His book, written in a tone of legal calmness and dignity, stands in refreshing contrast with Mr. Froude's savage bitterness and repulsive violence, and seriously damages any credit that may be claimed for the latter as a historian. Entirely at home in the customs, localities, laws, and history of Scotland, he throws unexpected light on a hundred interesting points heretofore left in obscurity by foreign, and even English historians. Mr. Hosack also produces many valuable documents never before published. Among these are the specific charges preferred against Mary at the conference at Westminster in 1568. The "Articles" produced by Mary's accusers before they exhibited their proofs to the commissioners of Queen Elizabeth, although constantly referred to by historians, are nowhere to be found among all the voluminous collections heretofore published on the subject. Mr. Hosack discovered this valuable paper in the collection known as the Hopetoun Manuscripts, which are now in the custody of the lord clerk register. Another most interesting document presented by Mr. Hosack is one long supposed to be lost, namely, the journal of the proceedings at Westminster on the day upon which the silver casket containing the alleged letters of Queen Mary to Bothwell was produced. Then comes the inventory of the jewels of the Queen of Scots, attached to her last will and testament, made in 1566, when Mary was supposed to be dying. This paper has been but recently discovered in the Register House, Edinburgh. It is of high importance, as throwing light on a disputed point concerning Darnley. Finally, with the aid of Professor Schiern, of Copenhagen, Mr. Hosack has succeeded in ascertaining the date of the capture of Nicholas Hubert, commonly called "French Paris." This point is also weighty in connection with the question of the authenticity of the deposition ascribed to him. The English critics of Mr. Hosack's book—many of them partisans of Froude, and armed in the triple steel of their national prejudice—are unanimous in praise of his research, and the able presentation of his argument. Mr. Hosack distinctly charges Mr. Froude with "inventing fictions," and, moreover, sustains the charge. The aim of Mr. Hosack's work is not so much to write the life of Mary Stuart as to demonstrate that her accusers were guilty of the very crime (the murder of Darnley) of which they charge her, and that she was innocent, not only of that, but of any intrigue with Bothwell. Passing over in silence the period of Mary's residence in France, our author rapidly glances at the salient points in the administration of Mary of Lorraine, the mother of Mary Stuart, an admirable character, whose energy, integrity, resolution, and fortitude would have adorned the character of the greatest sovereign that ever reigned. Mr. Hosack thus speaks of her death:
"The words of the dying princess, at once so magnanimous and gentle, were listened to with deep emotion by the Protestant chiefs, who, though in arms against her authority, all acknowledged and admired her private virtues. Amidst the tears of her enemies, thus died the best and wisest woman of the age."
Knox alone, adds Mr. Hosack, sought by means of the most loathsome slanders to vilify the character of this excellent princess; and it was no doubt at his instigation that the rites of Christian burial were denied to her remains in Scotland. Mr. Hosack then takes up the history of Mary from the period of her arrival in Scotland, and ends with the commencement of her imprisonment in England.
Mary came to reign over a country virtually in the power of a band of violent and rapacious lords, long in rebellion against their king. Of the five royal Jameses, three had perished, victims of their aristocratic anarchy. The personal piety of these rebellious lords was infinitesimal; but they had an enormous appreciation of Henry VIII.'s plunder of the monasteries and division of the church lands among the nobles, and desired to see Scotland submitted to the same regimen—they, of course, becoming ardent reformers. The young queen soon won the hearts of the people of Edinburgh by her sweetness and grace. One of her first experiences was the remarkable interview with Knox, in which he bore himself as properly became "the ruffian of the Reformation," while Mary, a girl of nineteen, utterly overcame him in self-possession, logic, and command of citation from the Old Testament. The man was brimful of vanity. The wound rankled, and from that moment he was Mary Stuart's personal enemy.
Long before Mary's arrival, Knox and his friends had obtained full sway. The reformers had destroyed the monastic establishments in the central counties, and, under the influence of Knox, had an "act" passed for the total destruction of what they called "monuments of superstition;" the monuments of superstition in question being all that Scotland possessed of what was most valuable in art and venerable in architecture.
"The registers of the church, and the libraries," says Spotiswoode, "were cast into the fire. In a word, all was ruined; and what had escaped in the time of the first tumult, did now undergo the common calamity." In his sermons, Knox openly denounced Mary, not only as an incorrigible idolatress, but as an enemy whose death would be a public boon. In equally savage style he fulminated against the amusements of the court, and dwelt especially on the deadly sin of dancing. And yet Knox—we must in candor admit it—was not totally indifferent to some social amenities, for he was then paying his addresses to a young girl of sixteen, whom he afterward married. Mary had freely accorded to her Protestant subjects the privilege of worshipping God according to their own creed; but it did not enter into the views of Knox and his co-religionists that the same privilege should be accorded to Mary in the land of which she was sovereign, and with great difficulty could she obtain the right to a private chapel at Holyrood—even this being interfered with, and the officiating priest afterward insulted, beaten, and driven away. And these Christian gentlemen did not stop here. They had the insolence and inhumanity to present to the queen what they called a "supplication," in which they declared that the practice of idolatry could not be tolerated in the sovereign any more than in the subject, and that the "papistical and blasphemous mass" should be wholly abolished. To this, Mary's reply was that, answering for herself, she was noways persuaded that there was any impiety in the mass, and trusted her subjects would not press her to act against her conscience; for, not to dissemble, but to deal plainly with them, she neither might nor would forsake the religion wherein she had been educated and brought up, believing the same to be the true religion, and grounded on the word of God. She further advised her "loving subjects" that she, "neither in times past nor yet in time coming, did intend to force the conscience of any person; but to permit every one to serve God in such a manner as they are persuaded to be the best." On this, Mr. Hosack remarks, "Nothing could exceed the savage rudeness of the language of the assembly. Nothing could exceed the dignity and moderation of the queen's reply."
The enemies of Mary Stuart always seek to find excuse for the rebellious outrages of the lords and the kirk in the design attributed to Mary Stuart of introducing Catholicity to the exclusion of Protestantism. Mr. Hosack handles this portion of his subject with great ease and success, showing conclusively the admirable spirit of toleration that animated Mary throughout. Then follow the marriage of Mary with Darnley; the rebellion of Murray, Argyll, and others to deprive the queen of her crown; the energy, ability, and admirable judgment of Mary in dealing with them, and the consummate hypocrisy and falsehood of Elizabeth in feigning good-will to Mary while furnishing the rebels money and assistance. The French ambassador in London had discovered that six thousand crowns had been sent from the English treasury to the Scotch rebels. The fact was positive. He mentioned it to Elizabeth in person; but she solemnly assured him, with an oath, (elle nia avec serment,) that he was misinformed. There were strong reasons why Elizabeth would not have it believed that she had lent the rebel lords any countenance, and she therefore got up a remarkable scene for the purpose. The French and Spanish ambassadors had charged her in plain terms with stirring up dissensions in Scotland, and she desired to reply to the imputation in the most public and emphatic manner. Murray and Hamilton were summoned to appear, and in presence of the ambassadors and her own ministers she asked them whether she had ever encouraged them in their rebellion. Murray began to reply in Scotch, when Elizabeth stopped him, bidding him speak in French, which she better understood. The scene was arranged beforehand. Murray fell on his knees and declared "that her majesty had never moved them to any opposition or resistance against the queen's marriage." "Now," exclaimed Elizabeth in her most triumphant tone, "you have told the truth; for neither did I, nor any one in my name, stir you up against your queen; for your abominable treason may serve for example to my own subjects to rebel against me. Therefore get you out of my presence; ye are but unworthy traitors." This astounding exhibition of meanness, and falsehood, and folly, which it is certain, says Mr. Hosack, imposed upon no one who witnessed it, is without a parallel in history.
Mary's energy and prudence in suppressing this dangerous rebellion sufficiently refute a prevalent notion that she was indebted to the counsels of Murray for the previous success of her administration. Even Robertson admits that at no period of her career were her abilities and address more conspicuous. And more remarkable than her ability in gaining success was the moderation with which she used it. Not one of the rebels suffered death, and her speedy pardon of the Duke of Chatelherault, a conspirator against her crown, of which he was the presumptive heir, was an instance of generosity unexampled in the history of princes.
The accusation against Mary of having signed the Catholic League, put forward by so many historians—Froude, of course, among them—is clearly shown by Mr. Hosack to be utterly untrue. She never joined it. By this refusal she maintained her solemn promises to her Protestant subjects—the chief of whom remained her staunchest friend in the days of her misfortune. She averted religious discord from her dominions, and posterity will applaud the wisdom as well as the magnitude of the sacrifice which she made at this momentous crisis.
Then comes the murder of Riccio, which is generally attributed to the jealousy of Darnley and the personal hatred of the nobles. These motives, if they ever existed at all, were but secondary with the conspirators who contrived Riccio's death.