The Queen herself describes this interview in her correspondence, and we here give the passages that occur in her letter to the Archbishop of Glasgow, dated the 24th November:—[51]
"You would find this language strange were you not informed that it has been signified to me by the mouth of Lord Buckhurst, Amyas Paulet, my great promoter, one Drew Drury, Knight, and Mr. Beale, that the assembly of the states of this country have condemned me to death. This they have announced to me on the part of their Queen, exhorting me to confess and acknowledge to her my offences. For this end and to incite me to die well and patiently, and to discharge my conscience, she proposed to send me a bishop and a dean. She also says that the occasion of this my death is the instant request made to her by her people, who, considering that I am still alive, and being her rival, as it appears by my having some time ago taken the name and arms belonging to this Crown (and not being prepared to renounce them, unless with the condition of being declared to be next in the succession to the throne), she cannot live in safety in her kingdom. Seeing even that all the Catholics call me their sovereign, and that her life has been so often attempted to this end, and that, so long as I live, her religion cannot safely exist in this kingdom.
I thanked God and them for the honour they did me in considering me to be such a necessary instrument for the re-establishment of religion in this island, of which, although unworthy, I desired to take it upon myself to be a very pressing and zealous defender. In confirmation of all this, as I had before protested, I offered willingly to shed my blood in the quarrel of the Catholic Church; and moreover, even, if the people thought that my life could serve for the good and public peace of this island, I would not refuse to give it to them (freely) in reward for the twenty years they have detained me in prison.
As to their bishops, I praise God that without their aid I know well enough my offences against God and His Church, and that I do not approve their errors, nor wish to communicate with them in any way. But if it pleased them to permit me to have a Catholic priest, I said I would accept that very willingly, and even demanded it in the name of Jesus Christ, in order to dispose my conscience, and to participate in the Holy Sacraments, on leaving this world.
They answered me that, do what I would, I should not be either saint or martyr, as I was to die for the murder of their Queen and for wishing to dispossess her. I replied that I was not so presumptuous as to aspire to these two honours; but that although they had power over my body by divine permission, not by justice, as I am a sovereign queen, as I have always protested, still they had not power over my soul, nor could they prevent me from hoping that through the mercy of God, who died for me, He will accept from me my blood and my life, which I offer to Him for the maintenance of His Church, outside of which I should never desire to rule any worldly kingdom, thereby risking the eternal kingdom either here or elsewhere; and I shall beg of Him that the sorrow and other persecutions of body and mind which I suffer, may weigh against my sins. But to have contrived, counselled, or commanded Elizabeth's death, that I have never done, nor would I suffer, for my own account, that one single blow should be given to her.
Elizabeth's emissaries rejoined, 'You have counselled and allowed that the English should name you their Sovereign, as appears by the letters of Allen, Lewis, and several others; and this you have not contradicted.'
To this I replied that I had taken nothing upon myself in my letters, but that it was not my province to prevent the Doctor and persons of the Church from naming me as they pleased. This was not my province, since I was under the obedience of the Church to approve what she decrees, and not to correct her; and I said the same in regard to His Holiness, if (as they declared) he caused me to be prayed for everywhere under a title of which I was ignorant. In any case I wished to die and to obey the Church, but not to murder any one in order to possess his rights; but in all this I saw clearly portrayed Saul's persecutions of David, yet I cannot escape as he did, by the window, but it may be that from the shedding of my blood protectors may arise for the sufferers in this universal quarrel."
After reading these words, which bear the vivid impress of Mary's steadfast faith, we are not surprised to hear that during her talk with Lord Buckhurst her face was illumined with an extraordinary joy at the thought that God had done her the honour to choose her as the instrument for the defence of the Catholic faith;[52] and we may imagine that Lord Buckhurst was capable of admiring, although he may not have sympathised with, her sentiments. Paulet took different views, and in a letter to Walsingham, in which he refers to the Queen's "superfluous and idle speeches on other occasions," he adds, "I am deceived if my Lord of Buckhurst will not give the same testimony of her tediousness."[53]