shall be held as a voluntary error, and not of ignorance; since it is notoriously known who they are that have murdered the king, as my said lord and master affirms; of which Protestation I require an Act thus signed, Robert Cunningham: of the production of which Writing and Protestation the said Robert demanded an Act and Instrument. The Judge considering the Writing and Protestation produced by the said Robert Cunningham, and having regard to the Letters sent to our sovereign lady, by Matthew earl of Lennox, also produced and read in judgment, the tenor of which is hereafter inserted; by which Letters and Writing the said earl of Lennox requires, that a brief and summary trial may be made of this cause: and having also regard to the Act, and the Order thereupon taken by the lords of the privy-council, and other such things; and to what the advocates insist upon as to the same fact, requiring that justice may be done to the said earl Bothwell; and taking notice likewise of the Request and Demand which he has made, that the whole may be thoroughly examined; the Judge, by the advice of the lords and barons his assistants, found that they ought to proceed to the decision of the said Cause the same day, according to the laws of the realin, notwithstanding the Writing and Protestation produced by the said Robert Cunningham, and that in the mean time he shall be admitted to join with and assist the said advocates, for the final Trial of the said cause, if he thinks good. Copies of the Letters sent to the Queen by the Earl of Lennox. the said cruel Murder, I most humbly request of your majesty, for the honour of God, and for that of your majesty and your realm, and for the welfare and peace of it, that you would be pleased not only to cause those who are named in the said placarts to be apprehended and put in safe custody, but likewise to assemble your nobility with all possible diligence, and then to summon by Proclamation the authors of the said Placarts to appear for the ends therein mentioned; and if they appear not, your majesty may, by the advice of your nobility and council, set at liberty those who are therein named. Your majesty will do an honourable act in bringing this matter to this issue, that according as the matter shall appear to your majesty, you may punish and chastise the authors of this cruel fact; or if the said Placarts shall be found false and of no validity, those who are charged may be acquitted and set at liberty, according to your majesty's good pleasure. Madam, I pray God Almighty to take your majesty into his protection and safeguard, and to preserve you in health and happy prosperity. From Howstoun the 26th of Feb A Second Letter from the Earl of Lennox. MADAM, I beseech your majesty to attend to what follows: Your highness in your last letters acquainted me, that if there were any names in the Placarts, which were set up at the door of the Senate-House of Edinburgh, of such persons as I thought worthy of condemna tion, for the Murder of the king your majesty's husband, you would, according to my advice, make it your business to bring them to Trial, according to the laws of this realm, and as the MADAM; I return most humble thanks to nature of the crime required. May it therefore your majesty for the gracious and consolotary please your majesty to know, that from the letters which I received the 24th of this pre- time I received your said Letters, I always exsent month by which I perceive that it is pected that some of those bloody murderers your majesty's pleasure to put off the Trial of would be made openly known to you; but this late execrable fact, till the Parliament since I perceive they are not, I cannot find in meets. May it please your majesty to consi- my heart to conceal them from you any longer. der, that though I be assured that your highness Your majesty therefore has here the Names of must needs think the time long till the truth of those whom I greatly suspect, viz. The earl of this fact be found out, and the authors of it Bothwell, sir James Balfour, and Gilbert Balpunished according to their demerits; yet I four his brother; master. David Chamers; most humbly beg pardon of your majesty for black master John Spence; the sieur Francistroubling and importuning you so often as I cus Bastian, John de Buordeaux, and Joseph, forced to do, the affair being such as touches the brother of Davy Rizio: whom I most me so near; and therefore most humbly re- humbly beseech your majesty, according to my quest, that your majesty would take in good former Petition, not only to cause to be appre part my advice as follows: It is, that it is too hended and committed to safe custody, but long to wait for the meeting of the parliament; also with all diligence to assemble your nobility besides, this is not an affair of that sort, which and council, and then to take such advice uses to be treated of in parliament, but being about the fact of the persons abovementioned, such, and of so great importance, it is evident to as they may be duly examined. And as I every one, it ought rather to be inquired into hope, so I make no doubt, but that by proceedwith all diligence, that the authors inay suffering in this manner, the spirit of God will assist an exemplary punishment. I know that your majesty is much more able to judge of it than I; but being informed that certain Placarts or Writings have been affixed to the Gate of the Senate-House of Edinburgh, which answered to your majesty's first and second Proclamation, and named some persons as authors of am toward bringing it to a good conclusion. Here in your majesty will do an act holy and ho nourable for yourself, who are a party, and highly satisfy those who stand in any relation to the deceased, whom you loved so dearly. And not doubting that your majesty will give proper orders for the whole, according to the importance of the matter (as I most humbly The Names of the Judges or Jury deputed for the Absolution of the Earl of Bothwell, Andrew earl of Rothes, George earl of Caithness, Gilbert earl of Cassils, lord John Hamilton, commendator of Arbroth, son to the duke, James lord Rosse, Robert lord Semple, John Maxwell lord Harris, Lawrence lord Oliphant, John master of Forbes, John Gourdon of Lochinvar, Robert lord Boyde, James Cockburn of Lanton, John Sommerville of Cumbusnethan, Moubray of Barnbougal, and Ogilbye of Boyne. clerk general of the said court, under my sign manual. Signed, John Bellenden, clerk of the court. Note, That at the same time Protestation was made by George carl of Caithness, Chancellor of the said Assize, that the said Dictate or Indictment was not in this point true, viz. alledging the mu.der to be committed the 9th day of Feb., for that indeed the murder was committed the next day, being the 10th day in the morning, at two hours after midnight, which in law was and ought to be truly accounted the 10th day: and so the acquittal that way, but cavillingly defended. The Proclamations and Placarts, in Answer to them mentioned in the Trial, and others that happened after, were as follows. Incontinent after the Murder of the king, the The above-named being chosen, admitted, 10th of February, 1566, a Proclamation was and sworn to give sentence according to cus-issued, setting forth, that whoever would distom, and the earl of Bothwell being accused by Indictment of the crime above declared, and submitting and referring himself to the Sentence of the said Judges, they went out of the Senate-House to another place: and after having long disputed together upon all the articles of the said Accusation, they did each of them, one after another, declare the said James earl of Bothwell quit and absolved of the whole, and every part of the Murder of the king, and in general of whatever depended on the said accusation. cover the Murderers should have 20001. sterling. This Proclamation was answered by a Placart, fixed on the door of the Senate-house of Edinburgh, on the 16th day of February, in form as follows: Whereas public Notice has been given, that whosoever will discover the Murderers of the king, should have 2000/ sterling; I who have made enquiry by those who committed the act itself, affirm, that the authors of the said Murder are the earl of Bothwell, sir James Balfour, the curate Elisk, master David Chambers, and black master author of this Murder; and the queen, who 'consented to it at the persuasion of the said 'earl of Bothwell, by the witchcraft of the lady Buccleugh.'-Upon this, another Proclamation was issued the same day, requiring the person who had set up the Placart to appear, own, and subscribe it in person, that he might have the sum promised by the former Proclamation, and more if he deserved it, as the queen and her council should think fit. 6 Afterwards, the said George earl of Caith-John Spens, who above all was the principal ness, chancellor or president at the said Trial (i. e. Foreman of the Jury) as well in his own name as that of the other judges, demanded an Act, to the end that as well the advocates, as the said Robert Cuningham, having a proxy from the earl of Lennox, and all others whomsoever, might be debarred hereafter frem producing any other Writing or Proofs whatsoever, in order to support the said Indictment, and that the Judges might not be induced to give any other opinion than they had To this the following Answer was given and done before; the rather because nobody had set up at the same place the day following.-proved the truth of the Accusation, nor so Forasmuch as a Proclamation has been issued much as any part of it, and that no accuser since I set up my former, requiring that I appeared but the above-mentioned, who were should come to subscribe and own it; for Anpresented in order to carry on the Trial: and swer I do likewise require, that the money therefore the Judges having regard to the may be consigned into the hands of some man same, declared him free as far as they could of substance, and I will appear next Sunday, have any knowledge of the fact, with a Pro- and four others with me, and then I will subtestation, that this might not be afterwards im- 'scribe and maintain what I have said. Moreputed to them as a fault. Which Act and over, I require that the Sieur Francis Bastein,` Protestation, when the said earl of Caithness and Joseph the queen's goldsmith, may be appresident and some of the judges above-men- 'prehended; and I will declare what each of tioned, returned to the court in the Senate-them and their accomplices did in particular.' House, and before the pronouncing of the aforesaid Sentence, was, at the request of the said earl of Caithness, read publicly, and in full court, and he demanded an Act and Instrument of it, protesting as above. Extracted from the Registers of the Acts of our sovereign lady's court of justice, by me John Bellenden of Auchnoule knight, and To this no answer was returned. Though the earl of Bothwell was acquitted as above-mentioned, yet knowing that the world did still esteem him guilty, he did, in order to clear himself further, set up a Paper in the Market-place, bearing, that albeit he had been acquitted by law, yet to make his innocence the more manifest, he was ready to try the same by single combat, with any man of honourable birth and reputation, who would accuse him of the king's Murder. Thursday, with the queen from Seton, appeared with armed retainers, and a band of hired solTo which Answer was made by another diers, who paraded the streets with their enPlacart, set up immediately after in the same signs displayed. The fact is now universally place,That farasmuch as the said earl of believed, that Morton conducted the whole Bothwell had caused a Placart to be set up, trial, and appeared at the bar with Bothwell; signed with his own hand, whereby he chal- but an examination of this circumstance lenged any man of quality, and of a fair repu- only serves to illustrate the progress of histo6 tation, who would and dared to say that he rical falsehood. In the instructions from the 'was guilty of the Death of the king;' ad- lords and abbots of Mary's party, her commisding, that he who said it, or went about sioners in England are directed to plead, in to support that charge, should be forced to answer to the marriage, that most part of the eat his words; a gentleman of honour and nobility, and principally of the usurpers, Morgood renown accepted his offer, and said, he ton, Semple, and Lindsay, gave their consent would prove by the law of arms that he was to the earl Bothwell, and to remove all suspithe principal author of that horrid Murder, of cion, had declared him innocent by a public which the Judges had rashly acquitted him for assize, ratified in parliament by the three esfear of death, after so much inquiry had been tates.' But the queen herself, in her Instrucmade into it. And whereas the king of France tions to her Commissioners, and in their reply and the queen of England required, by their to Murray, during the Conferences at York, ambassadors, that the said Murder might be maintains only, that Bothwell had received his punished, he also intreats their majesties to in- Acquittal from an assize of his peers, confirmed sist with the queen, his sovereign lady, that by in parliament by the nobility present, her opher consent a time and place may be appointed ponents and others; and her answer to the in their countries to combat the earl, according accusation at Westminster, that she prevented to the law of arms, in their presence, or in that the investigation and punishment of the murder of their deputies; at which time and place he to which she was accessary, refers to her promises and swears, on the word of a gentle- former reply at York. Amidst the artful ficman, to be present and do his daty, provided tions with which the simple fact of the bond their majesties will, by Proclamation, grant is invested, no intimation was then given of Safe-conduct to him and his company, to pass Morton's activity, or even presence at the trial, and repass through their dominions without any or of the concern of his associates in the acmolestation. He refers it to the judgment of quittal of Bothwell. Two years afterwards, in the readers and hearers what just cause he has a pamphlet published under a fictitious name, to desire this of the king of France and the Lesly resorts to the former instructions of the queen of England, and by this he advertises the lords and abbots, and asserts explicitly what rest of the Murderers to prepare themselves; he was afraid even to hint obscurely when confor he will give each of thein the like Chal- fronted at the conference with Morton and lenge, and publish their names in writing, that Lindsay; that Morton, Semple, Lindsay, and they may be known to every body.-To this their adherents, especially procured, and with Bothwell made no reply. all diligence laboured his purgation and acquitSome time afterwards, Bothwell was con- tal, which the three estates confirmed afterstrained to fly the kingdom, and went first to wards by act of parliament.' An additional the Orcades, and then to the isles of Shet-fact, unknown to Lesly in Scotland, was land, where being reduced to extreme want, he turned pirate but being in danger of being taken, he went to Denmark; where, not being able to give a good account of himself, he was taken into custody; and afterwards being known by some merchants, he was clapt up close prisoner; and after a loathsome imprisonment for ten years, that and other miseries made him distracted; and thus he came to a most ignominious death, suitable to his vile and "wicked course of life. : Further Account of the Trial of Earl Bothwell. Extracted from Laing's History of Scotland, vol. i. p. 65 *. "THE Trial took place on Saturday, April 12th, and Bothwell, who had returned on Upon the subject of queen Mary's concern in the murder of her husband, many well know volumes have been written. Some correspondence between Robertson and Hume about it is given in the Appendix to Dugald Stewart's brought forward in France, 1572, by the anonymous author of L' Innocence de Marie,' that Morton accompanied Bothwell before the judges. Blackwood scrupled not to intimate, in 1587, that Morton himself was one of Bothwell's judges; and in Maria Innocens,' published abroad, 1588, under a fictitious name, Turner, a Scottish priest and professor at Ingolstadt, affirms, without hesitation, that Morton actually pleaded the cause of Bothwell. This last assertion is, with some modifications, preferred by Camden, that Bothwell's cause was susstained or conducted by Morton; and the fictions of an anonymous French writer, and a Scottish. refugee, are eagerly snatched at by modern apologists, as historical facts. But the real authors of Bothwell's Acquittal are easily Life of Principal Robertson. The documents relating to the question are most diligently collected, most judiciously arranged, and most ably examined, by Mr. Malcolm Laing, in his excellent History of Scotland. for the Murder of Lord Darnley guilty of the murder; but the challenge ococcasioned another placard, in which the charge was renewed. As if his innocence, however, were now incontestible, he was appointed on Monday, the second day after his trial, to carry the crown and sceptre, a mark of distinguished favour, at the opening of parliament. The commissioners for its opening, and the lords of articles were selected from the queen's friends; and if Morton's name appears in the articles, we at the same time discover the abbots of Kiliwinning and Aberbrothick, Lesly and Herreis, Bothwell and Argyle. There was no investigation attempted, nor the least notice taken of the king's murder; but a severe act was passed against the placards, that whosoever first discovered and neglected to suppress them, should suffer the same capital or arbitrary punishment with the authors themselves." ascertained. Argyle, justice general, and Caithness, chancellor, or foreman of the jury, sat, with Bothwell, Lesley, and Lethington, in the privy council that appointed the Trial. That Pitcairn, commendator of Dumfermline, lord Lindsay, Macgill, and Balneaves, sat as assessors to the justice general, is another convenient assertion, for which there is no proof. Three of the jury, Herreis, Boyd, and Gordon of Lochinvar, were selected as Mary's commissioners in England; Rothes, Cassilis, Ross and others, subscribed the bonds for her release, or defence on her escape from Lochleven; and of the fifteen jurors, Semple alone adhered afterwards to Murray. The Trial was directed or conducted therefore by Argyle, and Caithness, Lesly and his coadjutors at the conferences in England; nor is a vague imputation published by Lesly two years afterwards, under "Buchanan, Melvil, and Spottiswood assure a fictitious name, sufficient to transfer the acus, that Bothwell died mad, and the two last, quitta! of Bothwell, from himself and his coThe writing after James had wintered in Denmark, adjutors, to Morton and his friends. crown lawyers disclaimed, in effect, all share must have known the fact. Turner, in order to authenticate the confession, first asserted, in in the prosecution, except their concurrence. No evidence whatsoever was produced. On 1588, that Bothwell's madness was a fiction of the contrary, Lennox was cited as a private Buchanan's, and the credulous Whitaker beaccuser, to support the charge, when Cunning-lieves, on Goodall's authority, that he lived at ham, a young man of his household, appearing large, unconfined, in Denmark. But Craw unexpectedly, excused his absence till his ford's MS. informs us, that he was committed friends could be collected to protect his per- to close prison till his death; the Summarium son; required the trial to be adjourned to pro- de Morte Mariæ, published 1587, that, "in cure support against the greatness of his ad- Dania captus, amens obiit" (Jebb, ii. 166), and versary, and protested for an assize of wilful Thuanus assures us, seemingly from particular error if the murderers should be absolved. information, that as soon as discovered, he was The demand was over-ruled, and the jury ac- imprisoned at Dracholm, "in aratissimis vincuquitted Bothwell of all share in the murder; lis, in qui buscum accusatus esset ab amicis but their foreman was instructed to protest in cujusdam nobilis virginis Norvegica, quam ante opposition to Cunningham, that as no evidence plures annos, pacto matrimonio violatam, alia, was produced to justify a different verdict, they super inducta, deseruerat, post decennium acwere not liable for wilful error. From these cedente amentia dignum flagitiosa vita exitum circumstances it appears, that the trial was habuit," ii. 551. The Norwegian lady whom directed by Bothwell himself, and that his ac- he had debauched when betrothed to her some quittal was managed and pronounced by the years before, and deserted for another, explains a friends of the queen. But whether conducted passage in Buchanan, that before his marriage by Morton or not, it is also evident, that from with the queen, duas uxores adhuc vivas haa collusive trial, directed by Bothwell, with an buit, tertiam ipse nuper suum fassus adulterium armed force to suppress the evidence, and pre- dimisisset; (lib. xviii. 357) and suggested the vent the appearance of the accuser, the queen crimes in his confession, that he had debauched could never have conceived that he was inno- a Danish lord's two daughters, and two daughcent, when, in the opinion of the whole nation, ters of a lord at Lubeck, &c. His body was as well as of impartial posterity, the circum-greatly swelled in summer, 1575, (Murden, stances of his acquittal served only to estab-285); and he seems to have died about the Buchanan had represented lish the reality of his guilt. The plain, and the end of that year. His age has been strangely controverted. only sound conclusion is, that in consequence of the remonstrances from France and Eng-James, instead of Patrick, earl of Bothwell, as land, Mary sought in the trial for such a decent Lennox's rival for the queen regent's hand; and pretext to her friends abroad, rather than to Tytler, who was slightly versed in the controher subjects at home, as might justify her in-versy, and in the history of the period, grasped tended marriage with Bothwell: that he was accused indeed by public report, but acquitted by a judicial sentence of all concern in the murder of her late husband. "The Acquittal was no sooner pronounced, than Bothwell posted up a public challenge, offering as a vindication of his innocence, to fight hand to hand, with any person of good reputation, who should dare to maintain that he VOL. I. at the mistake, and concluded that Bothwell, who courted the mother in 1544, must have been an old man, upwards of sixty, when he married the daughter in 1567. Tytler, 3 edit. 281. The mistake had been previously corrected by Thomas Crawford (Notes on Buchanan, 141) and by Ruddiman (Buchananari Opera, i. 452); but when lord Hailes discovered that Patrick, Bothwell's father, died in Sep 3 N tember 1556, and that Mary herself described | probably on his return from exile, when he Bothwell eight years afterwards, as "in his verie youth at his first enteris into this realm, immediately after the deceise of his fadder." (Remarks, 173. Anderson, i. 89), lord Elibank | and Tytler devised another conclusion, that Buchanan, by anticipation, described Bothwell by his future titles, when courting the queen regent in 1544, and that he was forty-four at least when he married the queen. Lord Elibank's letter to lord Hailes, 30. Tytler, ii. 155. To argue against such writers would be ridiculous, as it is sufficient to state their misquotation of Buchanan. Accessit æmulus Jacobus Hepburnus comes Bothwelliæ, &c. Is enim ab Jacobo quinto relegatus, ac etatim eo mortuo domum reversus, eisdem artibus reginæ viduæ nuptias ambiebat," &c. lib. xvi. p. 285. The earl of Bothwell, whom James had banished in 1537, was Patrick, the earl formerly imprisoned in 1531, and divorced from his wife, most paid his addresses to the queen regent. Goodall, i 319. Bothwell's mother was alive at the murder of Darnley (Paris's First Confession); and if born when his father was banished, Bothwell himself might be nineteen at his father's death, and less than thirty on his mar riage with the queen. From her words quoted above, he appears to have returned from abroad immediately after his father's death; and I conceive that he was then in Denmark or Norway where he married and deserted his first wife for another, as he passed through England to France, on his banishment in 1563. Douglas, in his Peerage, creates an intermediate Patrick earl of Bothwell; but in 1519, we discover a lord Hailes, by Buchanan called James Hepburn, who assassinated David Hume prior of Coldingham, to whose sister he was married. Buchanan, 260. Lesly, 371. Pitscottie, 151. Crawford's Notes on Buchanan, 126." 54. The Trial and Sentence of WILLIAM POWRIE, GEORGE DALGLEISH, JOHN HAY younger of Talo, and JOHN HEPBURN of Bowton, concerning the Murder of Henry, earl Darnley, Husband of Mary Queen of Scots: with their Examinations, Depositions, and Confessions: as also, the Declaration of NiCHOLAS HUBERT, a Frenchman, commonly called PARIS, in relation to that Murder, and other Matters: 9 ELIZ. a. d. 1567. [Bib. Cotton. sub. tit. Calig. C. 1. f. 243. 2 Anderson, 165. 2 Laing's Hist. of Scotland, 243. Buchanan's Detection.] THE DEPOSITIONS OF WILLIAM POWRIE. Apud Edinburgum, 23 Junii, Aun. Dom. 1567, in presentia Dominoruin Secreti Concilii. WILLIAM Powrie, borne in Kinfawnis, seruitor to the erle Bothwell, deponis, That ye sam day the king wes slane at night, the erle Boithwell, accumpanyt with James Ormistoune of yat ilk, Hob Ormestoune his fader-bruther, John Hepburne of Bolton, and Johne Hay zounger, zeid togidder to an counsele in ye nether hall of ye said erle Bothwells ludgeing in ye abbay, about four houris eftirnone, or yairby, and remanit yairin twa houris, or yairby; qubat yai did or said, he knawis not. Item. Deponis, Yat John Hepburne of Bolton, at ten houres at evin, commandit the Deponar and Pat Wilsoune to tak up ane carriage of twa maills and ane tronk, and ye vthir an leddirin mail, quhilks were lyand in the said nethir hall, quhilks the Deponar and the said Pat put on and chargit upon twa horses of my lordis, the ane being his sown horse, and carriit the same to the zet of the enteres of the black friers, and yare laid the same down, quhair the erle Bothwell, accumpanit with Robert Ormestoun and Paris, called French Paris, and vtheris twa quhilks had cloakes about yare faces, met the saidis deponar and Pat Wilsoun. And yat zoung Tallo, the lard of Ormestoune, and John Hepburne of Boltoun, wes awaitand vpon ye |