MARY STEWART was born at Linlithgow on December 8th, the Festival of the Immaculate Conception, 1542, sole heiress of one of the most splendid families, and one of the greatest misfortunes in Europe. The Crown of Scotland had been in the possession of the family of Stewart for more than two hundred years, for it came with the marriage of Margery, daughter of Robert Bruce, to Walter Stewart in 1315. All of the monarchs of this family had been notable men, expressing in their persons and their actions the highest ideals of the times in which they lived. Nearly all of them had suffered violent deaths.<br />JAMES I, the graceful and elegant author of &ldquo;The King&rsquo;s Quair,&rdquo; and by some considered the ablest of the Scottish sovereigns, was brutally murdered by a conspiracy of his nobles in February, 1446.