1564.] THE EMBASSY OF DE SILVA. 229 ,ley_. The arguments played round the mark but never reached it ; and at last, when there was no longer a hope of a satisfactory end, the commissioners found it was use- less to waste time longer. They parted without a quarrel, yet without a conclusion, Maitland summing up his own demands in the following words :
- That the Queen of England would permit his mis-
tress to marry where she would, saving in those royal houses where she desired her to forbear ; that her Majesty would give her some yearly revenue out of the realm of England, and by Parliament establish unto her the crown, if God did his will on her Majesty, and left her without children ; in so doing her Majesty might have the honour to have made the marriage, and be known to the world to have used the Queen of Scots as a dear and loving sister/ 1 Immediately after the breaking up of the conference Mary Stuart wrote to request that Lord Darnley might be allowed to join his father in Scotland, and assist him in the recovery of the Lennox estates. Had Elizabeth anticipated what would follow she would probably, in- stead of complying, have provided Darnley with a lodg- ing in the Tower. But the reports from Scotland were contradictory ; Lennox said openly that ' his son should marry the Queen ; ' yet Randolph ' knew of many, by that which had been spoken of her own mouth, that the marriage should never take eifect if otherwise she might have her desire.' Lennox had succeeded imperfectly in Report of the Conference at Berwick : Cotton. MSS., CALIG. B. 10.
