be more circumspect in the handling of Mary's letters. Elizabeth had no wish to foment further disquiet in Scotland following the recent disturbances. Requests for funding Colonel William Stewart was sent as ambassador by the regime to England in April 1583 to ask for £10,000 and yearly £5000 as an income from the English lands of Matthew Stewart, 4th Earl of Lennox, and for the ratification and renewal of the 1560 Treaty of Edinburgh. The Colonel was to enquire discreetly after the succession to the English throne. Robert Bowes, the English diplomat, stayed in Edinburgh and followed events. As it seemed opportune, he was instructed by Francis Walsingham to seek out the casket letters which had been used to incriminate Queen Mary in 1568, but the Earl of Gowrie refused to hand them over. French embassy Gowrie was also courted by France, receiving in February 1583 an offer of a yearly pension of 100,000 crowns for the state, 2000 crowns personally, and a lump sum of 10,000 crowns. Two French ambassadors, Bertrand de Salignac de la Mothe-Fénelon and François de Rocherolles, Sieur de Maineville, hoped to secure French influence over James's choice of bride. James VI gave the French ambassadors an audience in the presence of William Davidson, a English diplomat who would later deliver Mary, Queen of Scots death warrant. The ambassadors intended to build a pro-French faction, and may have offered French pensions to sympathetic nobles. Maineville remained in Scotland until May 1583. His presence and unpopularity divided the Ruthven lords and weakened their support. Failure of the Gowrie Regime Gowrie's regime was ineffectually supported by Queen Elizabeth I and her Secretary Walsingham. After ten months, the king gained his freedom at St Andrews in July 1583. James VI first stayed at the New Inns of St Andrews but was persuaded to sleep in St Andrews Castle. The faction opposed to the Gowrie regime was there in strength, and the Lords Enterprisers were dismissed from court, and a number of their followers who were salaried court servants were sacked. James VI went to Stirling and Falkland Palace, then joined Arran for a banquet at Kinneil House on 13 November, and returned to Edinburgh. The Earl of Arran gained a brief ascendancy over Scottish affairs. The earl of Gowrie was pardoned, but kept plotting and was later beheaded for high treason. In November 1585, however, Arran himself was removed