Page:History of England (Froude) Vol 9.djvu/154

 140 REIGN OF ELIZABETH. [CH. 53- less of dangers and ready, if he could extricate himself, to slip through the hands of her own keepers. While the two principals were thus engaged, the Bishop of Ross was besieging Leicester, and through Leicester the ears of Elizabeth. The Bishop of Ross, with every fibre of the conspiracy in his hands, could carry to the council the smoothest aspect of innocence. He could affect to grieve over the disturbances which he had himself assisted to kindle, and wind up with a lamentation over the dangers of his mistress, and en- treat that she might be allowed to fly from the storms which were threatening to ovsrwhelm her. His mis- tress, he said, had preferred the friendship of the Queen of England to that of the ' most puissant of princes/ She had chosen her out and clung to her as the sole support of her misfortunes ; her Majesty should return love for love and let her go. 1 Elizabeth's suspicions of the Queen of Scots had happily been stirred too deeply, and neither the advice remain mine own good Lord, as you subscribed once with God's grace, and I will remain yours faithfully. Neither weal nor woe shall remove me from you if you cast me not away.' Mary Stuart to Norfolk, December : LABANOFP, vol. iii. 1 'Let her Majesty remember,' he wrote to Leicester, ' what great commendations and immortal fame many kings and princes have pur- chased for themselves for benefit, aid, and support bestowed on other princes being in like distress. Abra- ham delivered his brother Lot. Cy- rus set free the Jews from their captivity. Evil Merodach delivered Joachim, King of Judah, forth of prison. The Romans restored Masi- nissa, King of Numidia, and did not noble Cordela (sic) set up again in the royal throne of Britain her father, driven from thence by his two other unkind and unnatural daughters ? Would not her Majesty in like manner have pity on one who was at once her sister, daughter, friend?' The Bishop of Ross to Leicester, November 28 : MS8. QUEEN OF SCOTS.