139.
It is asserted that the regent, to justify these measures, declared, that princes ought not to have their promises too strictly urged upon them; nor was any faith to be kept with heretics: and that for her part, could she find as good a color, she would willingly bereave all these men of their lives and fortunes.[*] But it is nowise likely that such expressions ever dropped from this prudent and virtuous princess.

On the contrary, it appears that all these violences were disagreeable to her; that she was in this particular overruled by the authority of the French counsellors placed about her; and that she often thought, if the management of those affairs had been intrusted wholly to herself, she could easily, without force, have accommodated all differences.[**] [3] The congregation, inflamed with their own zeal, and enraged by these disappointments, remained not long in tranquillity.

Even before they left Perth, and while as yet they had no color to complain of any violation of treaty, they had signed a new covenant, in which, besides their engagements to mutual defence, they vowed, in the name of God, to employ their whole power in destroying every thing that dishonored his holy name; and this covenant was subscribed, among others, by Argyle and the prior of St.Andrew's.[***] * Knox, p.139.Spotswood, p.

123.
** See note C, at the end of the volume.
*** Keith, p 89.

Knox, p.