enance,--a
trait, by the way, which stands on other and better authority than this
infamous letter. That her temper was so furious that it was dreadful to
attend upon her;--that she had broken the finger of one lady, and
afterwards pretended to the courtiers that it was done by the fall of a
chandelier, and that she had cut another across the hand with a
knife;--stories very probably not entirely unfounded in fact, since we
find the earl of Huntingdon complaining, in a letter still preserved in
the British Museum, that the queen, on some quarrel, had pinched his
wife "very sorely." That she interfered in an arbitrary manner with the
marriage of one of the countess of Shrewsbury's daughters, and wanted to
engross the disposal of all the heiresses in the kingdom;--in which
charge there was also some truth. This insulting epistle concluded with
assurances of the extreme anxiety of the writer to see a good
understanding restored between herself and Elizabeth.

Meantime, the most alarming manifestations of the inveterate hostility
of the persecuted papists against the queen, continued to agitate the
minds of a people who loved and honored her; and who anticipated with
well founded horror the succession of another Mary, which seemed
inevitable in the event of her death. A book was written by a Romish
priest, exhorting the female attendants of her majesty to emulate the
merit and glory of Judith by inflicting on her the fate of Holophernes.
Dr. Allen, afterwards cardinal, published a work to justify and
recommend the murder of a heretic prince; and by this piece a gentleman
of the name of Parry was confirmed, it is said, in the black design
which he had several times revolved in his mind, but relinquished as
often from misgivings of conscience.

In the history of this person there are some circumstances very
remarkable. He was a man of considerable learning, but, being vicious
and needy, had some years before this time committed a robbery, for
which he had received the royal pardon. Afterwards he went abroad, and
was reconciled to the Romish church, though employed at the same time by
the ministers of Elizabeth to give intelligence respecting the English
exiles, whom he often recommended to pardon or favor, and sometimes
apparently with success. Returning home, he gained access to the queen,
who admitted him to several private interviews; and he afterwards
declared, that fearing he might be tempted to put in act the bloody
p