asserts that a great part of it was carried off in barrels by his natural son James Douglas and one of his servants, and that a portion came into the possession of persons ‘wha maid ill compt of it again’ (Memoirs, p. 267). Hume, on the other hand, who had perhaps special means of knowing, says that ‘those on whom he would have bestowed them’ (the treasures) ‘if he had had power and opportunity to distribute them according to his mind lighted on them’ (House of Douglas, ii. 285). He also names the persons, but does not attempt even an estimate of the amount received.
Morton had alienated by his domestic policy the church and the nobles, and while his faithfulness to Elizabeth had awakened jealousy of English influence, it secured him no substantial support. The prime occasion of his fall was the hostility of Argyll [see Campbell, Colin, sixth earl], which Morton had provoked by his action in regard to the crown jewels. The breach was further widened by the regent's interference in a quarrel between Argyll and Atholl to prevent them settling it by the old method (for various references see Reg. P. C. vol. ii.). Both nobles, deeply indignant, resolved to combine against him. Morton had already expressed to the king his desire to demit his charge for the ‘relief of his wearie age’ (Hist. James Sext, p. 162), a proposal made possibly with a view to strengthen his position by the king's nominal assumption of government, but his enemies took advantage of it to oust him altogether from power. At a packed convention called by Argyll and Atholl and held at Stirlingon on 8 March 1578, the king took the government nominally into his own hands, with the aid of a council of twelve, of which Morton was not a member. Morton at once bent before the storm, guarding himself, however, by the protest at the cross of Edinburgh, that if the king ‘sould accept the regiment upon him for the preheminence of any subject of the cuntrie uther then himself, that his demission sould availl nathing’ (ib. p. 164). From expressions in his private letters it is evident that Morton was weary of the cares of office, and that if with safety to himself a stable government, preserving a similar attitude towards Mary, could have been established, he would have been glad to retire. ‘I would,’ he wrote in confidence to the laird of Lochleven, ‘be at the poynt, to have nathing ado now but to leif quietlie to serve my God and the king, my master’ (19 March 1577–8, Reg. Honor. de Morton, i. 103). For greater security he went to Lochleven, where he occupied himself with ‘devysing the situation of a fayre garden with allayis’ (Hist. James Sext, p. 165; also Melville, Memoirs, p. 264). But he soon saw that for him there could be no safety except at the head of affairs. His overthrow awakened the eager hopes of the catholics, and rumours arose of a joint invasion by France and Spain. Morton therefore persuaded the young Earl of Mar to assert his hereditary right to the governorship of Stirling Castle by seizing it from his relative, Alexander Erskine; and after the family quarrel had been settled, he, with the connivance of Mar, appeared at the castle on 5 May and resumed his ascendency over the king. By a convention in the castle on 12 June he was appointed to the ‘first roume and place’ in the council, and at a meeting of parliament in July, changed from the Tolbooth to the great hall of Stirling Castle, while his demission was accepted an act was passed discharging him of all the acts done during his regency (Acts Parl. Scot. iii. 94–114). Argyll and Atholl, having protested against the parliament as held in an armed fortress, assembled their forces at Edinburgh, and the Earl of Angus, lately proclaimed lieutenant-general of the kingdom, advanced to the succour of his uncle with five thousand men. When a contest near Stirling seemed imminent, it was averted through the mediation of the English ambassador, Sir Robert Bowes, and a compromise effected, Morton retaining his chief place on the council (see documents in Calderwood, iii. 419–36). It was, however, evident that Morton's position was precarious, its stability depending chiefly on the attitude of Elizabeth. Elizabeth's refusal to pay the king's English rents had no doubt considerable effect in making Morton disregard her remonstrances against the prosecution of the Hamiltons for the murder of the two regents, Moray and Lennox. By the pacification of Perth it was provided that the regent Morton could not of his own authority engage in it, and would be guided by the advice of Elizabeth, but Morton could plead that he was not now regent, and that the king having accepted the government the matter could no longer be deferred. It was therefore prosecuted with the utmost energy and vigour, and although the two principals escaped, all the estates of the family were sequestrated (for particulars see Reg. P. C. vol. iii.)
The sudden death of the Earl of Atholl on 25 April 1579, after his return from a banquet of reconciliation given by Mar to the nobility at Stirling, gave rise to the rumour that he had been poisoned by Morton. If he did contrive Atholl's death, he reaped from it, as from the proscription of the Hamiltons, calamity rather than advantage. It soon became
