ed again with that fatal love for him that
she was never able to surmount, and felt herself overcome with such
weakness, that, weeping bitterly, and before everyone, she wanted
Kirkcaldy to be told that she broke off all negotiations; however, as
Bothwell had understood that he was no longer safe in camp, it was he who
insisted that things should remain as they were; and, leaving Mary in
tears, he mounted, and setting off at full speed, he did not stop till he
reached Dunbar.

Next day, at the time appointed, the arrival of Lord Kirkcaldy of Grange
was announced by the trumpeters preceding him. Mary mounted directly and
went to meet him; them, as he alighted to greet her, "My lord;" said she,
"I surrender to you, on the conditions that you have proposed to me on
the part of the nobles, and here is my hand as a sign of entire
confidence". Kirkcaldy then knelt down, kissed, the queen's hand
respectfully; and, rising, he took her horse by the bridle and led it
towards the Confederates' camp.

Everyone of any rank in the army received her with such marks of respect
as entirely to satisfy her; but it was not so at all with the soldiers
and common people. Hardly had the queen reached the second line, formed
by them, than great murmurs arose, and several voices cried, "To the
stake, the adulteress! To the stake, the parricide!" However, Mary bore
these outrages stoically enough but a more terrible trial yet was in
store for her. Suddenly she saw rise before her a banner, on which was
depicted on one side the king dead and stretched out in the fatal garden,
and on the other the young prince kneeling, his hands joined and his eyes
raised to heaven, with this inscription, "O Lord! judge and revenge my
cause!" Mary reined in her horse abruptly at this sight, and wanted to
turn back; but she had scarcely moved a few paces when the accusing
banner again blocked her passage. Wherever she went, she met this
dreadful apparition. For two hours she had incessantly under her eyes the
king's corpse asking vengeance, and the young prince her son praying God
to punish the murderers. At last she could endure it no longer, and,
crying out, she threw herself back, having completely lost consciousness,
and would have fallen, if someone had not caught hold of her. In the
evening she entered Edinburgh, always preceded by the cruel banner, and
she already had rather the air of a prisoner than of a queen; for, not
having had a moment during