Melville now saw that there was no alternative, and that Lindsay must be called in to his assistance. Notorious for being one of the most passionate men in Scotland, Lindsay burst into the Queen's presence, with the instruments in his hands, and rage sparkling in his eyes. Mary, for the first time, became agitated, for she recollected the evening of Rizzio's murder, when Lindsay stood beside the gaunt form of Ruthven, instigating him to the commission of that deed of cruelty. With fearful oaths and imprecations, this unmannered barbarian, entitled to be called a man only because he bore the external form of one, vowed, that unless she subscribed the deeds without delay, he would sign them himself with her blood, and seal them on her heart.[132] Mary had a bold and masculine spirit; but, trembling under the prospect of immediate destruction, and imagining that she saw Lindsay's dagger already drawn, she became suddenly pale and motionless, and would have fallen in a swoon, had not a flood of tears afforded her relief. Melville, moved perhaps to contrition by the depth of her misery, whispered in her ear, that instruments signed in captivity could not be considered valid, if she chose to revoke them when she regained her liberty. This suggestion may have had some weight; but almost before she had time to attend to it, Lindsay's passion again broke forth, and, pointing to the lake which surrounded her confined residence, he swore that it should become her immediate grave, if she hesitated one moment longer. Driven to distraction, and scarcely knowing what she did, Mary seized a pen, and without reading a line of the voluminous writings before her, she affixed her name to each of them, as legibly as her tears would permit. The Commissioners then took their departure, secretly congratulating themselves, that, by a mixture of cunning and ferocity, they had gained their end. Mary, no longer a Queen, was left alone to the desolate solitude of her own gloomy thoughts.[133]