d Earl of Essex,--Robert
Carey, a distant cousin of Queen Elizabeth through her mother,--his
sister, Lady Scrope, one of the Queen's suite--and a few more, were all
active in the interest of James the Sixth of Scotland, who was
undoubtedly the true heir, if that true heir were not Sir Robert Basset.

In their way, too, there was an obstacle. And they were all intent on
getting rid of it.

King Henry the Eighth had introduced into the complicated question of
the succession one further complication, which several of his
predecessors had tried to introduce in vain. The success of all, before
him, had been at best only temporary. It took a Tudor will to do the
deed, and it took an obsequious Tudor age to accept it.

This new element was the pure will of the sovereign. Richard the First
had willed his crown to a nephew shut out by the law of
non-representation, and the attempt had failed to change the order of
succession. Edward the Third had in his life demanded the consent of
his nobility to a scheme exactly similar on behalf of his grandson, and
his plan had taken effect for twenty-three years, mainly on account of
the fact that the dispossessed heir, a protesting party in the first
case, had been a consenting party in the second. But one great element
in the success of Henry the Fourth was the return of the succession to
the old and beloved order.

The principle on which Henry the Eighth had governed for nearly forty
years was his own despotic will. And it would appear that England liked
his strong hand upon the rein. He had little claim beyond his strong
hand and (so much as he had of) his "Right Divine." Having become
accustomed to obey this man's will for thirty-eight years, when that
will altered the order of succession after the deaths of his own
children, England placidly submitted to the prospective change.

His son, Edward the Sixth, followed his father's example, and again
tried to alter the succession by will. But he had inherited only a
portion of his father's prestige. The party which would have followed
him was just the party which was not likely to struggle for its rights.
The order set up by Henry the Eighth prevailed over the change made by
Edward the Sixth.

But when Elizabeth came to die, the prestige of Henry the Eighth had
faded, and it was to her personal decision that England looked for the
settlement of the long-vexed question. The little knot of persons who
wished to secure the