Before the occurrence of the things spoken of in the foregoing chapter,
the great Earl of Glencairn, my grandfather's first and constant patron,
had been dead some time; but his son and successor, who knew the
estimation in which he had been held by his father, being then in
Edinburgh, allowed him, in consideration thereof, the privilege of his
hall. It suited not, however, with my grandfather's quiet and sanctified
nature to mingle much with the brawlers that used to hover there;
nevertheless, out of a respect to the Earl's hospitality, he did
occasionally go thither, and where, if he heard little to edify the
Christian heart, he learnt divers things anent the Queen and court that
made his fears and anxieties wax stronger and stronger.
It seemed to him, as he often was heard to say, that there was a better
knowledge of Queen Mary's true character and secret partialities among
those loose varlets than among their masters; and her marriage being
then in the parlance of the people, and much dread and fear rife with
the protestants that she would choose a papist for her husband, he was
surprised to hear many of the lewd knaves in Glencairn's hall speak
lightly of the respect she would have to the faith or spirituality of
the man she might prefer.
Among those wuddy worthies he fell in with his ancient adversary
Winterton, who, instead of harbouring any resentment for the trick he
played him in the Lord Boyd's castle, was rejoiced to see him again: he
himself was then in the service of David Rizzio, the fiddler, whom the
Queen some short time before had taken into her particular service.
This Rizzio was by birth an Italian of very low degree; a man of
crouched stature, and of an uncomely physiognomy, being yellow-skinned
and black-haired, with a beak-nose, and little quick eyes of a free and
familiar glance, but shrewd withal, and possessed of a pleasant way of
winning facetiously on the ladies, to the which his singular skill in
all manner of melodious music helped not a little; so that he had great
sway with them, and was then winning himself fast into the Queen's
favour, in which ambition, besides the natural instigations of his own
vanity, he was spirited on by certain powerful personages of the
papistical faction, who soon saw the great efficacy it would be of to
their cause, to have one who owed his rise to them constantly about the
Queen, and in the depths of all her personal correspondence with her
great friends abroad. But the subtle Italian, though still true to his
papal breeding, built upon the Queen's partiality more than on the
favour of those proud nobles, and, about the time of which I am now
speaking, he carried his head at court as bravely as the boldest baron
amongst them. Still in this he had as yet done nothing greatly to
offend. The protestant Lords, however, independent of their aversion to
him on account his religion, felt, in common with all the nobility, a
vehement prejudice against an alien, one too of base blood, and they
openly manifested their displeasure at seeing him so gorgeous and
presuming even in the public presence of the Queen, but he regarded not
their anger.
In this fey man's service Winterton then was, and my grandfather never
doubted that it was for no good he came so often to the Earl of
Glencairn's, who, though not a man of the same weight in the realm as
the old Earl his father, was yet held in much esteem, as a sincere
protestant and true nobleman, by all the friends of the Gospel cause;
and, in the sequel, what my grandfather jealoused was soon very plainly
seen. For Rizzio learning, through Winterton's espionage and that of
other emissaries, how little the people of Scotland would relish a
foreign prince to be set over them, had a hand in dissuading the Queen
from accepting any of the matches then proposed for her; and the better
to make his own power the more sicker, he afterwards laid snares in the
water to bring about a marriage with that weak young prince, the Lord
Henry Darnley. But it falls not within the scope of my narrative to
enter into any more particulars here concerning that Italian, and the
tragical doom which, with the Queen's imprudence, he brought upon
himself; for, after spending some weeks in Edinburgh, and in visiting
their friends at Crail, my grandfather returned with his wife and Agnes
Kilspinnie to Quharist, where he continued to reside several years, but
not in tranquillity.
Hardly had they reached their home, when word came of quarrels among the
nobility; and though the same sprung out of secular debates, they had
much of the leaven of religious faction in their causes, the which
greatly exasperated the enmity wherewith they were carried on. But even
in the good Earl of Murray's raid, there was nothing which called on my
grandfather to bear a part. Nevertheless, those quarrels disquieted his
soul, and he heard the sough of discontents rising afar off, like the
roar of the bars of Ayr when they betoken a coming tempest.
After the departure of the Earl of Murray to France, there was a syncope
in the land, and men's minds were filled with wonder and with
apprehensions to which they could give no name; neighbours distrusted
one another: the papists looked out from their secret places, and were
saluted with a fear that wore the semblance of reverence. The Queen
married Darnley, and discreet men marvelled at the rashness with which
the match was concluded, there being seemingly no cause for such
uncomely haste, nor for the lavish favours that she heaped upon him. It
was viewed with awe, as a thing done under the impulses of fraud, or
fainness, or fatality. Nor was their wedding-cheer cold when her eager
love changed into aversion. Then the spirit of the times, which had long
hovered in willingness to be pleased with her intentions, began to alter
its breathings, and to whisper darkly against her. At last the murder of
Rizzio, a deed which, though in the main satisfactory to the nation, was
yet so foul and cruel in the perpetration, that the tidings of it came
like a thunder-clap over all the kingdom.
The birth of Prince James, which soon after followed, gave no joy; for
about the same time a low and terrible whispering began to be heard of
some hideous and universal conspiracy against all the protestants
throughout Europe. None ventured to say that Queen Mary was joined with
the conspirators; but many preachers openly prayed that she might be
preserved from their leagues in a way that showed what they feared;
besides this suspicion, mournful things were told of her behaviour, and
the immoralities of her courtiers and their trains rose to such a pitch,
compared with the chastity and plain manners of her mother's court, that
the whole land was vexed with angry thoughts, and echoed to the rumours
with stern menaces.
No one was more disturbed by these things than my pious grandfather; and
the apprehensions which they caused in him came to such a head at last,
that his wife, becoming fearful of his health, advised him to take a
journey to Edinburgh, in order that he might hear and see with his own
ears and eyes; which he accordingly did, and on his arrival went
straight to the Earl of Glencairn, and begged permission to take on
again his livery, chiefly that he might pass unnoticed, and not be
remarked as having neither calling nor vocation. That nobleman was
surprised with his request; but, without asking any questions, gave him
leave, and again invited him to use the freedom of his hall; so he
continued as one of his retainers till the Earl of Murray's return from
France. But, before speaking of what then ensued, there are some things
concerning the murder of the the Queen's protestant husband--the
blackest of the sins of that age--of which, in so far as my grandfather
participated, it is meet and proper I should previously speak.