 Harper Audio presents Queen of Scots, written and read by John Guy. Mary Stuart was born in the coldest of winters. Snow blanketed the ground, and the narrow pathways and rough winding tracks between England and Scotland were completely blocked. The cattle that roamed the lowlands and the valleys of the border region during the summer months were crouching in their low stone buyers. The river Tweed, often a raging torrent as it flowed to the sea at Berwick upon Tweed on the eastern side of the border, was frozen over. Whereas it normally took a rider five or six days to carry important dispatches from Edinburgh to London, the news of Mary's birth took four days to reach Annick in Northumberland, only a few miles south of Berwick. The new baby was the only daughter and sole surviving heir of James the Fifth of Scotland and his second Queen, Mary of Geese. She was born at Linlithgow Palace, some 17 miles west of Edinburgh, on Friday, December the 8th, 1542. The deep frost scarcely troubled the occupants of the Queen's suite on the third floor of the northwest tower of the palace. James the Fifth had lavish tastes and sought to introduce the latest Renaissance styles. The windows of the palace were glazed, the ceilings painted, the stonework and woodwork intricately carved with crowns and thistles. In the great hall and throughout the dozen or so rooms of the Royal Apartments, logs blazed in the fireplaces. Linlithgow, along with Falkland in Five, was a favourite lodging of Mary of Geese. She had helped to redesign both palaces like French Chateau. This was hardly surprising because she was herself French. She was the widowed Duchess of Longview, the eldest daughter of Claude Duke of Geese and his wife Antoinette of Bourbon. The Geese were one of the most powerful noble families in France. Mary Stewart was born at a turning point in history. Only two weeks before, on November the 24th, her father's forces had been routed by the English at the Battle of Solway Moss. To the Scots, England was the old enemy. Relations between the two neighbours had smouldered since Edward I had claimed the feudal overlordship of Scotland and tried to annex the country in the 1290s. The Scots sought French and Papal support and fostered a hardy patriotism in defence of their kingdom's independence. Border skirmishes were the norm. Outright war was the exception, not least because the two countries were so unequally matched. England was so much richer and more powerful than its northern neighbour. The only Scottish town of any size was Edinburgh, where 13,000 people lived. This was, at most, a fifth of London's population. It was far easier to raise taxes and levy troops in England than in Scotland since the machinery of government was more centralised and the chain of command more efficient. A set-piece battle would almost inevitably end in a crushing defeat for the Scots. The wars within the British Isles had resumed under Henry VIII who came to the English throne in 1509. Henry was a strong leader. He saw himself as an English patriot and also as a military strategist. His ambition was to resume the Hundred Years' War against France and to win conquests there. If Henry sought to conquer French territory, he had to deal first with Scotland, France's old ally and England's backdoor. A popular rhyme quipped, who that intended France to win with Scotland let him begin. Henry was fond of quoting it and he put its lessons into practice. Typically, the defeat of the Scots at Solway Moss was less the result of a full-scale English invasion than of a border skirmish that went tragically wrong. The disaster stemmed less from Henry VIII's aggression than from James V's decision to launch a counterattack on an epic scale without choosing the ground or the moment carefully enough. In reaction to the incursions of English forces led by the Duke of Norfolk, James sent an army to pillage the disputed territory to the north and east of Carlisle known as the debatable land. His troops forwarded the River Esk at low tide. When they returned, it was high tide and they were caught between the river and a bog. Forced to retreat by a smaller but better-disciplined English battalion, the Scots was snared. Around 1200 were taken prisoner, including 23 important nobles and lads who were dispatched as hostages to London, where they were put in the tower. James V felt a deep psychological... Sample complete. Ready to continue?