Series 3 > Mary Queen of Scots and the Babington plot

§ I. THE SECRET CORRESPONDENCE 37
Poulet ‘ a mere Leicestrian/ and Mary advised Babington to look
for a leader among the Howards. Both these phrases are omitted,
evidently in order to avoid offending a man or a family which was
powerful at Court. This text will be referred to as K. (Kyffin).
The MSS. which I have collated in the Yelverton Library
( Yelverlon MSS. xxxi. 206) follow the K. text. The French version
(ibid. 243) is closely connected with the French copy at R.O.,
printed by Labanoff, vi. 385, and gives the signatures of the Com¬
missioners at the end. Referred to as Y.
The Bardon MS., printed by the Camden Society in 1909, and
edited by Dr. Conyers Read, shows a text very closely related to
the Record Office copy. Referred to as Bar.
Modern paragraphs (numbered), as also punctuation, are used.
They are far more easy to refer to, and no ancient copy sets a
standard which is authoritative in such things. The original
cipher would have been all one paragraph, without even a dis¬
tinction between the words.
It must be remembered that the ancient copyists of these letters
did not aim at literary (much less at literal) accuracy; only at
legal fidelity to the text before them : and they were quite
eclectic about such variants as ‘hath’ and ‘has,’ ‘my,’ ‘mine,’
‘ my own,’ the singulars and plurals of collective nouns, e.g. force
or forces. It would be labour wasted in collating to enumerate
exhaustively all such variants. We cannot get back beyond the
accuracy of our earliest texts. I have not attempted to give here
more variants than may be sufficient to identify the families of
texts noted in this section.
§ 9- Linguistic Peculiarities.
As this letter was originally written in French and translated
by a Scotsman, several Scotticisms and foreign constructions may
be traced.
Scotticisms. § vi. ‘ unnaming ’ for not naming; § ix. ‘ unbeing
assured ’ for not being assured; § ix. ‘ unhap ’ for mishap; § x.
‘ take hold ’ for succeed.
' Unusual turns probably due to translation. § iii. 4°, ‘ which would
be compassed conform to the proportion to yours’ for which
should be in proportion to yours; § xii. ‘ To seek upon the young
earl ’for to make inquiry about the young earl.