would in all probability have temporarily overthrown
it, had not the course of events been unexpectedly arrested. Every
Court in Europe was scheming for Mary's marriage. Proposals from
Spain, France, Austria, Sweden, Denmark, and the Earl of Leicester in
England were all considered. Mary's preference was for Don Carlos of
Spain; but when this proved impossible, she made, suddenly, an
unfortunate choice. Henry Stewart, who was Lord Darnley, the son of
the Earl of Lennox, was, like herself, the great grandchild of Henry
VII. That was a great point in eligibility, but the only one. He was
a Catholic, three years younger than herself, good-looking, weak and
vicious. The marriage was celebrated at Holyrood in 1565, and Mary
bestowed upon her consort the title of king. This did not satisfy him.
He demanded that the crown should be secured to him for life; and that
if Mary died childless, his heirs should succeed. With such violence
and insolence did Darnley press these demands, and so open were his
debaucheries, that Mary was revolted and disgusted. Her chief {289}
minister was an Italian named Rizzio, a man of insignificant, mean
exterior, but astute and accomplished. There seems no reason to
believe that Darnley was ever jealous of the Italian, but he believed
that he was an obstacle to his ambitious designs and was using his
influence with Mary to defeat them. He determined to remove him.
While Rizzio and the Queen were in conversation in her cabinet, Darnley
entered, seized and held Mary in his grasp, while his assassins dragged
Rizzio into an adjoining room and stabbed him to death. Who can wonder
that she left him, saying, "I shall be your wife no longer!" But after
the birth of her infant, three months later, her feelings seem to have
softened, and it looked like heroic devotion when she went to his
bedside while he was recovering from small-pox, and had him tenderly
removed to a house near Edinburgh, where she could visit him daily.

It will never be known whether Mary was cognizant of or, even worse,
accessory to Darnley's murder, which occurred at midnight a few hours
after she had left him, February 9, 1567.

{290}

Suspicion pointed at once to the Earl of Bothwell. The Court acquitted
him, but public opinion did not. And it was Mary's marriage with this
man which was her undoing. Innocent or guilty, the world will never
forgive her for having married, three months after her husband's death,
th