Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 47.djvu/284

  with the results of the campaign that, on a renewal of hostilities by the Scots, commissioners were sent to the camp of the Scottish king at Norham with proposals for a treaty of peace, and for a marriage between Joanna, princess of England, and David, only son of Robert Bruce. The result was the treaty of peace concluded at Edinburgh on 13 March 1327–8, and ratified at a parliament held at Northampton on 4 July 1328, in which the independent dignity of Robert Bruce as king of Scotland was fully recognised.

By the treaty the chronic warfare between the two countries was for a time suspended, and during Bruce's remaining years of increasing weakness, spent in retirement at Cardross, Randolph was one of his chief companions and counsellors. Much of their time was here occupied in shipbuilding, in which Randolph, as well as Bruce, took a special interest (Exchequer Rolls of Scotland, i. passim). On the death of Bruce, 7 June 1329, Randolph became regent of the kingdom, and guardian of the young king, David II, whom he led to his coronation at Scone on 24 Nov. 1331. He fully justified his choice as regent. The acts passed during his rule testify to his enlightened love of justice; and, while vigorous in checking the feuds of rival nobles, he kept watchful guard against possible attacks from England. While the English were on the march to invade Scotland, Randolph died, 20 July 1332, according to tradition at Musselburgh. Hector Boece states that he had long suffered from the stone, and died of this disease, but this is not corroborated by the earlier chronicles. Barbour affirms that he was poisoned, Wyntoun that he was poisoned at a feast at Wemyss by the sea, and the Brevis Chronica that he was poisoned, also at Wemyss, by the machinations of Edward Balliol. This would seem to indicate that, in any case, his illness was sudden; and if he was taken ill at Wemyss, and died at Musselburgh, he was probably carried in a small vessel across the Firth of Forth to a spot near Musselburgh. The house in Musselburgh in which tradition places his death stood, until 1809, on the south side of the street, near the east port. Randolph was buried at Dunfermline (ib. i. 433).

By his wife, Isabel, only daughter of Sir John Stewart of Bonkle, with whom he obtained the barony of Garlies, Randolph had two sons and a daughter: Thomas, who succeeded him, but was killed at the battle of Dupplin, 12 Aug. 1332; John, third earl [q. v.]; and Agnes, married to Patrick, earl of Dunbar.

[Chronicles of Fordun, Wyntoun, and Froissart; Barbour's Bruce; Cal. State Papers relating to Scotland, vol. iii.; Exchequer Rolls of Scotland, vol. i.; Acta Parl. Scot. vol. i.; Douglas's Scottish Peerage (Wood), ii. 250–1.]  RANDOLPH, THOMAS (1523–1590), ambassador, son of Avery Randolph of Badlesmere, Kent, was born in 1523. He entered Christ Church, Oxford, at the time of its foundation, and graduated B.A. in October 1545, and B.C.L. in 1547–8. Shortly afterwards he became a public notary; and in 1549 he was made principal of Broadgates Hall (now Pembroke College), Oxford. He continued there until 1553, when the protestant persecutions under Queen Mary compelled him to resign and retire to France. According to his own statement he had from his father, as long as he professed ‘the life of a scholar, sufficient for that state;’ and, when he ‘travelled,’ he ‘found him somewhat more liberal’ (Cal. State Papers, For. Ser. 1561–2, No. 635). Sir James Melville refers to Randolph's indebtedness to him ‘during his banishment in France’ (Memoirs, p. 231). Randolph seems to have mainly resided in Paris, where he was still living as a scholar in April 1557 (Cal. State Papers, For. Ser. 1553–8, p. 299). It was probably during his stay in Paris that he came under the influence of George Buchanan, to whom, in a letter to Peter Young, tutor of James VI, he refers in very eulogistic terms as his ‘master’ (, Opera Omnia, vol. ii., App. p. 18). Among his fellow-students and intimates in Paris was Sir William Kirkcaldy of Grange [q. v.] (Letter of Randolph, 1 May 1570, Cal. State Papers, For. Ser. 1569–71, No. 875).

Soon after the accession of Elizabeth, in 1558, Randolph was acting as an agent of the English government in Germany (ib. 1558–9, No. 68), but in a few months returned to England; and, probably soon afterwards, ‘procured, without his father's charge,’ a ‘farm in Kent, the house where he was born’ (ib. 1561–2, No. 635). Doubtless his acquaintance with the Scottish protestants in Paris suggested to Elizabeth the employment of Randolph in the task of bringing Arran, who had been compelled to flee from France, from Geneva to England [see under, second and first. Under the name of ‘Barnabie,’ he was also sent in the autumn of 1559 to secretly conduct Arran into Scotland (ib. passim). He left for London on 25 Nov. (ib. 1559–60, No. 328), but was again sent to Scotland in March 1560 (ib. No. 805), where his representations had considerable