ne Cole, Dean of
St. Paul's, was despatched by Mary with a special commission to "lash
the heretics of Ireland." That Cole slept on his way at an inn in
Chester, the landlady of which happened to have a brother, a Protestant
then living in Dublin. This woman, hearing him boast of his commission,
watched her opportunity, and stole the commission out of his cloak-bag,
substituting for it a pack of cards. Cole unsuspiciously pursued his
way, and presenting himself authoritatively before the deputy, declared
his business and opened his bag. There, in place of the commission
against the heretics, lay the pack of cards with the knave of clubs
uppermost!

The story goes on to say that the dean raged in discomfited fury, but
that the deputy, though himself a Roman Catholic, took the matter
easily. "Let us have another commission," he said, "and meanwhile we
will shuffle the cards." The cards were effectually shuffled, for before
any further steps could be taken Mary had died.

XXIV.

WARS AGAINST SHANE O'NEILL.

Upon the 17th of November, 1558, Mary died, and upon the afternoon of
the same day Elizabeth was proclaimed queen. A new reign is always
accounted a new starting-point, and in this case the traditional method
of dividing history is certainly no misleader. The old queen had been
narrow, dull-witted, bigoted; an unhappy woman, a miserable wife,
plagued with sickness, plagued, above all, with a conscience whose
mission seems to have been to distort everything that came under its
cognizance. A woman even whose good qualities--and she had several--only
seemed to push her further and further down the path of disaster.

The new queen was twenty-six years old. Old enough, therefore, to have
realized what life meant, young enough to have almost illimitable
possibilities still unrevealed to her. No pampered royal heiress,
either, for whom the world of hard facts had no reality, and the silken
shams of a Court constituted the only standpoint, but one who had
already with steady eyes looked danger and disaster in the face and knew
them for what they were. With a realm under her hand strong already, and
destined before her death to grow stronger still; with a spirit too,
strong enough and large enough for her realm; stronger perhaps in spite
of her many littlenesses than that of any of the men she ruled over.

And Ireland? How was it affected by this change of rulers? At first
fairly well. The early months of the new reig