Plots and intrigues.--How far Mary was involved.--Babington's conspiracy.--Secret correspondence.--Seizure of Mary's papers.--Her son James.--Elizabeth resolves to bring Mary to trial.--Fotheringay Castle.--Great interest in the trial.--Preparations for it.--The throne.--Mary refuses to plead.--The commission.--The great hall.--Mary pronounced guilty.--Elizabeth's pretended sorrow.--Signing the warrant.--Shuffling of Elizabeth.--Mary's letter to Elizabeth.--Interposition of Mary's friends.--Elizabeth signs the warrant.--It is read to Mary.--Mary hears the sentence with composure.--Protests her innocence.--Mary refused a priest.--Mary alone with her friends.--Affecting scene.--Supper.--Mary's farewell to her attendants.--Mary's last letters.--Her directions as to the disposal of her body.--Arrangements for the execution.--The scaffold.--Proceeding to the hall.--Interview with Melville.--Mary's last message.--She desires the presence of her attendants.--Mary's dress and appearance.--Symbols of religion.--Mary's firmness in her faith.--Her last prayer.--The execution.--Heart-rending scene.--Disposition of the body.--Elizabeth's affected surprise.--Her conduct.--The end of Mary's ambition realized.--Accession of James I.--Tomb of Mary at Westminster Abbey.--Mary's love and ambition.--She triumphs in the end. Mary did not always discourage the plots and intrigues with which her name was connected. She, of course, longed for deliverance from the thraldom in which Elizabeth held her, and was ready to embrace any opportunity which promised release. She thus seems to have listened from time to time to the overtures which were made to her, and involved herself, in Elizabeth's opinion, more or less, in the responsibility which attached to them. Elizabeth did not, however, in such cases, do any thing more than to increase somewhat the rigors of her imprisonment. She was afraid to proceed to extremities with her, partly, perhaps, for fear that she might, by doing so, awaken the hostility of France, whose king was Mary's cousin, or of Scotland, whose monarch was her son.