Mary Stuart | Page 7

I always saw her with her pale hue, as long as I
had the honour of seeing her in France, and Scotland, where she had to
go in eighteen months' time, to her very great regret, after her
widowhood, to pacify her kingdom, greatly divided by religious
troubles. Alas! she had neither the wish nor the will for it, and I have
often heard her say so, with a fear of this journey like death; for she
preferred a hundred times to dwell in France as a dowager queen, and
to content herself with Touraine and Poitou for her jointure, than to go
and reign over there in her wild country; but her uncles, at least some of
them, not all, advised her, and even urged her to it, and deeply repented
their error."
Mary was obedient, as we have seen, and she began her journey under
such auspices that when she lost sight of land she was like to die. Then
it was that the poetry of her soul found expression in these famous
lines:

"Farewell, delightful land of France, My motherland, The best beloved!
Foster-nurse of my young years! Farewell, France, and farewell my
happy days! The ship that separates our loves Has borne away but half
of me; One part is left thee and is throe, And I confide it to thy
tenderness, That thou may'st hold in mind the other part."'
[Translator's note.-It has not been found possible to make a rhymed
version of these lines without sacrificing the simplicity which is their
chief charm.]
This part of herself that Mary left in France was the body of the young
king, who had taken with him all poor Mary's happiness into his tomb.
Mary had but one hope remaining, that the sight of the English fleet
would compel her little squadron to turn back; but she had to fulfil her
destiny. This same day, a fog, a very unusual occurrence in
summer-time, extended all over the Channel, and caused her to escape
the fleet; for it was such a dense fog that one could not see from stern
to mast. It lasted the whole of Sunday, the day after the departure, and
did not lift till the following day, Monday, at eight o'clock in the
morning. The little flotilla, which all this time had been sailing
haphazard, had got among so many reefs that if the fog had lasted some
minutes longer the galley would certainly have grounded on some rock,
and would have perished like the vessel that had been seen engulfed on
leaving port. But, thanks to the fog's clearing, the pilot recognised the
Scottish coast, and, steering his four boats with great skill through ail
the dangers, on the 20th August he put in at Leith, where no
preparation had been made for the queen's reception. Nevertheless,
scarcely had she arrived there than the chief persons of the town met
together and came to felicitate her. Meanwhile, they hastily collected
some wretched nags, with harness all falling in pieces, to conduct the
queen to Edinburgh.
At sight of this, Mary could not help weeping again; for she thought of
the splendid palfreys and hackneys of her French knights and ladies,
and at this first view Scotland appeared to-her in all its poverty. Next
day it was to appear to her in all its wildness.

After having passed one night at Holyrood Palace, "during which," says
Brantome, "five to six hundred rascals from the town, instead of letting
her sleep, came to give her a wild morning greeting on wretched fiddles
and little rebecks," she expressed a wish to hear mass. Unfortunately,
the people of Edinburgh belonged almost entirely to the Reformed
religion; so that, furious at the queen's giving such a proof of papistry at
her first appearance, they entered the church by force, armed with
knives, sticks and stones, with the intention of putting to death the poor
priest, her chaplain. He left the altar, and took refuge near the queen,
while Mary's brother, the Prior of St. Andrews, who was more inclined
from this time forward to be a soldier than an ecclesiastic, seized a
sword, and, placing himself between the people and the queen, declared
that he would kill with his own hand the first man who should take
another step. This firmness, combined with the queen's imposing and
dignified air, checked the zeal of the Reformers.
As we have said, Mary had arrived in the midst of all the heat of the
first religious wars. A zealous Catholic, like all her family on the
maternal side, she inspired the Huguenots with the gravest fears:
besides, a rumour had got about that Mary, instead of landing at Leith,
as she had been obliged by the fog, was to land at Aberdeen. There,