Page:History of England (Froude) Vol 11.djvu/332

 316 REIGN OF ELIZABETH. [CH. 65. was only acting ; she produced the tears which were always at her command, she called God and her con- science to record, that she had never meant harm to her Majesty's person or estate, and then allowed him to proceed. When she learnt the quality of his communication, she was instantly attentive, and heard it patiently to the end. It was clearly a prelude to something which he had yet to say to her, and of which she was anxious to be put in possession. When he had finished, she said that if she was charged in writing with the murder, she would put in a reply. The Queen it was true had at first kept back her letters, ' but the worst had been done that could be done, in the printing Buchanan's book,' and for her complicity, she appealed to Lady Lennox, whom she had convinced of her innocence. Towards Elizabeth herself too she insisted that she stood per- fectly clear ; she had never plotted against her, never corresponded with Jesuits, or any other of her enemies, never placed on paper a single word of which Elizabeth could justly complain. The secretary, not perhaps without a smile, produced a bundle of her intercepted letters which had fallen into Walsingham's hands; letters to Father Allen, letters to the Bishop of Hoss, to the Archbishop of Glas- gow, to others of her secret agents in Paris and else- where. He began to read, and ' she changed counte- nance/ saw that denial was useless, and allowed that part of them might be her own. Beale completed her con- fession, intimating that they knew all to be her own.