Page:History of England (Froude) Vol 11.djvu/53

 158 1.] THE JESUIT INVASION, 37 ment charged him with foreknowledge of the murder of the King's father. Balfour's evidence was heard and accepted. No defence was permitted. The bare fact was true and could not be denied, and after a rapid consultation the Lords declared him guilty ' art and part/ 1 ' Art and part/ said Morton, striking the ground with his staff as the verdict was declared, ' art and part ; God knows the contrary/ His share in the crime had been that he knew that it was about to be committed, and that he had stood apart and let Both well do his work. But the technical guilt was sufficient for the present pur- pose. Short shrift was allowed. The trial was on the 1st of June : the next afternoon was fixed for i i PI June 2. the execution, and in the morning two of the Edinburgh ministers came to prepare the late Regent for death. No one till that moment knew the part that he had actually taken in the murder. A shadow had hung over him. He had been looked askance upon even by the* party to which he belonged, and there was the most earnest hope among the Protestants that before he died he would say something to dispel the mystery which still hung over that horrible transaction. He had slept soundly, being, as he said, ' at the end of his trouble/ The ministers ' telling him to be of good comfort, he said that he was rather willing to render his life than live/ ' God had appointed a time for his death, and had appointed the manner of it, and seeing that now was the time and this the manner, he was content/ Pitcairn's Criminal Trials of Scotland, vol. i. part 3.