<P> Portraits of Mary show that she had a small, oval - shaped head, a long, graceful neck, bright auburn hair, hazel - brown eyes, under heavy lowered eyelids and finely arched brows, smooth pale skin, a high forehead, and regular, firm features . She was considered a pretty child and later, as a woman, strikingly attractive . At some point in her infancy or childhood, she caught smallpox, but it did not mark her features . </P> <P> Mary was eloquent and especially tall by sixteenth - century standards (she attained an adult height of 5 feet 11 inches or 1.80 m), while Henry II's son and heir, Francis, stuttered and was abnormally short . Henry commented that "from the very first day they met, my son and she got on as well together as if they had known each other for a long time". On 4 April 1558, Mary signed a secret agreement bequeathing Scotland and her claim to England to the French crown if she died without issue . Twenty days later, she married the Dauphin at Notre Dame de Paris, and he became king consort of Scotland . </P> <P> In November 1558, Henry VIII's elder daughter, Mary I of England, was succeeded by her only surviving sibling, Elizabeth I. Under the Third Succession Act, passed in 1543 by the Parliament of England, Elizabeth was recognised as her sister's heir, and Henry VIII's last will and testament had excluded the Stuarts from succeeding to the English throne . Yet, in the eyes of many Catholics, Elizabeth was illegitimate, and Mary Stuart, as the senior descendant of Henry VIII's elder sister, was the rightful queen of England . Henry II of France proclaimed his eldest son and daughter - in - law king and queen of England, and in France the royal arms of England were quartered with those of Francis and Mary . Mary's claim to the English throne was a perennial sticking point between her and Elizabeth I . </P> <P> When Henry II died on 10 July 1559 from injuries sustained in a joust, fifteen - year - old Francis and sixteen - year - old Mary became king and queen of France . Two of the Queen's uncles, the Duke of Guise and the Cardinal of Lorraine, were now dominant in French politics, enjoying an ascendancy called by some historians la tyrannie Guisienne . </P>

Why did mary queen of scots have claim to english throne
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