5. What aspect did the dispute with Spain assume? What occurred in Ireland? What was the fate of Essex? Describe the conduct of Mountjoy. When and under what circumstances did Queen Elizabeth die?

6. What was the general character of her reign? Mention some of its beneficial acts. What did Sir Thomas Gresham become celebrated for? What progress did trade and commerce make? What voyages and discoveries were made?

7. What were the literary performances of Wyatt and Surrey? Who was Sir Philip Sidney? Mention some of the principal literary ornaments of this reign, with the names of their works. Who was at their head?

CHAPTER XXI.

SCOTLAND FROM THE ACCESSION OF MARY TO THE UNION OF the Crowns, a. d. 1542—1603.

The Regency-Martyrdom of Wishart-Battle of Pinkey-The Queen dowager-The Reformation-Mary's Return to Scotland-Darnley-Riz. zio-Bothwell-Mary seeks Refuge in England-Northern Insurrection -Assassination of Earl Murray-Execution of Queen Mary-James VI. -The Gowry Conspiracy.

1. THE REGENCY.-Mary, queen of Scots, was just a week old when her reign commenced, and she was nominally a queen. It naturally happened that the office of governor would fall to the person who had most influence and power in the country. Mary of Guise, the mother of the queen, struggled for the possession of it, and she was aided by the celebrated Cardinal Beaton, the chief champion of the Roman-catholics. The Earl of Arran, the nearest male relation of the infant queen, also claimed the right of being governor of the kingdom, and was successful.

With the view of uniting Great Britain under one crown, Henry, on the news of his nephew's death, determined to marry his son Edward to the infant Mary. Many of the Scotch nobles, among the foremost of whom were the Earls of Angus, Cassillis, and Glencairn, readily seconded his views, even to the sacrifice of the national independence. Arran, the heir-presumptive to the throne, not only succeeded in depriving_Cardinal Beaton of the regency, but actually shut him up in Blackness Castle. The clergy, feeling convinced that by his talent and energy alone could their ruin be warded off, closed their churches, and refused to administer the sacraments or bury the dead.

May

But Henry's plans, however skilfully laid by his own agents or abetted by a numerous party in Scotland, failed of success. The English monarch overreached himself, and his provocations were the means of bringing about a reconciliation between the Earl of Arran and Beaton. Not long after, the earl abjured Protestantism, and returned into the bosom of the Romish church; while Lennox, who had been set up as Arran's rival, joined the English interests. Plots and intrigues rapidly followed each other, until a sudden attack was made upon the town of Leith by the Earl of Hertford. The city of } 1544. Edinburgh was plundered and set on fire, and all the open country round that capital burnt or destroyed. On quitting Leith, at the approach of Arran and Beaton, the English forces burnt every town, village, and even cottage, along the seashore between Edinburgh and Berwick. Other incursions across the borders were marked by the most savage fury, and in one of these the beautiful abbeys of Melrose, Kelso, and Dryburgh were partly demolished. Nothing was left undone to convert the districts south of the Forth into one wide desert.

WISHART'S MARTYRDOM.-The persons who had assisted Henry the Eighth's projects in Scotland still followed their treacherous practices, and advised him to attempt another invasion. Some individuals even promised to murder Beaton if Henry would give them a sufficient reward. At length the barbarous execution of George Wishart, who was burned at St Andrews for heresy, seemed to favour their designs, by inspiring a number of his adherents with a determination to avenge his death. Early on the morning of the 29th of May 1546, Norman Leslie, eldest son of the Earl of Rothes, with sixteen associates, succeeded in entering the cardinal's castle, and having turned out the workmen and servants, they shut the gates, and proceeded deliberately to execute their purpose. The object of their vengeance had barricaded the door of his apartment, but an entrance was soon effected, when two of the assassins rushed upon him with drawn swords and inflicted several wounds. James Melville, however, one of their number, checked their impetuosity, declaring that the judgment of God ought to be executed with all gravity. He then presented the point of his sword to the bleeding victim, and calling upon him to repent of his evil courses, and especially of the death of the holy Wishart, passed the weapon repeatedly through the body of the prelate, who sank down at his feet and expired.

The

The conspirators took possession of the castle of St Andrews, and retained it throughout a protracted siege, during which they were joined by John Knox, who in vain raised his voice against their wild revelry and horrible immoralities. castle was not reduced till the aid of French engineers was obtained, and the garrison were taken prisoners and conveyed to France. It thus happened, that Knox, so conspicuous in A. D. the history of the Reformation in Scotland, was for some 1547. time a captive along with common criminals in the French galleys.

2. BATTLE OF PINKEY.-After the death of Henry VIII., the protector Somerset still determined to pursue his plan of forcing a marriage between the young Prince Edward and the still younger Queen of the Scots, and prepared a great army, 2d Sept. with which he crossed the border. In the castle of St 1547. Andrews there had been found a document in which many of the Scottish nobles had bound themselves to support the English government,—a disunion which naturally occasioned great anxiety to the regent. He adopted an ancient method of gathering the people, by sending "the fiery cross" through the country. This mysterious symbol of haste and danger was formed of yew, first set on fire, and then quenched in the blood of a goat. Every man who received it was bound to pass on with it through torrents or over mountains, by day or night, until another took it off his hands. An army was thus collected at Musselburgh, six miles east of Edinburgh, near which position they were defeated by Somerset, in the 10th Sep. bloody battle of Pinkey, where it is said that 15,000 1547. Scotsmen perished. Had Somerset pursued this victory, and advanced into Scotland, it is hard to say how dearly that country would again have had to buy its independence; but the news of plots forming against him induced him to return to England.

In the first Scottish parliament held under Arran's regency, an act was passed allowing the people to read the Scriptures in their native tongue. The assassination of Cardinal Beaton, much as it is to be reprobated, was thought at that time to favour the progress of the reformed doctrines; and under the new primate Hamilton an attempt was made to improve the manners of the ecclesiastics, whose corruption, immorality, and ignorance were set forth as the prime causes of the prevailing heresies.

3. In 1554. the queen-dowager, Mary of Guise, assumed

the title of regent, under the guidance of an able Frenchman named d'Oisel. Her administration was generally beneficial, and would have been more so had she not consulted too much the interests of France. She endeavoured to involve the Scotch in hostilities with England, but, save the usual border forays, peace was not interrupted. In 1558, by her management, Mary, queen of Scots, then in her sixteenth year, was married to Francis, the dauphin or heir to the crown of France.

The claims of Mary Stewart to the English throne were, by the canon law, considered preferable to those of Elizabeth,a sentence of the church having declared Henry's marriage with Anne Boleyn null and void. In an evil hour Mary and her husband quartered the arms of England with their own, and even assumed the titles of King and Queen of Scotland and England. In 1559, Francis II. succeeded to the throne of his father Henry II., —an event which the Scots began to regard as fatal to the independence of their country. To support the regent and re-establish their own power, Francis and Mary sent over 1000 French soldiers, who were quartered at Leith, and a number of learned Romanist divines.

The foundations of the reformed church had been watered with the blood of her martyrs; but the return of John Knox from Geneva in 1559 utterly ruined the cause of popery in Scotland. Roused by the eloquence of this apostle of reform, the people attacked the churches and monasteries, overturned the altars, defaced the pictures, and levelled many of the buildings with the ground. The armed lords of the congregation, took possession of Edinburgh on the 29th of June, and on the 1st of August 1560 abolished the papal jurisdiction and authority, annulled all the statutes for the maintenance of the old religion, and confiscated all the church property. The form of ecclesiastical government now adopted, embraced the principles laid down by Knox in his "First Book of Discipline," and was framed chiefly upon the presbyterian model of Geneva. Severe punishments were threatened against those who continued to say or attend mass. Meanwhile the reformed preachers inculcated the lawfulness of resistance to the constituted authorities, and the lords of the congregation applied for assistance to Queen Elizabeth. In despite of her repugnance to what was deemed Knox's anarchical polity, she listened to Cecil's reasoning, that her own safety and the liberty and religion of England depended on the course of affairs in Scotland, and resolved to give her secret support to

the protestant nobility. Sir Ralph Sadler, an old and wily diplomatist, was her agent in these discreditable transactions, The treacherous intrigues that followed this arrangement present to us a very odious picture of the leaders of the Scottish party. Queen Mary's share in them was that of a passive, inexperienced instrument, while Elizabeth was the mainspring of all the plots carried on by her ministers.

At length the lords of the congregation, after suppressing the abbeys of Paisley, Kilwinning, and Dunfermline, took the field, and marched upon Edinburgh, where they summoned a parliament. The queen-regent and the Romish party withdrew to Leith; but within a month the lords fled to Stirling by night, and the regent re-entered the capital in triumph.

In the following year, Elizabeth concluded with the lords of the congregation a treaty of mutual defence, and shortly after sent a fleet of thirteen ships of war into the Forth, by which Leith was attacked from the sea, while 6000 English and a considerable Scottish force blockaded it on the land side. The French garrison made a brave and skilful resistance, which gained them a high reputation among soldiers throughout Europe. The place was at length surrendered at the treaty of Edinburgh between England, France, and the lords of the congregation, one of the consequences of the death of the queen-regent about a month before.

4. Francis II. having left Mary a widow at the end of 1560, she was invited to return to her native throne, and in August 1561, she landed in Scotland, oppressed with melancholy forebodings. Her heart was, however, cheered by the transports of her loyal subjects, and her beauty and engaging manners gradually won upon their affections. But the reformed doctrines were then rapidly gaining ground in Scotland, and she being firmly attached to the Romish church, many of the clergy and people were disposed to view her religious observances with jealousy. Unfortunately, too, she was surrounded by factious nobles who were continually plotting against each other, and disturbing the country by their feuds. To enable her to control these fiery spirits, and to provide against the dangers of a disputed succession, the Scots were anxious that the queen should marry, but were by no means agreed regarding the person who should be chosen as her husband. Mary's own inclinations would have led her to an alliance with some foreign prince; but a papist consort would have displeased her subjects, and probably occasioned