from an event which may be best recorded in connection with the death of the poor abject, although so potent a queen. That was the Age of Courtiers, but we would not have it supposed that none but courtiers were worthy of notice. There were, at that time, in England, some of the most illustrious names the land has ever produced. To mention the name of Shakspere is quite superfluous, who was not, in his day, so much a dramatist, as the creator of the English Drama; and Spenser, too, the Poet Laureate, and the author of the "Fairy Queen," Spenser, whose poetry does indeed mirror the picturesque and allegoric age. He lived in comparative neglect until Essex patronised him, and lavished upon him his love and favour. Poor Spenser died broken-hearted in Ireland; he witnessed the destruction of his whole property by the rebels, and this event shook his soul, so that he never recovered himself. He was followed by an illustrious company to his grave in Wesminster Abbey, near that of Chaucer: all the Poets followed, and cast their pens and sonnets upon his coffin. The Earl of Essex defrayed the whole cost of the funeral, and walked himself as a mourner. We had proposed to have said something of Ben Johnson, Beaumont and Fletcher, Sir

John Harrington, and others, illustrious for their genius, or their fame, for their nobility, or their prowess; now only, alas! illustrating the evanescence of Fame, and the fleeting glory of all great names. Those whose persons and names were then the objects of universal attention in their several spheres, are now passed silently by, even in so poor a book as this is.

CHAPTER XI.

THE LAST OF THE TUDORS.

THE work of the Tudor Dynasty was done: the time approached when Queen Elizabeth must die as we have already intimated, the sun did not brighten at its setting. The queen had lost all heart for pleasure and gaiety; they had all left her, those great men who had either lent brilliancy to her court, or power to her sceptre. Burleigh was not-Walsingham was not-Leicester was not-Essex was not. She walked alone; all the old familiar faces had departed: still she pursued the round of political occupation-still she followed the amusements of other years; but she talked with the French ambassador, and owned herself weary of life.She sighed, and her eyes filled with tears, as she adverted to the death of Essex, and mentioned that, being apprehensive, from his am

bition, and the impetuosity of his temper, of his throwing himself into some rash design which would prove his ruin, she had counselled him, during the two last years, to content himself with pleasing her, and to forbear to treat her with the insolent contempt he had lately assumed; above all, not to touch her sceptre, lest she should be compelled to punish him by the laws of England, and not according to her own laws, which he had found too mild and favourable to give him any cause of fear.*—

At last a still more inveterate melancholy seized upon the queen. She was drawn to bed on the 21st of March, 1602, and there, three days afterward, she died.

We will, in conclusion, call our reader's attention to the following remarkable stories; the first is extracted from Dr. Birch's "Negotiations," and has been reprinted in the Memoirs of the Peers of England during the reign of James.

"The following curious story was frequently told by Lady Elizabeth Spelman, great granddaughter of Sir Robert Carey, brother of Lady Nottingham, and afterwards Earl of Monmouth, whose curious memoirs of himself were published a few years ago by Lord Corke:

*Miss Aitkin.

When Catherine, Countess of Nottingham, was dying (as she did, according to his lordship's own account, about a fortnight before Queen Elizabeth), she sent to her majesty to desire that she might see her, in order to reveal something to her majesty, without the discovery of which she could not die in peace. Upon the queen's coming, Lady Nottingham told her that while the Earl of Essex lay under sentence of death, he was desirous of asking her majesty's mercy in the manner prescribed by herself during the height of his favour; the queen having given him a ring, which, being sent to her as a token of his distress, might entitle him to her protection. But the earl, jealous of those about him, and not caring to trust any of them with it, as he was looking out of his window one morning, saw a boy with whose appearance he was pleased; and, engaging him by money and promises, directed him to carry the ring, which he took from his finger and threw down, to Lady Scroope, a sister of the Countess of Nottingham, and a friend of his lordship, who attended upon the queen; and to beg of her that she would present it to her majesty. The boy, by mistake, carried it to Lady Nottingham, who showed it to her husband, the admiral, an enemy of Lord