ettlement of the
succession, on which Elizabeth's own accession rested, excluded the
Scotch line: in virtue of it the descendants of the younger sister,
who were natives of England, possessed a greater right. And how if the
Queen of Scots, when recognised as heir to England, afterwards gave
her hand to a Catholic prince hostile to Elizabeth? The dangers
indicated above would then be doubled, the followers of the ancient
Church would have attached themselves to the royal couple, and formed
a compact party in opposition to Elizabeth's arrangements, which would
never have attained stability.

To meet this very objection, it was suggested that Mary might marry a
Protestant, in fact Robert Dudley Earl of Leicester, who was looked
upon as the favourite of the Queen of England herself. Elizabeth could
have been quite secure of him: she herself recommended him. Mary was
at the first moment unpleasantly affected by the idea that she was
expected to take as a husband one who was a born subject of England;
but she was by no means decidedly against it, always supposing that in
that case Elizabeth would recognise her right of inheritance in a
valid form for herself and her issue by this marriage. Above all men
Murray was in favour of this. He said, although his power must be
diminished by the Queen's union with Leicester, yet he wished for it,
in so far as it was bound up with the confirmation of the heirship;
for that was the hope by which he had kept Mary firm to the existing
system, and separated her from her old friends all these years past.
Such was without doubt the case: it is this point of view that renders
Mary's policy and conduct during the last years intelligible. If he,
so Murray continued, could not make his promise good, Mary would think
he had deceived her: should she afterwards marry a Catholic prince,
what would be their position?[210] Once more was the request brought
before Queen Elizabeth. But even under these circumstances she could
not be induced to grant it. She said, if Mary trusted her and married
Leicester, she should never repent it: but these words, which
contained no definite engagement, had rather an opposite effect on
Mary. In the hope of the recognition of her heirship she had hitherto
endured the absolute constraint of her position: she would even have
agreed to the choice of a husband by which she feared to be disparaged
and controlled: for how could she have concealed from herself, that by
it she