{243b} Yet they were convinced by the evidence of the witnesses, and by
their own eyes.

From the error of the Lords of the Articles, in 1609, it obviously
follows that the English Lords, at Hampton Court, in 1568, may have been
unable to detect proofs of forgery in the Casket Letters, which, if the
Casket Letters could now be compared with those of Mary, would be at once
discovered by modern experts. In short, the evidence as to Mary's
handwriting, even if as unanimously accepted, by the English Lords, as
Cecil declares, is not worth a 'hardhead,' a debased copper Scottish
coin. It is worth no more than the opinion of the Lords of the Articles
in the case of the letters attributed to Restalrig.

APPENDICES

APPENDIX A. THE FRONTISPIECE

_Gowrie's Arms and Ambitions_

The frontispiece of this volume is copied from the design of the Earl of
Gowrie's arms, in what is called 'Workman's MS.,' at the Lyon's office in
Edinburgh. The shield displays, within the royal treasure, the arms of
Ruthven in the first and fourth, those of Cameron and Halyburton in the
second and third quarters. The supporters are, dexter, a Goat; sinister,
a Ram; the crest is a Ram's head. The motto is not given; it was DEID
SCHAW. The shield is blotted by transverse strokes of the pen, the whole
rude design having been made for the purpose of being thus scored out,
after Gowrie's death, posthumous trial and forfeiture, in 1600.

On the left of the sinister supporter is an armed man, in the Gowrie
livery. His left hand grasps his sword-hilt, his right is raised to an
imperial crown, hanging above him in the air; from his lips issue the
words, TIBI SOLI, 'for thee alone.' Sir James Balfour Paul, Lyon,
informs me that he knows no other case of such additional supporter, or
whatever the figure ought to be called.

This figure does not occur on any known Ruthven seal. It is not on that
of the first Earl of Gowrie, affixed to a deed of February 1583-1584. It
is not on a seal used in 1597, by John, third Earl, given in Henry
Laing's 'Catalogue of Scottish Seals' (vol. i. under 'Ruthven'). But, in
Crawford's 'Peerage of Scotland' (1716), p. 166, the writer gives the
arms of the third Earl (John, the victim of August 5, 1600). In place of
the traditional Scottish motto _Deid Schaw_, is the Latin translation,
_Facta Probant_. The writer says (Note C), 'This from an authentic copy
of his arms, _richly illuminated in the year_ 1597