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[ NOTE R, p. 203. D’Ewes, p. 328. The Puritanical sect had indeed gone so far, that a book of discipline was secretly subscribed by above five hundred clergymen; and the Presbyterian government thereby established in the midst of the church, notwithstanding the rigor of the prelates and of the high commission. So impossible is it by penal statutes, however severe, to suppress all religious innovation. See Neal’s Hist. of the Puritans, vol. i. p. 483. Strype’s Life of Whitgift, p. 291.]

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[ NOTE S, p. 205. This year, the earl of Northumberland, brother to the earl beheaded some years before, had been engaged in a conspiracy with Lord Paget for the deliverance of the queen of Scots. He was thrown into the Tower; and being conscious that his guilt could be proved upon him, at least that sentence would infallibly be pronounced against him, he freed himself from further prosecution by a voluntary death. He shot himself in the breast with a pistol. About the same time the earl of Arundel, son of the unfortunate duke of Norfolk, having entered into some exceptionable measures, and reflecting en the unhappy fate which had attended his family, endeavored to depart secretly beyond sea, but was discovered and thrown into the Tower. In 1587, this nobleman was brought to his trial for high treason; chiefly because he had dropped some expressions of affection to the Spaniards, and had affirmed that he would have masses said for the success of the armada. His peers found him guilty of treason. This severe sentence was not executed; but Arundel never recovered his liberty. He died a prisoner in 1595. He carried his religious austerities so far, that they were believed the immediate cause of his death.]

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[ NOTE T, p. 216. Mary’s extreme animosity against Elizabeth may easily be conceived, and it broke out about this tune in an incident which may appear curious. While the former queen was kept in custody by the earl of Shrewsbury, she lived during a long time in great intimacy with the countess; but that lady entertaining a jealousy of an amour between her and the earl, their friendship was converted into enmity; and Mary took a method of revenge, which at once gratified her spite against the countess and that against Elizabeth. She wrote to the queen, informing her of all the malicious, scandalous stories which, she said, the countess of Shrewsbury had reported of her: that Elizabeth had given a promise of marriage to a certain person, whom she afterwards often admitted to her bed: that she had been equally indulgent to Simier, the French agent, and to the duke of Anjou: that Hatton was also one of her paramours, who was even disgusted with her excessive love and fondness: that though she was on other occasions avaricious to the last degree, as well as ungrateful, and kind to very few, she spared no expense in gratifying her amorous passions: that notwithstanding her licentious amours, she was not made like other women; and all those who courted her in marriage would in the end be disappointed; that she was so conceited of her beauty, as to swallow the most extravagant flattery from her courtiers, who could not, on these occasions, forbear even sneering at her for her folly: that it was usual for them to tell her that the lustre of Her beauty dazzled them like that of the sun, and they could not behold it with a fixed eye. She added that the countess had said, that Mary’s best policy would be to engage her son to make love to the queen; nor was there any danger that such a proposal would be taken for mockery; so ridiculous was the opinion which she had entertained of her own charms. She pretended that the countess had represented her as no less odious in her temper than profligate in her manners, and absurd in her vanity: that she had so beaten a young woman of the name of Scudamore, as to break that lady’s finger; and in order to cover over the matter, it was pretended that the accident had proceeded from the fall of a candlestick: that she had cut another across the hand with a knife, who had been so unfortunate as to offend her. Mary added, that the countess had informed her, that Elizabeth had suborned Rolstone to pretend friendship to her, in order to debauch her, and thereby throw infamy on her rival. See Murden’s State Papers, p. 558. This imprudent and malicious letter was written a very little before the detection of Mary’s conspiracy; and contributed, no doubt, to render the proceedings against her the more rigorous. How far all these imputations against Elizabeth can be credited, may perhaps appear doubtful; but her extreme fondness for Leicester, Hatton, and Essex, not to mention Mountjoy and others, with the curious passages between her and Admiral Seymour, contained in Haynes, render her chastity very much to be suspected. Her self-conceit with regard to beauty, we know from other undoubted authority to have been extravagant. Even when she was a very old woman, she allowed her courtiers to flatter her with regard to her “excellent beauties.” Birch, vol. ii. p. 442, 443. Her passionate temper may also be proved from many lively instances; and it was not unusual with her to beat her maids of honor. See the Sidney Papers, vol. ii. p. 38. The blow she gave to Essex before the privy council is another instance. There remains in the Museum a letter of the earl of Huntingdon’s, in which he complains grievously of the queen’s pinching his wife very sorely, on account of some quarrel between them. Had this princess been born in a private station, she would not have been very amiable; but her absolute authority, at the same time that it gave an uncontrolling swing to her violent passions, enabled her to compensate her infirmities by many great and signal virtues.]

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[ NOTE U, p. 226. Camden, p. 525. This evidence was that of Curie, her secretary, whom she allowed to be a very honest man; and who, as well as Nau, had given proofs of his integrity, by keeping so long such important secrets, from whose discovery he could have reaped the greatest profit. Mary, after all, thought that she had so little reason to complain of Curie’s evidence, that she took care to have him paid a considerable sum by her will, which she wrote the day before her death. Goodall, vol. i. p. 413. Neither did she forget Nau, though less satisfied in other respects with his conduct. Id. ibid.]

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[ NOTE X, p. 226. The detail of this conspiracy is to be found in a letter of the queen of Scots to Charles Paget, her great confidant. This letter is dated the 20th of May, 1586, and is contained in Dr. Forbes’s manuscript collections, at present in the possession of Lord Royston. It is a copy attested by Curie, Mary’s secretary, and endorsed by Lord Burleigh. What proves its authenticity beyond question is, that we find in Murden’s Collection, (p. 516,) that Mary actually wrote that very day a letter to Charles Paget; and further she mentions, in the manuscript letter, a letter of Charles Paget’s of the 10th of April. Now we find by Murden, (p. 506,) that Charles Paget did actually write her a letter of that date.

This violence of spirit is very consistent with Mary’s character. Her maternal affection was too weak to oppose the gratification of her passions, particularly her pride, her ambition, and her bigotry. Her son, having made some fruitless attempts to associate her with him in the title, and having found the scheme impracticable on account of the prejudices of his Protestant subjects, at last desisted from that design and entered into an alliance with England, without comprehending his mother. She was in such a rage at this undutiful behavior, as she imagined it, that she wrote to Queen Elizabeth, that she no longer cared what became of him or herself in the world; the greatest satisfaction she could have before her death, was, to see him and all his adherents become a signal example of tyranny, ingratitude and impiety, and undergo the vengeance of God for their wickedness. She would find in Christendom other heirs, and doubted not to put her inheritance in such hands as would retain the firmest hold of it. She cared not, after taking this revenge, what became of her body. The quickest death would then be the most agreeable to her. And she assured her that, if he persevered, she would disown him for her son, would give him her malediction, would disinherit him, as well of his present possessions as of all he could expect by her; abandoning him not only to her subjects to treat him as they had done her, but to all strangers to subdue and conquer him. It was in vain to employ menaces against her: the fear of death or other misfortune would never induce her to make one step or pronounce one syllable beyond what she had determined. She would rather perish with honor, in maintaining the dignity to which God had raised her, than degrade herself by the least pusillanimity, or act what was unworthy of her station and of her race. Murden, p. 566, 567.

James said to Courcelles, the French ambassador, that he had seen a letter under her own hand, in which she threatened to disinherit him, and said that he might betake him to the lordship of Darnley; for that was all he had by his father. Courcelles’ Letter, a MS. of Dr. Campbell’s. There is in Jebb (vol. ii. p. 573) a letter of hers, where she throws out the same menace against him.

We find this scheme of seizing the king of Scots, and delivering him into the hands of the pope or the king of Spain, proposed by Morgan to Mary. See Murden, p. 525. A mother must be very violent to whom one would dare to make such a proposal; but it seems she assented to it. Was not such a woman very capable of murdering her husband, who had so grievously offended her?]