CHAPTER XI.
MARY’S TRIAL AND CONDEMNATION
The closing scene of Mary’s life was now rapidly approaching. Debilitated as she was by her long confinement, and the many painful thoughts which had been incessantly preying on her peace of mind, it is not likely that she could have long survived, even though she had been left unmolested within the walls of her prison. But she had been the source of two much jealousy and uneasiness to Elizabeth, to be either forgotten or forgiven. Weak as she was in body, and destitute alike of wealth and power, her name had nevertheless continued a watchword and a tower of strength, not only to all her own friends throughout Christendom, but to all who were disposed, from whatever cause, to stir up civil dissensions and broils in England. Scarcely a conspiracy against Elizabeth’s person and authority had been contrived for the last sixteen years, with which the Queen of Scots was not supposed to be either remotely or immediately connected. Nor is it to be denied, that appeals were made to her sufferings and cruel treatment, to give plausibility to many an enterprise which was anti-constitutional in its object, and criminal in its execution. Other less objectionable enterprises Mary herself expressly countenanced, for she always openly declared, that being detained a captive by force, she considered herself fully entitled to take every means that offered to effect her escape. She acted solely upon a principle of self-defence. Whenever a nobleman of influence like Norfolk, or a man of integrity like Lesley, undertook to arrange a scheme for her release, she willingly listened to their proposals, and was ever ready to act in concert with them. She had been detained in strict ward in a realm into which she had come voluntarily, or rather into which she had been seduced by specious promises and offers of assistance; and it would have been against every dictate of common sense and common justice, to suppose that she had not a right to free herself from her unwarrantable imprisonment. It is true, that many of her attempts, mixed up as they were with the interested and ambitious projects of others, gave Elizabeth no little inconvenience and anxiety. But this was the price she must have laid her account with paying for the pleasure of seeing the Queen of Scots a helpless hostage in her hands.
To discourage the numerous plots which were formed, either by Mary’s real or pretended adherents, a number of persons of the first rank in the kingdom entered into a solemn “Association,” in which they bound themselves to defend Elizabeth against all her enemies, “and if any violence should be offered to her life, in order to favour the title of any pretender to the crown, not only never to allow or acknowledge the person or persons by whom, or for whom such a detestable act should be committed, but, as they should answer to the Eternal God, to prosecute such person or persons to the death, and pursue them with the utmost vengeance to their overthrow and extirpation.” The Parliament, which met in 1585, sanctioned this Association; and, alarmed by the recent discovery of a fanatical design, on the part of a Roman Catholic, to assassinate the Queen, because she had been excommunicated by the Pope, they passed an Act, by which they determined, with the most arbitrary injustice, “That if any rebellion should be excited in the kingdom, or any thing attempted to the hurt of her Majesty’s person, by or for any person pretending a title to the crown, the Queen should empower twenty-four persons, by a commission under the Great Seal, to examine into and pass sentence upon such offences; and that, after judgment given, a proclamation should be issued, declaring the persons whom they found guilty excluded from any right to the crown; and her Majesty’s subjects might lawfully pursue every one of them to the death; and that, if any design against the life of the Queen took effect, the persons by or for whom such a detestable act was executed, and their issues, being in any wise assenting or privy to the same, should be disabled for ever from pretending to the crown, and be pursued to death, in the like manner.” That the persons by whom any of these faults were committed, should be punished, was in strict accordance with equity; but that the persons for whom they might be supposed to be done, should be considered as much involved in their guilt, was alike contrary to law and reason. The discontented were forming plots every year against Elizabeth, and, with the very existence of many of these plots, Mary was unacquainted; yet, by this statute, she was made answerable for all of them. There is little wonder, therefore, if she considered it only a forerunner of greater severities; and it was not long before an occasion occurred which afforded a plausible pretext for making a practical application of it.
In the year 1586, three English priests, who had been educated in a Catholic seminary at Rheims, and over whose minds the most illiberal superstition held unlimited sway, actually conceived the belief, that the bull of excommunication, issued by Pope Pius V. against Elizabeth, had been dictated under the immediate inspiration of the Holy Ghost. They looked, consequently, upon that Sovereign with a fanatical hatred, which they determined, if possible, to gratify. Having contrived to win over one or two others to their own way of thinking, and, in particular, an officer of the name of Savage, and another priest of the name of Ballard, they sent them into England to disseminate their principles among all on whose co-operation they thought they could depend; and, in the meantime, they set on foot a negotiation with the Spanish ambassador in Paris, through whose means they hoped to obtain the assistance of a foreign force. He gave them a promise of encouragement, only on condition that they secured a strong party in England, and that means were taken to remove Elizabeth. Among the first persons to whom Savage and Ballard communicated their designs, was Anthony Babington, a young gentleman of estate and fortune in Derbyshire. Having resided for some time in France, he had formed an acquaintance with the Archbishop of Glasgow, and from him had heard so many eulogiums on Mary, that he became inspired with the most enthusiastic feelings in her favour, and cherished a romantic desire of performing some exploit which might secure for him her gratitude and esteem. By his advice and assistance, a knowledge of the conspiracy was intrusted to a number of persons of respectability of the Roman Catholic persuasion; and a secret correspondence was set on foot with the Queen of Scots, through the medium of her Secretaries Naw and Curl. Mary, however, was not disposed to give the conspirators much encouragement. She had been now so long accustomed to despair, and was so convinced of the fallaciousness of hope, that she was almost inclined to turn away from it, as from something painful. She had grown indifferent about her future fate, and had endeavoured to resign herself to the prospect of ending her days in captivity. Besides, she had the recent Act of Parliament before her eyes; and she was well aware, that though she did nothing but attempt an escape, she would be held responsible for the whole plot, whatever its extent or criminality might be. It is, however, not at all unlikely that she may, notwithstanding, have authorized her Secretaries to write once or twice to Babington and his associates; but that she gave them any support in their designs against Elizabeth, was never proved, and is not to be believed. It was indeed with no little difficulty that Mary was able to hold any epistolary communication at all with her friends, so strictly was she watched by Sir Amias Paulet and Sir Drue Drury, to whose custody she had been committed, and who kept her in the Castle of Chartley in Staffordshire. The conspirators were obliged to bribe one of the servants, who conveyed to the Queen or her Secretaries, the letters which they deposited in a hole in the wall, and put the answers into the same place, from which they took them privately, when it was dark.
Every thing seemed to proceed smoothly, and all the necessary arrangements were now concluded. The different conspirators had different tasks allotted to them; by some a rebellion was to be excited in several parts of the kingdom at once; six others bound themselves by solemn oaths to assassinate Elizabeth; and Babington himself undertook to head a strong party, which he was to lead to the rescue of the Queen of Scots. Nor were they to be destitute of foreign assistance as soon as the first blow was struck, and the first symptoms of internal commotion appeared. So inspired were these infatuated men with an idea of the glory of the revolution they were about to achieve, that they had medals prepared representing themselves assembled together, with Babington in the midst, and bearing the motto, – “Hi mihi sunt comites quos ipsa pericula ducunt.” But in all their fancied security and enthusiasm, they were ignorant that every step they took was known to Elizabeth and her minister Walsingham, and that they were advancing only to the foot of their own scaffold. It was through the treachery of one of their own associates of the name of Polly, one of Walsingham’s accredited spies, who had joined them only that he might betray them, that all their proceedings were discovered, and attentively watched. Savage, Ballard, and the other four who were bent on the murder of Elizabeth, had already come up to London, and were lying in wait for the first favourable opportunity to execute their purpose; and, as Walsingham was anxious to have complete evidence of their guilt in his possession before apprehending them, they were allowed to remain unmolested for some time. The Queen, however, fearing for her personal safety, at length insisted on their being seized, remarking, that, “in not taking heed of a danger when she might, she seemed more to tempt God than to hope in him.” Ballard was first arrested; his accomplices, struck with astonishment and dismay, fled out of London; but, after lurking for some days in woods and byeways, cutting off their hair, disfiguring their faces, and submitting to every kind of deprivation and hardship to avoid the hot search which was made for them, they were at length taken; and so much had the public feeling been excited against them, that, when they were brought into London, the bells of the city were rung, and bonfires kindled in the streets. Walsingham had arranged his measures so effectively, that all the other conspirators, who were scattered throughout the kingdom, were also seized and brought to the capital within a very short time. Fourteen of the principal inventors of the plot were immediately tried, condemned, and executed. No mercy whatever was shown to them; for Elizabeth seldom forgave her enemies.188
But, in the death of these men, only one part of Elizabeth’s vengeance was gratified. The wrongs and the merits of the Queen of Scots had been the means of imparting to this conspiracy a degree of respectability; and she, therefore, was regarded as the chief culprit. Walsingham had ascertained, that communications of some sort or another had passed between Mary’s secretaries and the conspirators; and before she was aware that Babington’s plot had been discovered, he sent down Sir Thomas Gorges to Chartley to take her by surprise, and endeavour to discover some additional grounds of suspicion. Sir Thomas arrived just as she was about to ride out in a wheeled carriage which had been procured for her, and, without permitting her to alight, he rudely told her of Babington’s fate; then entering the Castle, he committed Naw and Curl into custody; and, breaking into the private cabinets of the Queen, he seized all her letters and papers, and sent them off immediately to Elizabeth. He took possession too of all her money, “lest she should use it for corruption.” She herself was not allowed to return to Chartley for some days, but conveyed about from one castle to another. When she was at length brought back, and saw how she had been plundered in her absence, she could not refrain from weeping bitterly. “There are two things, however,” she said in the midst of her tears, “which they cannot take away, – my birth and my religion.”189
In the excited state of feeling which then prevailed in the nation, and the fears which her subjects entertained for the safety of their Sovereign, Elizabeth perceived that she might now safely proceed to those extremities against Mary which she had so long meditated, but which considerations of selfish prudence had hitherto prevented her from putting into execution. She asserted, that not only her own life, but the religion and peace of the country were at stake, and that either the Queen of Scots must be removed, or the whole realm given up as a sacrifice. By her own injustice, she had involved herself in inconveniences; and as soon as she began to feel their effects, she pretended to be indignant at the innocent victim of her tyranny. But it was not without difficulty that she brought all her ministers to think on this subject precisely as she herself did. Many of them did not hesitate to state their conviction, that Mary had neither set on foot nor countenanced Babington’s plot, and that, however the conspirators might have interwoven her name with it, she could not be punished for what she could not have prevented. Besides, they urged that she was not likely to live long at any rate, and that it would be more for the honour of the kingdom to leave her unmolested for the short remainder of her days. Nevertheless, by Elizabeth’s exertions, and those of Walsingham, who had always courted the favour of his mistress by the most persevering persecution of Mary, opposition was at length silenced, and the trial of the Queen of Scots finally determined. To give as much dignity, and as great a semblance of justice as possible to a proceeding so unwarrantable as that of calling upon her to answer for an imaginary offence, forty of the most illustrious persons in the kingdom were appointed Commissioners, and were intrusted with the charge of hearing the cause, and deciding upon the question of life or death.
On the 25th of September 1586, Mary had been taken from Chartley to the Castle of Fotheringay in Northamptonshire, where she was more strictly watched than ever by Sir Amias Paulet, who was a harsh and inflexible gaoler. On the 11th of October, Elizabeth’s Commissioners arrived, the great hall of the Castle having been previously fitted up as a court-room for their reception. They would have proceeded with the trial immediately; but a difficulty occurred, which, though they scarcely can have failed to anticipate, they were not prepared to obviate. Mary refused to acknowledge their jurisdiction, denying that they possessed any right either to arraign or try her. “I am no subject to Elizabeth,” she said, “but an independent Queen as well as she; and I will consent to nothing unbecoming the majesty of a crowned head. Worn out as my body is, my mind is not yet so enfeebled as to make me forget what is due to myself, my ancestors, and my country. Whatever the laws of England may be, I am not subject to them; for I came into the realm only to ask assistance from a sister Queen, and I have been detained an unwilling prisoner.” For two days the Commissioners laboured in vain to induce Mary to appear before them; and as she assigned reasons for refusing, which it was impossible for fair argument to invalidate, recourse was at length had to threats. They told her that they would proceed with the trial, whether she consented to be present or not; and that, though they were anxious to hear her justification, they would nevertheless conclude that she was guilty, and pronounce accordingly, if she refused to defend herself. It would have been well had Mary allowed them to take their own way; but, conscious that she was accused unjustly, she could not bear to think that she excited suspicion, by refusing the opportunity of establishing her innocence. Actuated by this honourable motive, she at length yielded, after solemnly protesting that she did not, and never would, acknowledge the authority which Elizabeth arrogated over her.
On the 14th of October the trial commenced. The upper half of the great hall of Fotheringay Castle was railed off, and at the higher end was placed a chair of state, under a canopy, for the Queen of England. Upon both sides of the room benches were arranged in order, where the Lord Chancellor Bromley, the Lord Treasurer Burleigh, fourteen Earls, thirteen Barons, and Knights and Members of the Privy Council, sat. In the centre was a table, at which the Lord Chief Justice, several Doctors of the Civil Law, Popham, the Queen’s Attorney, her Solicitors, Sergeants and Notaries, took their places. At the foot of this table, and immediately opposite Elizabeth’s chair of state, a chair, without any canopy, was placed for the Queen of Scots. Behind, was the rail which ran across the hall, the lower part of which was fitted up for the accommodation of persons who were not in the commission.190
There was never, perhaps, an occasion throughout the whole of Mary’s life on which she appeared to greater advantage than this. In the presence of all the pomp, learning, and talent of England, she stood alone and undaunted; evincing, in the modest dignity of her bearing, a mind conscious of its own integrity, and superior to the malice of fortune. Elizabeth’s craftiest lawyers and ablest politicians were assembled to probe her to the quick, – to press home every argument against her, which ingenuity could devise and eloquence embellish, – to dazzle her with a blaze of erudition, or involve her in a maze of technical perplexities. Mary had no counsellor – no adviser – no friend. Her very papers, to which she might have wished to refer, had been taken from her; and there was not one to plead her cause, or defend her innocence. Yet was she not dismayed. She knew that she had a higher Judge than Elizabeth; and that great as was the array of Lords and Barons that appeared against her, posterity was greater than they, and that to its decision all things would be finally referred. Her bodily infirmities imparted only a greater lustre to her mental pre-eminence; and not in all the fascinating splendor of her youth and beauty – not on the morning of her first bridal day, when Paris rang with acclamations in her praise – was Mary Stuart so much to be admired, as when, weak and worn out, she stood calmly before the myrmidons of a rival Queen, to hear and refute their unjust accusations, her eye radiant once more with the brilliancy of earlier years, and the placid benignity of a serene conscience, lending to her countenance its undying grace.
Elizabeth’s Attorney-General opened the pleadings. He began by referring to the act of Parliament, in which it was made capital to be the person for whom any design was undertaken against the life of the Queen. He then described the late conspiracy, and attempted to establish Mary’s connexion with it, by producing copies of letters which, he alleged, she had written to Babington himself and several of his accomplices. To these having added letters from Babington to her, and the declarations and confessions which had been extorted from her secretaries, he asserted that the case was made out, and wound up his speech with a laboured display of legal knowledge and forensic oratory.
Mary was now called upon for her defence; and she entered on it with composure and dignity. She denied all connexion with Babington’s conspiracy, in so far as he entertained any designs injurious to Elizabeth’s safety or the welfare of her kingdom; – she allowed that the letters which he was said to have addressed to her might be genuine, but it had not been proved that she ever received them; – she maintained that her own letters were all garbled or fabricated;191 that as to the confessions of her secretaries, they had been extorted by fear, and were therefore not to be credited; but that, if they were in any particulars true, these particulars must have been disclosed at the expense of the oath of fidelity they had come under to her when they entered her service, and that men who would perjure themselves in one instance were not to be trusted in any; – she objected besides that they had not been confronted with her according to an express law enacted in the thirteenth year of Elizabeth’s reign “that no one should be arraigned for intending the destruction of the Prince’s life, but by the testimony and oath of two lawful witnesses, to be produced face to face before him;” – she maintained, that even supposing she were to allow the authenticity of many of the papers adduced against her, they would not prove her guilty of any crime; for she was surely doing no wrong, if, after a calamitous captivity of nineteen years, in which she had lost forever her youth, her health, and her happiness, she made one last effort to regain the liberty of which she had been so unfairly robbed; but that as to scheming against the life of the Queen her sister, it was an infamy she abhored; – “I would disdain,” said she “to purchase all that is most valuable on earth by the assasination of the meanest of the human race; and worn out, as I now am, with cares and sufferings, the prospect of a crown is not so inviting that I should ruin my soul in order to obtain it. Neither am I a stranger to the feelings of humanity, nor unacquainted with the duties of religion, and it is my nature to be more inclined to the devotion of Esther, than to the sword of Judith. If ever I have given consent by my words, or even by my thoughts, to any attempt against the life of the Queen of England, far from declining the judgment of men, I shall not even pray for the mercy of God.”192
Elizabeth’s advocates were not a little surprised at the eloquent and able manner in which Mary conducted her defence. They had expected to have every thing their own way, and to gain an easy victory over one unacquainted with the forms of legal procedure, and unable to cope with their own professional talents. But they were disappointed and baffled; and in order to maintain their ground even plausibly, they were obliged to protract the proceedings for two whole days. Nor, after all, did the Commissioners venture to pronounce judgment, but adjourned the court to the Star-Chamber at Westminster, where they knew that Mary would not be present, and where, consequently, they would have no opposition to fear.193 On the 25th of October, they assembled there, and having again examined the Secretaries, Naw and Curl, who appear to have been persons of little fidelity or constancy, and who confirmed their former declarations, a unanimous judgment was delivered, that “Mary, commonly called Queen of Scots and dowager of France, was accessary to Babington’s conspiracy, and had compassed and imagined divers matters within the realm of England, tending to the hurt, death, and destruction of the royal person of Elizabeth, in opposition to the statute framed for her protection.”194
Elizabeth ordered this verdict to be laid before her Parliament, which assembled a few days afterwards; and, at Walsingham’s instigation, its legality was not only confirmed, but the Lord Chancellor was sent up with an address to the Queen, in which, after stating their conviction that her security was incompatible with Mary’s life, they requested that she would give the sentence effect, by ordering her immediate execution. Elizabeth, though conscious that, if her personal safety had been endangered, she had herself to blame, was rejoiced at the opportunity at length afforded her, for gratifying her long cherished hatred. She affected, however, to be greatly perplexed how to act. She declared that, if she were not afraid of endangering the welfare of her people, she would freely pardon Mary for all her treasonable practices, and she beseeched the House to endeavour to discover some less severe method of procedure. The Parliament, as she expected, replied firmly, that they could not recommend any more lenient measure; and in the pedantic language of the day, called to Elizabeth’s remembrance the examples of God’s vengeance upon Saul for sparing Agag, and on Ahab for sparing Benhadad. Elizabeth still affected to be irresolute; and indeed it was not unlikely that she was so in reality; for, though anxious to have Mary removed, she was not so hardened and insane as not to know, that however it might be sanctioned by the world, murder was as criminal and as contrary to the unchanging code of moral justice, when commanded by a Queen, as when perpetrated by a peasant. She desired that her Parliament should be content for the present “with an answer without an answer.” “If I should say, that I will not do what you request, I might say perhaps more than I intend; and if I should say I will do it, I might plunge myself into as much inconvenience as you endeavour to preserve me from.” All this manœuvring was for the purpose of conveying to the nation an impression of her extreme sensibility, and generous hesitation.
Another reason why Elizabeth did not choose to be over-precipitate, was her fear of giving any deadly offence to foreign courts. She ordered the sentence against Mary to be published both throughout her own kingdom and abroad, and she waited anxiously to observe the sensation which it should create, and the steps that might be taken in consequence. She need not, however, have given herself much uneasiness upon this score. Henry III. of France had never been more than a very lukewarm advocate for the Queen of Scots, and the remonstrances he occasionally made in her behalf, were rather for the sake of appearances, than because he was anxious that they should be successful. On the present occasion, startled by the imminence of his cousin’s danger, he seems to have been a little more in earnest, and ordered his ambassador to make as forcible a representation as possible against the iniquitous severity that was intended. But Elizabeth knew that his rage would evaporate in words, and paid little attention to the harangue. In Scotland, the young King, James, was surrounded by ministers who had sold themselves to England, and Elizabeth was well aware, that though he might bark, he dared not bite. Besides, the sentiments regarding his mother, which had been carefully instilled into him from his earliest years, were not such as were likely to inspire him with any decided wish to protect and avenge her. He had been constantly surrounded by her deadliest enemies, and the lesson which Buchanan taught him daily, was a lesson of hatred towards his only surviving parent. His succession also to the English crown, greatly depended on the friendship of Elizabeth; and she was able, in consequence, to maintain an ascendancy over him, which he dared not venture to resist. He was not, however, so entirely destitute of all ordinary filial sentiments as to consent to remain a quiet spectator of his mother’s execution. “His opinion is,” said his worthless minion the Master of Gray, “that it cannot stand with his honour to be a consenter to take his mother’s life, but he does not care how strictly she be kept; and is content that all her old knavish servants should be hanged.”195 To prevent if possible a catastrophe which “did not stand with his honour,” he sent the Master of Gray and Sir Robert Melville as his ambassadors to London, to press his objections upon the attention of Elizabeth. The latter was true to the cause in which he had been sent, and his remonstrances were vigorous and sincere. But Gray, wishing to curry favour with Elizabeth, assured her that she had no cause to fear the King’s resentment, for he was of an irresolute character and timid disposition, and that whatever might happen, he would never think of embroiling himself in a disastrous war with England. Elizabeth listened with evident satisfaction to these artful insinuations; and desired her minister Walsingham, to inform the Scottish monarch, that Mary’s doom was already fixed by the decision of the nation, and that his mistress the Queen had it not in her power to save her. James received this intelligence with grief, but not with the spirit that became the only child of Mary Stuart. Instead of putting himself at the head of an army, and marching into the heart of England, he was contented to communicate his mother’s unfortunate condition to his subjects, and order prayers to be said for her in all the churches, – “that it might please God to enlighten her with the light of his truth, and to protect her from the danger which was hanging over her.”
In the mean time, messengers had been sent to the Queen of Scots, to report to her the sentence of the Commissioners, and to prepare her for the consequences which might be expected to follow. So far from receiving the news with dismay, Mary solemnly raised her hands to heaven, and thanked God that she was so soon to be relieved from her troubles. They were not yet, however, at a close; and even during the short remainder of her life, she was to be still further insulted. Her keepers, Sir Amias Paulet and Sir Drue Drury, refused any longer to treat her with the reverence and respect due to her rank and sex. The canopy of state, which she had always ordered to be put up in her apartment wherever she went, was taken down, and every badge of royalty removed. It was intimated to her, that she was no longer to be regarded as a Princess, but as a criminal; and the persons who came into her presence stood before her without uncovering their heads, or paying her any obeisance. The attendance of a Catholic priest was refused, and an Episcopalian bishop sent in his stead, to point out and correct the errors of her ways. Mary bore all these indignities with a calm spirit, which rose superior to them, and which proved their unworthiness, by bringing them into contrast with her own elevation of mind. “In despite of your Sovereign and her subservient judges,” said she, “I will die a Queen. My royal character is indelible, and I will surrender it with my spirit to the Almighty God, from whom I received it, and to whom my honour and my innocence are fully known.”196 In December 1586, she wrote her last letter to Elizabeth; and though from an unfriended prisoner to an envied and powerful Sovereign, it evinces so much magnanimity and calm consciousness of mental serenity, that it is impossible to peruse it, without confessing Elizabeth’s inferiority, and Mary’s triumph. It was couched in the following terms: