she was not to stay the night. Angus was induced to sign a document undertaking to cease to interfere with her lands (ib. pp. 242, 253, 260). But Henry neglected to secure an effective guarantee for the performance of these promises. On 7 May Margaret joined with her sister Mary and with Queen Catherine in saving the lives of all but one of the apprentices condemned for the riots of 'Evil May day' (ib. p. 254). On 18 May she left London, re-entered Scotland on 15 June, was met by Angus at Lamberton Kirk, and made her entrance into Edinburgh on the 17th (ib. p. 260).
Albany had left Scotland on 8 June on a visit to France, but had taken effective precautions to prevent Margaret's recovering the regency. Her dower rents were still withheld, and she was refused access to her son on suspicion that she intended to convey him to England [see under James V of Scotland]. She besieged the English council with complaints. In the contest for power between Angus and Arran, the head of the Hamiltons, Margaret at first sided with her husband. But Angus broke his promise as to her jointure lands. Arran took her part, and in October 1518 she wrote to Henry hinting at a divorce (Letters and Papers, iii. 166). Angus, she said, loved her not, but she does not allude to the 'gentill-woman of Douglasdaill,' with whom, according to Lesley (p. 112), he was now living. Henry failed to arrest her breach with Angus, and she joined Henry's adversaries in a request to Francis I for the return of Albany, which fell into her brother's hands (Letters and Papers, ii. 4547, iii. 373, 396). Taxed with it by Wolsey she pleaded (14 July 1519) her sore plight and the pressure of the lords (ib. iii. 373, 381). She had now access to her son (ib. 889). But next year she once more changed sides. Angus got possession of Edinburgh by the fray of Cleanse-the-Causeway, on 30 April 1520 (Lesley, p. 115, but cf. Green, p. 300), and Henry in August sent Henry Chadworth, minister-general of the Friars Observants, to chide her for living apart from Angus to the danger of her soul and reputation and for her reported 'suspicious living,' and urged her reconciliation (ib. p. 292 ; Letters and Papers, iii. 467, 481-2). At the same time Arran and his party were opposing her resumption of the regency at the desire of Albany, whom Francis had promised Henry to keep in France (ib. iii. 467). She therefore joined Angus in Edinburgh on 15 Oct. (ib. 482, misdated). But before 8 Feb. 1521 they had quarrelled again, and Margaret rejoined Arran's party. According to the Douglas account she stole from Edinburgh by night escorted only by Sir James Hamilton, but this she denied (ib. iii. 1190 ; Green, p. 296). When Henry sided with Charles V, Francis allowed Albany to return to Scotland on 18 Nov. 1521. Albany and Margaret were now closely associated, and Dacre accused her, truly or falsely, of being 'over-tender' with the regent. He and Wolsey had circulated a rumour that in soliciting at Rome a divorce between Margaret and Angus Albany proposed to marry her himself. Albany, however, 'had enough of one wife' (ib. p. 311). So strong was the combination of the regent and the queen-mother that Angus either consented to retire to France or was kidnapped thither by Albany, as Henry asserted, and Lindsay of Pitscottie also states.
Margaret acted as intermediary in the truce negotiations between Dacre and Albany in September 1522. After Albany's return to France on 27 Oct. Margaret sought to form a party of her own round the young king with the support of England. Anti-English feeling ran high in Scotland after Surrey's devastation of the lowlands, and the queen professed herself ready, if need be, to enter England 'in her smock' to labour for the security of her son (ib. pp. 327-9 ; Letters and Papers, iii. 3138). When Albany did not return at the date promised (August 1523), Margaret, who had provided for her retreat into England, urged the English government to action, but they preferred to let events decide. The Scottish parliament of 31 Aug. would have emancipated James and come to an arrangement with England, but for the news that Albany had sailed from Picardy, which Margaret stigmatised as Hidings of the Canongate.' After this rebuff she 'grat bitterly all day' (Green, pp. 334-5). The king, too, 'spoke very sore for one so young,' and from all Surrey could hear the queen 'did that she could to cause him so to do.' On Albany's arrival, 20 Sept., Margaret requested the promised refuge in England, but Surrey and Wolsey agreed that it would be better and less costly to keep her in Scotland (ib. p. 345). Her treacherous confidant, the prioress of Coldstream, reported that she was 'right fickle,' and that the governor had already 'almost made her a Frenchwoman.' Another report says that 1 since nine hours to-day she has been singing and dancing, and the Frenchmen with her' (ib. p. 349). But her private opinion was that the governor, 'who can say one thing and think another,' would be 'right sharp' with her when the 'hosting' was done (ib. p. 351). Albany discovered that she was completely in the English interest, and the par-
