there was 'plentiful eating, drinking, and making merry." On the following Sunday, Te Deum was sung in the churches, and the general joy among all classes was unbounded. : the Charter House were laid with fine Elizabeth held her first privy council at Hatfield. Sir Thomas Parry was declared Comptroller of her Household; Sir Edward Rogers, Captain of the Guard; and Sir William Cecil, Principal Secretary of State. The first of these personages had filled, for many years, the office of cofferer to the Princess, and was completely in the secret of her confidential intercourse with Lord Seymour, the Lord High Admiral, and whose fidelity in that delicate affair had withstood all the threats and artifices of the Protector. Cecil was already known to the public, and his nomination to such an important office was a happy omen for the Protestant cause, of which he was the adherent. He maintained a secret and intimate correspondence with Elizabeth during the whole period of her adversity, and assisted her on many trying occasions with his salutary advice. On appointing him a member of her privy council, Elizabeth addressed him in the following terms:-"I give you this charge, that you shall be of my secret council, and content yourself to take pains for me and my realm. This opinion I have of you, that you will not be corrupted with any gift; and that you will be faithful to the state; that without respect to my private will, you will give me that counsel that you think best, and that if you shall know any thing necessary to be declared to me of secrecy, you will show it to my-stance of his being already married, self only; and be assured I will not fail to keep taciturnity therein." On the twenty-third of November, the Queen repaired to her capital, attended by a train of a thousand nobles, knights, gentlemen and ladies; and took up her temporary residence at the monastery of Chartreux, or Charter House, then the abode of Lord North. It was a splendid building, and afforded ample accommodation for a royal retinue. Her next removal, agreeably to ancient custom, was to the Tower, and on this interesting occasion, all the streets from Immediately on entering the royal apartments in the Tower, she, on her knees, returned humble and fervent thanks to that Providence which had hitherto protected her. How different must have been her sensations now from what they were when she had been led a prisoner under these walls! She had formerly entered that fortress by the traitors' gate, as a terrified and defenceless Princess, without hope of deliverance, and apprehensive of a violent death. She now returned to take legal possession of it, surrounded in all the pomp of royalty, by her ministers of state, and welcomed by the applause of the people. She was attended on her visit to the Tower by Lord Robert Dudley, one who, like herself, had been a prisoner there. He was now appointed Master of the Ordnance, and was regarded by his royal mistress with peculiar favour. His personal graces and elegant accomplishments were sufficiently striking to dazzle the eyes and charm the heart of a youthful Queen, possessed of a lively fancy, and now absolute mistress of her own actions. The circum blinded her, no doubt, as to the real nature of her sentiments towards him; or it was regarded by her as a sufficient sanction, in the eyes of the nation, for all those marks of favour and esteem with which she was pleased to honour him. The illustrious family of the Howards came in for a large share of the Queen's bounty; the Duke of Norfolk, her second cousin, was invested with the order of the Garter. Her great uncle, Lord William Howard, created Baron of Effingham by Mary, was continued by Elizabeth in the high office of Lord Chamberlain. Lord Thomas Howard, who had treated her with distinguished respect on her arrival at Woodstock from Hampton Court, now received the title of Viscount Bindon, and continued much in favour to the end of his life. Sir Francis Knolles, whose wife was one of Elizabeth's nearest kinswomen, was sworn in a member of the privy council, together with Sir Richard Sackville. But of all her relations, Henry Carey, son of Mary Boleyn, the Queen's aunt, was the most deserving of her gratitude. He had expended thousands of his patrimony in her service, during the period of her imprisonment, and she liberally requited his friendship, by conferring on him the title of Baron Hunsdon; together with the royal residence of that name, its surrounding park, and several beneficial leases of crown lands. Lord Hunsdon, however, was as little skilled in that sentimental gallantry which Elizabeth required from her courtiers, as in the circumspect and tortuous policy which she approved in her statesmen. "As he lived in a ruffling time," says Naunton, so he loved sword and buckler men; and such as our fathers were wont to call men of their hands; of which sort he had many brave gentlemen that followed him; yet he was not taken for a popular or dangerous person. It was said of him, that "his Latin and his dissimulation were both alike, and his custom in swearing and obscenity in speech, made him appear a worse Christian than he really was." 66 The Queen's attachment to her relations was so remarkable, that even Leicester, in the height of his favour, felt that he must hold sacred their claims to her regard. Accordingly he used to remark, in allusion to Sackville and Hunsdon"Those were of the tribe of Dan, and were Noli me tangeres!" (Touch me nots.) After spending a few days in the Tower, Elizabeth passed by water to Somerset Place, whence she removed to the palace of Westminster, where she kept her Christmas. Great preparations were now making for her coronation at Westminster Abbey. The people were resolved, on that festive occasion, to lavish, in honour of their new sovereign, every demonstration of loyalty and affection. The costume of that age was magnificent. Gowns of velvet or satin, richly trimmed with silk, furs, or gold lace; costly gold chains; and caps or hoods of rich materials, adorned with feathers, decorated on all occasions of ceremony the persons, not only of nobles and courtiers, but of their retainers, and even of the substantial citizens. The attire of the ladies was proportionally splendid. Hangings of cloth, of silk, and of velvet, cloth of gold and cloth of silver, or "needlework sublime," adorned, on days of family festivity, the principal chamber of every house of respectable appearance; and these on public festivals were suspended from the balconies, and combined with the banners and nons floating overhead, gave to the streets an appearance resembling a suite of long and gaily dressed saloons. Every circumstance tended to render the public entry of Queen Elizabeth the most gorgeous, and at the same time the most imposing, spectacle ever exhibited in the capital of Britain. pen The following characteristic_anecdote of this worthy is related by Fuller; "On one occasion, his neighbour, Mr. Colt, chanced to meet him coming from Hunsdon to London, in the equipage of a nobleman of those days. The baron, on calling to mind some former grudge, On the twelfth of January, 1559, her gave him a sound box on the ear; Colt Majesty was conducted from her palace, immediately returned the principal with in Westminster to the royal apartments interest; and thereupon his servants, in the Tower; and a splendid water drawing their swords, swarmed around procession was appointed for the purhim. You rogues!' said my lord, may pose. At this period, the streets of Lonnot I and my neighbour exchange a blow don were narrow and ill-paved, the roads but you must interfere?" His servants bad, and the luxury of a carriage unwithdrew, and thus the quarrel was be- known. The Thames, therefore, was gun and ended in the same minute." | the great thoroughfare of the metropolis. on The old palace of Westminster, as well | in each, who explained to the Queen, in The passage through the city took place two days afterwards. Her Majesty issued forth, drawn in a superb chariot, preceded by trumpeters and heralds in their coat-armour; and "most honourably accompanied by gentlemen, Barons, and the higher nobility of the realm; as also by a notable train of ladies. The ladies were on horseback, and both they and their lords were habited in crimson velvet, with which their horses were also caparisoned. This retinue of fair equestrians, constantly attendant on the person of the maiden queen in all her public appearances, produced a striking effect. As they approached, the air was rent by the acclamations of the citizens, who had erected across the principal streets a series of solemn pageants, in the manner of triumphant arches. On these were inscribed illustrative sentences in English and Latin: a child was stationed her heart and her lips, declared aloud, amidst the tears and grateful benedictions of her people, that she thanked the city more for that gift than for all the costly magnificence they had bestowed upon her; and that she would often read over that blessed book. The last pageant exhibited "a seemly and mete personage, richly apparelled in parliamentary robes, with a sceptre in her hand, over whose head was written: Deborah, the judge and restorer of the house of Israel!" The Recorder of London then approached her Majesty's chariot, near the further end of Cheapside-where ended the long array of the city companies, which had lined the streets all the way from Fenchurch Street—and presented her with a splendid purse, containing one thousand marks in gold. To crown the whole, those two celebrated personages, Gog and Magog, deserted on this memorable day their accustomed stations in the Guildhall, and reared up their stately dimensions on each side of Temple Bar; with joined hands they supported above the gate a copy of Latin verses, in which they obligingly expounded to her Majesty the sense of all the pageants which had been presented to her view; concluding with compliments and felicitations suitable to the happy occasion. The Queen, in a few cordial words, thanked the citizens for all their cost and pains, assured them that she would "stand their good queen;" and passed the gate amidst thunders of applause. tion service; but at length, Ogelthorp, Bishop of Carlisle, was gained over by the court, and the rite was duly celebrated. This refusal of the bishops was wisely overlooked by the government; but it no doubt proceeded partly from a conviction that the marriage of Henry the Eighth with Catherine of Arragon having been declared lawful and valid, Elizabeth, as the child of Anne Boleyn, must be regarded as illegitimate, and incapable of succeeding to the throne; and partly through a suspicious fear of the Roman religion, conceived because her Majesty had been brought up from the cradle in the Protestant faith. It appears also, that Elizabeth had a little before forbidden a bishop, at divine service, from lifting up and adoring the host; she likewise permitted the litany, epistles, and the gospels to be translated into English, which they held as The following traits of Elizabeth's behaviour on this auspicious day, are recorded, with affectionate delight, by Holinshed, our early English chronicler: -"Yonder is an ancient citizen,' said one of the knights attending on her person, who weepeth, and turneth his face backward: How may it be interpreted? That he doth so for sorrow or for gladness?' With a just and pleasing confidence, the Queen replied, 'I warrant you it is for gladness.' How many nose-execrable. gays," proceeds the same chronicler, "did her Grace receive at poor women's hands on that joyful day? How many times staid she her chariot when she saw any simple body offer to speak to her Grace? A branch of rosemary given her Grace with a supplication by a poor woman about Fleet Bridge, was seen in her chariot till her Grace came to Westminster." "Yet Queen Elizabeth," says an early and accurate historian, was truly godly, pious, and zealously devoted; for her Majesty was no sooner out of her bed, than she fell upon her knees in her private closet, and prayed to God devoutly. Certain hours were by her Majesty reserved, and devoted to the Lord. Moreover, her Majesty never failed every Lord's day and holy day to frequent the chapel; neither was any prince ever more conversant in divine service, or conducted himself with more "Her Majesty was twenty-five years of age at this auspicious period. She was a lady of passing beauty, of majestic de-devotion than her Majesty. She_zeaportment, and so rarely qualified by ad- lously heard all the sermons in Lent, versity, and so well accomplished by being attired in black, and very diliexperience (which are most effectual gently gave attention thereto, according tutors), that she had purchased pru-to the ancient use and custom; although dence and judgment far above the capacity of her age. She was possessed of pregnant wit and wisdom, and virtues which gained for her the name and fame of a gracious and popular princess." The ceremonies of the coronation took place on the following day; regulated in everything by ancient custom, they afforded little scope for that display of popular sentiments, which had given so intense an interest to the procession of the previous day. Great perplexity was occasioned by the refusal of the whole bench of bishops to perform the corona- I she said, and oft-times repeated, that which she had read of Henry the Third, her predecessor, that her Majesty had rather in her prayers speak to God devoutly, than hear others speak of Him eloquently. And concerning the cross, our Blessed Lady and the saints, she never conceived irreverently of them, neither spake herself, nor suffered any others to speak of them, without a certain kind of reverence." In all probability, had she found herself free to follow entirely the dictates of her own inclinations, Elizabeth would have established in the church a kind of medium, like that devised by her father, for whose authority she had the highest veneration. To the end of her reign she never could be reconciled to married bishops; and with respect to the clergy generally, she preferred the single man before the married one. Lord Bacon relates the following anecdote: "Queen Elizabeth, on the morrow of her coronation (it being the custom to release prisoners at the inauguration of a prince), went to the chapel; and in the great chamber, one of her courtiers, who was well known to her, either out of his own motion, or by the instigation of a wiser man, presented her with a petition; and before a great number of courtiers, besought her with a loud voice, that now this good time there might be four or five more principal prisoners released; these were the four evangelists, and the apostle St. Paul, who had long been shut, in an unknown tongue, as it were, in prison, so as they could not converse with the common people. The Queen answered very gravely, that it was best first to inquire of themselves whether they would be released or not." Immediately on her accession, Elizabeth resolved to abolish the Catholic religion as speedily as prudence would permit. According to Stowe, the moment she had called together her first privy council, she began to put into practice that oath of supremacy which her father, Henry the Eighth, first ordained. Amongst the many who refused that oath, was the Lord Chancellor, Dr. Heath. Yet the Queen, having a good respect for him, would not deprive him of his title, but committed the custody of the great seal to Sir Nicholas Bacon, who from that time was called Lord Keeper, and by the authority of parliament exercised the power and prerogative of the Lord Chancellor, Dr. Heath only retaining the empty title. "At this same time," proceeds the faithful chronicler, "the English nation was wonderfully divided in opinion, as well in matters of ecclesiastical government, as in divers points of religion, by reason of three important theological changes within the brief period of twelve years. King Henry the Eighth retained the ec clesiastical supremacy, with the first fruits and tenths; maintained seven sacraments, with obits and mass for the quick and the dead. King Edward abolished the mass, authorised one book of common prayer in English, with hallowing the dead, and wine, &c., and established only two sacraments. Queen Mary restored all things according to the Church of Rome, re-established the papal supremacy, and, in fact, permitted nothing within her dominion that was was repugnant to the Roman Catholic Church; but the death of Mary was the ruin of all Abbots, Priors and Prioresses, Monks and Nuns. Elizabeth, on her accession, commanded that no one should preach without a special license, that such rites and ceremonies should be used in all churches as had been used in her Highness's chapel, and that the epistle and gospel should be read in the English tongue; and in her first parliament, held at Westminster, in January, 1559, she expelled the papal supremacy, resumed the first fruits and tenths, repressed the mass, re-introduced the Book of Common Prayer and the Sacraments in the English tongue, and finally and firmly re-established the Protestant Church of England." Whilst these matters were pending, Elizabeth, to prevent the Londoners from hearing political sermons, locked up the pulpit of St. Paul's Cross, and herself, as an act of expediency, attended mass in her own chapel, and outwardly conformed to the ceremonies of the Catholic Church. In the same parliament that had reestablished the Protestant Church of England, two questions were agitated, personally interesting to the Queen, her title to the crown, and her marriage. By the counsels of the keeper of the seals, Sir Nicholas Bacon, she refrained from requiring of parliament the repeal of those acts of her father's reign which had declared his marriage with Anne Boleyn, her mother, null and void, and herself illegitimate. Reposing in the well-known maxim of law, that the crown once worn takes away all defects in blood, she contented herself with an act declaratory in general terms of her |