he was about to join the queen,
the governor of Inverness, who was entirely devoted to him, was refusing
to allow Mary to enter this castle, which was a royal one. It is true
that Murray, aware that it does not do to hesitate in the face of such
rebellions, had already had him executed for high treason.

This new act of firmness showed Huntly that the young queen was not
disposed to allow the Scottish lords a resumption of the almost sovereign
power humbled by her father; so that, in spite of the extremely kind
reception she accorded him, as he learned while in camp that his son,
having escaped from prison, had just put himself at the head of his
vassals, he was afraid that he should be thought, as doubtless he was, a
party to the rising, and he set out the same night to assume command of
his troops, his mind made up, as Mary only had with her seven to eight
thousand men, to risk a battle, giving out, however, as Buccleuch had
done in his attempt to snatch James V from the hands of the Douglases,
that it was not at the queen he was aiming, but solely at the regent, who
kept her under his tutelage and perverted her good intentions.

Murray, who knew that often the entire peace of a reign depends on the
firmness one displays at its beginning, immediately summoned all the
northern barons whose estates bordered on his, to march against Huntly.
All obeyed, for the house of Cordon was already so powerful that each
feared it might become still more so; but, however, it was clear that if
there was hatred for the subject there was no great affection for the
queen, and that the greater number came without fixed intentions and with
the idea of being led by circumstances.

The two armies encountered near Aberdeen. Murray at once posted the
troops he had brought from Edinburgh, and of which he was sure, on the
top of rising ground, and drew up in tiers on the hill slope all his
northern allies. Huntly advanced resolutely upon them, and attacked his
neighbours the Highlanders, who after a short resistance retired in
disorder. His men immediately threw away their lances, and, drawing
their swords, crying, "Cordon, Cordon!" pursued the fugitives, and
believed they had already gained the battle, when they suddenly ran right
against the main body of Murray's army, which remained motionless as a
rampart of iron, and which, with its long lances, had the advantage of
its adversaries, who were armed only with their claymores. It was th