e quiet of his college. But it
would seem equally clear that when the action of the sombre tragedy
quickened he was absent from the scene and knew of it only by the
rumours and reports that came across the Firth. First Rizzio's murder,
which the distant spectators would discuss, no doubt, with a thrill not
entirely of horror, a stern sense that justice had been done, a
satisfied prejudice--and no doubt some patriotic, if still prejudiced,
hope that now the Italian was removed there would be less of foreign
policy, and a more entire regard for the welfare of affairs at home.
Then would come the rumours of the Queen's vengeance, lightly held at
first, of Bothwell always in the foreground, her chief supporter and
partisan--Bothwell who, though loved by nobody, was yet a Protestant,
and therefore not altogether beyond hope. And then with ever-quickening
haste event after event--the murder of the King, for whom no one would
have mourned much had it been attended by circumstances less terrible;
the mad proceedings of the Queen, whether constrained or free, her
captivity, outrage, or conspiracy, whichever it was, her insane and
incomprehensible marriage, which no force or persuasion could account
for. As the posts arrived at uncertain intervals, delayed by weather,
strong winds and heavy seas, by breaking down of conveyances, by the
very agitations and tumults in the capital which made them so terribly
interesting, the eager spectators in Fife must have congregated to await
their arrival with an intensity of excitement, of which, with our
endless sources of information and constant communication, we can form
little idea now.

And there would seem to be no doubt of the strong immediate feeling
which arose against the Queen, the instant conclusion of the bystanders
as to her guilt. There have been no greater fluctuations in historical
opinion than those that have arisen around the facts of Mary's life.
Historians of the eighteenth century considered it as a test of a man's
moral sanity whether he persisted in believing in Mary's innocence or
not. Among her contemporaries the progress of time which softened
impression, and the many pathetic situations of her later history, the
terrible misfortunes under which she fell, her endless miseries and
troubles, and the brave spirit with which she met them, turned some
hearts again towards her, an ever-troubled but ever-devoted body of
partisans. But at the moment when these terrible even