plan was to be put in execution. The most that we can
suppose such a man as Bothwell would have communicated to her, would
be some dark and obscure intimations of his design, made in order to
satisfy himself that she would not really oppose it. To ask her,
woman as she was, to take any part in such a deed, or to communicate
to her beforehand any of the details of the arrangement, would have
been an act of littleness and meanness which such magnanimous
monsters as Bothwell are seldom guilty of.

Besides, Mary remarked that evening, in Darnley's room, in the course
of conversation, that it was just about a year since Rizzio's death.
On entering her palace, too, at Holyrood, that night, she met one of
Bothwell's servants who had been carrying the bags, and, perceiving
the smell of gunpowder, she asked him what it meant. Now Mary was
not the brazen-faced sort of woman to speak of such things at such a
time if she was really in the councils of the conspirators. The only
question seems to be, therefore, not whether she was a party to the
actual deed of murder, but only whether she was aware of, and
consenting to, the general design.

In the mean time, Mary and Bothwell went together into the hall where
the servants were rejoicing and making merry at the wedding. French
Paris was there, but his heart began to fail him in respect to the
deed in which he had been engaged. He stood apart, with a countenance
expressive of anxiety and distress. Bothwell went to him, and told
him that if he carried such a melancholy face as that any longer in
the presence of the queen, he would make him suffer for it. The poor
conscience-stricken man begged Bothwell to release him from any
further part in the transaction. He was sick, really sick, he said,
and he wanted to go home to his bed. Bothwell made no reply but to
order him to follow _him_. Bothwell went to his own rooms, changed
the silken court dress in which he had appeared in company for one
suitable to the night and to the deed, directed his men to follow
him, and passed from the palace toward the gates of the city. The
gates were shut, for it was midnight. The sentinels challenged them.
The party said they were friends to my Lord Bothwell, and were
allowed to pass on.

They advanced to the convent gardens. Here they left a part of their
number, while Bothwell and French Paris passed over the wall, and
crept softly into the house. They unlocked the room where they had
left the two