Darnley, finding that he could not accomplish his aims by such methods as these, wrote, it is said, to the Catholic governments of Europe, proposing that, if they would co-operate in putting him into power in Scotland, he would adopt efficient measures for changing the religion of the country from the Protestant to the Catholic faith. He made, too, every effort to organize a party in his favor in Scotland, and tried to defeat and counteract the influence of Mary's government by every means in his power. These things, and other trials and difficulties connected with them, weighed very heavily upon Mary's mind. She sunk gradually into a state of great dejection and despondency. She spent many hours in sighing and in tears, and often wished that she was in her grave.
So deeply, in fact, was Mary plunged into distress and trouble by the state of things existing between herself and Darnley, that some of her officers of government began to conceive of a plan of having her divorced from him. After looking at this subject in all its bearings, and consulting about it with each other, they ventured, at last, to propose it to Mary. She would not listen to any such plan. She did not think a divorce could be legally accomplished. And then, if it were to be done, it would, she feared, in some way or other, affect the position and rights of the darling son who was now to her more than all the world besides. She would rather endure to the end of her days the tyranny and torment she experienced from her brutal husband, than hazard in the least degree the future greatness and glory of the infant who was lying in his cradle before her, equally unconscious of the grandeur which awaited him in future years, and of the strength of the maternal love which was smiling upon him from amid such sorrow and tears, and extending over him such gentle, but determined and effectual protection.
The sad and sorrowful feelings which Mary endured were interrupted for a little time by the splendid pageant of the baptism of the child. Embassadors came from all the important courts of the Continent to do honor to the occasion. Elizabeth sent the Earl of Bedford as her embassador, with a present of a baptismal font of gold, which had cost a sum equal to five thousand dollars. The baptism took place at Stirling, in December, with every possible accompaniment of pomp and parade, and was followed by many days of festivities and rejoicing. The whole country were interested in the event except Darnley, who declared sullenly, while the preparations were making, that he should not remain to witness the ceremony, but should go off a day or two before the appointed time.
The ceremony was performed in the chapel. The child was baptized under the names of "Charles James, James Charles, Prince and Steward of Scotland, Duke of Rothesay, Earl of Carrick, Lord of the Isles, and Baron of Renfrew." His subsequent designation in history was James Sixth of Scotland and First of England. A great many appointments of attendants and officers, to be attached to the service of the young prince, were made immediately, most of them, of course, mere matters of parade. Among the rest, five ladies of distinction were constituted "rockers of his cradle." The form of the young prince's cradle has come down to us in an ancient drawing.
[Illustration: PRINCE JAMES'S CRADLE.]
In due time after the coronation, the various embassadors and delegates returned to their respective courts, carrying back glowing accounts of the ceremonies and festivities attendant upon the christening, and of the grace, and beauty, and loveliness of the queen.
In the mean time, Bothwell and Murray were competitors for the confidence and regard of the queen, and it began to seem probable that Bothwell would win the day. Mary, in one of her excursions, was traveling in the southern part of the country, when she heard that he had been wounded in an encounter with a party of desperadoes near the border. Moved partly, perhaps, by compassion, and partly by gratitude for his services, Mary made an expedition across the country to pay him a visit. Some say that she was animated by a more powerful motive than either of these. In fact this, as well as almost all the other acts of Mary's life, are presented in very different lights by her friends and her enemies. The former say that this visit to her lieutenant in his confinement from a wound received in her service was perfectly proper, both in the design itself, and in all the circumstances of its execution. The latter represent it as an instance of highly indecorous eagerness on the part of a married lady to express to another man a sympathy and kind regard which she had ceased to feel for her husband.
Bothwell himself was married as well as Mary. He had been married but a few months to a beautiful lady a few years younger than the queen. The question, however, whether Mary did right or wrong in paying this visit to him, is not, after all, a very important one. There is no doubt that she and Bothwell loved each other before they ought to have done so, and it is of comparatively little consequence when the attachment began. The end of it is certain. Bothwell resolved to kill Darnley, to get divorced from his own wife, and to marry the queen. The world has never yet settled the question whether she was herself his accomplice or not in the measures he adopted for effecting these plans, or whether she only submitted to the result when Bothwell, by his own unaided efforts, reached it. Each reader must judge of this question for himself from the facts about to be narrated.
Bothwell first communicated with the nobles about the court, to get their consent and approbation to the destruction of the king. They all appeared to be very willing to have the thing done, but were a little cautious about involving themselves in the responsibility of doing it. Darnley was thoroughly hated, despised, and shunned by them all. Still they were afraid of the consequences of taking his life. One of them, Morton, asked Bothwell what the queen would think of the plan. Bothwell said that the queen approved of it. Morton replied, that if Bothwell would show him an expression of the queen's approval of the plot, in her own hand-writing, he would join it, otherwise not. Bothwell failed to furnish this evidence, saying that the queen was really privy to, and in favor of the plan, but that it was not to be expected that she would commit herself to it in writing. Was this all true, or was the pretense only a desperate measure of Bothwell's to induce Morton to join him?
Most of the leading men about the court, however, either joined the plot, or so far gave it their countenance and encouragement as to induce Bothwell to proceed. There were many and strange rumors about Darnley. One was, that he was actually going to leave the country, and that a ship was ready for him in the Clyde. Another was, that he had a plan for seizing the young prince, dethroning Mary, and reigning himself in her stead, in the prince's name. Other strange and desperate schemes were attributed to him. In the midst of them, news came to Mary at Holyrood that he was taken suddenly and dangerously sick at Glasgow, where he was then residing, and she immediately went to see him. Was her motive a desire to make one more attempt to win his confidence and love, and to divert him from the desperate measures which she feared he was contemplating, or was she acting as an accomplice with Bothwell, to draw him into the snare in which he was afterward taken and destroyed?
The result of Mary's visit to her husband, after some time spent with him in Glasgow, was a proposal that he should return with her to Edinburgh, where she could watch over him during his convalescence with greater care. This plan was adopted. He was conveyed on a sort of litter, by very slow and easy stages, toward Edinburgh. He was on such terms with the nobles and lords in attendance upon Mary that he was not willing to go to Holyrood House. Besides, his disorder was contagious: it is supposed to have been the small-pox; and though he was nearly recovered, there was still some possibility that the royal babe might take the infection if the patient came within the same walls with him. So Mary sent forward to Edinburgh to have a house provided for him.