Ere long a rebellion broke out, and the insurgents marched to battle beneath a banner painted with the figure of a murdered king with an infant prince kneeling beside the body, crying, “Judge and avenge my cause, O God.” At Carberry Hill, on the longest day of the year 1567, Bothwell offered to decide the contest by single combat, but this the queen would not allow. Her forces melted away. Bothwell fled, and she was a captive in the hands of an exasperated people. A month later she was rowed across Loch Leven to the castle which still stands upon its little island. Here she was imprisoned, and here she was forced to abdicate the throne in favour of her infant son James. The Earl of Moray, her half-brother, was named regent, and the Protestant party was once more supreme. Within a year Mary was free again. She found a knight-errant in the person of “pretty George Douglas,” younger brother of the Laird of Loch Leven. He fell deeply in love with the deposed queen, and ere long he had planned her escape. The story goes that when all was ready Douglas sent Mary a signal in the shape of a pearl fashioned like a pear. The key of the castle was obtained by the ruse of Willie Douglas, a page boy. It was the custom of the governor of the castle to have the key of the great gate placed on the table beside him when at supper. The page, who served at table, placed a plate before the governor, and at the same time dropped a napkin on the key, and then lifted key and handkerchief together. He slipped out to the queen, who was waiting for him. They gained the gate unperceived, locked it behind them, and threw the key into the water. The lad put Mary and her companion, a little maid of ten, into a boat, cast off, and plied his oars manfully. The queen waved a white veil to and fro, and at the signal George Douglas rose up from the reeds by the side of the lake and hurried to the village, from which he soon afterwards returned with a troop of armed men and some led horses. By the time the boat touched the shore the horsemen were waiting for the queen, and in a few minutes she was galloping southwards towards the ferry across the Forth. On the way she was joined by another troop of horse. That night she slept in Niddrie Castle, and next day reached Hamilton in safety.