This we put in memory, that the posterities to come may know that God once made His truth to triumph; but, because some of ourselves delighted more in darkness than in light, He hath restrained our freedom, and put the whole body in bondage.... [Sidenote: Lord James Stewart created Earl of Mar: his Marriage.] In the meantime, to wit, in February, the year of God 1561, Lord James Stewart was first made Earl of Mar,[195] and then married to Agnes Keith, daughter to the Earl Marischall. At the marriage, which was public in the church of Edinburgh, they both got an admonition to behave themselves moderately in all things; "For," said the preacher (John Knox) to him, "to this day the Kirk of God hath received comfort by you, and by your labours. If hereafter ye shall be found fainter in this than ye were before, it will be said that your wife hath changed your nature." The greatness of the banquet, and the vanity used thereat, offended many godly. There began the masking, which from year to year hath continued since. [195] "Soon after, the Earldom of Moray was bestowed upon him, instead of the Earldom of Mar. Lord Erskine had an old right to the Earldom of Mar."--_MS. variant._ Master Randolph, agent for the Queen of England, was then, and for some time after, in no small conceit with our Queen; for his mistress' sake, she drank to him in a cup of gold, which he possessed with greater joy for the favour of the giver, than for the gift and its value; and yet it was honourable. The things that then were in handling betwixt the two Queens--Lethington, Secretary Cecil, and Master Randolph being ministers--were of great weight, as we will afterwards hear. [Sidenote: Disorderly Conduct of Earl Bothwell and others.] This winter, the Earl Bothwell, the Marquis D'Elboeuf, and Lord John of Coldingham, played riot in Edinburgh, misordered the whole town, broke Cuthbert Ramsay's gates and doors, and searched his house for his good-daughter,[196] Alison Craik. This was done in despite of the Earl of Arran, whose mistress the said Alison was suspected to have been. The horror of this fact, and the rarity of it, highly commoved all godly hearts. The Assembly and the nobility were in the town for the most part; and they concluded to crave justice by supplication. This they did.... [196] Daughter-in-law. This supplication was presented by divers gentlemen. At first the flatterers of the Court stormed, and asked, "Who durst avow it?" The Master, now Lord Lyndsay, answered, "A thousand gentlemen within Edinburgh." Others were ashamed to oppose themselves to the supplication in public; but they suborned the Queen to give a gentle answer until such time as the Convention was dissolved. This she did; for she lacks no craft, both to cloak and to maintain impiety. She alleged that her uncle was a stranger and had a young company; but that she should put such order to him, and unto all others, that thereafter they should have no occasion to complain....