the right. It is surmounted by a heavy cornice,
richly carved and gilded. This cornice, and the embroidered curtains
that hang from it, must have been very magnificent in their day, though
now they are faded and tattered by age. The coverings of the bed are
also greatly decayed. Only a little shred of the blanket now remains,
and that is laid upon the bolster. The rest of it has been gradually
carried away by visitors, who for a long time were accustomed to pull
off little shreds of it to take with them, as souvenirs of their visit.
These depredations are, however, now no longer allowed. That part of the
room is now enclosed by a cord, fastened to iron rods fixed in the
floor, so that visitors cannot approach the bed. They are watched, too,
very closely, wherever they go, to prevent their taking any thing away.
They are not allowed to sit down in any of the chairs.

The door in the corner of the room to the left leads into the little
boudoir, or cabinet, where Rizzio was murdered. You can see a little way
into this room, in the picture. Mr. George and the boys went into it.
There was a table on the back side of it, with the armor, and also the
gloves, and one of the boots which Darnley wore, lying upon it. The
attendant took up a breast-plate, which formed a part of the armor, and
let the boys lift it. It was very heavy. There was an indentation in the
front of it, where it had been struck by a bullet. The boot, too, was
prodigiously thick and heavy. The heel was not less than three inches
high.

There was a fireplace in this room, and over it was an altar-piece; a
sort of picture in stone, which Mary used in her oratory, according to
the custom of the Catholics. It had been broken to pieces and put
together again. It was said that John Knox broke it, to show his
abhorrence of Popery, but that the pieces were saved, and it was
afterwards mended.

There was also in this room a square stone, shaped like a block, about
two feet long, sawed off from the end of a beam of timber. This was the
stone that Mary knelt upon when she was crowned Queen of Scotland.

To the right of the door which leads to the boudoir, under the tapestry,
we see in the engraving the opening in the wall which leads to the
staircase where the conspirators came up. The boys went in here and
looked down. The stairs were very narrow, and very dark. The passage was
closed below, so that they could not go down. In Mary's time these
stairs not only led