as hardly inferior in intellectual power to Elizabeth herself, while in
fire and grace and brilliancy of temper she stood high above her. She
brought with her the voluptuous refinement of the French Renascence;
she would lounge for days in bed, and rise only at night for dances and
music. But her frame was of iron, and incapable of fatigue; she galloped
ninety miles after her last defeat without a pause save to change
horses. She loved risk and adventure and the ring of arms; as she rode
in a foray to the north the swordsmen beside her heard her wish she was
a man "to know what life it was to lie all night in the fields, or to
walk on the cawsey with a jack and knapschalle, a Glasgow buckler and a
broadsword." But in the closet she was as cool and astute a politician
as Elizabeth herself; with plans as subtle, and of a far wider and
bolder range than the Queen's. "Whatever policy is in all the chief and
best practised heads of France," wrote an English envoy, "whatever
craft, falsehood, and deceit is in all the subtle brains of Scotland, is
either fresh in this woman's memory, or she can fetch it out with a wet
finger." Her beauty, her exquisite grace of manner, her generosity of
temper and warmth of affection, her frankness of speech, her
sensibility, her gaiety, her womanly tears, her manlike courage, the
play and freedom of her nature, the flashes of poetry that broke from
her at every intense moment of her life, flung a spell over friend or
foe which has only deepened with the lapse of years. Even to Knollys,
the sternest Puritan of his day, she seemed in her later captivity to be
"a notable woman." "She seemeth to regard no ceremonious honour besides
the acknowledgement of her estate royal. She showeth a disposition to
speak much, to be bold, to be pleasant, to be very familiar. She showeth
a great desire to be avenged on her enemies. She showeth a readiness to
expose herself to all perils in hope of victory. She desireth much to
hear of hardiness and valiancy, commending by name all approved hardy
men of her country though they be her enemies, and she concealeth no
cowardice even in her friends."

[Sidenote: Mary's plans.]

Of the stern bigotry, the intensity of passion, which lay beneath the
winning surface of Mary's womanhood, men as yet knew nothing. But they
at once recognized her political ability. Till now she had proved in her
own despite a powerful friend to the Reformation. It was her claim of
the Englis