ending that nothing further was required to a perfect
accommodation than the concurrence of the council of state in Scotland,
she ordered her ambassador, Bowes, to open the negotiation for Mary's
liberty, and her association with her son in the title to the crown.
Though she seemed to make this concession to Mary she refused her the
liberty of sending any ambassador of her own; and that princess could
easily conjecture, from this circumstance, what would be the result of
the pretended negotiation. The privy council of Scotland, instigated
by the clergy, rejected all treaty; and James, who was now a captive in
their hands, affirmed, that he had never agreed to an association with
his mother, and that the matter had never gone further than some loose
proposals for that purpose.[*]

** MS. in the Advocates' Library, A. 3, 28, p. 401, from the
Cott Lib. Calig. c. 9.

The affairs of Scotland remained not long in the present situation.
James, impatient of restraint, made his escape from his keepers; and
flying to St. Andrews, summoned his friends and partisans to attend
him. The earls of Argyle, Marshal, Montrose, and Rothes, hastened to pay
their duty to their sovereign; and the opposite party found themselves
unable to resist so powerful a combination. They were offered a pardon,
upon their submission, and an acknowledgment of their fault in seizing
the king's person and restraining him from his liberty. Some of them
accepted of the terms; the greater number, particularly Angus, Hamilton,
Marre, Glamis, left the country, and took shelter in Ireland or England,
where they were protected by Elizabeth. The earl of Arran was recalled
to court; and the malecontents, who could not brook the authority of
Lenox, a man of virtue and moderation, found, that by their resistance,
they had thrown all power into the hands of a person whose counsels were
as violent as his manners were profligate.[*]

Elizabeth wrote a letter to James, in which she quoted a moral sentence
from Isocrates, and indirectly reproached him with inconstancy, and a
breach of his engagements. James, in his reply, justified his measures;
and retaliated, by turning two passages of Isocrates against her.[**]
She next sent Walsingham on an embassy to him; and her chief purpose in
employing that aged minister in an errand where so little business was
to be transacted, was to learn, from a man of so much penetration and
experience, the real character of James