Two hours after the execution, the body and the head were taken into the
same hall in which Mary Stuart had appeared before the commissioners,
set down on a table round which the judges had sat, and covered over
with a black serge cloth; and there remained till three o'clock in the
afternoon, when Waters the doctor from Stamford and the surgeon from
Fotheringay village came to open and embalm them--an operation which
they carried out under the eyes of Amyas Paulet and his soldiers,
without any respect for the rank and sex of the poor corpse, which was
thus exposed to the view of anyone who wanted to see it: it is true that
this indignity did not fulfil its proposed aim; for a rumour spread
about that the queen had swollen limbs and was dropsical, while, on the
contrary, there was not one of the spectators but was obliged to confess
that he had never seen the body of a young girl in the bloom of health
purer and lovelier than that of Mary Stuart, dead of a violent death
after nineteen years of suffering and captivity.
When the body was opened, the spleen was in its normal state, with the
veins a little livid only, the lungs yellowish in places, and the brain
one-sixth larger than is usual in persons of the same age and sex; thus
everything promised a long life to her whose end had just been so
cruelly hastened.
A report having been made of the above, the body was embalmed after a
fashion, put in a leaden coffin and that in another of wood, which was
left on the table till the first day of August--that is, for nearly five
months--before anyone was allowed to come near it; and not only that,
but the English having noticed that Mary Stuart's unhappy servants, who
were still detained as prisoners, went to look at it through the
keyhole, stopped that up in such a way that they could not even gaze at
the coffin enclosing the body of her whom they had so greatly loved.
However, one hour after Mary Stuart's death, Henry Talbot, who had been
present at it, set out at full speed for London, carrying to Elizabeth
the account of her rival's death; but at the very first lines she read,
Elizabeth, true to her character, cried out in grief and indignation,
saying that her orders had been misunderstood, that there had been too
great haste, and that all this was the fault of Davison the Secretary of
State, to whom she had given the warrant to keep till she had made up
her mind, but not to send to Fotheringay. Accordingly, Davison was sent
to the Tower and condemned to pay a fine of ten thousand pounds
sterling, for having deceived the queen. Meanwhile, amid all this grief,
an embargo was laid on all vessels in all the ports of the realm, so
that the news of the death should not reach abroad, especially France,
except through skilful emissaries who could place the execution in the
least unfavourable light for Elizabeth. At the same time the scandalous
popular festivities which had marked the announcement of the sentence
again celebrated the tidings of the execution. London was illuminated,
bonfires lit, and the enthusiasm was such that the French Embassy was
broken into and wood taken to revive the fires when they began to die
down.
Crestfallen at this event, M. de Chateauneuf was still shut up at the
Embassy, when, a fortnight later, he received an invitation from
Elizabeth to visit her at the country house of the Archbishop of
Canterbury. M. de Chateauneuf went thither with the firm resolve to say
no word to her on what had happened; but as soon as she saw him,
Elizabeth, dressed in black, rose, went to him, and, overwhelming him
with kind attentions, told him that she was ready to place all the
strength of her kingdom at Henry III's disposal to help him put down the
League. Chateauneuf received all these offers with a cold and severe
expression, without saying, as he had promised himself, a single word
about the event which had put both the queen and himself into mourning.
But, taking him by the hand, she drew him aside, and there, with deep
sighs, said--
"Ah! sir, since I saw you the greatest misfortune which could befall me
has happened: I mean the death of my good sister, the Queen of Scotland,
of which I swear by God Himself, my soul and my salvation, that I am
perfectly innocent. I had signed the order, it is true; but my
counsellors have played me a trick for which I cannot calm myself; and I
swear to God that if it were not for their long service I would have
them beheaded. I have a woman's frame, sir, but in this woman's frame
beats a man's heart."
Chateauneuf bowed without a response; but his letter to Henry III and
Henry's answer prove that neither the one nor the other was the dupe of
this female Tiberius.
Meanwhile, as we have said, the unfortunate servants were prisoners, and
the poor body was in that great hall waiting for a royal interment.
Things remained thus, Elizabeth said, to give her time to order a
splendid funeral for her good sister Mary, but in reality because the
queen dared not place in juxtaposition the secret and infamous death and
the public and royal burial; then, was not time needed for the first
reports which it pleased Elizabeth to spread to be credited before the
truth should be known by the mouths of the servants? For the queen hoped
that once this careless world had made up its mind about the death of
the Queen of Scots, it would not take any further trouble to change it.
Finally, it was only when the warders were as tired as the prisoners,
that Elizabeth, having received a report stating that the ill-embalmed
body could no longer be kept, at last ordered the funeral to take place.
Accordingly, after the 1st of August, tailors and dressmakers arrived at
Fotheringay Castle, sent by Elizabeth, with cloth and black silk stuffs,
to clothe in mourning all Mary's servants. But they refused, not having
waited for the Queen of England's bounty, but having made their funeral
garments at their own expense, immediately after their mistress's death.
The tailors and dressmakers, however, none the less set so actively to
work that on the 7th everything was finished.
Next day, at eight o'clock in the evening, a large chariot, drawn by
four horses in mourning trappings, and covered with black velvet like
the chariot, which was, besides, adorned with little streamers on which
were embroidered the arms of Scotland, those of the queen, and the arms
of Aragon, those of Darnley, stopped at the gate of Fotheringay Castle.
It was followed by the herald king, accompanied by twenty gentlemen on
horseback, with their servants and lackeys, all dressed in mourning,
who, having alighted, mounted with his whole train into the room where
the body lay, and had it brought down and put into the chariot with all
possible respect, each of the spectators standing with bared head and in
profound silence.
This visit caused a great stir among the prisoners, who debated a while
whether they ought not to implore the favour of being allowed to follow
their mistress's body, which they could not and should not let go alone
thus; but just as they were about to ask permission to speak to the
herald king, he entered the room where they were assembled, and told
them that he was charged by his mistress, the august Queen of England,
to give the Queen of Scotland the most honourable funeral he could;
that, not wishing to fail in such a high undertaking, he had already
made most of the preparations for the ceremony, which was to take place
on the 10th of August, that is to say, two days later,--but that the
leaden shell in which the body was enclosed being very heavy, it was
better to move it beforehand, and that night, to where the grave was
dug, than to await the day of the interment itself; that thus they might
be easy, this burial of the shell being only a preparatory ceremony; but
that if some of them would like to accompany the corpse, to see what was
done with it, they were at liberty, and that those who stayed behind
could follow the funeral pageant, Elizabeth's positive desire being that
all, from first to last, should be present in the funeral procession.
This assurance calmed the unfortunate prisoners, who deputed Bourgoin,
Gervais, and six others to follow their mistress's body: these were
Andrew Melville, Stewart, Gorjon, Howard, Lauder, and Nicholas
Delamarre.
At ten o'clock at night they set out, walking behind the chariot,
preceded by the herald, accompanied by men on foot, who carried torches
to light the way, and followed by twenty gentlemen and their servants.
In this manner, at two o'clock in the morning, they reached
Peterborough, where there is a splendid cathedral built by an ancient
Saxon king, and in which, on the left of the choir, was already interred
good Queen Catharine of Aragon, wife of Henry VIII, and where was her
tomb, still decked with a canopy bearing her arms.
On arriving, they found the cathedral all hung with black, with a dome
erected in the middle of the choir, much in the way in which 'chapelles
ardentes' are set up in France, except that there were no lighted
candles round it. This dome was covered with black velvet, and overlaid
with the arms of Scotland and Aragon, with streamers like those on the
chariot yet again repeated. The state coffin was already set up under
this dome: it was a bier, covered like the rest in black velvet fringed
with silver, on which was a pillow of the same supporting a royal crown.
To the right of this dome, and in front of the burial-place of Queen
Catharine of Aragon, Mary of Scotland's sepulchre had been dug: it was a
grave of brick, arranged to be covered later with a slab or a marble
tomb, and in which was to be deposited the coffin, which the Bishop of
Peterborough, in his episcopal robes, but without his mitre, cross, or
cope, was awaiting at the door, accompanied by his dean and several
other clergy. The body was brought into the cathedral, without chant or
prayer, and was let down into the tomb amid a profound silence. Directly
it was placed there, the masons, who had stayed their hands, set to work
again, closing the grave level with the floor, and only leaving an
opening of about a foot and a half, through which could be seen what was
within, and through which could be thrown on the coffin, as is customary
at the obsequies of kings, the broken staves of the officers and the
ensigns and banners with their arms. This nocturnal ceremony ended,
Melville, Bourgoin, and the other deputies were taken to the bishop's
palace, where the persons appointed to take part in the funeral
procession were to assemble, in number more than three hundred and
fifty, all chosen, with the exception of the servants, from among the
authorities, the nobility, and Protestant clergy.
The day following, Thursday, August the 9th, they began to hang the
banqueting halls with rich and sumptuous stuffs, and that in the sight
of Melville, Bourgoin, and the others, whom they had brought thither,
less to be present at the interment of Queen Mary than to bear witness
to the magnificence of Queen Elizabeth. But, as one may suppose, the
unhappy prisoners were indifferent to this splendour, great and
extraordinary as it was.
On Friday, August 10th, all the chosen persons assembled at the bishop's
palace: they ranged themselves in the appointed order, and turned their
steps to the cathedral, which was close by. When they arrived there,
they took the places assigned them in the choir, and the choristers
immediately began to chant a funeral service in English and according to
Protestant rites. At the first words of this service, when he saw it was
not conducted by Catholic priests, Bourgoin left the cathedral,
declaring that he would not be present at such sacrilege, and he was
followed by all Mary's servants, men and women, except Melville and
Barbe Mowbray, who thought that whatever the tongue in which one prayed,
that tongue was heard by the Lord. This exit created great scandal; but
the bishop preached none the less.
The sermon ended, the herald king went to seek Bourgoin and his
companions, who were walking in the cloisters, and told them that the
almsgiving was about to begin, inviting them to take part in this
ceremony; but they replied that being Catholics they could not make
offerings at an altar of which they disapproved. So the herald king
returned, much put out at the harmony of the assembly being disturbed by
this dissent; but the alms-offering took place no less than the sermon.
Then, as a last attempt, he sent to them again, to tell them that the
service was quite over, and that accordingly they might return for the
royal ceremonies, which belonged only to the religion of the dead; and
this time they consented; but when they arrived, the staves were broken,
and the banners thrown into the grave through the opening that the
workmen had already closed.
Then, in the same order in which it had come, the procession returned to
the palace, where a splendid funeral repast had been prepared. By a
strange contradiction, Elizabeth, who, having punished the living woman
as a criminal, had just treated the dead woman as a queen, had also
wished that the honours of the funeral banquet should be for the
servants, so long forgotten by her. But, as one can imagine, these ill
accommodated themselves to that intention, did not seem astonished at
this luxury nor rejoiced at this good cheer, but, on the contrary,
drowned their bread and wine in tears, without otherwise responding to
the questions put to them or the honours granted them. And as soon as
the repast was ended, the poor servants left Peterborough and took the
road back to Fotheringay, where they heard that they were free at last
to withdraw whither they would. They did not need to be told twice; for
they lived in perpetual fear, not considering their lives safe so long
as they remained in England. They therefore immediately collected all
their belongings, each taking his own, and thus went out of Fotheringay
Castle on foot, Monday, 13th August, 1587.
Bourgoin went last: having reached the farther side of the drawbridge,
he turned, and, Christian as he was, unable to forgive Elizabeth, not
for his own sufferings, but for his mistress's, he faced about to those
regicide walls, and, with hands outstretched to them, said in a loud and
threatening voice, those words of David: "Let vengeance for the blood of
Thy servants, which has been shed, O Lord God, be acceptable in Thy
sight". The old man's curse was heard, and inflexible history is
burdened with Elizabeth's punishment.
We said that the executioner's axe, in striking Mary Stuart's head, had
caused the crucifix and the book of Hours which she was holding to fly
from her hands. We also said that the two relics had been picked up by
people in her following. We are not aware of what became of the
crucifix, but the book of Hours is in the royal library, where those
curious about these kinds of historical souvenirs can see it: two
certificates inscribed on one of the blank leaves of the volume
demonstrate its authenticity. These are they:
FIRST CERTIFICATE
"We the undersigned Vicar Superior of the strict observance of the Order
of Cluny, certify that this book has been entrusted to us by order of
the defunct Dom Michel Nardin, a professed religious priest of our said
observance, deceased in our college of Saint-Martial of Avignon, March
28th, 1723, aged about eighty years, of which he has spent about thirty
among us, having lived very religiously: he was a German by birth, and
had served as an officer in the army a long time.
"He entered Cluny, and made his profession there, much detached from all
this world's goods and honours; he only kept, with his superior's
permission, this book, which he knew had been in use with Mary Stuart,
Queen of England and Scotland, to the end of her life.
"Before dying and being parted from his brethren, he requested that, to
be safely remitted to us, it should be sent us by mail, sealed. Just as
we have received it, we have begged M. L'abbe Bignon, councillor of
state and king's librarian, to accept this precious relic of the piety
of a Queen of England, and of a German officer of her religion as well
as of ours.
"(Signed)BROTHER GERARD PONCET, "Vicar-General Superior."
SECOND CERTIFICATE
"We, Jean-Paul Bignon, king's librarian, are very happy to have an
opportunity of exhibiting our zeal, in placing the said manuscript in
His Majesty's library.
"8th July, 1724."
"(Signed) JEAN-PAUL BIGNAN."
This manuscript, on which was fixed the last gaze of the Queen of
Scotland, is a duodecimo, written in the Gothic character and containing
Latin prayers; it is adorned with miniatures set off with gold,
representing devotional subjects, stories from sacred history, or from
the lives of saints and martyrs. Every page is encircled with arabesques
mingled with garlands of fruit and flowers, amid which spring up
grotesque figures of men and animals.
As to the binding, worn now, or perhaps even then, to the woof, it is in
black velvet, of which the flat covers are adorned in the centre with an
enamelled pansy, in a silver setting surrounded by a wreath, to which
are diagonally attached from one corner of the cover to the other, two
twisted silver-gilt knotted cords, finished by a tuft at the two ends.
----