772). On the 24th he was able to attend a meeting of council. The queen meanwhile had been taken seriously ill, and on the 26th her life was despaired of. On her recovery Bothwell attended her in her progress through the southern shires. She stayed from 17 to 23 Nov. at his castle of Dunbar.
Thence she removed to Craigmillar, where early in December the famous conference was held in her presence regarding her relation to Darnley. The conference was called in order to determine on a method by which the queen might gratify her desire to be rid of Darnley. The only account of the conference, apart from a very summary notice by Buchanan, is contained in a narrative signed by Argyll and Huntly (printed in Keith, History, App. No. xvi. and frequently reprinted). As this narrative emanated from the queen it is necessary to receive its statements with caution. Bothwell is there represented merely as favouring a divorce, and citing his own case as a proof that a divorce might be obtained without prejudice to the young prince. Maitland alone is represented as letting fall a hint of the advisability of recourse to a more summary method; but this hint is said to have drawn from the queen an appeal to those present not to do anything ‘whereto any spot may be laid to my honour and conscience.’ It is plain that none of those present had a good word to say for Darnley, and all were of opinion that matters would be simplified if he ceased to be the husband of the queen. The majority of the protestant nobles saw no obstacle to procuring a divorce. But the catholic nobles, with the exception of Huntly, were unlikely to assent to this procedure. After the conference Bothwell was approached on the subject of Morton's recall. He assented to the proposal, but clearly demanded a quid pro quo, which should include the dissolution by some means or other of the queen's marriage with Darnley.
Bothwell's natural predilection for lawless violence, and his fear of revelations made during the process of divorce, contributed, with possibly the representations of Maitland and others, to shape his plans. Nor could he suppose that the protestant nobles, the majority of whom had been involved in the plot against Rizzio, would be greatly shocked by the death of their treacherous co-conspirator. Accordingly, after the Craigmillar conference a bond, so the subordinate agents in Darnley's murder subsequently asserted, was signed by Bothwell, Huntly, Argyll, Maitland of Lethington, and James Balfour, in which it was engaged that Darnley ‘sould be put off by ane way or other, and quahosever sould take the deid in hand, or do it, they sould defend and fortifie it as themselves.’ Bothwell, after a vain effort to obtain the help of Morton, resolved himself to ‘take the deid in hand.’ There is undoubted proof that he had the immediate charge of the practical arrangements, and he doubtless suggested the method adopted. Cool, resolute determination characterised his every step. If the genuineness of the ‘Casket Letters’ be admitted, the queen, presumedly under the spell of an absorbing passion for Bothwell, forced herself to become his instrument in effecting his purpose.
When the queen set out in January 1566–1567 to visit Darnley at Glasgow, Bothwell, according to the ‘Diary’ handed in by the Scottish commissioners at Westminster, accompanied her to Lord Livingstone's place at Callendar. His movements after parting from her are somewhat uncertain. Not improbably, before returning to Edinburgh, he proceeded to Whittingham, where he made an unsuccessful attempt to induce Morton to undertake the murder. According to the ‘Diary’ already mentioned, he superintended the arrangements at Edinburgh for lodging Darnley at Kirk-o'-Field. Subsequently he proceeded south, for on the 27th he set out from Jedburgh to chastise some rebellious borderers in Liddesdale, with whom he had a sharp skirmish (Scrope to Cecil, Cal. State Papers, For. Ser. 1566–8, entry 918). On 31 Jan. he met the queen some distance from Edinburgh, and escorted her and Darnley into the city. A suite of apartments was assigned him in Holyrood Palace. Here on the night of Sunday, 9 Feb., he held a consultation with certain subordinates to arrange the final details of his plot. His plan from the beginning appears to have been to blow up the lodging. He had conveyed an immense quantity of powder from the fortress of Dunbar, his calculation being to arrange the explosion on such a gigantic scale that it would be beyond the limits of possibility for his victim to escape, or for it to be known how he met his death. On the Sunday evening the queen, who occasionally slept in a chamber below that occupied by Darnley, had remained at Kirk-o'-Field till a late hour. She intended to sleep at Holyrood, having agreed to attend a masked ball in the palace in honour of the marriage of one of her servants. Before setting out she and her escort went upstairs to Darnley's apartment. Bothwell must at least have been informed of the queen's intentions. It was actually while she and her escort were in the room above that he superintended the conveyance of the powder into the room which she had just left below. It was placed beneath the bed which she would have occupied had she
