being abandoned the same night, the English are entirely expelled from France.

Philip

The loss of Calais occasions great discontent. offers to assist in recovering it, but the queen's council plead inability to bear the expense of the attempt.

The parliament meets, Jan. 20, and sits till March 7. The French defeated at Gravelines, July 13, by the Spaniards, assisted by an English fleet.

A fleet sent against France, under Lord Clinton, burns Conquet, in Britanny, (July 29,) but though joined by some Spanish ships, does not venture, as was intended, to attack Brest.

Conferences for peace between England, France, and Spain opened at Cambray, in October.

The queen, who had been long in bad health, dies at St. James's, Nov. 17; she is buried in Henry VII.'s chapel, Westminster abbey, Dec. 13.

The bishop of Winchester (John White) preached her funeral sermon; his text was, "I praised the dead which are already dead more than the living which are yet alive;" and giving offence by speaking warmly in her praise, and condemning the projected alterations in religion, he was confined to his house until the meeting of the parliament.

ELIZABETH, the only surviving child of Henry VIII. by Anne Boleyn, was born at the palace of Placentia (Greenwich), September 7, 1533. In her third year she was deprived of her mother, and was also declared illegitimate; but in 1544 she was conditionally restored; and from that time until the death of Edward VI. she was apparently well treated. She joined her sister Mary in opposing the usurpation of Lady Jane Grey, and accompanied the queen on her entry into London. Little cordiality, however, could be expected to subsist between them; Elizabeth was looked upon as the hope of the Protestant party, and, being suspected of favouring the rebellion of Wyatt, she was sent to the Tower, but after a short time was released, probably by the desire of Philip of Spain; she was, however, soon placed under restraint again, and dwelt in a confinement more or less

rigorous, according to the various tempers of her different keepers, until called to the throne by the death of Mary, Nov. 17, 1558.

It was the general expectation of both friends and foes that Elizabeth would restore the public profession of Protestantism, and she at once proceeded to do so. Her principal adviser was William Cecil (afterwards Lord Burghley b), who took his measures with so much address that all opposition was borne down, and an apparent conformity brought about with very little trouble. The Protestant Church was re-established, but it needed all the firmness of three successive primates (Parker, Grindal, and Whitgift), to prevent it being reduced to a mere creature of the State,- -a scheme most agreeable

Of these, Sir Thomas Pope is said to have been the most indulgent, and Sir Henry Bedingfield the most severe.

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He remained her prime minister until his death, and to him is due more properly than to the queen, the praise or blame of the most important transactions of her reign. He was born in 1520, his father being master of the robes to Henry VIII. He was educated at Cambridge, and was a diligent student; he was intended for the law, but attracted the attention of the king, and became a courtier. Cecil served in the Scottish war under the protector Somerset ; became secretary of state to Edward VI.; so temporized in the matter of Lady Jane Grey, as not to be committed with either party; and complied with the change of religion under Mary. On Elizabeth's accession he again professed Protestantism, and drew up a device for alteration of religion," in which he recommended a systematic discouragement of all who had been in authority under Queen Mary, and supplying their place with "men meaner in substance and younger in years," the involving the clergy in a præmunire, and “a sharp law" against popular assemblies. The plan was adopted, and at first seemed successful; but many men were found, both Romanists and Puritans, who refused to follow his example of sacrificing their consciences to every change of government; nor could the many "sharp laws" that were devised by him bring them to conformity. In the midst of the cares of state, Cecil was not neglectful of his own interest. He was ennobled, as Lord Burghley, in 1571, and afterwards made lord high treasurer; and he succeeded in raising a vast estate, great part of it, as was too usual with the courtiers of the Tudors, wrung by way of inequitable exchange from the Church. He died Aug. 4, 1598.

to the arbitrary temper of the queen, who entertained as high ideas of her ecclesiastical supremacy as Henry VIII. had ever done.

Elizabeth's relations with foreign powers were, during the whole course of her reign, surrounded with difficulties connected with the subject of religion. At her accession the reigning pope (Paul IV.) refused to acknowledge her title; Philip of Spain professed personal regard, but gave it to be understood that he could only continue in friendship with her if she continued a Catholic; the king of France (Henry II.) induced his daughter-in-law, Mary of Scotland, to assume the style and arms of queen of England: on the other hand, the Protestants of France, Scotland, and the Netherlands looked to her for support against the tyranny of their sovereigns, as well in civil as religious matters. Whatever her own intentions may have been, the "Machiavelgovernance" of her ministers only aggravated the troubles of other countries; their arts were retorted by men as unscrupulous as themselves, and many determined attempts were made both against her government and her life, but all their efforts were signally unsuccessfula.

Such is the term used by Archbishop Parker, in letters to Cecil, as fittest to describe the secret favour given by members of the government to both Romanists and Puritans whom the bishops were compelled to coerce.

Most of these plots were foiled by the sagacity of Sir Francis Walsingham, who was for many years secretary of state, and who, by foreign travel, had imbibed much of the dark and dangerous policy of his opponents. He was born at Chiselhurst, in Kent, in 1536; was educated at King's College, Cambridge; became an accomplished linguist, and was employed on the most important embassies to France and Scotland. He was rewarded with the chancellorship of the duchy of Lancaster, but he was not a favourite with Elizabeth, for he belonged to the Puritan party, and, unlike his patron Burghley, he remained a poor man. He died April 6, 1590.

Elizabeth sent aid to the French Protestants on several occasions, but without any very important results. Her interference in Scotland was of a more decided character, the affairs of that country being in reality directed by her ministers. Mainly by their intrigues the ill-advised, unhappy, but probably not guilty Mary, was driven from her throne. She sought shelter in England; and though she found instead a prison, and eventually a violent death, her coming had most important consequences, for the Romanists, who had hitherto yielded an apparent conformity to the English service, now very generally abandoned it, and looked to foreign powers for support, which they hoped to obtain by her means, and in return many shewed themselves ready to accept her as queen.

The Romanists had, indeed, some time before begun to decline attendance at church, moved by the exhortations of William Allenf and other priests who had gone abroad on the re-establishment of the English Liturgy, but about 1563 had ventured to return, and spread among them a censure of the Council of Trent on such conformity. Allen, too, founded a seminary at Douay 8,

• The guilt or innocence of the Scottish queen has frequently been made almost a national question, and innumerable writers have employed their powers upon it; all their researches, however, only confirm the propriety of the remark of a cotemporary (Camden), who says, "There are many suspicions, but no proofs."

He was born in Lancashire in 1532; he studied at Oxford, was principal at St. Mary's Hall there, in the time of Mary, and withdrew to the continent on her death. He resided principally in Flanders, and is accused of being deeply engaged in the various plots against Elizabeth. He was made a cardinal in 1587, wrote an Admonition in favour of the projected Spanish invasion, was rewarded by Philip with the archbishopric of Mechlin, and died in 1594.

The college was dedicated to St. Thomas Becket; it subsisted till the first French revolution, when the members removed to Eng