h heavy loss an Anglo-
Scottish attack on the walls; but on June 16 the Regent made a good end,
in peace with all men. She saw Chatelherault, James Stewart, and the
Earl Marischal; she listened patiently to the preacher Willock; she bade
farewell to all, and died, a notable woman, crushed by an impossible
task. The garrison of Leith, meanwhile, was starving on rats and
horseflesh: negotiations began, and ended in the Treaty of Edinburgh
(July 6, 1560).
This Treaty, as between Mary, Queen of France and Scotland, on one hand,
and England on the other, was never ratified by Mary Stuart: she appears
to have thought that one clause implied her abandonment of all her claims
to the English succession, typified by her quartering of the Royal
English arms on her own shield. Thus there never was nor could be amity
between her and her sister and her foe, Elizabeth, who was justly
aggrieved by her assumption of the English arms, while Elizabeth
quartered the arms of France. Again, the ratification of the Treaty as
regarded Mary's rebels depended on their fulfilling certain clauses
which, in fact, they instantly violated.
Preachers were planted in the larger town, some of which had already
secured their services; Knox took Edinburgh. "Superintendents,"--by no
means bishops--were appointed, an order which soon ceased to exist in the
Kirk: their duties were to wander about in their provinces,
superintending and preaching. By request of the Convention (which was
crowded by persons not used to attend), some preachers drew up, in four
days, a Confession of Faith, on the lines of Calvin's rule at Geneva:
this was approved and passed on August 17. The makers of the document
profess their readiness to satisfy any critic of any point "from the
mouth of God" (out of the Bible), but the pace was so good that either no
criticism was offered or it was very rapidly "satisfied." On August 24
four acts were passed in which the authority of "The Bishop of Rome" was
repudiated. All previous legislation, not consistent with the new
Confession, was rescinded. Against celebrants and attendants of the Mass
were threatened (1) confiscation and corporal punishment; (2) exile; and
(3) for the third offence, Death. The death sentence is not known to
have been carried out in more than one or two cases. (Prof. Hume-Brown
writes that "the penalties attached to the breach of these enactments"
(namely, the abjuration of Papal jurisdiction, the cond
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