ender to
Murray,--a step not to be thought of. Time pressed; fear urged; and
resolved to throw herself at the feet of her kinswoman, she crossed,
never to return, the Rubicon of her destiny. A common fishing-boat, the
only vessel that could be procured, landed her on May 16th 1568, with
about twenty attendants, at Workington in Cumberland, whence she was
conducted with every mark of respect to Carlisle-castle; and from this
asylum she instantly addressed to Elizabeth a long letter, relating her
fresh reverse of fortune, complaining of the injuries which she had
received at the hands of her subjects, and earnestly imploring her favor
and protection.

With what feelings this important letter was received it would be
deeply interesting to inquire, were there any possibility of arriving at
the knowledge of a thing so secret. If indeed the professions of
friendship and offers of effectual aid lavished by Elizabeth upon Mary
during the period of her captivity, were nothing else than a series of
stratagems by which she sought to draw an unwary victim within her
toils, and to wreak on her the vengeance of an envious temper and
unpitying heart, we might now imagine her exulting in the success of her
wiles, and smiling over the atrocious perfidy which she was about to
commit. If, on the other hand, we judge these demonstrations to have
been at the time sincere, and believe that Elizabeth, though profoundly
sensible of Mary's misconduct, was yet anxious to save her from the
severe retribution which her exasperated subjects had taken upon them to
exact, we must imagine her whole soul agitated at this crisis by a crowd
of conflicting thoughts and adverse passions.

In the first moments, sympathy for an unhappy queen, and the intuitive
sense of generosity and honor, would urge her to fulfil every promise,
to satisfy or surpass every hope which her conduct had excited. But soon
the mingled suggestions of female honor, of policy, of caution, uniting
with the sentiment of habitual enmity, would arise, first to moderate,
then to extinguish, her ardor in the cause of her supplicant. Further
reflection, enforced perhaps by the reasonings of her most trusted
counsellors, would serve to display in tempting colors the advantages to
be taken of the now defenceless condition of a competitor once
formidable and always odious; and gradually, but not easily, not without
reluctance and shame and secret pangs of compunction, she would suffer
the t