Front Matter

Dunbarton Castle on the Clyde.

Mary Queen of Scots Painted from the original by John Watson Gordon R.I.A.

Preface

Of the unfortunates of history, few touch our sympathies so deeply as Mary Queen of Scots, though perhaps in so doing we allow her beauty, her grace and her rare accomplishments to influence us too strongly, for history cannot acquit her of grave error. Half French by birth and wholly French by education, she dazzled the brilliant court of which she became queen, when suddenly her gorgeous diadem vanished, and she was torn from her beloved France to be thrust upon stern and rugged Scotland. A foreigner to the land of her birth, she commenced a series of missteps, followed exultantly by her watchful rival on the English throne; and, at last, driven from her throne by her outraged subjects, she cast herself blindly upon Elizabeth's generosity. That generosity was Fotheringay.