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4<meta name="content" content="biography of Queen Elizabeth I (1533-1603) by Edward Spencer Beesly, 1892">
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11<title>Secondary Sources: Queen Elizabeth by Edward Spencer Beesly, 1892:
12Chapter XII</title>
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24 <td valign="top" width="50%" height="29">&nbsp;</td>
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35 <p align="center"><b><font size="7">Queen Elizabeth<br></font></b>
36 <font size="4">by Edward Spencer Beesly, 1892</font></p>
37 <p align="center">
38 <img border="2" src="eliz1-ermine.jpg" width="400" height="478" alt="'The Ermine Portrait' of Elizabeth I, c1585, by Nicholas Hilliard"><p align="center">
39 <i><font size="2">'The Ermine Portrait' of Elizabeth I, c1585, by Nicholas
40 Hilliard;<br>from the <a href="http://www.marileecody.com/eliz1-images.html">Portraits of Queen Elizabeth I</a> website</font></i></td>
41 <td width="25%" height="610"></td>
42 </tr>
43</table>
44<blockquote>
45 <blockquote>
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53 <font style="font-family: Times New Roman">
54 <div align="left">
55 <b>CHAPTER XII</b><br>
56 <b>LAST YEARS AND DEATH: 1601-1603</b></div>
57 <p align="left">THE death of Mary Stuart did something to simplify parties
58 in Scotland; and, if her son had possessed the qualities of a ruler, he
59 would have had a better chance of reducing his kingdom to order than any of
60 his predecessors, because a middle class was at length rising into
61 importance. As far as knowledge and discernment went, he was an able
62 politician, and on several occasions he showed not only skill in his
63 combinations, but--what he is not generally credited with by those who study
64 only his career in England -- considerable energy and courage. But he was
65 wanting in perseverance, and a slave to idle pleasures. He had always some
66 favourite upon whom he lavished any money that came into his hands. What was
67 needed in his own interest and that of his country was that he should
68 exercise rigid economy, develop all the forces that made for order, ally
69 himself with the burghs and lower barons, cultivate good relations with the
70 Kirk, industriously attend to all the details of government, and seize every
71 opportunity to humble the great nobles of whatever party or creed. Instead
72 of this, he tried to maintain himself by balancing rival parties, and
73 employing one nobleman to execute his vengeance on another. Instead of
74 honestly and zealously seconding the policy of Elizabeth, and so deserving
75 her confidence and support, which would have been of the utmost value to
76 him, he tried to levy blackmail on her by coquetting with Spain and the
77 Catholics. </p>
78 <p align="left">Elizabeth is accused of deliberately encouraging Scottish
79 factions in order to keep the northern kingdom weak. She certainly supported
80 Stewart, Earl of Bothwell, a turbulent and unprincipled man, while he was
81 the antagonist of the Catholic nobles who were inviting the Spaniard. But it
82 is plain that she desired nothing so much as to see James crush all
83 aristocratic disorder, and make himself master of his kingdom. Her
84 exhortations to him on this subject are full of wisdom, and expressed in
85 most stirring language. But they only produced petitions for money.
86 Notwithstanding her own difficulties, she long allowed him £3000 a year,
87 which, in 1600, was increased to £6000. But ten times that amount would have
88 done him no good, because he would immediately have squandered it. </p>
89 <p align="left">As Elizabeth grew old, James naturally became absorbed in
90 the prospect of his succession to the English crown. All Scotchmen shared
91 his eagerness. In England, feeling was almost unanimous in his favour,
92 though some of the Catholics continued to talk of the Infanta or Arabella
93 Stuart the niece of Darnley. By teasing Elizabeth to recognise his title,
94 intriguing with her courtiers, and calling on his own subjects to furnish
95 him with the means of asserting his rights, James irritated the English
96 Queen. But she had always intended that he should succeed her, and she did
97 nothing to prejudice his claim. </p>
98 <p align="left">The two leading men at the English court--Cecil and
99 Raleigh--who had been united in their hostility to Essex, were now secretly
100 competing for the favour of James. Each warned the Scottish King against the
101 other, and represented himself as the only trustworthy adviser. Cecil, from
102 his confidential relations with the Queen, had the most difficult game to
103 play, and it was not till her health was evidently failing that he ventured
104 to open private communications with James. Even then he did not dare to
105 correspond with him directly, but it was understood that everything written
106 by Lord Henry Howard (brother of the last Duke of Norfolk) was to be taken
107 as written by Cecil. To make up for his previous backwardness, he lent James
108 £10,000--a pledge of fidelity which it was out of his rival's power to
109 emulate. </p>
110 <p align="left">The long career of Elizabeth was now drawing to its close.
111 Her sun might seem to be going down in calm splendour. She had triumphed
112 over all her enemies. She might say with Virgil's heroine-- </p>
113 <blockquote>
114 <p align="left">&quot;<i>Vixi, et quem dederat cursum fortuna, peregi;<br>
115 Et nunc magna mei sub terras ibit imago</i>.&quot; </p>
116 </blockquote>
117 <p align="left">The mighty Philip had gone to his grave five years before
118 her (1598), a beaten man, having failed in Holland, failed in France, failed
119 against England. Of the three great champions who withstood him, Elizabeth,
120 if not the most distinguished by high qualities, had yet, perhaps, the
121 largest share in saving Europe from the retrograde tyranny which menaced it.
122 The glorious resistance of William of Orange covered only sixteen years
123 (1568-84). That of Henry IV can hardly be said to have had any European
124 importance before his accession to the French throne, from which date to the
125 peace of Vervins and the death of Philip is a period of nine years
126 (1589-98). But the whole of Elizabeth's long reign was spent in abating the
127 power of Spain. It was the persistent, never-relaxing pressure from an
128 unassailable enemy which wore out Philip, as it afterwards wore out
129 Bonaparte. Elizabeth had found England weak and distracted: she was leaving
130 it united and powerful. Nor was she of those to whom their due meed of
131 praise is denied during life, and accorded only by the tardy justice of
132 posterity. Her wisdom and courage were the admiration not of her own people
133 alone, but of all Europe. &quot;Her very enemies,&quot; says a French historian,
134 &quot;proclaimed her the most glorious and fortunate of all women who ever wore a
135 crown.&quot; From the point of view of public life, little or nothing was
136 wanting--so Bacon thought--to fill up the full measure of her felicity. </p>
137 <p align="left">Yet it seems that the last months of her life were clouded
138 by melancholy, and deformed by a querulous ill-temper. Some have suggested
139 that she suffered from remorse for her severity to Essex; others that she
140 felt herself out of sympathy with the Puritan tendencies of the time. It is
141 not necessary to resort to these unfounded or far-fetched suppositions to
142 account for her gloom. If we turn from her public to her private life, what
143 situation could be more profoundly pitiable? Honour and obedience, indeed,
144 still surrounded her. But that which also should accompany old age, love and
145 troops of friends, she might not look to have. Near relations she had none.
146 Alone she had chosen to live, and alone she must die. As her time
147 approached, she was haunted by the consciousness that, among all those who
148 treated her with so much reverence, there was not one who had any reason to
149 be attached to her or to care that her life should be prolonged. Those who
150 have not loved when they were young must not expect to find love when they
151 are old. While health and strength remained, she had tasted the satisfaction
152 of living her own life and playing the great game of politics, for which she
153 was exceptionally gifted. But to a woman who has passed through life without
154 knowing what it is to love or be loved, who has no memory of even an
155 unrequited affection to feed on, who has never shared a husband's joys and
156 sorrows, never borne the sweet burden of maternity, never suckled babe or
157 rocked cradle, who must finish her journey alone, sitting in the solemn
158 twilight before the last dark hour uncared for and uncaring, without the
159 cheer of children or the varied interests that gather round the family--to
160 such a one, what avails it that she has tasted the excitement of public
161 life, that she has borne a share in politics or business--what even that her
162 aims have been high or that she has done the State some service, if she has
163 renounced the crown of womanhood, and turned from their appointed use those
164 numbered years within which the female heart can find present joy and lay up
165 store of calm satisfaction for declining age? </p>
166 <p align="left">Elizabeth had always enjoyed good health, thanks to her
167 &quot;exact temperance both as to wine and diet, which, she used to say, was the
168 noblest part of physic,&quot; and her active habits. In capacity for resisting
169 bodily fatigue and freedom from nervous ailments, she was like a man. It was
170 not till the beginning of 1602 that those about her noticed any signs of
171 failing strength. She still went on hunting and dancing. In dancing she
172 excelled, and she kept it up for exercise, as many an old man keeps up his
173 skating or tennis without being exposed to ill-natured remarks. In December
174 1602 her godson Harington, an amusing person, whose company she enjoyed,
175 found her &quot;in most pitiable state,&quot; both in body and mind. &quot;She held in her
176 hand a golden cup which she often put to her lips; but in sooth her heart
177 seemeth too full to lack more filling.&quot; He read her some verses he had
178 written, &quot;whereat she smiled once,&quot; but said, &quot;When thou dost feel creeping
179 Time at thy gate, these fooleries will please thee less. I am past my relish
180 for such matters. Thou seest my bodily meat doth not suit me well. I have
181 eaten but one ill-tasted cake since yesternight.&quot; Harington hastened to send
182 a present to the King of Scots, with the inscription, &quot;<i>Domine memento mei
183 cum veneris in regnum</i>.&quot; </p>
184 <p align="left">In the same month Robert Carey, son of her cousin Lord
185 Hunsdon, visited her, and professed to think her looking well. &quot;No, Robin,&quot;
186 she said, &quot;I am not well,&quot; and then &quot;discoursed of her indisposition, and
187 that her heart had been sad and heavy for ten or twelve days, and in her
188 discourse she fetched not so few as forty or fifty great sighs. . . .
189 Hereupon I wrote to the King of Scots.&quot;(1) Her melancholy was not caused by
190 any weakening of her mind. A long letter to James, dated 5 January 1603,
191 though hardly legible, is very vigorous and characteristic. </p>
192 <p align="left">At the beginning of March1603 she became much worse. There
193 was some disease of the throat, attended with swelling and a distressing
194 formation of phlegm, which made speaking difficult. The only relatives about
195 her were Robert Carey and his sister Lady Scrope, watching keenly that they
196 might be the first to inform James of her death. She could not be brought by
197 any of her Council to take food or go to bed. When in bed she had been
198 troubled by a visual illusion; &quot;she saw her body exceedingly lean and
199 fearful in a light of fire.&quot; At last Nottingham, the Admiral, who was
200 mourning the recent death of his wife, was sent for. He was a second cousin
201 of Anne Boleyn, and was the one person to whom the dying Queen seemed to
202 cling with some trust. He induced her to take some broth. &quot;For any of the
203 rest,&quot; says her maid-of-honour, Mistress Southwell, &quot;she would not answer
204 them to any question, but said softly to my Lord Admiral's earnest
205 persuasions that if he knew what she had seen in her bed he would not
206 persuade her as he did. And Secretary Cecil, overhearing her, asked if her
207 Majesty had seen any spirits; to which she said she scorned to answer him so
208 idle a question. Then he told her how, to content the people, her Majesty
209 must go to bed. To which she smiled, wonderfully contemning him, saying that
210 the word must was not to be used to princes; and thereupon said, 'Little
211 man, little man, if your father had lived ye [he?] durst not have said so
212 much: but thou knowest I must die, and that maketh thee so presumptuous.'
213 And presently commanding him and the rest to depart her chamber, willed my
214 Lord Admiral to stay; to whom she shook her head, and with a pitiful voice
215 said, 'My Lord, I am tied with a chain of iron about my neck.' He alleging
216 her wonted courage to her, she replied, 'I am tied, and the case is altered
217 with me.'&quot; At last, &quot;what by fair means,&quot; says Carey, &quot;what by force, he got
218 her to bed.&quot; </p>
219 <p align="left">It was perfectly understood that she meant James to be her
220 successor. The Admiral now told his colleagues that she had confided her
221 intention to him just before her illness took a serious turn. Two years
222 before, in conversation with Rosni, the minister of Henry IV., she had
223 spoken of the approaching union of the Scotch and English crowns as a matter
224 of course. But it was not till a few hours before her death that her
225 councillors ventured to question her on the subject. They gave out that she
226 indicated James by a sign; and this is also asserted by Carey, who, however,
227 does not seem to have been present, though probably his sister was. Mistress
228 Southwell seems to write as an eye-witness, but betrays a Catholic bias,
229 which may cast some doubt on her testimony. &quot;The Council sent to her the
230 bishop of Canterbury and other of the prelates, upon sight of whom she was
231 much offended, cholericly rating them, bidding them be packing, saying she
232 was no atheist, but knew full well they were hedgepriests, and took it for
233 an indignity that they should speak to her. Now being given over by all, and
234 at the last gasp, keeping still her sense in everything and giving ever when
235 she spoke apt answers, though she spake very seldom, having then a sore
236 throat, she desired to wash it, that she might answer more freely to what
237 the Council demanded; which was to know whom she would have king; but they,
238 seeing her throat troubled her so much, desired her to hold up her finger
239 when they named whom liked her. Whereupon they named the king of France, the
240 king of Scotland, at which she never stirred. They named my lord Beauchamp,
241 (2) whereto she said, 'I will have no rascal's son in my seat, but one
242 worthy to be a king.' Hereupon instantly she died.&quot; (23 March, afternoon.)
243 </p>
244 <p align="left">It is certain, however, that she lived several hours after
245 this characteristic outburst. Carey says that at six o'clock in the evening
246 he went into her room with the Archbishop; that, though speechless, she
247 showed by signs that she followed his prayers, and twice desired him to
248 remain when he was going away. She died in the early hours of Thursday, 24
249 March. </p>
250 <p align="left">There have been many greater statesmen than Elizabeth. She
251 was far from being an admirable type of womanhood. She does not, in my
252 opinion, stand first even among female sovereigns, for I should put that
253 able ruler and perfect woman, Isabella of Castile, above her. I admit,
254 however, that such comparisons are apt to be unjust. Few rulers have had to
255 contend with such formidable and complicated difficulties as the English
256 Queen. Few have surmounted them so triumphantly. This is the criterion, and
257 the sufficient criterion, which determines the judgment of practical men.
258 Research, if applied with fairness and common sense, may perhaps modify, it
259 can never set aside, the popular verdict. There are writers who have made
260 the discovery that Elizabeth was a very poor ruler, selfish and wayward,
261 shortsighted, easily duped, fainthearted, rash, miserly, wasteful, and
262 swayed by the pettiest impulses of vanity, spite, and personal inclination.
263 They have not explained, and never will, how it was that a woman with all
264 these disqualifications for government should have ruled England with signal
265 success for forty-four years. Statesmen are indebted to good luck
266 occasionally, like other people. But when this explanation is offered again
267 and again with dull regularity, we are compelled to say, with one who had at
268 once the best opportunity and the highest capacity for estimating the
269 greatness of Elizabeth: &quot;It is not to closet penmen that we are to look for
270 guidance in such a case; for men of that order being keen in style, poor in
271 judgment, and partial in feeling, are no faithful witnesses as to the real
272 passages of business. It is for ministers and great officers to judge of
273 these things, and those who have handled the helm of government and been
274 acquainted with the difficulties and mysteries of State business.&quot; (Bacon,
275 <i>In felicem memoriam Elizabethœ.)</i></p>
276 <p align="left">The judgment of those who have handled the helm of
277 government is to be found in the words of her contemporary, the great
278 Henry--&quot;She was my other self:&quot; and of a greater still in the next
279 generation-&quot;Queen Elizabeth of famous memory; we need not be ashamed to call
280 her so!&quot; (Carlyle, <i>Letters and Speeches of Oliver Cromwell</i>, Speech
281 V.)</p>
282 </font>
283 <hr>
284 </font>
285 <font face="Times New Roman">
286 <p align="left"><b>Notes:</b> 1. Elizabeth made large use of the courage and
287 fidelity of her kinsmen on the Boleyn side, but she did little to advance
288 them either in rank or wealth. Hunsdon had set his heart on regaining the
289 Boleyn Earldom of Wiltshire. When he was dying, Elizabeth brought the patent
290 and robes of in earl, and laid them on his bed; but the choleric old man
291 replied, &quot;Madam, seeing you counted me not worthy of this honour while I was
292 living, I count myself unworthy of it now I am dying.&quot; 2. Son of Catherine
293 Grey by the Earl of Hertford. &quot;Rascal&quot; at that time meant a person of low
294 birth. </p>
295 </font>
296 <font style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif">
297 <p align="left"><font style="font-family: Times New Roman" size="2">From <i>
298 Queen Elizabeth</i> by Edward Spencer Beesly.&nbsp; Published in London by
299 Macmillan and Co., 1892.</font></p>
300 </font>
301 <font face="Times New Roman" size="2">
302 </blockquote>
303</blockquote>
304
305 <p align="center">
306 <a href="monarchs/eliz1.html">to the Queen
307 Elizabeth I website</a>&nbsp; /&nbsp;
308 <a href="relative/maryqos.html">to the Mary,
309 queen of Scots website</a></p>
310 <p align="center"><a href="secondary.html">
311 to Secondary Sources</a></p>
312 </font>
313
314</body>
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