Mary Queen of Scots 1542-1587 Part 28

"_BESIDE THE BLOCK--ALONE_"

Whereupon, after some consultation, they granted that she might have some of her servants according to her Grace's request, and therefore desired her to make choice of half-a-dozen of her men and women: who presently said that of her men she would have Melvin, her apothecary, her surgeon, and one other old man beside; and of her women, those two that did use to lie in her chamber.

After this, she being supported by Sir Amias's two gentlemen aforesaid, and Melvin carrying up her train, and also accompanied with the Lords, Knights, and Gentlemen aforenamed, the Sheriff going before her, she pa.s.sed out of the entry into the Great Hall, with her countenance careless, importing thereby rather mirth than mournful cheer, and so she willingly stepped up to the scaffold which was prepared for her in the Hall, being two feet high and twelve feet broad, with rails round about, hung and covered with black, with a low stool, long cus.h.i.+on, and block, covered with black also. Then, having the stool brought her, she sat her down; by her, on the right hand, sat the Earl of Shrewsbury and the Earl of Kent, and on the left hand stood the Sheriff, and before her the two executioners; round about the rails stood Knights, Gentlemen, and others.

Then, silence being made, the Queen's Majesty's Commission for the execution of the Queen of Scots was openly read by Mr. Beale, clerk of the Council; and these words p.r.o.nounced by the a.s.sembly, "G.o.d save the Queen." During the reading of which Commission the Queen of Scots was silent, listening unto it with as small regard as if it had not concerned her at all; and with as cheerful a countenance as if it had been a pardon from her Majesty for her life; using as much strangeness in word and deed as if she had never known any of the a.s.sembly, or had been ignorant of the English language.

_A THEOLOGICAL CONTROVERSY_

Then one Doctor Fletcher, Dean of Peterborough, standing directly before her, without the rail, bending his body with great reverence, began to utter this exhortation following: "Madam, the Queen's most excellent Majesty," &c, and iterating these words three or four times, she told him, "Mr. Dean, I am settled in the ancient Catholic Roman religion, and mind to spend my blood in defence of it." Then Mr. Dean said: "Madam, change your opinion, and repent you of your former wickedness, and settle your faith only in Jesus Christ, by Him to be saved." Then she answered again and again, "Mr. Dean, trouble not yourself any more, for I am settled and resolved in this my religion, and am purposed therein to die." Then the Earl of Shrewsbury and the Earl of Kent, perceiving her so obstinate, told her that since she would not hear the exhortation begun by Mr. Dean, "We will pray for your Grace, that it stand with G.o.d's will you may have your heart lightened, even at the last hour, with the true knowledge of G.o.d, and so die therein." Then she answered, "If you will pray for me, my Lords, I will thank you; but to join in prayer with you I will not, for that you and I are not of one religion."

_THE EARL OF KENT_

Then the Lords called for Mr. Dean, who, kneeling on the scaffold stairs, began this prayer, "O most gracious G.o.d and merciful Father,"

&c, all the a.s.sembly, saving the Queen of Scots and her servants, saying after him. During the saying of which prayer, the Queen of Scots, sitting upon a stool, having about her neck an _Agnus Dei_, in her hand a crucifix, at her girdle a pair of beads with a golden cross at the end of them, a Latin book in her hand, began with tears and with loud and fast voice to pray in Latin; and in the midst of her prayers she slided off from her stool, and kneeling, said divers Latin prayers; and after the end of Mr. Dean's prayer, she kneeling, prayed in English to this effect: "For Christ His afflicted Church, and for an end of their troubles; for her son; and for the Queen's Majesty, that she might prosper and serve G.o.d aright." She confessed that she hoped to be saved "by and in the blood of Christ, at the foot of whose Crucifix she would shed her blood." Then said the Earl of Kent, "Madam, settle Christ Jesus in your heart, and leave those trumperies." Then she little regarding, or nothing at all, his good counsel, went forward with her prayers, desiring that "G.o.d would avert His wrath from this Island, and that He would give her grief and forgiveness for her sins." These, with other prayers she made in English, saying she forgave her enemies with all her heart that had long sought her blood, and desired G.o.d to convert them to the truth; and in the end of the prayer she desired all saints to make intercession for her to Jesus Christ, and so kissing the crucifix, and crossing of her also, said these words: "Even as Thy arms, O Jesus, were spread here upon the Cross, so receive me into Thy arms of mercy, and forgive me all my sins."

_SMILING CHEER_

Her prayer being ended, the executioners, kneeling, desired her Grace to forgive them her death; who answered, "I forgive you with all my heart, for now, I hope, you shall make an end of all my troubles." Then they, with her two women, helping of her up, began to disrobe her of her apparel; she never changed her countenance, but with smiling cheer she uttered these words, "that she never had such grooms to make her unready, and that she never put off her clothes before such a company."

Then she, being stripped of all her apparel saving her petticoat and kirtle, her two women beholding her made great lamentation, and crying and crossing themselves prayed in Latin; she, turning herself to them, embracing them, said these words in French, "Ne criez vous; j'ay promis pour vous;" and so crossing and kissing them, bade them pray for her, and rejoice and not weep, for that now they should see an end of all their mistress's troubles. Then she, with a smiling countenance, turning to her men servants, as Melvin and the rest, standing upon a bench nigh the scaffold, who sometime weeping, sometime crying out aloud, and continually crossing themselves, prayed in Latin, crossing them with her hand bade them farewell; and wis.h.i.+ng them to pray for her even until the last hour.

"_INTO THY HANDS_"

This done, one of the women having a Corpus Christi cloth lapped up three-corner ways, kissing it, put it over the Queen of Scots' face, and pinned it fast to the caul of her head. Then the two women departed from her, and she kneeling down upon the cus.h.i.+on most resolutely, and without any token or fear of death, she spake aloud this Psalm in Latin, "In te, Domine, confido, non confundar in eternum," &c. {Ps. xxv.}. Then, groping for the block, she laid down her head, putting her chin over the block with both her hands, which holding there, still had been cut off, had they not been espied. Then lying upon the block most quietly, and stretching out her arms, cried, "In ma.n.u.s tuas, Domine," &c, three or four times. Then she lying very still on the block, one of the executioners holding of her slightly with one of his hands, she endured two strokes of the other executioner with an axe, she making very small noise or none at all, and not stirring any part of her from the place where she lay; and so the executioner cut off her head, saving one little grisle, which being cut asunder, he lifted up her head to the view of all the a.s.sembly, and bade "G.o.d save the Queen." Then her dressing of lawn falling off from her head, it appeared as grey as one of threescore and ten years old, polled very short, her face in a moment being so much altered from the form she had when she was alive, as few could remember her by her dead face. Her lips stirred up and down a quarter of an hour after her head was cut off.

Then Mr. Dean said with a loud voice, "So perish all the Queen's enemies;" and afterwards the Earl of Kent came to the dead body, and standing over it, with a loud voice said, "Such end of all the Queen's and the Gospel's enemies."

Ill.u.s.tration: EFFIGY AT WESTMINSTER.

_THE LAST COURTIER_

Then one of the executioners pulling off her garters, espied her little dog which was crept under her clothes, which could not be gotten forth but by force, yet afterward would not depart from the dead corpse, but came and lay between her head and her shoulders, which being imbrued with her blood, was carried away and washed, as all things else were that had any blood was either burned or clean washed; and the executioners sent away with money for their fees, not having any one thing that belonged unto her. And so, every man being commanded out of the Hall, except the Sheriff and his men, she was carried by them up into a great chamber lying ready for the surgeons to embalm her.

A full account of Queen Mary's last days will be found in "The Tragedy of Fotheringay," by the Hon. Mrs. Maxwell-Scott. In August 1587, the Queen was buried, with great ceremony, in Peterborough Cathedral, and, in 1612, was reinterred in Westminster Abbey by her son James VI. and I.

APPENDICES

_CONTENTS_

(A.) Genealogical Tables.

(B.) Lord Darnley.

(C.) Contemporary Writers.

(D.) Authorities.

(E.) Controversial Books.

_APPENDIX A._

(A.) TABLE SHOWING THE RELATIONs.h.i.+P OF MARY TO LORD DARNLEY AND TO THE DUKE OF CHaTELHERAULT.

JAMES II., King of Scotland.

+----------------------+-------------------+ James III. Mary = James, Lord Hamilton.

James IV. = Margaret, = Archibald, +-----+-------+ dau. of Earl of Henry VII. Angus. of England. James, Elizabeth, _m._ 1st Earl Matthew, Earl of Arran. of Lennox.

James V. = Mary of Guise. James, 2nd Earl of Arran Mary Stuart. and Duke of John, Earl Chatelherault. of Lennox.

+----------------+ Margaret = Matthew, Earl of Lennox.

Henry, Lord Darnley.

TABLE SHOWING THE POSITION OF MARY AND DARNLEY WITH REGARD TO THE CROWN OF ENGLAND.

HENRY VII.

+-------------------+---------+------------+ Henry VIII. James IV. = Margaret = Archibald, Mary = Charles, Duke +------+----+ Earl of of Suffolk.

Angus Edward VI. Elizabeth. James V. +---+-----+ Mary. Margaret, _m._ Mary. Matthew, Earl of Lennox. Frances, Eleanor, _m._ _m._ Henry, Lord Henry, Henry, Darnley. Duke of Earl of Suffolk. c.u.mberland.

+-----------------+-----------------+ Lady Jane Grey. Catherine, _m._ Edward, Earl of Hertford. +--------------------------+ Margaret, _m._ Henry, Earl of Derby.

_APPENDIX B._

(B.) LORD DARNLEY.

It may be of some interest to collect a few contemporary opinions regarding the unfortunate Lord Darnley. The extracts from Sir James Melville and Randolph (pp. 46-53, 54-56) sufficiently ill.u.s.trate the personality of Mary, and we need only add Knolly's description of the Queen of Scots on her arrival in England (Wright's "Elizabeth," vol. i. pp. 280-1). He wrote to Cecil: "This ladie and princess is a notable woman. She semeth to regard no ceremonious honour beside the acknowledging of her estate regalle. She sheweth a disposition to speake much, to be bold, to be pleasant, and to be very famylyar. She sheweth a great desire to be avenged of her enemies: she sheweth a readiness to expose herself to all perylls in hope of victorie; she delyteth much to hear of hardiness and valiancye, commending by name all approved hardy men of her c.u.n.trye, altho' they be her enemies: and she commendeth no cowardice even in her friends. The thing that most she thirsteth after is victory, and it semeth to be indifferent to her to have her enemies diminish, either by the sword of her friends, or by the liberall promises and rewards of her purse, or by division and quarrells raised among themselves; so that for victorie's sake, payne and perrylls semeth pleasant unto her, and in respect of victorie, welthe and all thyngs semeth to her contemptuous and vile."

Our best picture of Darnley comes from the pen of the continuator of Knox. "He was of a comely stature, and none was like unto him within this island; he died under the age of one and twenty years; prompt and ready for all games and sports; much given to hawking and hunting, and running of horses, and likewise to playing on the lute; and also to Venus chamber he was liberal enough; he could write and dictate well; but he was somewhat given to wine, and much feeding, and likewise to inconstancy; and proud beyond measure, and therefore contemned all others; he had learned to dissemble well enough, being from his youth misled up in Popery" (Laing's "Knox,"

vol. ii. p. 551). Incidental references to Darnley's character will be found on pp. 47-8, 64-5, 87-8, &c. The author of the "Histoire of James the s.e.xt" wrote of him, "He was a comelie Prince, of a fayre and large stature of bodie, pleasant in countenance, and affable to all men, and devote, weill exercised in martiall pastymes upoun horseback as ony Prince of that age, but was sa facile as he could conceal no secret, although it might tend to his own weill." Of Darnley's literary abilities we possess two indications--a letter written to Mary Tudor, and the following ballad, both printed in Maidment's "Scottish Songs and Ballads,"

vol. ii. It may be noted that the figure of the turtle-dove or wood-pigeon occurs in the ballad and in one of the "Casket Letters."

Gife langour makis men licht, Or dolour thame decoir, In earth there is no wicht,[98]

May me compair in gloir.

Gif cairfuill thoftis restoir My havy heart from sorrow I am for evir moir In joy, both evin and morrow.

Gif plesour be to pance,[99]

I playne me nocht opprest, Or absence micht avance, My heart is haill possesst, Gif want of quiet rest From cairis micht me convoy, My mynd is nocht mollest, Bot evir moir in joy.

Thocht that I pance in paine, In pa.s.sing to and fro, I laubor all in vane, For so hes mony mo, That hes nocht servit so, In suting of thair sueit,[100]