the English throne.--She is made prisoner
by Elizabeth.--Various plots.--Execution of Mary.--The impossibility
of settling the claims of Mary and Elizabeth.--Elizabeth's
duplicity.--Her scheming to entrap Mary.--Maiden ladies.--Their
benevolent spirit.--Elizabeth's selfishness and jealousy.--The
maids of honor.--Instance of Elizabeth's cruelty.--Her
irritable temper.--Leicester's friend and the gentleman of
the black rod.--Elizabeth in a rage.--Her invectives against
Leicester.--Leicester's chagrin.--Elizabeth's powers of
satire.--Elizabeth's views of marriage.--Her insulting conduct.--The
Dean of Christ Church and the Prayer Book.--Elizabeth's good
qualities.--Her courage.--The shot at the barge.--Elizabeth's
vanity.--Elizabeth and the embassador.--The pictures.--Elizabeth's
fondness for pomp and parade.--Summary of Elizabeth's character.

Mankind have always been very much divided in opinion in respect to the
personal character of Queen Elizabeth, but in one point all have agreed,
and that is, that in the management of public affairs she was a woman of
extraordinary talent and sagacity, combining, in a very remarkable
degree, a certain cautious good sense and prudence with the most
determined resolution and energy.

She reigned about forty years, and during almost all that time the whole
western part of the Continent of Europe was convulsed with the most
terrible conflicts between the Protestant and Catholic parties. The
predominance of power was with the Catholics, and was, of course,
hostile to Elizabeth. She had, moreover, in the field a very prominent
competitor for her throne in Mary Queen of Scots. The foreign Protestant
powers were ready to aid this claimant, and there was, besides, in her
own dominions a very powerful interest in her favor. The great
divisions of sentiment in England, and the energy with which each party
struggled against its opponents, produced, at all times, a prodigious
pressure of opposing forces, which bore heavily upon the safety of the
state and of Elizabeth's government, and threatened them with continual
danger. The administration of public affairs moved on, during all this
time, trembling continually under the heavy shocks it was constantly
receiving, like a ship staggering on in a storm, its safety depending on
the nice equilibrium between the shocks of the seas, the pressure of the
wind upon the sails, and the weight and steadiness of the ballast below.

During all this forty