Mary, Queen of Scots, and the Murder of Lord Darnley

by Alison Weir

  5

  “MOST UNWORTHY TO BE MATCHED”

  AT THE TIME OF DARNLEY’S arrival in Scotland, Mary and her court were on a progress in Fife, whither he was obliged to follow them in snowy weather. On Saturday, 17 February, Mary received him at Wemyss Castle, a pink sandstone fortress overlooking the Firth of Forth. Randolph, still hoping that she would accept Leicester, reported that the Queen welcomed Darnley with no more than the courtesy due to a cousin, but Melville wrote later, “Her Majesty took well with him and said that he was the lustiest and best proportioned long [tall] man that she had seen.”1 Lennox later claimed that, as soon as she saw Darnley, she was “struck with the dart of love,”2 but there is no other evidence for this.

  Few of the Protestant Lords welcomed the arrival of the reputedly Catholic Darnley, and on 19 February, Randolph reported that Glencairn and Darnley’s cousin Morton “much misliked him and wished him away.” Later, Lady Lennox secured Morton’s support with her renunciation of her claim to the earldom of Angus in Morton’s favour, and in the hope of buying friendship, Darnley himself distributed expensive gifts of jewellery to the chief Lords.

  On 18 February, Mary left Wemyss Castle for Dunfermline, while Darnley visited his father, Lennox, at Dunkeld before riding south to rejoin the progress. On 24 February, he crossed the Forth with Mary and returned to Edinburgh,3 and thereafter remained with the court, high in favour with the Queen.

  On the day after his arrival at Holyrood, Darnley accompanied Moray to St. Giles’s Kirk to hear Knox preach, intent on earning the support of the Earl, in which he was initially successful. Afterwards, he dined with Moray and Randolph, and that evening, at Moray’s suggestion, partnered the Queen in a galliard. Mary later recalled that Moray was at this time in favour of a match with Darnley, if only to thwart the dynastic ambitions of the Hamiltons.4

  Darnley’s visit to St. Giles was meant to allay the fears of the Protestants, yet he also attended Mass with the Queen in the chapel royal. For Darnley, religion was a matter of policy, as it was for his father. Although brought up a Catholic, at Queen Elizabeth’s court he had practised the reformed faith because it was expedient to do so. He was now prepared to follow both doctrines in order to retain the favour of Queen Mary and her nobles. His contemporaries thought he was “indifferent to religion,”5 and indeed there is little evidence that he had any deep spiritual convictions.

  Darnley’s willingness to compromise on religion went some way towards placating those who had been hostile to him. “A great number wish him well,” wrote Randolph, but “others doubt him, and deeplier consider what is fit for the state of their country than a fair, jolly young man.” Some feared that, if Darnley married the Queen, “it would be the utter overthrow and subversion of them and their Houses.”6 It was not so much his religion that was the stumbling block, as the fact that he was a Lennox Stuart, and a rival of the powerful Hamilton faction.

  Darnley, meanwhile, was enjoying the pleasures of the court and the Queen’s company. He set himself to charm her by his lute playing and dancing, and made friends with Rizzio. Darnley and Mary shared a passion for riding and hunting, and in the evenings they enjoyed cards, dice and music. Mary was certainly taken with Darnley, but she was still prepared to marry Leicester if Elizabeth, in return, would name her as her successor. Randolph believed that Mary’s favour to Darnley and her long talks with him proceeded “rather from her own courteous nature than that anything is meant which some here fear may ensue”; yet he conceded that Mary’s emotions were unpredictable, “seeing she is a woman and in all things desires to have her own will.”

  So far, according to Randolph, Darnley’s behaviour was “well liked, and hitherto he so governs himself that there is great praise of him.” Buoyed up with his success, he precipitately proposed marriage to Mary, only to be coldly turned down. After she told Melville “how she had refused the ring which he offered unto her,” Melville “took occasion to speak in Darnley’s favour, that their marriage would put out of doubt their title to the succession.”7 Rizzio also added his persuasions, but to no avail.

  Before 5 March, to the dismay of Moray and the Protestant Lords, Bothwell returned to Scotland. Randolph reported that Mary “mislikes his home-coming without her licence,”8 but when Bothwell, from the security of Hermitage Castle, sent his friend, Sir William Murray of Tullibardine, to plead his cause with the Queen, she listened sympathetically and declared that “she could not hate him.” Moray, however, insisted that Bothwell was plotting to kill him and Maitland,9 and demanded that he be “put to the horn” (i.e., outlawed). But although Mary told Randolph that Bothwell would never receive favour at her hands, the Earl of Bedford, from his vantage point at Berwick, believed that she would not permit him to be exiled.

  Moray and Randolph now got two of Bothwell’s enemies, Sir James Murray of Purdovis, brother of Tullibardine, and the Earl’s former servant, Dandie Pringle, who was now employed by Moray, to tell Mary that, whilst in France, Bothwell had “spoken dishonourably of the Queen,” claiming that between them, she and Queen Elizabeth “would not make one honest woman”; as for Mary, she had been her uncle “the Cardinal’s whore.”10 What Bothwell had allegedly said was not only a dreadful slur on Mary’s honour, but also high treason, and the Queen, shocked, willingly agreed to Moray’s demand that the Earl be summoned to Edinburgh to face trial.11

  For many months now, Mary had been urging Elizabeth to proclaim her her heir. If marriage to Leicester was the price, then Mary was prepared to pay it. On 16 March, Randolph finally delivered Elizabeth’s answer, sent ten days earlier, which was that, if Mary agreed to marry Leicester, Elizabeth would advance her title to the succession in every way that she could, but she “could not gratify her desire to have her title determined and published until she be married herself, or determined not to marry.”

  It was a bitter blow. Too late, Mary saw that she had been duped. In a passion, she “wept her fill” and “used evil speech” of Elizabeth, complaining that she had “abused” her, deceiving her with vain hopes and wasting her time to no purpose.12 After this, there was no more talk of the Leicester marriage, and no longer a pressing need to keep Elizabeth sweet.

  While Moray and Maitland simmered with anger, Mary did “nothing but weep,” reported Randolph. He espied her crying as she watched Darnley and her half-brother, Lord Robert Stewart, running at the ring on Leith Sands, and noticed there was “much sadness in her looks.” It seemed that her hopes must now be invested in Darnley, which is what Elizabeth had perhaps intended when she effectively scuppered the match with Leicester.

  Darnley was about to alienate his most important ally. When Lord Robert Stewart showed him a map of Scotland and pointed out the extent of Moray’s vast estates, Darnley tactlessly remarked “that it was too much.” Moray, hearing of this, was mightily offended and complained to the Queen. Mary made Darnley apologise, but it was too late,13 for Moray, alarmed, had realised that, if Darnley became King, he would almost certainly try to curb Moray’s power and encourage Mary to free herself from his tutelage. From this time onwards, therefore, Moray was Darnley’s enemy, and, in concert with Maitland, Argyll and Chatelherault, strongly opposed any plan for his marriage to Mary, having no intention of allowing his political supremacy, built up over six years, to be eroded. According to Bothwell, “these villains did all they could to stop her, chiefly because they wanted above everything else to prevent her having any children, but also because they wanted no one else to challenge their authority. They realised well enough that any such marriage could only diminish their own influence.”14 Significantly, Bothwell makes no mention of the Lords acting in the interests of the reformed faith.

  As yet, it was by no means certain that Darnley was Mary’s first choice as a husband. On 24 March, she again attempted to revive negotiations for a union with Don Carlos,15 but at the same time, aware that there was little hope of success, she agonised over whether or not she should take Darnley. “What to do, or wherein to r
esolve, she is marvellously in doubt,” Randolph wrote on 27 March.

  Rizzio, whose influence at this time should never be underestimated, was strongly in favour of a match with Darnley. Rizzio was now Mary’s most valued counsellor, and any lord who sought an audience with her had to approach him first, for he controlled access to her. Arrogant, boastful and open to bribery, he swaggered about the court dressed in rich velvets and silks, incurring enmity on all sides. “Some of the nobility would gloom upon him, and some of them would shoulder him and push him aside when they entered the chamber and found him always speaking with Her Majesty,” recalled Melville, who tried to warn Rizzio of the folly of his conduct, only to be told that the Queen approved of it. Melville gently attempted to alert Mary to “the inconveniences I did clearly foresee would inevitably follow if she did not alter her carriage to Rizzio, a stranger, and one suspected by her subjects to be a pensioner of the Pope,” yet she insisted she would not be restrained but would “dispense her favours to such as she pleased.” Melville reminded her “what displeasure had been procured to her by the rash behaviour” of Chastelard. “I told Her Majesty that a grave and comely behaviour towards strangers, not admitting them to too much familiarity, would bring them to a more circumspect and reverend carriage.” Once the hearts of her subjects were lost, they might never be regained. Mary thanked him for his advice, but ignored it.16

  Given the hatred of the Lords, it was in Rizzio’s interests to secure the friendship and patronage of Darnley and further the latter’s prospects of becoming King. According to Randolph,17 Rizzio was one of “the chief dealers” in negotiations for the Darnley marriage—the other was Melville—and Buchanan says Rizzio “was also assiduous in sowing seeds of discord between [Darnley] and Moray.”

  Before long, Rizzio had become Darnley’s “great friend at the Queen’s hand.”18 It was a friendship of mutual self-interest, for Darnley too needed an advocate, and it was also very warm, for Rizzio, having persuaded Darnley “that it was chiefly by his good offices that the Queen had become attracted to him,” was admitted to Darnley’s “table, his chamber and his most secret thoughts.”19 On occasions, the two men would “lie in one bed together.”20 This and other evidence, which will be considered later, suggests that the effeminate-looking Darnley, although he certainly chased women, did have bisexual tendencies, which he may have indulged with Rizzio.

  Randolph had thought by now to see evidence as to whether or not Mary was attracted to Darnley, but although he wondered “what alteration the sight of so fair a face daily in presence may work on the Queen’s heart, hitherto I have espied nothing. I am somewhat suspicious.”

  Moray was unable to stomach the triangular relationship between Mary, Darnley and Rizzio. He too was suspicious of the fact that all three were Catholics, and believed that they were plotting to undermine not only his own position, but also the reformed Church. On 3 April, he withdrew from court on the pretext that he did not wish to witness the “ungodly” Catholic ceremonies that the Queen would observe at Easter.21 Mary was irritated by his disapproval, but, freed from his constant unwelcome advice, realised she would have scope to act independently.

  The court now moved north to Stirling Castle, a mighty fortress commanding access to the Highlands. Set upon a steep rock, the castle boasted strong mediaeval defences, but within its walls was a magnificent great hall, erected by James IV, and a luxurious Renaissance palace that had been built by James V in c. 1538–42 and embellished by French and Italian craftsmen. The Queen’s apartments boasted large windows, decorated stone fireplaces and a ceiling adorned with carved oak roundels known as the Stirling Heads, many of which survive today. The castle was surrounded with ornamental gardens and a hunting park stocked with deer, boar and wild cattle.

  On 5 April, soon after arriving at Stirling, Darnley fell ill with a feverish cold and took to his bed; within two days, “measles came out on him marvellous thick.”22 Mary insisted on helping to nurse him back to health, regardless of the threat of infection; there was shocked amazement in European diplomatic circles when it became known that she had spent an entire night in Darnley’s sickroom,23 notwithstanding the fact that she had “showed herself very careful and anxious about his malady,” although it was conceded that “her care was marvellous, great and tender over him.”24

  Darnley’s illness marked a turning point in his relationship with Mary, for it inspired in her first sympathy and then something deeper, and made her realise that she did indeed wish to marry him. Melville says that she tried at first to suppress her feelings, but that it was not long before she was so infatuated that she could not bear to be apart from Darnley. “Great tokens of love daily pass” between them, reported Randolph, but it was clear Mary had become entranced by a “fantasy of a man, without regard to his tastes, manners or estate,”25 in consequence of which she was throwing propriety and discretion to the winds.

  Love, or perhaps lust, blinded her to other concerns, not the least of which was the scandal her behaviour was causing, and she was unwilling to listen to those Lords who cautioned her against the marriage, urging that it could only bring discord and divisions to Scotland. Nor would she heed those who warned her that Darnley was not all that he seemed. For him, she would defy Moray, Maitland, Knox, the Hamiltons and even Queen Elizabeth, jeopardising her long-cherished hopes of the English succession. As she began to lavish gifts on Darnley—rich materials for clothing, hats, shoes, shirts, ruffs, nightcaps, trappings of cloth of gold for his horse, feathered bonnets for his fools—the courts of Europe began to bristle with scurrilous rumours and disapproval of a queen thus compromising her reputation.

  John Leslie, Bishop of Ross, who was later in Mary’s confidence, felt that there was a strong maternal element in her feelings for Darnley; she displayed “very motherly care” while he was ill, and, although “they were not very different in years”—she was 22, he 18—“she was to him not only a loyal prince, but a most careful and tender mother.”26 This would explain her forbearance when the baser side of Darnley’s nature began to manifest itself.

  Darnley’s feelings for Mary are more difficult to determine. His poems express the conventional sentiments of courtly love,27 but it is uncertain when they were written or to whom they were addressed. He seems to have wanted Mary as a queen rather than as a woman, and to have regarded her as a trophy; his overriding emotion at this time may well have been triumph at the realisation of his ambitions.

  Randolph had quickly seen through Darnley, and wrote to Cecil: “What is thought of his behaviour, wit and judgement I would were less spoken than is, or less occasion for all men to enlarge their tongues as they do. Of this I have a greater number of particulars than I may well put in writing, which shall not be secret to you, though I cannot utter them but with great grief of heart.” Even Randolph, her enemy, felt pity for the unsuspecting Mary.

  Maitland believed that Mary chose Darnley to spite Elizabeth, but she herself was convinced that there were sound political reasons for marrying him. Foremost was the uniting of their claims to the thrones of England and Scotland, which could only strengthen her position and that of any children of the marriage. Secondly, Mary’s union with a Catholic would earn her the approval of the Pope and the Kings of France and Spain. Thirdly, she counted on Darnley to help her break free from her thraldom to Moray and Maitland and enable her to exercise the sovereign power that was her right. Yet she failed to envisage how much hostility the marriage would engender amongst her Protestant nobles, especially Moray, who had been the mainstay of her throne, nor did she foresee how it would alienate Queen Elizabeth and create bitter divisions at court.

  That was soon evident. By 15 April, Moray had hastened back to court, having heard “more than a bruit” that the Queen meant to “forsake all other offers and content herself with her own choice, despite the dangers like to ensue.” Mary was furious to hear that he was joining forces with other opponents of the marriage, and angrily accused him of scheming to “set
the crown on his own head.”28 After this, relations between brother and sister deteriorated rapidly.

  On 15 April, Randolph got wind of what was afoot and wrote to Cecil that Mary’s “familiarity” with Darnley “breeds no small suspicions that there is more intended than merely giving him honour for his nobility.” When this report reached London, Elizabeth began to be alarmed. She already regretted allowing Darnley to go to Scotland, and now it looked as if Mary really did mean to marry him.

  Having made her decision, Mary sent Maitland to London to break the news formally to Elizabeth and seek her blessing, which she had no reason to think would not be forthcoming. Elizabeth was no doubt gratified that she had diverted Mary from making a foreign alliance, but she was now aware of how deeply her friends the Protestant Lords in Scotland disapproved of any union with Darnley, so she took steps to distance herself from that which she had been instrumental in bringing to pass. Flying into a rage, she told Maitland she was astonished at this “very strange and unlikely proposal” and much offended at Darnley’s disobedience, for, as her subject and her cousin, he required her permission to marry, which she was not prepared to give. On her orders, the English Privy Council declared that such a marriage “would be unmeet, unprofitable and perilous to the amity between the Queens and both realms,” and offered Mary a free choice “of any other of the nobility in this whole realm.”29 On 20 April, two days after her audience with Maitland, Elizabeth had Lady Lennox placed under house arrest.

  By 18 April, Randolph knew for certain that Mary meant to marry Darnley, and reported Chatelherault’s fears that the House of Hamilton would be “quite overthrown” once a Lennox Stuart sat on the throne. “The godly cry out that they are undone,” wrote Randolph. “No hope now of the sure establishment of Christ’s true religion, but all turning to confusion.”