might appear to the world as if nothing had ruffled the even tenor of the Queen Dowager's household, and that the Princess had quitted her roof of her own accord: Three months after this expulsion of Elizabeth, the Queen Dowager died within a few days of her confinement. Before passing away, and being conscious that the end was nigh, she spoke to her faithful attendant of the sorrows which had recently been oppressing her. It is easy to see ta what she alludes.

"Two days before her death," writes Elizabeth Tyrwhyt, "she, having my Lord Admiral by the hand, spake these words! My Lady Tyrwhyt, I am not well handled, for those that be about me care not for me, but stand laughing at my grief; and the more good I will to them, the less good they will to me.' Whereupon my Lord Admiral answered, 'Why, sweetheart, I would you no hurt. And she said to him again, aloud, No, my Lord. I think so ;' and immediately she said to him, in his ear, But, my Lord, you have given me many shrewd taunts. These words, I perceived, she spake with good memory; and very sharply and earnestly, for her mind was sore unquieted.

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On the death of his wife, the Admiral, whose heart was always well under the control of his ambition, looked about to see to whom he could unite himself so as to further his advancement. Six weeks after the death of Henry he had married Catherine Parr, and six weeks after the death of Catherine Parr he was scheming to secure the hand of Lady Jane Grey. Rebuffed in this quarter by the lady's father, he bethought himself of the damsel to whom he had so often bade "good morrow" in the scanty garb which repose commands. To the match Elizabeth herself was far from averse. She had permitted those in attendance upon her to speak to her of the intentions of the Admiral, and had even employed them to correspond with the fascinating widower upon his visits to her house. Thomas Parry, one of her suite, asked her bluntly, 'Whether, if the Council would like it, she would marry with the Admiral?" to which the wary girl replied, "When that comes to pass, I will do as God shall put in my mind." Katherine Ashley. did not discourage the suit-perhaps she thought that after the fa miliarities that had taken place it was a very fitting termination to the flirtation of the past. She told Elizabeth that the Admiral would far rather have married her than the late Queen had he had his own will. "How did she know that?" asked Elizabeth. Then she said, "She knew it well enough both by himself and by others." Another time she said, "You shall see, shortly, that he that would fain have had you before he married the Queen will come now to woo you." The governess was right; the Admiral came to woo the Princess, and did not find her cruel. The intended marriage, however, attracted the attention of the Council, and it was considered most dangerous to the interests of the country that a man so grasping and unscrupulous as was the Admiral should be permitted to strengthen his position by an alliance with one who

stood so near the throne. Elizabeth was sent for by the Council and subjected to a severe examination; but the clever girl knew how to fence with her inquisitors and to divulge no more than she desired. "In no way," writes Sir Robert Tyrwhit, one of her examiners, to the Lord Protector, "will she confess any practice by Mrs. Ashley or the cofferer Parry concerning my Lord Admiral, and yet I do see it in her face that she is guilty, and do perceive as yet she will abide more storms ere she accuse Mrs. Áshley." On the following day Sir Robert, "by gentle persuasion," gained a few additional particulars from her. "But I do assure your Grace," he writes to Somerset, "she hath a very good wit, and nothing is gotten of her but by great policy." In spite, however, of his "great policy," Elizabeth had no intention of being pumped beyond a certain point. "My Lady's Grace," dolefully writes Sir Robert, "doth plainly deny that she knoweth any more than she hath already opened to me. I do verily believe that there hath been some secret promise between my lady, Mrs. Ashley, and the cofferer never to confess to death; and if it be so it will never be gotten of her but either by the King's Majesty or else by your Grace." Irritated that he, a man of the world and accustomed to command, should be baffled by a smart bold girl in her teens, Sir Robert now proceeded to terrify Elizabeth into admitting the charge he wished to bring against the Admiral. He told her how her fair fame had been dragged through the mire, and how grave were the reports circulated about her. It had been said that she had already given to the Admiral all that it was in her power to give, and that she was even now quick with the fruits of such sinful intimacy. Here Sir Robert in trying to prove too much had overshot the mark, and his indignant witness was not slow to take advantage of the false position in which he had now placed himself. Elizabeth wrote to the Lord Protector :

"Master Tyrwhit and others," she said, "have told me that there goeth rumors abroad which be greatly both against my honor and honesty (which above all other things I esteem), which be these-that I am in the Tower, and with child by my Lord Admiral. My lord, these are shameful slanders, for the which, besides the great desire I have to see the King's Majesty, I shall most heartily desire your Lordship that I may come to the Court, after your first determination, that I may show myself there as I am."

Her prayer was not acceded to, and Sir Robert still essayed his utmost to wring from her some admission which would bring the bold suitor to the block. It was in vain.

"Her Grace," he writes, "will in no wise confess that either before or after that Kate Ashley spoke to her touching the marriage betwixt her and my Lord Admiral, than which I think nothing more untrue, and do well perceive that she will no more accuse Mistress Ashley than she will her own self. If your Grace did know all my persuasions with her, all manner of ways, weighing her honor and surety one way, and the danger to the country, your Grace would not a little marvel that she will no more cough out matter than she doth."

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Elizabeth, however, refused to."cough" out anything, and her obstinacy was imitated by those attached to the household. They all sing one song," cries the disappointed Councilor, "and so I think they would not do unless they had set the note before for surely they would confess, or else they could not so well agree." The scanty confession was, however, considered by the Council sufficient to serve their purpose. The Lord Admiral was charged with having "attempted and gone about to marry the King's Majesty's sister, the Lady Elizabeth, second inheritor in remainder to the crown;" he was accused of high treason, tried, condemned and executed. Edward then coldly records the death of his uncle in his diary. "The Lord Sudeley, Admiral of England, was condemned to death, and died the March ensuing."

The blow fell severely upon Elizabeth; she "drooped," and for some time declined to be comforted. In this affection for the Lord Admiral, the only man for whom she ever exhibited any real feeling, have we not the true reason why in after-life she shunned all matrimonial proposals? Such an interpretation of her conduct is not improbable. A proud and imperious woman who had given her heart to a man, who had permitted him a license which should not have occurred, who had been harshly cross-examined as to her conduct, and who had seen her lover torn from her arms and put to a shameful death, may well have declined to erase the event from her memory, or to permit another to make her forget her sorrows. The name of woman may be frailty, yet there have been daughters of the sex who have been constant to the memory of their first love, and more especially when such love has been connected with a sad and painful end. We read that Elizabeth could never bear to hear the Lord Admiral "discommended, but she is ready to make answer therein."

Elizabeth was now intrusted to the care of Lady Tyrwhit.

"Katherine Ashley," said the Council to the bereaved Princess, "who heretofore hath had the special charge to see to the good education and government of your person, hath shown herself far unmeet to occupy any such place longer about your Grace; and we thereby thought convenient to send unto you the Lady Tyrwhit, to remain about you in lieu of the said Ashley, and to commit unto her the same charge about your person that Ashley had."

"She

This change was at first far from appreciated by Elizabeth. took the matter so heavily that she wept all that night, and loured all the next day," she declined to listen to advice, and remained sulkily aloof. Gradually this obstinacy gave way before the sterling excellence of Lady Tyrwhit, and a strong feeling of friendship sprung up between the two ladies. The new governess was a most estimable creature, while the mental anguish which Elizabeth had of late undergone had greatly softened her character. We read that she was most earnest in her devotions, and diligently paid heed to all good counsel that was given her. Among the maxims drawn

up by Lady Tyrwhit for her pupil were the following: "Use invo cation of God's holy name. Think upon the needy once a day. Further the just suit of the poor. Help to pacify displeasure. Kill anger with patience. Make much of modesty. Be always one. Favor the friendless. Look chiefly to yourself. Once you were not here. Away you must, and turn to dust."

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Elizabeth was now seventeen; she was mistress of a liberal establishment, and her education was well-nigh finished. From her Household Book we are let into the secret of her expenditure. Her income was equal to some £30,000 of our money, and permitted her to live in a state becoming her rank. Like many persons whose intellectual powers are well developed, the Princess was a gourmet, and a large portion of her handsome allowance was spent on good living. Wheat could be bought in those days at twenty shillings a quarter, yet the bakehouse of her Royal Highness cost her over £200, or £1,200 of our money. The expense of her kitchen came to nearly £600 poultry cost her over £300; wax and candles are entered at £350; coals and wood came to £200 ; her “ sauce " (a comprehensive item including vegetables) stands at £20; beer and wine cost her over £300; the wages and liveries of her retainers are charged at over £400. She was waited on by thirteen gentlemen of the body, to each of whom was presented a coat which cost forty shillings; when we remember that money in those days is represented by six times the amount at the present time, we shall find that Elizabeth spent upon her household expenditure no less than some fifteen thousand a year. Some of the items entered in her household book strike us as very small compared with the sums she spent upon poultry and wax lights. Her charities of the year are put down at £7 158. 8d., nearly a third of what she spent upon 66 sauce." "court milliner" of the period must have found her Royal Highness one of the shabbiest of her customers, for the Princess was indifferent to the charm of dress, and we read that "the maidenly apparel which she used in her brother's time made the noblemen's wives and daughters ashamed to be dressed and painted like peacocks." Husbands who are called upon to settle the "little bills" of the great milliners of to-day would be only too happy to find such a modest item in their wives' accounts as the following: "To making a pair of upper bodies for her Grace 12 pence; lining 15 pence; silk 4 pence;" even multiply this expenditure by six, and it can scarcely be considered alarming for a princess of the blood. Elizabeth could, however, occasionally launch forth, for we see that sometimes she paid thirty shillings a yard for black velvet, or nine pounds of our present money.

The

Study, however, was the great resource of the Princess. Ascham had been appointed her tutor, and under his scholarly supervision her progress was most rapid. In these days, what with schoolboards, middle-class examinations, text-books on every conceivable

subject, and "the higher education of women," we expect much from the female mind; yet even a very advanced damsel of the period would find it difficult to hold her own in accomplishments against the Princess Elizabeth. According to the proud and admiring Ascham, his pupil, at the age of seventeen, could speak French and Italian as well as she spoke English; she could talk Latin fluently, and read Greek fairly well; she was well read in theology; she was fond of mathematics and philosophy; she was no mere proficient in music; and her handwriting was exquisite. She not only read the classical authors, but she appreciated them, criticising their style, and weighing their merits. Her taste for culture followed her to the throne, and amid the grave affairs of government. When placed in power, Ascham thus expresses his admiration of the studious habits of Elizabeth in contradistinction to the idleness and frivolity of la jeunesse dorée attached to the Court.

"It is your shame," he writes, ("I speak to you, all you young gentlemen of England), that one maid should go beyond you all in excellency of learning and knowledge of diverse tongues. Point fort six of the best given gentlemen of this Court, and all they together show not so much good will, spend not so much time, bestow not so many hours, daily, orderly, and constantly for the increase of learning and knowledge, as doth the Queen's Majesty herself. Yea, I believe that besides her perfect readiness in Latin, Italian, French, and Spanish, she readeth here now at Windsor more Greek every day than some prebendary of this Church doth read Latin in a whole week."

The intrigues of politics. were now for a time to interfere with the quiet of her student life. The reign of Edward was rapidly drawing to a close. The boy had always been sickly, and he was now so weak that it was remarked that the chain of gold which he wore around his neck, "which was then held a kingly ornament," caused his feeble body to bow. One morning, while heated by playing tennis, he drank a deep draught of cold water, which resulted in his system catching a severe chill. Consumption set in; the King was harassed by a hacking cough; sleep could only be produced by the aid of narcotics; his legs began to swell, his hair fell off, and the fevered skin peeled off in patches. Then the end came; the royal lad, who had been called by the Reformers "a youth of much promise," and by the Ritualists "a young tiger cub," was spared further suffering and passed away. The events that followed are known to us all. The bequest of the Crown to Lady Jane Grey through the wiles of the Duke of Northumberland, the result of the conspiracy, the accession of Mary, “and thus was the matter ended without bloodshed, which men feared would have brought the death of many thousands." We have a portrait of Queen Mary at this time, which has only recently seen the light through the investigations of Mr. Rawdon Brown amid the Venetian State Papers. Giacomo Soranzo was embassador