; of
penny steamboats; of heavy barges on the muddy river all defiled by the
great city that presses down to its banks. St. Paul's dome, the grand
old Tower of London, and the towers and spires of Sir Christopher Wren's
"fifty new churches," pierce the smoke and the haze, and rise above the
roofs of the busiest part of the city. The only trees to be seen are the
planes on the embankment, along that waterside where the bride met the
queen. Is this a fit place for a brilliant court to come to a gay
wedding?

[Illustration: MONUMENT TO MISS ELIZABETH RUSSELL.]

Happily we know what Blackfriars was like in Elizabethan days. At
Sherbourne Castle in Dorsetshire, Lord Digby possesses a most
interesting picture supposed to be painted by Isaac Oliver, of this very
procession from the waterside. There is a pleasant background of fields
and trees with two or three fine houses standing on the wooded slopes of
Holborn hill. The queen, clad in a long-waisted dress covered with
jewels, and wearing a great ruff open at the throat, which was then only
worn by young unmarried women, is seated in a chair under a light canopy
borne by six knights. Anne Russell, the bride, walks directly behind the
litter, in huge hooped skirt of white, with a richly worked and
bejewelled bodice. She wears an open ruff like the queen's, which shows
her throat. Her mother and Lucy Harrington, Countess of Bedford, who are
her supporters, have close ruffs that cover their necks, and are dressed
in black and gray with rich jewels. Nobles splendidly habited, go
before, two and two; and ladies follow, among whom we may suppose that
the fair Bess Russell figures. Lord Herbert, the bridegroom, carries the
right end of the pole that supports the litter, and reaches his left
hand back to his pretty bride who is close behind him. Next him a slim
and exquisitely dressed figure is thought by Mr. Scharf F. S. A. to be
Sir Walter Raleigh, who had just returned with Lord Cobham from a
mission in Flanders.

After the marriage the queen dined with the wedding party at Lady
Russell's, where "the entertainment was great and plentiful; and the
mistress of the feast much commended for it." At night--for in those
days dinners were early--she went to Lord Cobham's where she supped. And

after supper came a memorable masque of eight ladies, each
clad in a skirt of cloth of silver, a rich waistcoat
wrought with silks and gold and silver, a mantle of
carnation ta