first day of October, Master Robert Forman, Lion King of Arms, who brought unto us the following credit:—
"That she wondered how any durst presume to command her in that realm, which needed not to be conquered by any force, considering that it was already conquered by marriage; that Frenchmen could not justly be called strangers, seeing that they were naturalised; and therefore that she would neither make the town of Leith patent, nor yet send any man away, except as she thought expedient. She accused the Duke of violating his promise; she made long protestation of her love towards the commonwealth of Scotland; and in the end she commanded that, under pain of treason, all assisters to the Duke and to us should depart from the town of Edinburgh."...
The Congregation convene at Edinburgh; they agree to depose the Regent.
The whole nobility, barons, and burgesses, then present, were commanded to convene in the Tolbooth of Edinburgh, the same twenty-first day of October, for deliberation. The whole cause being exponed there by the Lord Ruthven, the question was proponed, Whether she that so contemptuously refused the most humble request of the born counsellors of the realm, being also but a Regent whose pretences threatened the bondage of the whole commonwealth, ought to be suffered so tyrannously to empire over them? Because this question had not before been disputed in open assembly, it was thought expedient that the judgment of the preachers should be required. These being called and instructed in the case, John Willock spoke as follows, affirming:—