probably stand for a Marie, de la part de--The thistle heads and leaves in gold at the corners were a usualdecoration of the period; compare the ceiling of the room in EdinburghCastle where James VI. was born, four months after Rizzio's murder.They also occur in documents. Dr. Gregory conjectures that sovaluable a present as a diamond cross may have been made not byRizzio, but through Rizzio by the Pope.It did not seem good to the doctor to consult Mary's lists of jewels,nor, if he had done so, would he have been any the wiser. In 1566,just before the birth of James VI., Mary had an inventory drawn up,and added the names of the persons to whom she bequeathed hertreasures in case she died in child-bed. But this inventory, hiddenamong a mass of law-papers in the Record Office, was not discoveredtill 1854, nine years after the vision of 1845, and three after itspublication by Dr. Gregory in 1851. Not till 1863 was the inventoryof 1566, discovered in 1854, published for the Bannatyne Club by Dr.Joseph Robertson.Turning to the inventory we read of a valuable present made by DavidRizzio to Mary, a tortoise of rubies, which she kept till her death,for it appears in a list made after her execution at Fotheringay. Themurdered David Rizzio left a brother Joseph. Him the queen made hersecretary, and in her will of 1566 mentions him thus:--"A Josef, pour porter a celui qui je luy ay dit, une emeraude emaillede blanc."A Josef, pour porter a celui qui je luy ai dit, dont il ranvoirquittance."Une bague garnye de vingt cinq diamens tant grands que petis."Now the diamond cross seen by the young officer in 1845 was set withdiamonds great and small, and was, in his opinion, a gift from orthrough Rizzio. "The queen wore it out of sight." Here in theinventory we have a bague (which may be a cross) of diamonds small andgreat, connected with a secret only known to Rizzio's brother and tothe queen. It is "to be carried to one whose name the queen hasspoken in her new secretary's ear" (Joseph's), "but dare not trustherself to write". "It would be idle now to seek to pry into themystery which was thus anxiously guarded," says Dr. Robertson, editorof the queen's inventories. The doctor knew nothing of the visionwhich, perhaps, so nearly pried into the mystery. There is nothinglike proof here, but there is just a presumption that the diamondsconnected with Rizzio, and secretly worn by the queen, seen in thevision of 1845, are possibly the diamonds which, had Mary died in1566, were to be carried by Joseph Rizzio to a person whose name mightnot safely be written. {35a}We now take a dream which apparently reveals a real fact occurring ata distance. It is translated from Brierre de Boismont's book, DesHallucinations {35b} (Paris, 1845). "There are," says the learnedauthor, "authentic dreams which have revealed an event occurring atthe moment, or later." These he explains by accidental coincidence,and then gives the following anecdote, as within his own intimateknowledge:--
