CHAPTER XXXI--ENGLAND UNDER ELIZABETH
CHAPTER XXXI--ENGLAND UNDER ELIZABETH
There was great rejoicing all over the land when the Lords of the Councilwent down to Hatfield, to hail the Princess Elizabeth as the new Queen ofEngland. Weary of the barbarities of Mary's reign, the people lookedwith hope and gladness to the new Sovereign. The nation seemed to wakefrom a horrible dream; and Heaven, so long hidden by the smoke of thefires that roasted men and women to death, appeared to brighten oncemore.
Queen Elizabeth was five-and-twenty years of age when she rode throughthe streets of London, from the Tower to Westminster Abbey, to becrowned. Her countenance was strongly marked, but on the whole,commanding and dignified; her hair was red, and her nose something toolong and sharp for a woman's. She was not the beautiful creature hercourtiers made out; but she was well enough, and no doubt looked all thebetter for coming after the dark and gloomy Mary. She was well educated,but a roundabout writer, and rather a hard swearer and coarse talker. Shewas clever, but cunning and deceitful, and inherited much of her father'sviolent temper. I mention this now, because she has been so over-praisedby one party, and so over-abused by another, that it is hardly possibleto understand the greater part of her reign without first understandingwhat kind of woman she really was.
She began her reign with the great advantage of having a very wise andcareful Minister, SIR WILLIAM CECIL, whom she afterwards made LORDBURLEIGH. Altogether, the people had greater reason for rejoicing thanthey usually had, when there were processions in the streets; and theywere happy with some reason. All kinds of shows and images were set up;GOG and MAGOG were hoisted to the top of Temple Bar, and (which was moreto the purpose) the Corporation dutifully presented the young Queen withthe sum of a thousand marks in gold--so heavy a present, that she wasobliged to take it into her carriage with both hands. The coronation wasa great success; and, on the next day, one of the courtiers presented apetition to the new Queen, praying that as it was the custom to releasesome prisoners on such occasions, she would have the goodness to releasethe four Evangelists, Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John, and also the ApostleSaint Paul, who had been for some time shut up in a strange language sothat the people could not get at them.
To this, the Queen replied that it would be better first to inquire ofthemselves whether they desired to be released or not; and, as a means offinding out, a great public discussion--a sort of religioustournament--was appointed to take place between certain champions of thetwo religions, in Westminster Abbey. You may suppose that it was soonmade pretty clear to common sense, that for people to benefit by whatthey repeat or read, it is rather necessary they should understandsomething about it. Accordingly, a Church Service in plain English wassettled, and other laws and regulations were made, completelyestablishing the great work of the Reformation. The Romish bishops andchampions were not harshly dealt with, all things considered; and theQueen's Ministers were both prudent and merciful.
The one great trouble of this reign, and the unfortunate cause of thegreater part of such turmoil and bloodshed as occurred in it, was MARYSTUART, QUEEN OF SCOTS. We will try to understand, in as few words aspossible, who Mary was, what she was, and how she came to be a thorn inthe royal pillow of Elizabeth.
She was the daughter of the Queen Regent of Scotland, MARY OF GUISE. Shehad been married, when a mere child, to the Dauphin, the son and heir ofthe King of France. The Pope, who pretended that no one could rightfullywear the crown of England without his gracious permission, was stronglyopposed to Elizabeth, who had not asked for the said gracious permission.And as Mary Queen of Scots would have inherited the English crown inright of her birth, supposing the English Parliament not to have alteredthe succession, the Pope himself, and most of the discontented who werefollowers of his, maintained that Mary was the rightful Queen of England,and Elizabeth the wrongful Queen. Mary being so closely connected withFrance, and France being jealous of England, there was far greater dangerin this than there would have been if she had had no alliance with thatgreat power. And when her young husband, on the death of his father,became FRANCIS THE SECOND, King of France, the matter grew very serious.For, the young couple styled themselves King and Queen of England, andthe Pope was disposed to help them by doing all the mischief he could.
Now, the reformed religion, under the guidance of a stern and powerfulpreacher, named JOHN KNOX, and other such men, had been making fierceprogress in Scotland. It was still a half savage country, where therewas a great deal of murdering and rioting continually going on; and theReformers, instead of reforming those evils as they should have done,went to work in the ferocious old Scottish spirit, laying churches andchapels waste, pulling down pictures and altars, and knocking about theGrey Friars, and the Black Friars, and the White Friars, and the friarsof all sorts of colours, in all directions. This obdurate and harshspirit of the Scottish Reformers (the Scotch have always been rather asullen and frowning people in religious matters) put up the blood of theRomish French court, and caused France to send troops over to Scotland,with the hope of setting the friars of all sorts of colours on their legsagain; of conquering that country first, and England afterwards; and socrushing the Reformation all to pieces. The Scottish Reformers, who hadformed a great league which they called The Congregation of the Lord,secretly represented to Elizabeth that, if the reformed religion got theworst of it with them, it would be likely to get the worst of it inEngland too; and thus, Elizabeth, though she had a high notion of therights of Kings and Queens to do anything they liked, sent an army toScotland to support the Reformers, who were in arms against theirsovereign. All these proceedings led to a treaty of peace at Edinburgh,under which the French consented to depart from the kingdom. By aseparate treaty, Mary and her young husband engaged to renounce theirassumed title of King and Queen of England. But this treaty they neverfulfilled.
It happened, soon after matters had got to this state, that the youngFrench King died, leaving Mary a young widow. She was then invited byher Scottish subjects to return home and reign over them; and as she wasnot now happy where she was, she, after a little time, complied.
Elizabeth had been Queen three years, when Mary Queen of Scots embarkedat Calais for her own rough, quarrelling country. As she came out of theharbour, a vessel was lost before her eyes, and she said, 'O! good God!what an omen this is for such a voyage!' She was very fond of France,and sat on the deck, looking back at it and weeping, until it was quitedark. When she went to bed, she directed to be called at daybreak, ifthe French coast were still visible, that she might behold it for thelast time. As it proved to be a clear morning, this was done, and sheagain wept for the country she was leaving, and said many times,'Farewell, France! Farewell, France! I shall never see thee again!' Allthis was long remembered afterwards, as sorrowful and interesting in afair young princess of nineteen. Indeed, I am afraid it gradually came,together with her other distresses, to surround her with greater sympathythan she deserved.
When she came to Scotland, and took up her abode at the palace ofHolyrood in Edinburgh, she found herself among uncouth strangers and wilduncomfortable customs very different from her experiences in the court ofFrance. The very people who were disposed to love her, made her headache when she was tired out by her voyage, with a serenade of discordantmusic--a fearful concert of bagpipes, I suppose--and brought her and hertrain home to her palace on miserable little Scotch horses that appearedto be half starved. Among the people who were not disposed to love her,she found the powerful leaders of the Reformed Church, who were bitterupon her amusements, however innocent, and denounced music and dancing asworks of the devil. John Knox himself often lectured her, violently andangrily, and did much to make her life unhappy. All these reasonsconfirmed her old attachment to the Romish religion, and caused her,there is no doubt, most imprudently and dangerously both for herself andfor England too, to give a solemn pledge to the heads of the RomishChurch that if she ever succeeded to the English crown, she would set upthat religion again. In reading her unhappy history, you must alwaysremember this; and also that during her whole life she was constantly putforward against the Queen, in some form or other, by the Romish party.
That Elizabeth, on the other hand, was not inclined to like her, ispretty certain. Elizabeth was very vain and jealous, and had anextraordinary dislike to people being married. She treated LadyCatherine Grey, sister of the beheaded Lady Jane, with such shamefulseverity, for no other reason than her being secretly married, that shedied and her husband was ruined; so, when a second marriage for Marybegan to be talked about, probably Elizabeth disliked her more. Not thatElizabeth wanted suitors of her own, for they started up from Spain,Austria, Sweden, and England. Her English lover at this time, and onewhom she much favoured too, was LORD ROBERT DUDLEY, Earl ofLeicester--himself secretly married to AMY ROBSART, the daughter of anEnglish gentleman, whom he was strongly suspected of causing to bemurdered, down at his country seat, Cumnor Hall in Berkshire, that hemight be free to marry the Queen. Upon this story, the great writer, SIRWALTER SCOTT, has founded one of his best romances. But if Elizabethknew how to lead her handsome favourite on, for her own vanity andpleasure, she knew how to stop him for her own pride; and his love, andall the other proposals, came to nothing. The Queen always declared ingood set speeches, that she would never be married at all, but would liveand die a Maiden Queen. It was a very pleasant and meritoriousdeclaration, I suppose; but it has been puffed and trumpeted so much,that I am rather tired of it myself.
Divers princes proposed to marry Mary, but the English court had reasonsfor being jealous of them all, and even proposed as a matter of policythat she should marry that very Earl of Leicester who had aspired to bethe husband of Elizabeth. At last, LORD DARNLEY, son of the Earl ofLennox, and himself descended from the Royal Family of Scotland, wentover with Elizabeth's consent to try his fortune at Holyrood. He was atall simpleton; and could dance and play the guitar; but I know ofnothing else he could do, unless it were to get very drunk, and eatgluttonously, and make a contemptible spectacle of himself in many meanand vain ways. However, he gained Mary's heart, not disdaining in thepursuit of his object to ally himself with one of her secretaries, DAVIDRIZZIO, who had great influence with her. He soon married the Queen.This marriage does not say much for her, but what followed will presentlysay less.
Mary's brother, the EARL OF MURRAY, and head of the Protestant party inScotland, had opposed this marriage, partly on religious grounds, andpartly perhaps from personal dislike of the very contemptible bridegroom.When it had taken place, through Mary's gaining over to it the morepowerful of the lords about her, she banished Murray for his pains; and,when he and some other nobles rose in arms to support the reformedreligion, she herself, within a month of her wedding day, rode againstthem in armour with loaded pistols in her saddle. Driven out ofScotland, they presented themselves before Elizabeth--who called themtraitors in public, and assisted them in private, according to her craftynature.
Mary had been married but a little while, when she began to hate herhusband, who, in his turn, began to hate that David Rizzio, with whom hehad leagued to gain her favour, and whom he now believed to be her lover.He hated Rizzio to that extent, that he made a compact with LORD RUTHVENand three other lords to get rid of him by murder. This wicked agreementthey made in solemn secrecy upon the first of March, fifteen hundred andsixty-six, and on the night of Saturday the ninth, the conspirators werebrought by Darnley up a private staircase, dark and steep, into a rangeof rooms where they knew that Mary was sitting at supper with her sister,Lady Argyle, and this doomed man. When they went into the room, Darnleytook the Queen round the waist, and Lord Ruthven, who had risen from abed of sickness to do this murder, came in, gaunt and ghastly, leaning ontwo men. Rizzio ran behind the Queen for shelter and protection. 'Lethim come out of the room,' said Ruthven. 'He shall not leave the room,'replied the Queen; 'I read his danger in your face, and it is my willthat he remain here.' They then set upon him, struggled with him,overturned the table, dragged him out, and killed him with fifty-sixstabs. When the Queen heard that he was dead, she said, 'No more tears.I will think now of revenge!'
Within a day or two, she gained her husband over, and prevailed on thetall idiot to abandon the conspirators and fly with her to Dunbar. There,he issued a proclamation, audaciously and falsely denying that he had anyknowledge of the late bloody business; and there they were joined by theEARL BOTHWELL and some other nobles. With their help, they raised eightthousand men; returned to Edinburgh, and drove the assassins intoEngland. Mary soon afterwards gave birth to a son--still thinking ofrevenge.
That she should have had a greater scorn for her husband after his latecowardice and treachery than she had had before, was natural enough.There is little doubt that she now began to love Bothwell instead, and toplan with him means of getting rid of Darnley. Bothwell had such powerover her that he induced her even to pardon the assassins of Rizzio. Thearrangements for the Christening of the young Prince were entrusted tohim, and he was one of the most important people at the ceremony, wherethe child was named JAMES: Elizabeth being his godmother, though notpresent on the occasion. A week afterwards, Darnley, who had left Maryand gone to his father's house at Glasgow, being taken ill with the small-pox, she sent her own physician to attend him. But there is reason toapprehend that this was merely a show and a pretence, and that she knewwhat was doing, when Bothwell within another month proposed to one of thelate conspirators against Rizzio, to murder Darnley, 'for that it was theQueen's mind that he should be taken away.' It is certain that on thatvery day she wrote to her ambassador in France, complaining of him, andyet went immediately to Glasgow, feigning to be very anxious about him,and to love him very much. If she wanted to get him in her power, shesucceeded to her heart's content; for she induced him to go back with herto Edinburgh, and to occupy, instead of the palace, a lone house outsidethe city called the Kirk of Field. Here, he lived for about a week. OneSunday night, she remained with him until ten o'clock, and then left him,to go to Holyrood to be present at an entertainment given in celebrationof the marriage of one of her favourite servants. At two o'clock in themorning the city was shaken by a great explosion, and the Kirk of Fieldwas blown to atoms.
Darnley's body was found next day lying under a tree at some distance.How it came there, undisfigured and unscorched by gunpowder, and how thiscrime came to be so clumsily and strangely committed, it is impossible todiscover. The deceitful character of Mary, and the deceitful characterof Elizabeth, have rendered almost every part of their joint historyuncertain and obscure. But, I fear that Mary was unquestionably a partyto her husband's murder, and that this was the revenge she hadthreatened. The Scotch people universally believed it. Voices cried outin the streets of Edinburgh in the dead of the night, for justice on themurderess. Placards were posted by unknown hands in the public placesdenouncing Bothwell as the murderer, and the Queen as his accomplice;and, when he afterwards married her (though himself already married),previously making a show of taking her prisoner by force, the indignationof the people knew no bounds. The women particularly are described ashaving been quite frantic against the Queen, and to have hooted and criedafter her in the streets with terrific vehemence.
Such guilty unions seldom prosper. This husband and wife had livedtogether but a month, when they were separated for ever by the successesof a band of Scotch nobles who associated against them for the protectionof the young Prince: whom Bothwell had vainly endeavoured to lay hold of,and whom he would certainly have murdered, if the EARL OF MAR, in whosehands the boy was, had not been firmly and honourably faithful to histrust. Before this angry power, Bothwell fled abroad, where he died, aprisoner and mad, nine miserable years afterwards. Mary being found bythe associated lords to deceive them at every turn, was sent a prisonerto Lochleven Castle; which, as it stood in the midst of a lake, couldonly be approached by boat. Here, one LORD LINDSAY, who was so much of abrute that the nobles would have done better if they had chosen a meregentleman for their messenger, made her sign her abdication, and appointMurray, Regent of Scotland. Here, too, Murray saw her in a sorrowing andhumbled state.
She had better have remained in the castle of Lochleven, dull prison asit was, with the rippling of the lake against it, and the moving shadowsof the water on the room walls; but she could not rest there, and morethan once tried to escape. The first time she had nearly succeeded,dressed in the clothes of her own washer-woman, but, putting up her handto prevent one of the boatmen from lifting her veil, the men suspectedher, seeing how white it was, and rowed her back again. A short timeafterwards, her fascinating manners enlisted in her cause a boy in theCastle, called the little DOUGLAS, who, while the family were at supper,stole the keys of the great gate, went softly out with the Queen, lockedthe gate on the outside, and rowed her away across the lake, sinking thekeys as they went along. On the opposite shore she was met by anotherDouglas, and some few lords; and, so accompanied, rode away on horsebackto Hamilton, where they raised three thousand men. Here, she issued aproclamation declaring that the abdication she had signed in her prisonwas illegal, and requiring the Regent to yield to his lawful Queen. Beinga steady soldier, and in no way discomposed although he was without anarmy, Murray pretended to treat with her, until he had collected a forceabout half equal to her own, and then he gave her battle. In one quarterof an hour he cut down all her hopes. She had another weary ride onhorse-back of sixty long Scotch miles, and took shelter at DundrennanAbbey, whence she fled for safety to Elizabeth's dominions.
Mary Queen of Scots came to England--to her own ruin, the trouble of thekingdom, and the misery and death of many--in the year one thousand fivehundred and sixty-eight. How she left it and the world, nineteen yearsafterwards, we have now to see.