Chapter XXI: Book XVI: , Chapters 55, 57, 58; Knox, Volume II., pages

66‒72.

The negotiations resulted in the conclusion of the treaty of Edinburgh on the 6th of July, 1560. This treaty dealt with a variety of matters touching France and England, some of which were never ratified. The articles more immediately affecting the cause of the Congregation were mainly these――that the French troops should return home; that no foreigners hereafter should be employed in Scotland without the sanction of Parliament; that an act of oblivion should be passed for all injurious deeds committed against the laws of the kingdom from the 6th of March, 1559, till the 11th of August, 1560; that a general peace should be made amongst the lords and all the subjects of the kingdom, so that those who were of the Congregation, and those who were not, should have no cause of quarrel with each other for the things done since the above date. That a Parliament should be held on the 10th of July, and adjourned to the 11th of August; and that this parliament should be as valid as if it had been expressly summoned by their majesties the King and Queen, provided that nothing be treated before the 1st of August.¹ Peace was proclaimed on the 8th of July, and a few days afterwards the French and English troops departed from Scotland.

¹ Fœdera, Volume XV., page 593, _et seq._; Keith, Volume I.,
pages 298‒306.

The Queen-Regent had removed into the castle of Edinburgh on the approach of the English army. She was wearied with the responsibilities of her position, and, worn out, she died on the 10th of July, 1560. On her death-bed she showed a nobleness of feeling and a magnanimity of soul which moved the minds of the hardest reformers; she called for Willock, the reformed preacher, and freely and cheerfully heard such exhortations as he deemed suitable for the occasion;¹ and thus she gave an example of religious humility and liberality unmatched in that fierce intolerant age. The important place which she naturally assumed in Scotland at this crisis, and the attitude which various associations and influences led her to take up, have often been overlooked in the heat of controversy; and she has been blamed for not acting in a way which her position, and the circumstances of her connections precluded her from attempting, even apart from her hereditary tendencies and her domestic feelings and sentiments. She had often said that, if she had been permitted to act according to her own wishes and judgment, she would have ended the dissensions and settled the kingdom in peace.

¹ Sir James Melville’s _Memoirs_, page 29; Buchanan, Book XVI.,