arnley.

By some persons Mary's account of the transactions at Dunbar is
believed. Others think that the whole affair was all a preconcerted
plan, and that the appearance of resistance on her part was only for
show, to justify, in some degree, in the eyes of the world, so
imprudent and inexcusable a marriage. A great many volumes have been
written on the question without making any progress toward a
settlement of it. It is one of those cases where, the evidence being
complicated, conflicting, and incomplete, the mind is swayed by the
feelings, and the readers of the story decide more or less favorably
for the unhappy queen, according to the warmth of the interest
awakened in their hearts by beauty and misfortune.

CHAPTER IX.

THE FALL OF BOTHWELL.

1567

Mary's infatuation.--Excuses for her.--Mary's deep
depression.--Interposition of the King of France.--Bothwell at Edinburgh
Castle.--He is hated by the people.--The opposing parties.--How far
Mary was responsible.--Melrose.--Ruins of the abbey.--Mary's
proclamation.--The prince's lords.--Bothwell alarmed.--Borthwick
Castle.--Bothwell's retreat.--He is besieged.--Makes his
escape.--Bothwell at Dunbar.--Proclamation.--Approaching
contest.--Mary's appeal.--Approach of the prince's lords.--Carberry
Hill.--Efforts of Le Croc to effect an accommodation.--Bothwell's
challenge.--Morton.--Mary sends for Grange.--Proposition of
Grange.--Dismissal of Bothwell.--Question of Mary's guilt.--The
supposition against her.--The supposition in her
favor.--Uncertainty.--The box of love letters.--Their genuineness
suspected.--Disposal of Mary.--Return to Edinburgh.--The
banner.--Rudeness of the populace.--Bothwell's retreat.--He is
pursued.--Bothwell's narrow escape.--He turns pirate.--Bothwell
in prison.--His miserable end.

The course which Mary pursued after her liberation from Dunbar in
yielding to Bothwell's wishes, pardoning his violence, receiving him
again into favor, and becoming his wife, is one of the most
extraordinary instances of the infatuation produced by love that has
ever occurred. If the story had been fiction instead of truth, it
would have been pronounced extravagant and impossible. As it was, the
whole country was astonished and confounded at such a rapid
succession of desperate and unaccountable crimes. Mary herself seems
to have been hurried through these terrible scenes in a sort of
delirium of excitement, produced by the strange circumstances of