Having failed to inveigle the regent into their power, the brother and
sister instructed Dacre to "sow debate" between him and his Council,
but this scheme failed also. Dacre wrote, however, to show that he was
not wanting in zeal in this behalf, saying that, being unable to
interfere with Scottish affairs in any other way, he had given rewards
to four hundred outlaws for burnings in various parts of the kingdom.*
No means proved too vile, no instrument unworthy, to be employed in the
work of destroying the regent and advancing Tudor interests. The queen
even condescended to use her truant husband, and the part played by
Angus is scarcely less reprehensible than Margaret's own, for while he
pretended to be loyal to Albany and to Scotland, he possessed himself
of every important State secret and transmitted it to his wife, in the
hope of appeasing her for his desertion. She, of course, passed on all
that she thus learned to Henry and Wolsey.

* Dacre to Wolsey; Calig. B 1, 150; B.M.


Margaret was entertained for a whole year in pomp and splendour at the
English court, feasts and revels succeeding each other in bewildering
magnificence-- luxury in vivid contrast to the misery which she had
undergone during the first months after her flight from Scotland.
Pageants, tournaments, and banquets now took the place of privation and
suffering; all that met the eye was changed, but the dark and
treacherous under-currents known to but few of her contemporaries
remained the same, and were the realities that shaped her course. In
spite, however, of plots and intrigues, Margaret's position was not
improving. Her visit to England could not be prolonged indefinitely,
and as the queen was evidently not to return to Scotland in triumph, it