Series 1 > Papal negotiations with Mary Queen of Scots during her reign in Scotland, 1561-1567

xcviii PAPAL NEGOTIATIONS WITH MARY
afterwards. If no catastrophe had ensued, we should probably
have been content to pass on, suspending our judgment for
the time until ampler evidence came to hand.
vi. Bishop Chisholm’s second commission
We now turn to the second commission entrusted to the
Bishop of Dunblane, the request for a war subsidy from the
Pope. We do not know whether the idea of obtaining this
arose spontaneously in Mary’s mind, or whether it was
suggested by the Cardinal of Lorraine, or even by the appeals
of her Protestant subjects to Elizabeth of England. The
coincidence, however, is worth noting, that both the queen
and her subjects were applying for foreign aid at the same
moment. Randolph’s letters in July show that the Lords of
the Congregation were asking England’s aid at the very time
when the Bishop of Dunblane was speeding abroad to petition
assistance for the queen from the continent. But English
gold was nearer and more abundant, and it had begun to
flow in to the insurgent lords long before Mary’s distant
friends had made up their minds whether they should do
anything at all.
Queen Mary’s ambassadors did indeed do their best by
promptitude, earnestness and skill to urge her allies to action.
The harangue of the Bishop of Dunblane is an able piece of
pleading. ‘ The pious queen cannot make use of what is her
own,’ for her heretical ministers of state keep the administra¬
tion of her revenues in their hands. ‘She wishes to raise
10,000 to 12,000 men for four or five months,’ and so to
recover the rights of her crown. The Pope by granting an
adequate subsidy ‘will restore religion to splendour’ and
‘life to a devout queen, who is not only noble, valiant,
patient, constant,’ but has a heart, ‘which is not merely
virile but simply godlike.’ If the Pope does not save her,
Elizabeth will harass her to death, just as she brought to an