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1079. Demands and Sayings of the Scottish Queen, concerning her Confinement, with Notes by [Robt. Beale]. |
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1581, Dec. 3. |
Her demands. |
Her sayings, &c., with Beale' s notes. |
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1. That it would please Her Majesty to permit her to send into Scotland upon such conditions and promises as she is contented to make for her Majesty's satisfaction and surety. |
1. Her Majesty shall be privy to the instructions which she shall send. She will be a means to do anything in Scotland that her Majesty shall require for settling of things in good order in that realm. Nothing shall be done in Scotland without the privity of the party which her Majesty shall send jointly with the other. Nothing shall be there concluded but only the young King's will known. The conclusion to be made at their return into England, and then her Majesty's assent to be taken therein. |
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For her Majesty's satisfaction she offereth to make an open declaration to the whole world that she doth acknowledge her Majesty and her issue to be the most lawful inheritors of this crown; that she will attempt nothing to the prejudice of her Majesty's person or estate, nor have any dealing with any foreign Prince, rebel, &c., to disquiet this estate or alter the state of the policy or religion. |
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If she may be assured of her Majesty's good will and favour, which she pretendeth to desire above all things, she will do anything that shall be required, and therefore desireth to be advertised from her Majesty and her Council what they will require her to do, and she will do it, so it may stand with her honour. |
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She desires that the sending may be with as much speed as may be, before things wax worse in Scotland, and her son be contracted and brought into debt, &c.; and besides she is pressed out of France to send an answer, and hereafter shall not be able to do so much good as she persuadeth herself she now can. If the messengers shall be refused, then shall she have occasion to mislike of her son, and he shall not have her blessing. But she hopeth otherwise. It shall be for her Majesty's and the realm's safety that her son be not married but where her Highness shall like, and that he be kept from joining with others who seek to annoy this realm, and if she may obtain this she will then deal more particularly than she hath done. |
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2. That she may have liberty to go with her coach two or three miles out of the Park. |
2. She desireth but so to accommodate herself as may stand with her Majesty's surety. Will not go about to escape, use any indirect practice to send or receive letters, or do anything that may displease her Majesty. |
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3. That my lord of Shrewsbury may remove her at the least twice a year into some other of his houses for change of air which the physicians say to be necessary for her health. |
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4. That she may have six geldings or horses appointed to attend upon her when she goeth in her coach. |
4. Four I think will serve her turn, for Nau, Curie, Melville, and Bastian without dagges : and if my lord of Shrewsbury's men be more in number with dagges, and some going as scouts before there will be the less danger. |
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5. That she may have two gentlewomen and two grooms of her chamber to attend upon her, besides the number she now hath in consideration that divers are sickly. |
5. She named the Lady Luddington in Mistress Seton's place, which perhaps there is no reason to deny unto her : and therefore she may name whom she would have, and then her Majesty do as she shall see cause. |
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6. Sorry to understand of the rebatement made to my lord of Shrewsbury, and to be a burden unto him. |
6. Her desire to be only beholden to her Majesty for all. |
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7. That she may have a gentleman to attend upon her at the table, which was granted unto her, as she saith, before Bcton's departure. |
7. Upon the naming of the gentlemen, &c., let her Majesty do as she shall see cause. Howbeit, in mine opinion, it is requisite to have a regard to the nation, whether they shall be French or Scottish; that there be not of the one more than of the other. For now as I hear there is some jealousy between them, and strife who should be in most favour; and if such Scottish men as are of the religion were only admitted, it were not amiss. For Melville's behaviour is much commended in that house. |
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Item, one to serve her in the office of the pantry, in place of Alexander Scott lately dead in Scotland, whose return she looked for. |
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8. That for her extra-ordinary charges, daily increasing, the sum of two thousand crowns which she was wont to receive out of France by Mr. Secretary's means may be increased to £1,000. |
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9. That once a year the commis of her treasurer may be suffered to have access unto her to give an account of the governing of her dowry in France. |
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10. That seeing some of her servants are weary of their being there, and desirous to depart, that she may have liberty to discharge them and to take other in their places. |
10. Expressly she desired me to get leave for one Courcelles, a French gentlewoman, who has been with her these 20 years, and is desirous to return into France upon occasion of the death of some of her friends. |
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11. That it may please her Majesty to recommend unto Monsieur the matter of Senlis and Epernay. |
11. The French Ambassador hath dealt with his Excellency. |
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Touching the Earl of Shrewsbury. |
[His sayings.] |
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That it would please her Majesty to grant him leave to come up to do his duty, not having seen her these eight years. |
He will leave such order for his charge as that she shall be always forthcoming upon his peril as hitherto she hath been. |
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Most humbly'desireth her Majesty to consider his service now by the space of these thirteen years. Item, the restraint of liberty, sequestration from his friends and children. |
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Keeping of more houses and other charges. |
His ordinary wages of servants between £700 and £800. His lands after his death charged with £300 pensions and annuities at the least. |
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The rebatement of the allowance is a great discredit to him after so long a time. |
No man served so long without some great consideration. He desireth this only for the preservation of his honour which he esteemeth above all things. |
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Upon hope of more convenient time he hath hitherto forborne to show unto her Majesty his griefs. For upon the first motion the French Commissioners came over, and then was it no time to deal in such a matter. After, during Mr. Secretary's being in France the time likewise served not. Nor now, whilst Monsr is here. Notwithstanding he trusteth that her Majesty will consider of him. He hath her promise and letters that she will be good unto him. Whatsoever it shall please her Majesty to bestow upon him, he shall take it as a token of her good acceptation of his service. And shall be ready to employ both that which it shall please her to bestow upon him, and all that he hath besides to do her Majesty service. |
I think this would content him : £200 land fee-farm, and that it would please her Majesty to bestow the reversion of such offices as he hath upon his children, as Queen Mary did to him after his father's death. And the like was, as it is said, granted to the Earl of Pembroke after his father's death. |
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Endorsed :—“Concerning the Scottish Queen.” |
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Copy. 4½ pp. [Original in State Papers (Scotland), Mary Q. of Scots, Vol. XI. No. 72.] |
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1080. — to Sir Henry Cobham. |
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1581, Dec. 7. |
Her Majesty hath desired him to signify that Pinard, in a speech that passed between her and him, said that he thought the
causes of the Low Countries between the King of Spain and his subjects might be compounded, to which her Majesty answered that such a composition might prove more profitable for Spain than for France. Cobham is to let the King and Queen Mother know how dangerous her Majesty reports that advice to be. |
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Encloses two letters for Don Antonio, who is to be informed that the ships under Mr. Knolles had committed great spoils upon the Portuguese, contrary to their commission; and being admonished by her Majesty to make restitution, had refused so to do. They are, therefore, to be declared pirates. The Queen would have been content they should have followed their journey to the Azores if they had forborne these riotous dealings.—Undated. |
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Endorsed :—“7 December 1581.” |
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Rough draft. 2½ pp. [Murdin, pp. 365–366. In extenso.] |
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1081. Lord Deputy Grey to Lord Burghley. |
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1581, Dec. 10. |
Being ready to send away his former letters, he received Burghley's of 25 September, whereunto, by reason of their oldness, he replies at once. Concerning the dislikes as are conceived of the charges of this realm, trusts that in the general answer to the memorial full satisfaction is yielded. Thanks Burghley for his promise not to suffer any defalcations upon bills there to be made; but being informed that, out of the present mass which is now to come over, only £5,000 is appointed to the growing charges of this realm he cannot but think a very strait hand therein held, considering the need wherewith the garrison is pinched, whom how to relieve he sees not, “unless it be thought that men may feed of air.”—Dublin, 10 December 1581. |
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Signed. |
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1½ pp. [Murdin, p. 366. In extenso.] |
