Page:History of England (Froude) Vol 7.djvu/370

 3 50 REIGN OF ELIZA BE TH. [c 1 1. 44. had been more grievous to him than all his other troubles ; ' he trusted that ' he might in time receive from her some more comfortable answer/ 1 It does not appear that Elizabeth saw Murray any more. She was only anxious to be rid of his presence, which was an intolerable reproach to her ; and with these words the least which the occasion required, yet not without a sad dignity he returned to his friends who had been sent on to Newcastle, where they were ordered for the present to remain. Elizabeth was left to play out in character the rest of her ignoble game. To the ambassadors, whom she intended to deceive, it was a transparent farce ; and there was probably not a house in London, Catholic or Protestant, where her con- duct, which she regarded as a political masterpiece, was not ridiculed as it deserved. But it must be allowed at least the merit of completeness. An elaborate account of the interview with Murray was sent to Randolph to- be laid before the Queen of Scots; Elizabeth accom- panied it with an autograph letter in which she at- tempted to impose on the keenest-witted woman living by telling her she wished ' she could have been present to have heard the terms in which she addressed her re- bellious subject/ ' So far was she from espousing the cause of rebels and traitors,' she said, ' that she should hold herself disgraced if she had so much as tacitly borne with them ; ' ' she wished her name might be blotted out from the list of princes as unworthy to hold 1 The Earl of Murray to Queen Elizabeth, from "Westminster, October 31 Scotch MSS. Rolls House.