king's party. On 4 March the heads of both parties held a convention in Edinburgh to consult on their common affairs, but were unable to arrive at an agreement as to the arrangements for the government (ib. pp. 544–5); and about the end of March 1570 Atholl and others sent a letter to Elizabeth asking her to enter ‘in conditions with the queen of Scotland, whereat the different claims betwixt her highness and her son may cease from henceforth’ (ib. p. 549). On 13 April they came to Edinburgh, but were unable to persuade the magistrates to deliver up the keys of the town and ports (ib. p. 554). Atholl then attempted to induce the lords of the opposite party to attend a convention at Edinburgh, but they declined to come to Edinburgh before 1 May, the day fixed for the meeting of parliament (ib. p. 557); and on 20 April he and others left Edinburgh for Linlithgow, where they held an opposition convention to that held by the king's lords at Edinburgh (ib. p. 560). The election of Lennox as regent in the protestant interest was entirely displeasing to Atholl, his former confidant; and at a great council of the nobility held at Atholl in August it was definitely resolved to combine in support of the cause of the queen (ib. iii. 11).
Atholl sought to prevent the election of Morton to the regency on 24 Nov. 1572 by sending, along with Lord Gray, ‘a bill to desire the election to be stayed for the present’ (ib. p. 243), but seems to have refrained from active opposition either to Morton's predecessors or to himself. In 1574 proceedings were taken against him as a papist; and for not executing the sentence of excommunication against him and his lady James Paton [q. v.], bishop of Dunkeld, was, at an assembly of the kirk held at Edinburgh on 6 March, ordained to confess his fault in his own cathedral kirk, and to undertake to execute the sentence within forty days thereafter (ib. p. 331). Notwithstanding this and other injunctions, Paton still refrained from taking action, and, being finally asked to explain his remissness to the assembly, stated that the earl desired a conference with the ministers for the resolution of his doubts. This was granted, and it was reported that as yet he was ‘not fully resolved upon sundry heads of religion;’ whereupon the assembly gave him until midsummer to be resolved (ib. p. 341), with apparently satisfactory results.
In the spring of 1577–8 Atholl joined with Argyll in a coalition for ousting Morton from the regency. The scheme succeeded, a council of regency being appointed, of which Atholl was one, and Atholl was also, on 29 March, appointed chancellor (Reg. P. C. Scotl. ii. 679). When Morton shortly afterwards obtained entrance into Stirling Castle, and resumed his custody of the young king, Argyll and Atholl took up arms against him, and marched towards Stirling with seven thousand men. But before the two parties came to blows they were pacified through the intervention of Bowes, the English ambassador, Atholl and Argyll being added to the new council, which was to assist Morton in the government. After attending a banquet given by Morton at Stirling to celebrate the reconciliation, Atholl, on his way home, was seized with a sudden illness, of which he died on 24 or 25 April 1579 at Kincardine Castle, a stronghold of Montrose near Auchterarder. At once the rumour spread that he had been poisoned; and, according to Calderwood, after a post-mortem examination, all the doctors affirmed so except Dr. Preston, who having, in token of his confidence in his own opinion, rashly touched with his tongue a portion of the contents of the stomach, ‘almost had died, and was after, so long as he lived, sickly’ (History, iii. 443). At a convention of the friends of Atholl held at Dunkeld on 3 May it was resolved to bring the matter before the king (Tytler, History, ed. 1868, vol. iv. app. No. iv.); but nothing was done. The suspicion, of course, was that Morton was the instigator of the supposed crime; but even the evidence of poisoning is vague, and probably it was with perfect sincerity that Morton, in his ‘confession,’ expressed his detestation of such a method of revenge. Atholl was buried on 4 July in the cathedral church of St. Giles, Edinburgh.
By his first wife, Elizabeth Gordon, daughter of George, fourth earl of Huntly, he had two daughters: Elizabeth—whose third husband was James Stewart, earl of Arran [q. v.] —and Margaret, married to George, seventh lord Abernethy of Saltoun. By his second wife, Margaret, widow of Thomas Erskine, and daughter of Malcolm Fleming, third lord Fleming, he had a son, John, fifth earl of Atholl, on whose death in 1595 the earldom reverted to the crown. By his second wife Atholl also had three daughters—Grizel, married to David, tenth earl of Crawford; Jean, to Duncan Campbell of Glenurchy; and Anne, to Francis, ninth earl of Errol. The second wife of Atholl was reputed to possess magical powers; and, when Queen Mary was confined with the child afterwards James VI, she was said to have cast the pains of childbirth on Lady Rires.
