This matter was at once the main cause of Darnley's murder and the bond of union among the murderers. On the evening of the adjournment of parliament, its members were entertained at a supper by Bothwell. After the feast, a bond was produced by Sir James Balfour, by which they bound themselves to sustain Bothwell's acquittal, recommended him as the fittest husband for the queen, and engaged to support him with their whole power, and to hold as enemies any who should presume to hinder the marriage. They all signed but one, the Earl of Eglinton. It was at this time that Bothwell began to manifest his intentions to Mary, and a letter of hers relates that he tried "if he might by humble suit purchase our good-will, but found our answer nothing correspondent to his desire." Mary then went to Stirling to visit her child. She probably wished, says Mr. Caird, by leaving Edinburgh at this juncture, to indicate to Bothwell that her rejection of his approaches was decisive; and he acted as if he thought so. His next step was that of a desperate man.
BOTHWELL CARRIES OFF THE QUEEN.
On her return from Stirling, three days later, he suddenly met her on the road with a large armed force, seized her, made her escort prisoners, and carried her off to his castle at Dunbar. He kept her there for eleven or twelve days. When she resisted his insolence, he produced the bond granted to him by the nobility, and she there found the signatures of every man from whom she could have expected help. Not one moved a finger in her defence. Huntly and Lethington, who were there with Bothwell, would not fail to remind her of the calamities which she had brought upon herself by opposing the policy of her nobles in her former marriage. Day after day she held out, but no help came. Sir James Melville, who had been taken prisoner with her, records that such violence was at last used that she no longer had a choice. Bothwell, in his dying confession, said that he accomplished his purpose "by the use of sweet waters." Morton's proclamations charged him with using violence to the queen, "and other more unleisum means." It seems not unlikely, therefore, that he employed some sweetened potion. Mary herself says that "in the end, when she saw no hope to be ridd of him, never man in Scotland ance making a mint for her deliverance, she was driven to the conclusion, from their hand-writes and silence, that he had won them all." He partly extorted and partly obtained her consent to marriage. Bothwell then conveyed the heart-broken queen, surrounded by a great force, to the Castle of Edinburgh. He next carried her before the judges, after lining the streets and crowding the courts and passages with his armed retainers. She there submitted to make a declaration that she "forgave him of all hatred conceived by her for taking and imprisoning her;" and also that she was now at liberty. The necessity for such a declaration implies previous coercion. Mr. Caird explains that, under the then existing law, Bothwell had committed an offence punishable with death if he had not obtained this declaration. A marriage was formally solemnized, and so little was her will consulted that it was in the Protestant form. Fettered by their bond, the nobles all looked on and lent no aid. One honest man there was, though, the Protestant minister Craig, who boldly told Bothwell that he objected to the marriage because he (Bothwell) had forced the queen. Called upon to proclaim the banns, Craig denounced it from the pulpit, and afterward publicly testified in the next general assembly that he was alone in opposing the marriage, and that "the best part of the realm did approve it, either by flattery or by their silence."
The Silver Casket Letters are treated by Mr. Caird as they must be by every fair-minded man. He says, "These letters, in truth, were as gross and clumsy fabrications as ever were put forward." His thorough analysis of the longest letter—a love-letter of fourteen quarto pages of print—is the most successful we have seen.
Mr. Caird closes his work with two scenes so effectively portrayed that our readers will thank us for transcribing them:
"After much earthly glory, and a long reign, the time came at last when the great Queen Elizabeth must die. Wealth, grandeur, power which none might question—all were hers. But a cold hand was on her heart. The shadow of death was creeping over her—slow, very slow, but deepening every hour. There was not one left who loved her, or whom she could love. Her most trusted servants trembled at her passions, and longed for a change. Hume tells us she rejected all consolation. She refused food. She threw herself on the floor. She remained sullen and immovable, feeding her thoughts on her afflictions, and declaring her existence an insufferable burden. Few words she uttered, and they were all expressive of some inward grief which she did not reveal; but sighs and groans were the chief vent of her despondency, which discovered her sorrows without assuaging them.
"Oh! the long and unutterable agony of such a time. What is there on earth that could bribe one to bear it willingly? How bitterly she must have realized the words addressed to her by Mary Stuart on the eve of her execution:
"'Think me not presumptuous, madam, that now, bidding farewell to this world, and preparing for a better, I remind you that you also must die and account to God for your stewardship as well as those who have been sent before you. Your sister and cousin, prisoner of wrong,'
Marie R.
"Ten days and nights Queen Elizabeth lay thus upon the carpet; then her voice left her, her senses failed, and so she died."
Mary Stuart had gone long before, destroyed and done to death by this woman; sent to the scaffold in a land where she had been wrongfully kept a prisoner, to whose law she owed no allegiance, and by virtue of a law which was passed to compass her death. On her way to execution, she was met by her old servant, Andrew Melville. He threw himself on his knees before her, wringing his hands in uncontrollable agony.
"Woe is me," he cried, "that it should be my hard hap to carry back such tidings to Scotland!"
"Weep not, Melville, my good and faithful servant," she replied; "thou shouldst rather rejoice to see the end of the long troubles of Mary Stuart. This world is vanity, and full of sorrows. I am Catholic, thou Protestant; but as there is but one Christ, I charge thee in his name to bear witness that I die firm in my religion. Commend me to my dearest son. May God forgive them that have thirsted for my blood."
She then passed to the scaffold. She surveyed it, the block, the axe, the executioners, and spectators undauntedly as she advanced. She prayed to God to pardon her sins and forgive her enemies.