fate so tragic; those two ominous personages, the deposed little
archbishop-elector of Cologne, with his melancholy face, and the unlucky
Don Antonio, Pretender of Portugal, for whom, dead or alive, thirty
thousand crowns and a dukedom were perpetually offered by Philip II.;
young Maurice of Nassau, the future controller of European destinies;
great counsellors of state, gentlemen, guardsmen, and portcullis-herald,
with the coat of arms of Elizabeth, rode in solemn procession along. Then
great Leicester himself, "most princelike in the robes of his order,"
guarded by a troop of burghers, and by his own fifty halberd-men in
scarlet cloaks trimmed with white and purple velvet, pranced gorgeously
by.

The ancient cathedral, built on the spot where Saint Willebrod had once
ministered, with its light, tapering, brick tower, three hundred and
sixty feet in height, its exquisitely mullioned windows, and its
elegantly foliaged columns, soon received the glittering throng. Hence,
after due religious ceremonies, and an English sermon from Master
Knewstubs, Leicester's chaplain, was a solemn march back again to the
palace, where a stupendous banquet was already laid in the great hall.

On the dais at the upper end of the table, blazing with plate and
crystal, stood the royal chair, with the Queen's plate and knife and fork
before it, exactly as if she had been present, while Leicester's trencher
and stool were set respectfully quite at the edge of the board. In the
neighbourhood of this post of honour sat Count Maurice, the Elector, the
Pretender, and many illustrious English personages, with the fair Agnes
Mansfeld, Princess Chimay, the daughters of William the Silent, and other
dames of high degree.

Before the covers were removed, came limping up to the dais grim-visaged
Martin Schenk, freshly wounded, but triumphant, from the sack of Werll,
and black John Norris, scarcely cured of the spearwounds in his face and
breast received at the relief of Grave. The sword of knighthood was laid
upon the shoulder of each hero, by the Earl of Leicester, as her
Majesty's vicegerent; and then the ushers marshalled the mighty feast.
Meats in the shape of lions, tigers, dragons, and leopards, flanked by
peacocks, swans, pheasants, and turkeys "in their natural feathers as in
their greatest pride," disappeared, course after course, sonorous metal
blowing meanwhile the most triumphant airs. After the banquet came
dancing, vaulting, tumbling;