It is probable that the real ground of offense which the nobles had against Rizzio was jealousy of his superior influence with the queen. They, however, made his religion a great ground of complaint against him. He was a Catholic, and had come from a strong Catholic country, having been born in the northern part of Italy. The Italian language was his mother tongue. They professed to believe that he was a secret emissary of the pope, and was plotting with Mary to bring Scotland back under the papal dominion.
In the mean time, Rizzio devoted himself with untiring zeal and fidelity to the service of the queen. He was indefatigable in his efforts to please her, and he made himself extremely useful to her in a thousand different ways. In fact, his being the object of so much dislike and aversion on the part of others, made him more and more exclusively devoted to the queen, who seemed to be almost his only friend. She, too, was urged, by what she considered the unreasonable and bitter hostility of which her favorite was the object, to bestow upon him greater and greater favors. In process of time, one after another of those about the court, finding that Rizzio's influence and power were great and were increasing, began to treat him with respect, and to ask for his assistance in gaining their ends. Thus Rizzio found his position becoming stronger, and the probability began to increase that he would at length triumph over the enemies who had set their faces so strongly against him.
Though he had been at first inclined to follow Melville's advice, yet he afterward fell in cordially with the policy of the queen, which was, to press boldly forward, and put down with a strong hand the hostility which had been excited against him. Instead, therefore, of attempting to conceal the degree of favor which he enjoyed with the queen, he boasted of and displayed it. He would converse often and familiarly with her in public. He dressed magnificently, like persons of the highest rank, and had many attendants. In a word, he assumed all the airs and manners of a person of high distinction and commanding influence. The external signs of hostility to him were thus put down, but the fires of hatred burned none the less fiercely below, and only wanted an opportunity to burst into an explosion.
Things were in this state at the time of the negotiations in respect to Darnley's marriage; for, in order to take up the story of Rizzio from the beginning, we have been obliged to go back in our narrative. Rizzio exerted all his influence in favor of the marriage, and thus both strengthened his influence with Mary and made Darnley his friend. He did all in his power to diminish the opposition to it, from whatever quarter it might come, and rendered essential service in the correspondence with France, and in the negotiations with the pope for obtaining the necessary dispensation. In a word, he did a great deal to promote the marriage, and to facilitate all the arrangements for carrying it into effect.
Darnley relied, therefore, upon Rizzio's friendship and devotion to his service, forgetting that, in all these past efforts, Rizzio was acting out of regard to Mary's wishes, and not to his own. As long, therefore, as Mary and Darnley continued to pursue the same objects and aims, Rizzio was the common friend and ally of both. The enemies of the marriage, however, disliked Rizzio more than ever.
As Darnley's character developed itself gradually after his marriage, every body began to dislike him also. He was unprincipled and vicious, as well as imperious and proud. His friendship for Rizzio was another ground of dislike to him. The ancient nobles, who had been accustomed to exercise the whole control in the public affairs of Scotland, found themselves supplanted by this young Italian singer, and an English boy not yet out of his teens. They were exasperated beyond all bounds, but yet they contrived, for a while, to conceal and dissemble their anger.
It was not very long after the marriage of Mary and Darnley before they began to become alienated from each other. Mary did every thing for her husband which it was reasonable for him to expect her to do. She did, in fact, all that was in her power. But he was not satisfied. She made him the sharer of her throne. He wanted her to give up her place to him, and thus make him the sole possessor of it. He wanted what was called the crown matrimonial. The crown matrimonial denoted power with which, according to the old Scottish law, the husband of a queen could be invested, enabling him to exercise the royal prerogative in his own name, both during the life of the queen and also after her death, during the continuance of his own life. This made him, in fact, a king for life, exalting him above his wife, the real sovereign, through whom alone he derived his powers.
Now Darnley was very urgent to have the crown matrimonial conferred upon him. He insisted upon it. He would not submit to any delay. Mary told him that this was something entirely beyond her power to grant. The crown matrimonial could only be bestowed by a solemn enactment of the Scottish Parliament. But Darnley, impatient and reckless, like a boy as he was, would not listen to any excuse, but teased and tormented Mary about the crown matrimonial continually.
Besides the legal difficulties in the way of Mary's conferring these powers upon Darnley by her own act, there were other difficulties, doubtless, in her mind, arising from the character of Darnley, and his unfitness, which was every day becoming more manifest, to be intrusted with such power. Only four months after his marriage, his rough and cruel treatment of Mary became intolerable. One day, at a house in Edinburgh, where the king and queen, and other persons of distinction had been invited to a banquet, Darnley, as was his custom, was beginning to drink very freely, and was trying to urge other persons there to drink to excess. Mary expostulated with him, endeavoring to dissuade him from such a course. Darnley resented these kind cautions, and retorted upon her in so violent and brutal a manner as to cause her to leave the room and the company in tears.
When they were first married, Mary had caused her husband to be proclaimed king, and had taken some other similar steps to invest him with a share of her own power. But she soon found that in doing this she had gone to the extreme of propriety, and that, for the future, she must retreat rather than advance. Accordingly, although he was associated with her in the supreme power, she thought it best to keep precedence for her own name before his, in the exercise of power. On the coins which were struck, the inscription was, "In the name of the Queen and King of Scotland." In signing public documents, she insisted on having her name recorded first. These things irritated and provoked Darnley more and more. He was not contented to be admitted to a share of the sovereign power which the queen possessed in her own right alone. He wished to supplant her in it entirely.
Rizzio, of course, took Queen Mary's part in these questions. He opposed the grant of the crown matrimonial. He opposed all other plans for increasing or extending in any way Darnley's power. Darnley was very much incensed against him, and earnestly desired to find some way to effect his destruction. He communicated these feelings to a certain fierce and fearless nobleman named Ruthven, and asked his assistance to contrive some way to take vengeance upon Rizzio.
Ruthven was very much pleased to hear this. He belonged to a party of the lords of the court who also hated Rizzio, though they had hated Darnley besides so much that they had not communicated to him their hostility to the other. Ruthven and his friends had not joined Murray and the other rebels in opposing the marriage of Darnley. They had chosen to acquiesce in it, hoping to maintain an ascendency over Darnley, regarding him, as they did, as a mere boy, and thus retain their power. When they found, however, that he was so headstrong and unmanageable, and that they could do nothing with him, they exerted all their influence to have Murray and the other exiled lords pardoned and allowed to return, hoping to combine with them after their return, and then together to make their power superior to that of Darnley and Rizzio. They considered Darnley and Rizzio both as their rivals and enemies. When they found, therefore, that Darnley was plotting Rizzio's destruction, they felt a very strong as well as a very unexpected pleasure.