in the time of danger, which were characteristic of the Tudors. She seemed to have forgotten that she ever had a mother: but was proud to remind both herself and others that she was the daughter of a powerful monarch, of Henry VIII. On occasions of ceremony she appeared in all her splendour, accompanied by the great officers of state, and with a numerous retinue of lords and ladies dressed in their most gorgeous apparel. In reading the accounts of her court, we may sometimes fancy ourselves transported into the palace of an eastern princess. When Hentzner saw her, she was proceeding on a Sunday from her own apartment to the chapel. First appeared a number of gentlemen, barons, earls, and knights of the garter; then came the chancellor with the seals; between two lords carrying the sceptre and the sword Elizabeth followed: and wherever she cast her eyes, the spectators instantly fell on their knees. She was then in her sixty-fifth year. She wore false hair of a red colour, surmounted with a crown of gold. The wrinkles of age were imprinted on her face, her eyes were small, her teeth black, her nose prominent: the collar of the garter hung from her neck, and her bosom was uncovered, as became an unmarried queen. Behind her followed a long train of young ladies, dressed in white; and on each side stood a line of gentlemen pensioners, with their gilt battleaxes, and in splendid uniforms.

The traveller next proceeded to the diningroom. Two gentlemen entered to lay the cloth, two to bring the queen's plate, salt, and bread. All, before they approached the table, and when

they retired from it, made three genuflexions. Then came a single and a married lady, performing the same ceremonies. The first rubbed the plate with bread and salt; the second gave a morsel of meat to each of the yeomen of the guard, who brought in the different courses; and at the same time the hall echoed to the sound of twelve trumpets, and two kettle drums. But the queen dined that day in private and, after a short pause, her maids of honour entered in procession, and with much reverence and solemnity, took the dishes from the table, and carried them into an inner apartment.

Yet while she maintained this state in public and in the palace, while she taught the proudest of the nobility to feel the distance between them and their sovereign, she condescended to court the good will of the common people. In the country they had access to her at all times; neither their rudeness nor importunity appeared to offend her she received their petitions with an air of pleasure, thanked them for their expressions of attachment, and sought the opportunity of entering into private conversation with individuals. Her progresses were undoubtedly undertaken for pleasure; but she made them subservient to policy, and increased her popularity by her affability and condescension to the private inhabitants of the counties in which she made her temporary abode.

From the elevation of the throne we may now follow Elizabeth into the privacy of domestic life. Her natural abilities were great: she had studied under experienced masters; and her stock

of literature was much more ample than that of most females of the age. Like her sister Mary she possessed a knowledge of five languages; but Mary did not venture to converse in Italian, neither could she construe the Greek testament, like Elizabeth. The queen is said to have excelled on the virginals, and to have understood the most difficult music. But dancing was her principal delight; and in that exercise she displayed a grace and spirit which was universally admired. She retained her partiality for it to the last. Few days passed in which the young nobility of the court were not called to dance before their sovereign; and the queen herself condescended to perform her part in a galliard with the duke of Nevers, at the age of sixtynine.

Of her vanity the reader will have noticed several instances in the preceding pages: there remains one of a more extraordinary description. It is seldom that females have the boldness to become the heralds of their own charms; but Elizabeth, by proclamation, announced to her people, that none of the portraits, which had hitherto been taken of her person, did justice to the original: that at the request of her council she had resolved to procure an exact likeness from the pencil of some able artist; that it should soon be published for the gratification of her loving subjects: and that on this account she strictly forbade all persons whomsoever to paint or engrave any new portraits of her features without licence, or to show or publish any of the old

portraits, till they had been reformed according to the copy to be set forth by authority.

The courtiers soon discovered how greedy their sovereign was of flattery. If they sought to please, they were careful to admire; and adulation the most fulsome and extravagant was accepted by the queen with gratitude, and rewarded with bounty. Neither was her appetite for praise cloyed, it seemed rather to become more craving by enjoyment. After she had passed her grand climacteric she exacted the same homage to her faded charms as had been paid to her youth; and all who addressed her were still careful to express their admiration of her beauty in the language of oriental hyperbole.

But however highly the queen might think of her person she did not despise the aid of external ornament. At her death two, some say three, thousand dresses were found in her wardrobe, with a numerous collection of jewellery, for the most part presents, which she had received from petitioners, from her courtiers on her saint's day, at the beginning of each year, and from the noblemen and gentlemen whose houses she had honoured with her presence. To the austere notions of the bishop of London, this love of finery appeared unbecoming her age; and in his sermon he endeavoured to raise her thoughts from the ornaments of dress to the riches of heaven; but she told her ladies that, if he touched upon that subject again, she would fit him for heaven. He should walk there without a staff, and leave his mantle behind him.

In her temper Elizabeth seemed to have inhe

rited the irritability of her father. The least inattention, the slightest provocation would throw her into a passion. At all times her discourse was sprinkled with oaths: in the sallies of her anger it abounded with imprecations and abuse. Nor did she content herself with words: not only the ladies about her person, but her courtiers and the highest officers in the state felt the weight of her hands. She collared Hatton, she gave a blow on the ear to the earl marshal, and she spat on Sir Matthew with the foppery of whose

dress she was offended.

To her first parliament she had expressed a wish that on her tomb might be inscribed the title of "The virgin queen." But the woman who despised the safeguards, must be content to forfeit the reputation of chastity. It was not long before her familiarity with Dudley provoked dishonourable reports. At first they gave her pain; but her feelings were soon blunted by passion: in the face of the whole court she assigned to her supposed paramour an apartment contiguous to her own bedchamber; and by this indecent act proved that she was become regardless of her character, and callous to every sense of shame. But Dudley, though the most favoured, was not considered as her only lover: among his rivals were numbered Hatton and Raleigh, and Oxford and Blount, and Simier and Anjou: and it was afterwards believed that her licentious habits survived even when the fires of wantonness had been quenched by the chill of age. The court imitated the manners of the sovereign. It was a place in which, according to Faunt, "all enor