Page:History of England (Froude) Vol 7.djvu/404

 REIGN OF ELIZABETH. [CH. 44. meeting at the Tolbooth to prepare the Bill of Attainder. The Lords of the Articles, 1 carefully as they had been selected, at first reported ( that they could find no cause sufficient for so severe a measure/ 2 The next day Saturday the Queen appeared at the Tolbooth in per- son, and after ' great reasoning and opposition ' carried her point. ' There was no other way but the lords should be attainted/ 3 The Act was drawn, the for- feiture was decreed, and required only the sanction of the Estates. 4 The same day, perhaps at the same hour, when Mary Stuart was exulting in the consciousness of triumph, the conspirators were completing their preparations. Sun- day, the loth, had been the day on which they had first fixed to strike their blow. But Darnley was impatient. He swore that ' if the slaughter was not hasted ' he would stab David in the Queen's presence with his own hand. Each hour of delay was an additional risk of discovery, and it was agreed that the deed should be done the same evening. Euthven proposed to seize Rizzio in his own room, to try him before an extempor- ized tribunal, and to hang him at the market cross. So commonplace a proceeding however would not satisfy the imagination of Darnley, who desired a more dra- matic revenge ; he would have his enemy seized in the 1 The Lords of the Articles were a committee chosen from the Three Estates, and according to law, chosen by the Estates, to prepare the measures which were to be sub- mitted to Parliament. 2 RUTH YEN'S narrative. 3 KM ox. 4 The Queen of Scots to the Archbishop of Glasgow, April 2 : KEITH.