Moray

“ If then she loved Bothwell, her love, however wicked, was not unnatural or incredible. He had been loved by many women, and had ruined all of them.
Among the other persons of the play, Moray is foremost, Mary’s natural brother, the son of her whom James V. loved best, and, it was said, still dreamed of while wooing a bride in France. Moray [Pg 19] is an enigma. History sees him, as in Lethington’s phrase, ‘looking through his fingers,’ looking thus at Riccio’s and at Darnley’s murders. These fingers hide the face. ”

“ Moray was a traitor, and did what Lethington scorned to do. But Moray’s most remarkable quality was caution. He always had an alibi. He knew of Riccio’s murder—and came to Edinburgh next day. He left Edinburgh in the morning, some sixteen hours before the explosion of Kirk o’ Field. He left Edinburgh for England and France, twelve days before the nobles signed the document upholding Bothwell’s innocence, and urging him to marry the Queen. He allowed Elizabeth to lie, in his presence, and about her encouragement of his rebellion, to the French Ambassador. ”

“ On Saturday, 15th May 1650, the Marquis of Argyle was attending the marriage festivities of his son, Lord Lorn, and the Earl of Moray’s daughter; and on that day the great Montrose was dragged on a hurdle through the streets of Edinburgh to the Tolbooth, amid all the insults that the cruelty of the Covenanting rabble could devise.
He either fears his fate too much,
Or his deserts are small,
Who dares not put it to the touch
To gain or lose it all. [44]
As the procession passed Moray House, the entire wedding party stepped out on to the balcony to exult over the fallen hero. ”

“ We need not credit his tale of Mary’s informing Darnley that the nobles meant to kill him, and then calling Moray out of bed, half-naked, to hear that he was to be killed by Darnley. All that is known of this affair of the hurried Moray speeding through the corridors in his dressing-gown, comes from certain notes of news sent by Bedford to Cecil on August 15. ‘The Queen declared to Moray that the King had told her he was determined to kill him, finding fault that she bears him so much company. ”

“ During the short regency of Moray, Morton was his chief adviser both in his policy towards Mary and in the measures he undertook for the pacification of Scotland. He approved of, if he did not counsel, the apprehension of his old ally Maitland of Lethington, who had now joined the queen's party, and of the influence of whose diplomacy on Elizabeth, Moray and Morton were no doubt greatly in dread. On the day appointed for Maitland's trial for Darnley's murder, Morton lay at Dalkeith with three thousand men, ready to obey the regent's commands should the necessity arise (Calderwood, ii. 506) ”

“ From what you tell me of Earle Moray, I should imagine that he is a man of great talent. If so, there can be little difficulty."
"He has something more than talent," said Doris, proudly; "he has genius."
"My dear child, you will know, when you are as old as I am, that talent and industry are worth any amount of genius."
"I am sure that he has industry, papa," she said.
"Then, if he has industry and genius, his fortune is sure," said the earl. "As soon as we have a Countess of Linleigh to do the honors, we must ask Earle Moray to come and see us." ”

“ They were appointed to do this on Christmas Day, but only put in an argumentative answer to Moray’s ‘Eik.’ But on January 11, when Elizabeth had absolved both Moray and Mary (a ludicrous conclusion) and was allowing Moray and his company to go home, Cecil said that Moray wished to know whether Herries and Lesley would openly accuse him and his friends, or not. ”

“ The proclamation regarding Moray's Rebellion is a document that is not usually included in the biographies of Queen Mary. This proclamation was the result of Moray and Morton's conduct in opposing to the very [Pg 287] last Mary's marriage with Darnley and taking steps to create a rebellion in the kingdom. The Queen keenly resented this conduct, and although her position and influence were much stronger than that of the rebels, these two nobles were vindictive, unforgiving, and tyrannical to a degree. ”

“ MURRAY (or Moray) , EARLS OF. The earldom of Moray was one of the seven original earldoms of Scotland, its lands corresponding roughly to the modern counties of Inverness and Ross. Little is known of the earls until about 1314, when Sir Thomas Randolph, a nephew of King Robert Bruce, was created earl of Moray (q.v.) , and the Randolphs held the earldom until 1346, when the childless John Randolph, 3rd earl of this line and a soldier of repute, was killed at the battle of Neville’s Cross. ”

“ Meanwhile, by the aid of Both well and Huntly, she was soon at the head of a powerful force, with which on the 18th she entered Edinburgh. Moray's former experience made him hesitate to risk a second rebellion, and no attempt was made to oppose her. Nor did she now take further action against him and the other rebel lords ; and Morton and others directly concerned in the murder had already fled to England before a notice was issued on the 19th summoning them to answer for their share in it (Randolph, 21 March, Cal. State Papers, For. Ser. 156 (5-8, entry 205 ; Reg. P. C. Scotl. i. 437) . ”

“ Mary and Moray now wished to pardon Lord Boyd, with whom Darnley had a private quarrel, and whom he accused of being a party to Riccio’s murder. [58] On May 13, Randolph tells Cecil that ‘Moray and Argyll have such misliking of their King (Darnley) as never was more of man.’ [59] Moray, at this date, was most anxious for the recall of Morton, who (May 24) reports, as news from Scotland, that Darnley ‘is minded to depart to Flanders,’ or some other place, to complain of Mary’s unkindness. ”

“ On April 25, 1566, Randolph writes from Berwick to Cecil: ‘Murray, Argyll, and Glencairn are come to Court. I hear his (Moray’s) credit shall be good. The Queen wills that all controversies shall be taken up, in especial that between Murray and Bothwell.’ [84] On April 21, 1566, Moray, Argyll, Glencairn, and others were received by Mary in the Castle, and a Proclamation was made to soothe ‘the enmity that was betwixt the Earls of Huntly, Bothwell, and Murray.’ [85] Thenceforward, as we have proved in detail, Moray was ostensibly in Mary’s favour. ”

“ He was never brought to trial, and was liberated on bail. Gordon of Buckie, the true murderer, lived for nearly fifty years after Moray’s death, and in his latter days expressed great contrition for the act of which he had been guilty. From punishment at the hands of man, the power of his family, the unsettled state of society, and the laws succeeded in screening him. The melancholy fate of the Earl of Moray, which we have just been relating, has been embalmed in his country’s verse in a ballad deeply affecting in its pathos:—
Ye Highlands and ye Lowlands, Oh, where have ye been? ”

“ Again, that Earle Moray, Esq., the poet, intended to contest the borough of Anderley. He found himself continually mentioned as one of the leading men of the day, one to whom the eyes of the country turned with hope. Earle could not imagine how it was, and in his perplexity he spoke of it to Lord Linleigh.
"If I did not know that it was impossible," he said, "I should imagine some one was always sending little paragraphs to the newspapers about me."
"It is the price of celebrity," said the earl. "A man who wishes to advance with the public must always keep himself before the public eye. ”

“ So much were Moray and Argyll in doubt regardin her intentions that when they came to Edinburgh to ‘keep the day of law’ against the Earl of Bothwell, then on trial for high treason, they deemed it prudent to bring with them seven thousand men, and at no time would be in court together, in order that one of them might be left on guard. ”

“ Mr. Froude first quoted de Silva’s report of Moray’s report of this bloodthirsty letter of Mary’s: and declared that Moray described accurately the long Glasgow Letter (Letter II.) . [237] But Moray, as Mr. Hosack proved, described a letter totally and essentially different from Letter II. That epistle, unlike the one described by Moray, is not signed. We could not with certainty infer this from the want of signatures to our copies; their absence might be due to a common custom by which copyists did not add the writer’s signature, when the letter was otherwise described. ”

“ The Earl of Moray did little better, for at London, without any advice, he ran and married Sir William Balfour’s second daughter.’ The Earl of Rothes was clapped up in Edinburgh Castle, by the Protector’s orders, in great infamy on account of a certain light-mannered Lady Howard, who had come to his lordship’s house on a visit, and whose husband was now in Scotland, bent on obtaining a bloody satisfaction for his dishonour. ”

“ After Moray's return to Scotland in the spring of 1569 Herries joined the Hamiltons in an attempted revolt; and on coming to Edinburgh to arrange terms for an agreement he was on 16 April warded in the castle (Diurnal of Occurrents, p. 144) , on the ground that he had advised the Duke of Chatelherault not to take the oath to the regent (Herries, Memoirs, p. 114) . ”

“ But there's more spotted morays around than green ones."
"But that's hardly more a fish than a shark is," objected Colin. "Isn't a moray a kind of eel?"
"Yes, sir, but an eel's a fish. Leastways so I was always told, when I used to work over at the Aquarium on Agar's Island." [Pg 228]
"All right," said Colin good-humoredly, "I guess you're in the right about it. Go ahead and tell me about the moray."
"I was just sayin', sir, that they were the only ugly things around Bermuda. And they stay quite a bit from shore out around the coral atolls. You see lots of 'em around the sea-gardens. ”

“ Moravia was made up of the earldoms of Moray, forfeited in the earlier portion of David’s reign; Caithness, which still included Sutherland, then extending as far as Dingwall; and Ross, a sort of debatable land between the Gall-Gael, Oirir-Gael, and ancient Mormaors of Moray: with “Northern Argyle,” or that portion of the territories of the Oirir-Gael which reached, at this period, from the northern boundaries of the modern county to the frontiers of the Gall-Gael in Sutherland. ”

“ The fact that Moray's death was approved of, if not instigated, by Mary, who liberally rewarded the assassin, had incalculably injured her cause in Scotland, and rendered Morton's hostility more implacable than ever. He was now strenuous in his efforts to induce Elizabeth to declare for the king, informing her at last that if she would not supply him with money and men to punish the Hamiltons, the instigators of the murder, ‘he would not run her course any longer’ (instructions to the commendator of Dunfermline, 1 May) . ”

“ A grimmer and a godlier man is Mr. John Wood, secretary of Moray, with whom he had been in France, an austere person, a rebuker of Mary’s dances and frivolity. He, too, was a Lord of Session, and was wont to spur Moray on against Idolaters. We shall find him very busy in managing the Casket Letters. He was slain by young Forbes of Reres, the son of the corpulent Lady Reres, rumoured to have been the complacent confidant of Mary’s amour with Bothwell. Reres had certainly no reason to love Mr. ”

“ Supper was over, and Dingwall had taken his seat at the ingle neuk to smoke his pipe, while Morag sat cleaning a gun with her tiny, but strong little fingers, as she silently pondered over the castle scene, and at last came to the conclusion that the bonnie wee leddy must have been one of the ghosts which were said to haunt the old keep. Her father at last broke the silence by saying, between one of the whiffs of his pipe—
"I'm thinkin' we've gotten the richt kin' o' folk this year, Morag. The master's the best-like gentleman I've seen i' the Glen this mony a day. ”

“ The night is gone, morning is come, mass is said, and they go to horse. They left Medina and past the river Salon, and pricked up Arbuxuelo, and they crost the plain of Torancio. That good Christian the Bishop Don Hieronymo, night and day he guarded the ladies; on a goodly horse he rode, and they went between him and Alvar Fañez. They came to Molina and there were lodged in a good and rich house, and Abencaño the Moor waited on them. Nothing did they want which they could wish to have; he even had all their beasts new shod, and for Minaya and the ladies, Lord! ”

“ Morley felt as if he were somewhat ungrateful for scanning so closely the character of one who had treated him with much kindness, and, soon quitting such thoughts, he rang for his good old servant, Adam Gray, and enquired into all that had passed at Morley Court since he had left it--the situation of the poor cottagers, whose fate he had endeavoured to soften; the health of his horses and his dogs; the promises of the game season; and all those things that the most interest a very young Englishman, in his hours of health. ”

“ I shall be at Morley Court about mid-day to-morrow, and can see Juliet and her father, and know my fate before another night pass over my head."
"Oh! it will all go very well," said Lady Malcolm; "do not be afraid, my dear Morley. If you but consider, you will see that Mr. Carr will never be so foolish as to make any difficulty. He thinks of nothing on earth but money, you know, and in that point he certainly cannot object to you." ”

“ A good understanding was not likely to exist between men of such opposite principles, and St. Morys, although he possessed the kindest and the warmest heart, was rather of a hasty disposition, and had a little more brusquerie of manner than is generally found among Frenchmen of his rank. What may have been the first, or the principal cause of the dispute, I know not, but, from what I heard, it appeared to me most probable that the object of Colonel Barbier de Fay was to compel Monsieur de St. Morys to give him a high price for his land in order to get rid of so disagreeable a neighbour. ”