the tyranny of the harsh men, to whose power you have abandoned me, I entreat your Majesty that I may not be executed in secret, but in the presence of my servants and other persons, who may bear testimony of my faith and fidelity to the true church, and guard the last hours of my life, and my last sighs from the false rumours which my adversaries may spread abroad. Third, I request that my domestics, who have served me through so much misery, and with so much constancy, may be allowed to retire without molestation whereever they choose, to enjoy for the remainder of their lives the small legacies which my poverty has enabled me to bequeath to them. I conjure you, Madam, by the blood of Jesus Christ, by our consanguinity, by the memory of Henry VII., our common father, and by the royal title which I carry with me to death, not to refuse me those reasonable demands, but to assure me, by a letter under your own hand, that you will comply with them; and I shall then die as I have lived, your affectionate sister and prisoner, MARY, Queen of Scots." ||

Whether Elizabeth ever answered this letter, does not appear; but it produced so little effect, that epistles from her to Sir Amias Paulet still exist, which prove that, in her anxiety to avoid taking upon herself the responsibility of Mary's death, she wished to have her privately assassinated or poisoned. Paulet, however, though a harsh and violent man, positively refused to sanction so nefarious a scheme. Yet in the very act of instigating murder, Elizabeth could close || Jebb. vol. ii. P. 91.

her eyes against her own iniquity, and affect indignation at the alleged offences of another. * But perceiving at length, that no alternative remained, she ordered her secretary Davidson to bring her the warrant for Mary's execution, and after perusing it, she deliberately affixed her signature. She then desired him to carry it to Walsingham, saying, with an ironical smile, and in a "merry tone," that she feared he would die of grief when he saw

Tytler, vol. ii. p. 319, et seq., and p. 403.-Chalmers, vol. i. p. 447.—Tytler gives a strong and just exposition of the shameful nature of the Queen's corresponden ce with Paulet. The reader cannot fail to peruse the following passage with interest:

Pau

"The letters written by Elizabeth to Sir Amias Paulet, Queen Mary's keeper in her prison at Fotheringay Castle, disclose to us the true sentiments of her heart, and her steady purpose to have Mary privately assassinated. let, a rude but an honest man, had behaved with great insolence and harshness to Queen Mary, and treated her with the utmost disrespect. He approached her person without any ceremony, and usually came covered into her presence, of which she had complained to Queen Elizabeth. He was therefore thought a fit person for executing the above purpose. The following letter from Elizabeth displays a strong picture of her artifice and flattery, in order to raise his expectations to the highest pitch,

TO MY LOVING AMIAS.

Amias, my most faithful and careful servant, God reward thee treblefold for the most troublesome charge so well discharged. If you knew, my Amias, how kindly, beside most dutifully, my grateful heart accepts and praiseth your spotless endeavours and faithful actions, performed in so dangerous and crafty a charge, it would ease your travail, and rejoice your heart; in which I charge you to carry this most instant thought, that I cannot balance in any weight of my judgment the value that I prize you at, and suppose no treasure can countervail such a faith. And you shall condemn me in that fault that yet I never commit◄

it. Walsingham sent the warrant to the Chancellor, who affixed the Great Seal to it, and despatched it by Beal, with a commission to the Earls of Shrewsbury, Kent, Derby, and others, to see it put in execution. Davidson was afterwards

ted, if I reward not such desert; yea let me lack when I most need it, if I acknowledge not such a merit, non omnibus datum. ' ||

Having thus buoyed up his hopes and wishes, Walsingham, in his letters to Paulet and Drury, mentions the proposal in plain words to them. We find, by a speech lately made by her Majesty, that she doth note in you both a lack of that care and zeal for her service, that she looketh for at your hands, in that you have not in all this time (of yourselves, without any other provocation) found out some way to shorten the life of the Scots Queen, considering the great peril she is hourly subject to, so long as the said Queen shall live.'-In a Postscript: I pray you, let both this and the enclosed be committed to the fire; as your answer shall be, after it has been communicated to her Majesty, for her satisfaction. In a subsequent letter: I pray you let me know what you have done with my letters, because they are not fit to be kept, that I may satisfy her Majesty therein, who might otherwise take offence thereat.'

What a cruel snare is here laid for this faithful servant! He is tempted to commit a murder, and at the same time has orders from his Sovereign to destroy the warrant for doing it. He was too wise and too honourable to do either the one or the other. Had he fallen into the snare,

What a picture have we here, of the heroine of England! Wooing a faithful servant to commit a clandestine murder, which she herself durst not avow! The portrait of King John, in the same predicament, practising with Hubert to murder his nephew, then under his charge, shows how intimately the great Poet was acquainted with nature.

O my gentle Hubert,

We owe thee much! Within this wall of flesh,

There is a soul, counts thee her creditor,

And with advantage means to pay thy love,

And, my good friend, thy voluntary oath

Lives in this bosom dearly cherished.

made the victim of Elizabeth's artifice,—who, to complete the solemn farce she had been playing, pretended he had obeyed her orders too quickly, and doomed him in consequence to perpetual imprisonment. §

we may guess, from the fate of Davidson, what would have been his. Paulet, in return, thus writes to Walsingham:— Your letters of yesterday coming to my hand this day, I would not fail, according to your directions, to return my answer with all possible speed; which I shall deliver unto you with great grief and bitterness of mind, in that I am so unhappy, as living to see this unhappy day, in which I am required, by direction of my most gracious Sovereign, to do an act which God and the law forbiddeth. My goods and life are at her Majesty's disposition, and I am ready to lose them the next morrow if it shall please her. But God forbid I should make so foul a shipwreck of my conscience, or leave so great a blot to my poor posterity, as shed blood without law or

§ Mackenzie's Lives of the Scottish Writers, vol. iii. p. 336.-Robertson, vol. ii. p. 194.-Chalmers, vol. i. P. 449.

CHAPTER XII.

MARY'S DEATH, AND CHARACTER.

On the 7th of February 1587, the Earls, who had been commissioned to superintend Mary's execution, arrived at Fotheringay. After dining together, they sent to inform the Queen, that they desired to speak with her. Mary was not well, and in bed; but as she was given to understand that it was an affair of moment, she rose, and received them in her own chamber. Her six waiting maids, together with her physician, her surgeon, and apothecary, and four or five male servants, were in attendance. The Earl of Shrewsbury, and the others associated with him, standing before her respectfully, with their heads uncovered, communicated, as gently as possible, the disagreeable duty with which they had been intrusted. Beal was then desired to read the warrant for Mary's execution, to which she listened patiently; and making the sign of the cross, she said, that though she was sorry it came from Elizabeth, she had long been expecting the mandate for her death, and was not unprepared to die. "For many years," she added, "I have lived in