Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 06.djvu/109

 soon became as decided and energetic a partisan of the queen as he had formerly been of the congregation. In June he attempted to hold Edinburgh for the queen, in conjunction with Huntly, the archbishop of St. Andrews, and the commendator of Kilwinning. The citizens, however, refused to defend the place, and it almost immediately fell into the hands of the other faction. In August we find him, with Argyll, Livingston, and the commendator of Kilwinning, in negotiation with Murray for the release of the queen from captivity. In 1568, after her escape from Lochleven (2 May), he joined her forces at Hamilton, and was present at the battle of Langside (13 May). After the battle he retired to his castle of Kilmarnock, which, however, he was soon compelled to surrender to the council. In September he was appointed one of the bishop of Ross's colleagues for the conference to be held at York. After the conclusion of the negotiations he accompanied the bishop to London, and was admitted to audience of the queen at Hampton Court (24 Oct.) On 6 Jan. 1568-9 Mary made him one of her council. He was employed by her in her intrigues with the Duke of Norfolk, and was entrusted by the latter with a diamond to deliver to the queen at Coventry as a pledge of his affection and fidelity. In a letter to the duke, apparently written in December 1569, she says: 'I took from my lord Boyd the diamond, which I shall keep unseen about my neck till I give it again to the owner of it and me both.' In June 1569 he was despatched to Scotland with authority from Mary to treat with the regent, and a written mandate to institute proceedings for a divorce from Bothwell. Chalmers (Life of Mary, p. 331, published in 1818) asserts that Bothwell's consent to the divorce had been obtained before the commencement of the correspondence with Norfolk, and that the document signifying it 'remained among the family papers of Lord Boyd to the present century.' The papers referred to are presumably identical with those which on the attainder of [q. v.], were placed in the custody of the public officials of the town of Kilmarnock, where they remained until 1837, when a selection from them, comprising all such as were of any historical value, was edited for the Abbotsford Club, and constitutes the first portion of the 'Abbotsford Miscellany.' No such document, however, as Chalmers refers to is there to be found, though a draft of the formal authority to apply for the divorce is among the papers. Boyd had an interview with Murray in July at Elgin, and on the 30th the question of the divorce was submitted to the council at Perth, when it was decided by a large majority that nothing further should be done in the matter. After reporting the failure of his mission to the queen, Boyd appears to have remained in England for some months, during which the record of his life is very scanty. He seems to have stood very high in the estimation of his mistress. In one of her letters (5 Jan. 1568-9) she designates him 'our traist cousigne and counsallour,' and writing to Cecil, under date 11 Feb. 1569-70, she expresses a desire to retain him with the bishop of Ross permanently about her person. At this time, however, he was again in Scotland actively engaged in hatching a plot for a general rising, and much suspected of complicity in the murder of Murray (22 Jan. 1569-70). The following year he was commissioned by Mary to establish in that country 'a lieutenant, ane or twa,' in her name. In the brief insurrection of the summer he was taken prisoner by Lennox at Paisley, but escaped to Edinburgh, and thence went to Stirling in August, and on the 12th, with Argyll, Cassilis, and Eglinton, affixed his seal to a treaty of secession and amity executed on the part of the regent by Morton and Mar. This defection is ascribed by the unknown author of the 'History of King James the Sext' to the 'great promises' of Lennox, but the reason given by Mary is probably nearer the mark. She writes to De la Motte Fénelon, under date 28 June 1571, that she is advised that Argyll, Athole, and Boyd, 'comme désespérés d'aucune aide,' 'commencent à se retirer et regarder qui aura du meilleur.' On 5 Sept. we find Boyd mentioned as a consenting party to the election of Mar to the regency; on the 7th he was made a member of the privy council. He visited Knox on his deathbed (17 Nov.), but except that he said, 'I know, sir, I have offended in many things, and am indeed come to crave your pardon,' what passed on either side is unknown. He was included in the act of indemnity passed 26 Jan. 1571-2, and subscribed the articles of pacification drawn up at Perth on 23 Feb. 1572-3, by one of which he was appointed one of the judges for the trial of claims for restitution of goods arising out of acts of violence committed during the civil war. On 24 Oct. 1573 he was appointed extraordinary lord of session by Morton, of whom from this time forward he was a firm adherent. Relying on the favour of Morton, he signalised his elevation to the bench by ejecting (November 1573) Sir John Stewart from the office of baillie of the regality of Glasgow, held under a grant from the late king, and engrossing the