wledge the
jurisdiction of the court. She denied that they had any right to
arraign or to try her. "I am no subject of Elizabeth's," said she. "I
am an independent and sovereign queen as well as she, and I will not
consent to any thing inconsistent with this my true position. I owe
no allegiance to England, and I am not, in any sense, subject to her
laws. I came into the realm only to ask assistance from a sister
queen, and I have been made a captive, and detained many years in an
unjust and cruel imprisonment; and though now worn down both in body
and mind by my protracted sufferings, I am not yet so enfeebled as to
forget what is due to myself, my ancestors, and my country."

This refusal of Mary's to plead, or to acknowledge the jurisdiction
of the court, caused a new delay. They urged her to abandon her
resolution. They told her that if she refused to plead, the trial
would proceed without her action, and, by pursuing such a course, she
would only deprive herself of the means of defense, without at all
impeding the course of her fate. At length Mary yielded. It would
have been better for her to have adhered to her first intention.

The commission by which Mary was to be tried consisted of earls,
barons, and other persons of rank, twenty or thirty in number. They
were seated on each side of the room, the throne being at the head.
In the center was a table, where the lawyers, by whom the trial was
to be conducted, were seated. Below this table was a chair for Mary.
Behind Mary's chair was a rail, dividing off the lower end of the
hall from the court; and this formed an outer space, to which some
spectators were admitted.

Mary took her place in the seat assigned her, and the trial
proceeded. They adduced the evidence against her, and then asked for
her defense. She said substantially that she had a right to make an
effort to recover her liberty; that, after being confined a captive
so long, and having lost forever her youth, her health, and her
happiness, it was not wonderful that she wished to be free; but
that, in endeavoring to obtain her freedom, she had formed no plans
to injure Elizabeth, or to interfere in any way with her rights or
prerogatives as queen. The commissioners, after devoting some days to
hearing evidence, and listening to the defense, sent Mary back to her
apartments, and went to London. There they had a final consultation,
and unanimously agreed in the following decision: "That Mary,
commonly