Drury too seems to have had at the same time a narrow escape, ‘for it was meant by Ferniehurst and Buccleuch to have slain him on his return from Edinburgh.’ Owing to the nightly raids of the Scots, the state of the north country at this time was such, he wrote to Cecil, ‘as it would pity any English heart to see.’ And in April 1570 he accompanied the Earl of Sussex on a retaliatory expedition into Scotland. Ninety castles and strongholds razed to the ground and three hundred towns and villages in flames marked the course of the army through Liddisdale, Teviotdale, and the Merse. On 11 May, having been knighted by the lord-lieutenant, Drury, with an army of 180 lances, 230 light horse, and 1,200 foot, again entered Scotland. Marching rapidly to Edinburgh he endeavoured, according to his instructions, to persuade Lethington and Grange to a ‘surcease of arms’ on Elizabeth's terms; but failing in this he hastened to Glasgow, only to find that the Duke of Chatelherault and the Earl of Westmorland had raised the siege and taken refuge in the highlands. Lord Fleming, however, was at Dumbarton, and with him he endeavoured to open negotiations, which were brought to an abrupt termination by a dastardly attempt to assassinate him, not without, there was good reason for believing, the connivance of Lord Fleming himself, to whom accordingly Sir George Cary sent a challenge, which was declined by that nobleman. On his return journey he razed the principal castles belonging to the Hamiltons and ravaged the whole of Clydesdale with fire and sword. The good effect of these raids proving only temporary, he was despatched in May 1571 into Scotland to discover the relative strength of parties there, and Elizabeth finding from his report that the regent was ‘in harder case than was convenient for the safety of the king,’ he was ordered ‘to travail to obtain a surcease of arms on both sides so that it may be beneficial for the king's party.’ His travail was in vain; but while at Leith he again narrowly escaped being shot in the open street. These repeated attempts to take his life caused him considerable anxiety, not so much, he wrote to Lord Burghley, on account of personal danger, but more because of his wife and children. In February 1572 Thomas Randolph was joined with him on the same bootless errand. They were politely received by the regent and by those in the castle; but, finding their intervention ineffectual, they returned to Berwick on 23 April. But the arrival of De Croc in May with instructions from the French king to persuade the queen's party to submit to the regent induced Elizabeth once more to send Drury to assist in negotiating a peace. Fearing that he might never return from a journey so fraught with danger, he besought Lord Burghley to extend his favour to his wife and children if he chanced to end his life in her majesty's service. On 12 July he wrote that he had again been attacked on the highway; this being the eighth shot that had been discharged at him in Scotland after the like sort. With De Croc playing his own game little good could be expected from the negotiations; and having heard that a request had been made to Burghley that some more efficient person than himself might be sent, he expressed his hope that their wish might be granted, ‘for he would sooner serve the queen in Constantinople than among such an inconstant and ingrate people.’ At last Elizabeth determined to reduce the recalcitrants by force; and once more, in April 1573, he appeared in Edinburgh; this time with an English army and a heavy train of artillery at his back. The castle having refused to submit, he planted his guns with skill and care. On 21 May the assault commenced. Day and night the batteries blazed, and on the 28th the castle surrendered. With its capture, the death of Maitland, and the execution of Kirkcaldy of Grange, the civil war came practically to an end. Drury, it is said, was greatly distressed at the fate of Kirkcaldy, ‘for he was a plain man of war and loved Grange dearly.’ A few days before his death Kirkcaldy said of Drury that ‘he had ever found him deal uprightly in his sovereign's cause,’ and there can be little doubt that it was his probity of conduct that caused him to be so much hated and detested by the time-serving men around him. It ought to be remarked that the very vague and probably malicious charge preferred against him of ‘taking’ the crown jewels of Scotland is without foundation in fact (Sadler, State Papers, i.; Machyn, Diary, p. 244; Calendar of Foreign Papers, vii. viii. ix. x.; Calendar relating to Scotland, i.; Churchyard, Chips; Melville, Memoirs; Birrell, Diary; Register of the Privy Council of Scotland, ii. 247, 330).
In 1574, owing to the threatening state of affairs in Ireland, the privy council had half determined to send him with an army into Munster. But the danger passed away, and with it the necessity for immediate action. In 1576, however, Elizabeth having given her consent to the re-establishment of a resident government in Munster and Connaught, he was persuaded, much to the satisfaction of Sir Henry Sidney, to accept the post of president of Munster. No sooner had he been
