SCOTLAND AND ITS TROUBLES DURING MARY'S INFANCY.
James V. left, as an inheritance to his kingdom, an expensive and destructive war with England. He likewise left what, under such circumstances, was a very questionable advantage, a treasury well stored with gold, and a coinage in good condition, produced from the mines which he had worked in Scotland. The foreign relations of the country demanded the utmost attention; but the long minority necessarily ensuing, as Mary, his only surviving lawful child, was but a few days old when James died, awakened hopes and wishes in the ambitious which superseded all other considerations. For a time England was forgotten; and the prize of the Regency became a bone of civil contention and discord.
There were three persons who aspired to that office, and the pretensions of each had their supporters, as interest or reason might dictate. The first was the Queen-Dowager, a lady who inherited many of the peculiar virtues, as well as some of the failings, of the illustrious house of Guise, to which she belonged. She possessed a bold and masculine understanding, a perseverance to overcome difficulties, and a fortitude to bear up against misfortunes, not often met with among her sex. She was indeed superior to most of the weaknesses of the female character; and having, from her earliest years, deeply studied the science of government, she felt herself, so far as mere political tactics and diplomatic acquirements were concerned, able to cope with the craftiest of the Scotch nobility. Besides, her intimate connexion with the French court, coupled with the interest she might naturally be supposed to take in the affairs of a country over which her husband had reigned, and which was her daughter's inheritance, seemed to give her a claim of the strongest kind.
The second aspirant was Cardinal David Beaton, at that time the undoubted head of the Catholic party in Scotland. He was a man whose abilities all allowed, and who, had he been less tinctured with severity, and less addicted to the exclusive principles of the Church of Rome, might probably have filled with _éclat_ the very highest rank in the State. He endeavoured to strengthen his title to the Regency, by producing the will of James V. in his favour. But as this will was dated only a short while before the King's death, it was suspected that the Prelate had himself written it, and obtained the King's signature, at a time when his bodily weakness had impaired his mental faculties. Beaton was, moreover, from his violence and rigour, particularly obnoxious to all those who favoured the Reformation.