EARLY LIFE. 85 



read from the chair, and submitted to criticism. The 

 questions were put into a list, upon the report of a 

 committee. One was given out for each meeting, 

 and a member appointed to debate it on each side ; 

 any other afterwards taking part in the discussion. 

 Many of the speeches were read, but sometimes an 

 extempore debate was had on a question proposed by 

 the president, without any notice. The politics of the 

 day were generally excluded ; but from a letter from 

 Forbes (Lord Medwyn), addressed to the secretary in 

 1794, there appears to have been an apprehension of 

 their introduction. 



I see one debate was on theatrical representations 

 being injurious to virtue, and decided in the negative 

 by four to one. On the question whether Elizabeth 

 was justified in putting Mary to death, I stood alone 

 against Elizabeth, which shows that the answer I gave 

 at Edinburgh two years ago had not been an opinion 

 recently formed. Having attended the drawing-room 

 given by Lady Belhaven (his Grace the Lord High 

 Commissioner's wife), in Holyrood House, I was taken 

 to see the chamber in which Eizzio had been mur- 

 dered, and the queen's bedroom adjoining; and on 

 my expressing the natural feeling of horror at the 

 assassination, and the outrage also to her feelings, 

 with some observation upon the conduct of Elizabeth, 

 they said, " Then of course you consider Mary as 

 innocent of all that has been laid to her charge." I 

 answered, " Quite the contrary ; I regard her conduct 

 in the worst light possible as regards Scotland, my 



