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11 | <title>Secondary Sources: Queen Elizabeth by Edward Spencer Beesly, 1892:
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12 | Chapter XII</title>
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23 | <td width="25%" height="29"></td>
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29 | <td width="50%" height="3"><font size="3"></font></td>
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33 | <td width="25%" height="610"></td>
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34 | <td valign="top" width="50%" height="610">
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35 | <p align="center"><b><font size="7">Queen Elizabeth<br></font></b>
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36 | <font size="4">by Edward Spencer Beesly, 1892</font></p>
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37 | <p align="center">
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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">
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39 | <i><font size="2">'The Ermine Portrait' of Elizabeth I, c1585, by Nicholas
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40 | Hilliard;<br>from the <a href="http://www.marileecody.com/eliz1-images.html">Portraits of Queen Elizabeth I</a> website</font></i></td>
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41 | <td width="25%" height="610"></td>
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42 | </tr>
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43 | </table>
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44 | <blockquote>
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45 | <blockquote>
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54 | <div align="left">
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55 | <b>CHAPTER XII</b><br>
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56 | <b>LAST YEARS AND DEATH: 1601-1603</b></div>
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57 | <p align="left">THE death of Mary Stuart did something to simplify parties
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58 | in Scotland; and, if her son had possessed the qualities of a ruler, he
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59 | would have had a better chance of reducing his kingdom to order than any of
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60 | his predecessors, because a middle class was at length rising into
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61 | importance. As far as knowledge and discernment went, he was an able
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62 | politician, and on several occasions he showed not only skill in his
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63 | combinations, but--what he is not generally credited with by those who study
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64 | only his career in England -- considerable energy and courage. But he was
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65 | wanting in perseverance, and a slave to idle pleasures. He had always some
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66 | favourite upon whom he lavished any money that came into his hands. What was
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67 | needed in his own interest and that of his country was that he should
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68 | exercise rigid economy, develop all the forces that made for order, ally
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69 | himself with the burghs and lower barons, cultivate good relations with the
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70 | Kirk, industriously attend to all the details of government, and seize every
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71 | opportunity to humble the great nobles of whatever party or creed. Instead
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72 | of this, he tried to maintain himself by balancing rival parties, and
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73 | employing one nobleman to execute his vengeance on another. Instead of
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74 | honestly and zealously seconding the policy of Elizabeth, and so deserving
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75 | her confidence and support, which would have been of the utmost value to
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76 | him, he tried to levy blackmail on her by coquetting with Spain and the
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77 | Catholics. </p>
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78 | <p align="left">Elizabeth is accused of deliberately encouraging Scottish
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79 | factions in order to keep the northern kingdom weak. She certainly supported
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80 | Stewart, Earl of Bothwell, a turbulent and unprincipled man, while he was
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81 | the antagonist of the Catholic nobles who were inviting the Spaniard. But it
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82 | is plain that she desired nothing so much as to see James crush all
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83 | aristocratic disorder, and make himself master of his kingdom. Her
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84 | exhortations to him on this subject are full of wisdom, and expressed in
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85 | most stirring language. But they only produced petitions for money.
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86 | Notwithstanding her own difficulties, she long allowed him £3000 a year,
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87 | which, in 1600, was increased to £6000. But ten times that amount would have
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88 | done him no good, because he would immediately have squandered it. </p>
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89 | <p align="left">As Elizabeth grew old, James naturally became absorbed in
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90 | the prospect of his succession to the English crown. All Scotchmen shared
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91 | his eagerness. In England, feeling was almost unanimous in his favour,
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92 | though some of the Catholics continued to talk of the Infanta or Arabella
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93 | Stuart the niece of Darnley. By teasing Elizabeth to recognise his title,
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94 | intriguing with her courtiers, and calling on his own subjects to furnish
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95 | him with the means of asserting his rights, James irritated the English
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96 | Queen. But she had always intended that he should succeed her, and she did
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97 | nothing to prejudice his claim. </p>
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98 | <p align="left">The two leading men at the English court--Cecil and
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99 | Raleigh--who had been united in their hostility to Essex, were now secretly
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100 | competing for the favour of James. Each warned the Scottish King against the
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101 | other, and represented himself as the only trustworthy adviser. Cecil, from
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102 | his confidential relations with the Queen, had the most difficult game to
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103 | play, and it was not till her health was evidently failing that he ventured
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104 | to open private communications with James. Even then he did not dare to
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105 | correspond with him directly, but it was understood that everything written
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106 | by Lord Henry Howard (brother of the last Duke of Norfolk) was to be taken
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107 | as written by Cecil. To make up for his previous backwardness, he lent James
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108 | £10,000--a pledge of fidelity which it was out of his rival's power to
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109 | emulate. </p>
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110 | <p align="left">The long career of Elizabeth was now drawing to its close.
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111 | Her sun might seem to be going down in calm splendour. She had triumphed
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112 | over all her enemies. She might say with Virgil's heroine-- </p>
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113 | <blockquote>
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114 | <p align="left">"<i>Vixi, et quem dederat cursum fortuna, peregi;<br>
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115 | Et nunc magna mei sub terras ibit imago</i>." </p>
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116 | </blockquote>
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117 | <p align="left">The mighty Philip had gone to his grave five years before
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118 | her (1598), a beaten man, having failed in Holland, failed in France, failed
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119 | against England. Of the three great champions who withstood him, Elizabeth,
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120 | if not the most distinguished by high qualities, had yet, perhaps, the
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121 | largest share in saving Europe from the retrograde tyranny which menaced it.
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122 | The glorious resistance of William of Orange covered only sixteen years
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123 | (1568-84). That of Henry IV can hardly be said to have had any European
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124 | importance before his accession to the French throne, from which date to the
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125 | peace of Vervins and the death of Philip is a period of nine years
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126 | (1589-98). But the whole of Elizabeth's long reign was spent in abating the
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127 | power of Spain. It was the persistent, never-relaxing pressure from an
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128 | unassailable enemy which wore out Philip, as it afterwards wore out
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129 | Bonaparte. Elizabeth had found England weak and distracted: she was leaving
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130 | it united and powerful. Nor was she of those to whom their due meed of
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131 | praise is denied during life, and accorded only by the tardy justice of
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132 | posterity. Her wisdom and courage were the admiration not of her own people
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133 | alone, but of all Europe. "Her very enemies," says a French historian,
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134 | "proclaimed her the most glorious and fortunate of all women who ever wore a
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135 | crown." From the point of view of public life, little or nothing was
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136 | wanting--so Bacon thought--to fill up the full measure of her felicity. </p>
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137 | <p align="left">Yet it seems that the last months of her life were clouded
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138 | by melancholy, and deformed by a querulous ill-temper. Some have suggested
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139 | that she suffered from remorse for her severity to Essex; others that she
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140 | felt herself out of sympathy with the Puritan tendencies of the time. It is
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141 | not necessary to resort to these unfounded or far-fetched suppositions to
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142 | account for her gloom. If we turn from her public to her private life, what
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143 | situation could be more profoundly pitiable? Honour and obedience, indeed,
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144 | still surrounded her. But that which also should accompany old age, love and
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145 | troops of friends, she might not look to have. Near relations she had none.
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146 | Alone she had chosen to live, and alone she must die. As her time
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147 | approached, she was haunted by the consciousness that, among all those who
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148 | treated her with so much reverence, there was not one who had any reason to
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149 | be attached to her or to care that her life should be prolonged. Those who
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150 | have not loved when they were young must not expect to find love when they
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151 | are old. While health and strength remained, she had tasted the satisfaction
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152 | of living her own life and playing the great game of politics, for which she
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153 | was exceptionally gifted. But to a woman who has passed through life without
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154 | knowing what it is to love or be loved, who has no memory of even an
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155 | unrequited affection to feed on, who has never shared a husband's joys and
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156 | sorrows, never borne the sweet burden of maternity, never suckled babe or
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157 | rocked cradle, who must finish her journey alone, sitting in the solemn
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158 | twilight before the last dark hour uncared for and uncaring, without the
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159 | cheer of children or the varied interests that gather round the family--to
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160 | such a one, what avails it that she has tasted the excitement of public
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161 | life, that she has borne a share in politics or business--what even that her
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162 | aims have been high or that she has done the State some service, if she has
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163 | renounced the crown of womanhood, and turned from their appointed use those
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164 | numbered years within which the female heart can find present joy and lay up
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165 | store of calm satisfaction for declining age? </p>
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166 | <p align="left">Elizabeth had always enjoyed good health, thanks to her
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167 | "exact temperance both as to wine and diet, which, she used to say, was the
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168 | noblest part of physic," and her active habits. In capacity for resisting
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169 | bodily fatigue and freedom from nervous ailments, she was like a man. It was
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170 | not till the beginning of 1602 that those about her noticed any signs of
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171 | failing strength. She still went on hunting and dancing. In dancing she
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172 | excelled, and she kept it up for exercise, as many an old man keeps up his
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173 | skating or tennis without being exposed to ill-natured remarks. In December
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174 | 1602 her godson Harington, an amusing person, whose company she enjoyed,
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175 | found her "in most pitiable state," both in body and mind. "She held in her
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176 | hand a golden cup which she often put to her lips; but in sooth her heart
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177 | seemeth too full to lack more filling." He read her some verses he had
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178 | written, "whereat she smiled once," but said, "When thou dost feel creeping
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179 | Time at thy gate, these fooleries will please thee less. I am past my relish
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180 | for such matters. Thou seest my bodily meat doth not suit me well. I have
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181 | eaten but one ill-tasted cake since yesternight." Harington hastened to send
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182 | a present to the King of Scots, with the inscription, "<i>Domine memento mei
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183 | cum veneris in regnum</i>." </p>
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184 | <p align="left">In the same month Robert Carey, son of her cousin Lord
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185 | Hunsdon, visited her, and professed to think her looking well. "No, Robin,"
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186 | she said, "I am not well," and then "discoursed of her indisposition, and
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187 | that her heart had been sad and heavy for ten or twelve days, and in her
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188 | discourse she fetched not so few as forty or fifty great sighs. . . .
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189 | Hereupon I wrote to the King of Scots."(1) Her melancholy was not caused by
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190 | any weakening of her mind. A long letter to James, dated 5 January 1603,
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191 | though hardly legible, is very vigorous and characteristic. </p>
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192 | <p align="left">At the beginning of March1603 she became much worse. There
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193 | was some disease of the throat, attended with swelling and a distressing
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194 | formation of phlegm, which made speaking difficult. The only relatives about
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195 | her were Robert Carey and his sister Lady Scrope, watching keenly that they
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196 | might be the first to inform James of her death. She could not be brought by
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197 | any of her Council to take food or go to bed. When in bed she had been
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198 | troubled by a visual illusion; "she saw her body exceedingly lean and
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199 | fearful in a light of fire." At last Nottingham, the Admiral, who was
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200 | mourning the recent death of his wife, was sent for. He was a second cousin
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201 | of Anne Boleyn, and was the one person to whom the dying Queen seemed to
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202 | cling with some trust. He induced her to take some broth. "For any of the
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203 | rest," says her maid-of-honour, Mistress Southwell, "she would not answer
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204 | them to any question, but said softly to my Lord Admiral's earnest
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205 | persuasions that if he knew what she had seen in her bed he would not
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206 | persuade her as he did. And Secretary Cecil, overhearing her, asked if her
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207 | Majesty had seen any spirits; to which she said she scorned to answer him so
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208 | idle a question. Then he told her how, to content the people, her Majesty
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209 | must go to bed. To which she smiled, wonderfully contemning him, saying that
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210 | the word must was not to be used to princes; and thereupon said, 'Little
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211 | man, little man, if your father had lived ye [he?] durst not have said so
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212 | much: but thou knowest I must die, and that maketh thee so presumptuous.'
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213 | And presently commanding him and the rest to depart her chamber, willed my
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214 | Lord Admiral to stay; to whom she shook her head, and with a pitiful voice
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215 | said, 'My Lord, I am tied with a chain of iron about my neck.' He alleging
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216 | her wonted courage to her, she replied, 'I am tied, and the case is altered
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217 | with me.'" At last, "what by fair means," says Carey, "what by force, he got
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218 | her to bed." </p>
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219 | <p align="left">It was perfectly understood that she meant James to be her
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220 | successor. The Admiral now told his colleagues that she had confided her
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221 | intention to him just before her illness took a serious turn. Two years
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222 | before, in conversation with Rosni, the minister of Henry IV., she had
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223 | spoken of the approaching union of the Scotch and English crowns as a matter
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224 | of course. But it was not till a few hours before her death that her
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225 | councillors ventured to question her on the subject. They gave out that she
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226 | indicated James by a sign; and this is also asserted by Carey, who, however,
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227 | does not seem to have been present, though probably his sister was. Mistress
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228 | Southwell seems to write as an eye-witness, but betrays a Catholic bias,
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229 | which may cast some doubt on her testimony. "The Council sent to her the
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230 | bishop of Canterbury and other of the prelates, upon sight of whom she was
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231 | much offended, cholericly rating them, bidding them be packing, saying she
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232 | was no atheist, but knew full well they were hedgepriests, and took it for
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233 | an indignity that they should speak to her. Now being given over by all, and
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234 | at the last gasp, keeping still her sense in everything and giving ever when
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235 | she spoke apt answers, though she spake very seldom, having then a sore
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236 | throat, she desired to wash it, that she might answer more freely to what
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237 | the Council demanded; which was to know whom she would have king; but they,
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238 | seeing her throat troubled her so much, desired her to hold up her finger
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239 | when they named whom liked her. Whereupon they named the king of France, the
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240 | king of Scotland, at which she never stirred. They named my lord Beauchamp,
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241 | (2) whereto she said, 'I will have no rascal's son in my seat, but one
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242 | worthy to be a king.' Hereupon instantly she died." (23 March, afternoon.)
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243 | </p>
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244 | <p align="left">It is certain, however, that she lived several hours after
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245 | this characteristic outburst. Carey says that at six o'clock in the evening
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246 | he went into her room with the Archbishop; that, though speechless, she
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247 | showed by signs that she followed his prayers, and twice desired him to
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248 | remain when he was going away. She died in the early hours of Thursday, 24
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249 | March. </p>
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250 | <p align="left">There have been many greater statesmen than Elizabeth. She
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251 | was far from being an admirable type of womanhood. She does not, in my
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252 | opinion, stand first even among female sovereigns, for I should put that
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253 | able ruler and perfect woman, Isabella of Castile, above her. I admit,
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254 | however, that such comparisons are apt to be unjust. Few rulers have had to
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255 | contend with such formidable and complicated difficulties as the English
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256 | Queen. Few have surmounted them so triumphantly. This is the criterion, and
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257 | the sufficient criterion, which determines the judgment of practical men.
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258 | Research, if applied with fairness and common sense, may perhaps modify, it
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259 | can never set aside, the popular verdict. There are writers who have made
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260 | the discovery that Elizabeth was a very poor ruler, selfish and wayward,
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261 | shortsighted, easily duped, fainthearted, rash, miserly, wasteful, and
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262 | swayed by the pettiest impulses of vanity, spite, and personal inclination.
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263 | They have not explained, and never will, how it was that a woman with all
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264 | these disqualifications for government should have ruled England with signal
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265 | success for forty-four years. Statesmen are indebted to good luck
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266 | occasionally, like other people. But when this explanation is offered again
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267 | and again with dull regularity, we are compelled to say, with one who had at
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268 | once the best opportunity and the highest capacity for estimating the
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269 | greatness of Elizabeth: "It is not to closet penmen that we are to look for
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270 | guidance in such a case; for men of that order being keen in style, poor in
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271 | judgment, and partial in feeling, are no faithful witnesses as to the real
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272 | passages of business. It is for ministers and great officers to judge of
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273 | these things, and those who have handled the helm of government and been
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274 | acquainted with the difficulties and mysteries of State business." (Bacon,
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275 | <i>In felicem memoriam Elizabeth.)</i></p>
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276 | <p align="left">The judgment of those who have handled the helm of
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277 | government is to be found in the words of her contemporary, the great
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278 | Henry--"She was my other self:" and of a greater still in the next
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279 | generation-"Queen Elizabeth of famous memory; we need not be ashamed to call
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280 | her so!" (Carlyle, <i>Letters and Speeches of Oliver Cromwell</i>, Speech
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281 | V.)</p>
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282 | </font>
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283 | <hr>
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284 | </font>
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285 | <font face="Times New Roman">
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286 | <p align="left"><b>Notes:</b> 1. Elizabeth made large use of the courage and
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287 | fidelity of her kinsmen on the Boleyn side, but she did little to advance
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288 | them either in rank or wealth. Hunsdon had set his heart on regaining the
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289 | Boleyn Earldom of Wiltshire. When he was dying, Elizabeth brought the patent
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290 | and robes of in earl, and laid them on his bed; but the choleric old man
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291 | replied, "Madam, seeing you counted me not worthy of this honour while I was
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292 | living, I count myself unworthy of it now I am dying." 2. Son of Catherine
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293 | Grey by the Earl of Hertford. "Rascal" at that time meant a person of low
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294 | birth. </p>
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295 | </font>
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296 | <font style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif">
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297 | <p align="left"><font style="font-family: Times New Roman" size="2">From <i>
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298 | Queen Elizabeth</i> by Edward Spencer Beesly. Published in London by
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299 | Macmillan and Co., 1892.</font></p>
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300 | </font>
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301 | <font face="Times New Roman" size="2">
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302 | </blockquote>
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303 | </blockquote>
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304 |
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305 | <p align="center">
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306 | <a href="monarchs/eliz1.html">to the Queen
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307 | Elizabeth I website</a> /
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308 | <a href="relative/maryqos.html">to the Mary,
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309 | queen of Scots website</a></p>
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310 | <p align="center"><a href="secondary.html">
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311 | to Secondary Sources</a></p>
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312 | </font>
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313 |
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314 | </body>
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315 |
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