Darnley, thus finding that, though the ball was at his foot, the game was not already won, saw it necessary to engage with his father's assistance, as powerful a party as possible to support his pretensions. Sir James Melville was his friend, and spoke in his favour to Mary. All the Lords who hated or feared Murray did the same; among whom were, the Earls of Athol and Caithness, and the Lords Ruthven and Hume. A still more useful agent than any of these, Darnley found in David Rizzio, who, as the Queen's French Secretary, and one whose abilities she respected, had a good deal of influence with her. Rizzio knew that for this very reason he was hated by Murray, and others of the Privy Council. He was, therefore, not ill pleased to find himself sought after by her future husband, for he hoped thus to retain his place at Court, and perhaps to rise upon the ruin of some of those who wished his downfal. An accidental illness which overtook Darnley, when the Queen, with her Court, was at Stirling, about the beginning of April 1565, was another circumstance in his favour. At first, his complaint was supposed to be a common cold, but in a few days it turned out to be the measles. The natural anxiety which Mary felt for Darnley's recovery, induced her to exhibit a tenderer interest in him than she had ever done before. She paid him the most flattering attentions, and continued them unwearyingly, though her patient was provokingly attacked by an ague, almost immediately after his recovery from the measles.[86]
It is worth noticing, that while Mary was thus occupied in attending to Darnley, the Earl of Bothwell returned to Scotland from his involuntary banishment. His former misdemeanours were not yet forgotten, and he was summoned by the Queen and Murray to take his trial in Edinburgh; but not liking to trust himself in the hands of his ancient enemies, he again left the country for six months. He did not depart before giving utterance to several violent threats against Murray and Maitland, and speaking so disrespectfully of the Queen, that Randolph says she declared to him, upon her honour, that he should never receive favour at her hands.[87]
The Queen of Scots being now resolved to bestow her hand on Darnley, sent her Secretary, Maitland, to London, to intimate her intentions, and to request Elizabeth's approbation. This was the very last thing Elizabeth meant to give. The matter had now arrived exactly at the point to which she had all along wished to bring it. She had prevailed upon Mary to abandon the idea of a foreign alliance; she had induced her to throw away some valuable time in ridiculous negociations concerning the Earl of Leicester; she had consented, first that the Earl of Lennox, and then that his son Darnley, should go into Scotland; and she did not say a single syllable against it till she had allowed Mary to be persuaded, that no marriage in Christendom could be more prudent. It was now that the cloven-foot was to betray itself; that her faction was to be called upon to exert itself in Scotland; that the cup was to be dashed from Darnley's lips; and that Mary was to be involved in the vortex of civil dissension. The historian Castelnau, whom Mary at this time sent as her ambassador to France, and who there obtained their Majesties' consent to the marriage, mentions, that when he returned through England, he found the Queen much colder than formerly, complaining that Mary had subtracted her relation and subject, and that she was intending to marry him without her permission, and against her approbation. "And yet I am sure," adds Castelnau, "that these words were very far from her heart; for she used all her efforts, and spared nothing to set this marriage a-going."[88]