He sent Tremaine home through Brittany, where he gathered proposals for betraying French towns to Elizabeth, rather prematurely.

Surrounded by treachery, and destitute of funds, the Guises could not aid the Regent, and Throckmorton kept advising Cecil to "strike while the iron was hot," and paralyse French designs.

The dying Regent of Scotland never lost heart in circumstances so desperate.
Even before the outbreak at Perth, Mary of Guise had been in very bad health.

When the English crossed the Border to beleaguer Leith, Lord Erskine, who had maintained neutrality in Edinburgh Castle, allowed her to come there to die (April 1, 1560).
On April 29, from the Castle of Edinburgh, she wrote a letter to d'Oysel, commanding in Leith.

She told him that she was suffering from dropsy; "one of her legs begins to swell.