‘For though I was rugged and wild and free, I had a heart like another man; And oh! had I known how the end would be, I would it had broke ere the play began.’
As Mary Stuart stood forward to welcome Elizabeth’s ambassador to her court, many an eye dwelt on the face and figure of the Scottish Queen with enthusiastic admiration. Though dressed in the mourning which she still wore for her first husband, the dark folds of her robe did but enhance the brilliancy of her complexion, and, whilst even the spotless ruff did not detract from the fairness of her neck, the whitest hand in Europe hung like a snowdrop against the black volume of her draperies. Even Randolph, cynic though he were, could not repress a thrill of delight as he approached so beautiful an object, though the sentiment uppermost in his diplomatic heart, had he put it into words, would probably have been as follows:--
‘It is lucky my mistress cannot see you at this moment, or she would hate you more cordially than ever, and my task would be even more difficult than it is!’
He made his obeisance, nevertheless, with the cool assurance and easy grace of a practised courtier. The Queen received him with a cordiality that she seemed anxious should not be lost on the bystanders.
‘A messenger from my loving cousin,’ said she, ‘is always welcome; how much more when he comes in the person of our old and esteemed friend Mr Randolph.’
The ambassador answered in a few well-chosen words for his sovereign and himself, dropping once more on his knee and craving permission to present an autograph letter and a costly ring from Elizabeth to the cousin whom she never saw. Mary received them both with expressions of unbounded delight, and the shrewd bearer, judging from his own experience and his own heart, argued that there must be no small weakness concealed under so much affection, and that it was unnatural for one woman to be so fond of another, unless she felt herself uncomfortably in her power.
‘You have had a long ride,’ said the Queen, ‘and we can but give you a rude, though hearty, welcome. A long ride and a dangerous, for indeed the borders of both countries are not so quiet as we could wish, or as we hope to render them before many months are past.’