John Brett. Portrait of Christina Rossetti. 1857.
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Smith, Horace
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Smith, Horace, "Essex and the Maid of Honour." in The Bijou; (London:
from The Bijou Literary Annual, 1828
Essex and the Maid of Honour
By Horace Smith, Esq. Author of Brambletye House
Fraser, William (1796-1854), compiler
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Horace Smith, 1779-1849
Essex and the Maid of Honour
The Bijou;
or Annual of Literature and
the Arts
William Fraser
London
William Pickering
1828
285-311
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The Bijou
Literary Annual
Fraser, William (1796-1854)
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Essex and the Maid of Honour
Horace Smith, Esq. Author of Brambletye House
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The Bijou;
or Annual of Literature and the Arts
compiled by William Fraser
William Pickering
London
1828
pp. 285-311
Essex and the Maid of Honour
By Horace Smith, Esq. Author of
Brambletye House
THE palace of Nonsuch, near Ewell, in Surrey, was intended by Henry the Eighth, as
its proud title sufficiently attests, to afford an unrivalled specimen of his
magnificence and taste; but, while he was lavishing his treasures in this most
unnecessary addition to his royal residences, Death was sharpening the dart which was
to tumble down the ostentatious tyrant, and consign him to his last narrow palace —
the tomb.
Nonsuch was left unfinished, and unfulfilled promise of splendour, a gorgeous and yet
melancholy evidence of the uncertainty of human grandeur; and Queen Mary, shrinking
from the cost of its completion, had it in contemplation to ull it down to save
farther charges; when the Earl of Arundel, "for the love and honour he bore to his
old master," purchased the place, and finished it according to the original design.
Not a vestige of it now remains; it has passed away with the other elaborate gewgaws
of mortal vanity, and the arrogant name which it has
left behind it, sounds in our ears like a mournful echo, mocking the presumption of
other times. And yet the proud structure was not deficient in solidity as well as
stateliness. "It was built round two courts," says the accomplished authoress of
Queen Elizabeth's Memoirs — "an outer and an inner one, both very spacious; and the
entrance to each was by a square gate-house highly ornamented, embattled, and having
turrets at the four corners. These gate-houses were of stone, as was the lower story
of the palace itself; but the upper one was of wood, "richly adorned, and set forth
and garnished with a variety of statues, pictures, and other antic forms of excellent
art and workmanship, and of no small cost;" all which ornaments, it seems, were made
of rye dough. In modern language the pictures would probably be called
basso-relievos. From the eastern and western angles of the inner court rose two
slender turrets, five stories high, with lanterns on the top, which were leaded and
surrounded with wooden balustrades. These towers of observation, from which the two
parks attached to the palace, and a wide expanse of champaign country beyond, might
be surveyed as in a map, were celebrated as the peculiar boast of Nonsuch.
It was the morning of Michaelmas Eve, the woodwork of the gaudy structure which was
painted and lacquered, glistered in the light of a
cloudless sun the numerous gilt vanes, fashioned in the shapes of the various animals
that figured in the armorial bearings of royalty, flashed form the top of every tower
and pinnacle; while the royal banners displayed from the summits of the two lofty
turrets, and flaunting proudly on the breeze, announced to all the circumjacent
country that they floated over Queen Elizabeth and her Court, who were then residing
in the palace. Although it was thus graced and honoured, the earliness of the hour,
and the heat of the morning, had prevented any great appearance of bustle around the
exterior of the building. A few halberdiers and yeomen of the guard, in their rich
liveries, were lounging in front of the outer gate-house; along the roads that
skirted the parks, horses and carriages, betraying their progress by the dust, were
seen to converge towards the same point; but in other respects, the landscape was as
still as it was lovely. The herds of deer in the park, only distinguishable by their
horns, were crouching in the shade: the cows, that were usually pastured around the
gatehouse, had not yet returned from the farm, whither they had been driven to be
milked; and with the exception of a single stately stag which emerged from a thicket,
as if to reconnoiter, and snuff up the morning air, nothing appeared to move within
the wide chase that surrounded the mansion; while the absence of music, or any other sound of state or revelry from the walls,
gave reason to conclude that her majesty had not yet arisen from her slumbers.
Upon a terrace, however, which flanked the exterior of the inner court, and
communicated by a flight of stone steps with the park, was assembled a little party,
who had obeyed the first summons of Chanticleer, in the loyal and laudable hope of
affording good entertainment to their royal mistress, when it should please her to
begin the sports and pastimes of the day. Among these was old Yeovil, one of the
huntsmen, a withered weatherbeaten figure, but with a patch of red upon either
cheek-bone, that seemed to attest he might still be in at a good many deaths before
his own. He held three leash of greyhounds by leathern thongs, and was surrounded by
several couple of staghounds, most of the latter being crouched at his feet, dosing
and winking at the sun; while the former with ears erect, and in various graceful
attitudes of alert attention, were imitating their master in watching the movements
of a motley group immediately opposite to them. It consisted of Master
Toby so called from his being at the head of the scullery, and who for the nonce had
constituted himself, moreover, a sort of deputy master of the revels; and a troop of
extempore maskers, collected from among the inferior domestics, who had agreed to get
up a little pageant among themselves, stuffed full of ful-some compliments to the queen, and according to the fashion of
the time, most fantastically allegorical. Shakspeare's ridicule, and the burlesque of
Bottom the Weaver, had not been yet long enough before the public to banish the rage
for such emblematic foolery: nor would it under any circumstances have been likely to
exert a beneficial influence upon Master Toby, who sometimes made furtive excursions
from the scullery into the regions of Parnassus, and whose taste had been exclusively
derived from the quaint devices of those symbolical banquets he had assisted in
cooking; and which, from their hieroglyphical character, had received the appropriate
name of Subtleties. At this self-appointed masque-master, who with a paper in one
hand, and a cane in the other, was strutting about, endeavouring to get up a
rehearsal as well among the amateur actors by whom he was surrounded, some of whom
were attired as allegorical females, the calm old huntsman gazed with a quiet
wonderment, that kept his face fixed in an intermediate expression between a simper
and a sneer. And, sooth to say, they must have exhibited a puzzling sort of
cross-reading to a straightforward man like him, who knew all the parties by sight,
but neither understood why they were thus strangely metamorphosed, nor comprehended
the purport of what they were instructed to utter.
The man who was to misrepresent Diana having thrown up
his legs on a bench, in defiance of petticoats and decorum, and all the
bienseances that should distinguish the "chaste huntress of the
silver bow;" swore "by cogs nouns, and snails," in answer to the summons of Master
Toby, that he would not come to book 'til he had finished his pipe; in confirmation
of which averment he spat upon the ground, and recommenced his whiffs with such
energy, that the half-moon in his head was only occasionally seen as it dimly emerged
from the cloud of tobacco-smoke in which it was enveloped.
"Come, then, Cupid, we will begin with you, have you got your speech quite perfect?"
said Master Toby, to a little boy, who had twisted his wings all awry in the
earnestness of a game of marbles with an urchin of his own age.
"Yes, sir, yes;" replied the son of Venus. "Fain dubs, Jemmy! fain tribbs! Knuckle
down, Jemmy! fain going through the ring a second time! Keep your yard's distance,
and no cheating!"
Pittikins! you young scapegrace! call you this saying the speech?" exclaimed Toby, in
wrath. "Spout it, sirrah, spout it, or your shoulders shall be scored with my rattan
till they show like ribs of pork."
"Nay, now, forsooth, Master Toby, let us finish the game, there's a good fellow. Its
my go next, and there are only three in the ring. And look you her's lazy Barney Mumpford falling asleep in the sun for want
of something to do. Hallo, Barney! Barney!" continued the stripling, bawling in his
ear; "there's Master Toby waiting for you to begin."
The person thus aroused, whose close doublet and hose were thickly painted with
tongues to give him the semblance of Report of Fame, now got lazily up, and after
some very deliberate stretching and yawning begun his speech, which he spouted with a
sort of drowsy pomposity. As it was intended to compliment the queen, not less upon
the wide diffusion of her glory than upon her extensive knowledge of languages or
tongues, it commenced after the following fashion:
"To the four quarters of the earth I've blown
Eliza's name; I need not add my own.
Useless to her would such a blazon be,
For she who knows all tongues must needs know me!" —
"By my fackins, though, Master Toby," cried the spokesman, breaking off in the very
exordium of his address, "if her grace should ask my name after all, I shall e'en
tell her that I'm Barney Mumpford, that I have been a groom seven years, and that the
post-master of the great stables is vacant; for I may as well have it as another, and
a nod's as good as a wink to a blind horse."
With a look of profound alarm, the culinary stage-manager declared that such a departure from histrionic precedent would infallibly
bring them all into disgrace, and reminded his pupil that he ought to have announced
himself in the first instance by blowing his trumpet.
"Odso! And so I ought," cried Barney; "and I need not have forgotten it, for I found
that part easier to learn by heart than all the rest."
So saying her put the instrument to his mouth, and summoning all his breath to his
aid, gave birth to a discordant bray, which seemed to have had a groan and a roar for
its respective parents. At this abortive effort, old Yeovil, who from childhood
upwards had been accustomed to wind every instrument of the sort from a penny trumpet
to a French horn, could no longer remain a passive spectator; but seizing the trumpet
and applying it to his mouth, he collected the breath into his hollow leathern
cheeks, and blew so loud and lusty a recheat, that the inner court echoed to the
sound, the dogs suddenly leaped up, baying and barking, and at the same moment, a
gentleman-usher, issuing form the offices, rebuked them angrily, as a set of
unmannerly grooms and brawling mummers, to keep such a coil ere the breakfast-bell
had warned in the great court, and when it was even uncertain whether her Highness
had quitted her bed-room.
"I would give a Harry groat," said Yeovil, "to know
whether her grace means to betake herself to the stand in the park to see the
coursing, or whether we are to uncouple the hounds, and drive up a fat buck for the
cross-bow, for the morning begins to wear, and the dew will be soon off the
grass."
"Body o' me!" ejaculated Master Toby, drawing himself up, and looking contemptuously
at the huntsman; "think you our noble and learned mistress will recreate herself with
brute beasts, when she might listen to the Orphean strains of poetry that I have
provided for her in this our most quaint, dainty, and delectable device? Now, good
man Report, pursue your speech — pursue your speech — 'accept, fair, peerless,
learned, virgin queen — "
"Grammercy! Master Toby," quoth Report — "four lines at a stretch is honest yeoman's
work, you must get some one else to accept the queen, for it is clean beyond me to go
any further." Not less indignant as a poet than as a loyal subject at this
declaration, master Toby was about to pronounce a severe reprimand upon Goodman
Report, when he was forestalled by a loud laugh from the four quarters of the world,
who were standing in the shade playing at chuck-arthing with Saint Michael, which
latter personage had been dressed up to do honor to his own approaching eve. Africa
and the Saint, after wrangling for some time about a farthing, had betaken
themselves, like true Englishmen, to swearing, and then to mutual accusations of profaneness; when the Saint, pointing to is
adversary's visage, which was smeared over with a sooty pigment to give him the
better semblance of a negro, declared that he must needs have been the greatest
offender, since he had sworn till he was black in the face. This joke was received
with a huge and simultaneous burst of laughter by Europe, Asia, and America, although
they were repeatedly called to order, and were threatened with the tattan by the
wrathful master Toby. Finding his four refractory quarters to be indifferent to his
menaces, the latter now betook himself to father Thames, a venerable looking figure
with a crown of bulrushes, a long beard of sedge and water-flags, and wearing a loose
watchet robe, which having fallen back while he was emptying a pot of ale, disclosed
a pair of greasy buckskin hose, with riding boots and spurs. "Zooks, master Toby, let
us finish the tankard — you know the Thames is apt to be dry at this season," cried
the river god, chuckling at his own wit. "Dry quotha! methinks you're always adry,"
replied Toby — "but beshrew me an I ever knew the Thames to be replenished with
humming ale, where's your urn?" "Here, master Toby, here," said father Thames,
thrusting a large pitcher under his left arm, and where's the tinsel stream that is
to come pouring out of it?" "I popp'd it inside to keep it dry, for there was an ugly
dew this morn-ing that would presently have washed off
all the glitter."
"By my fackins! that was well cared for: keep your water dry whatever you do: hold
your urn more sloping, and though that cannot spout, you many spout away
yourself."
Thus instructed and commended, the river god lifting up his voice, which was by no
means so clear and liquid as the character required, exclaimed,
"On my proud breast those floating castles ride,
That did subdue the great Armada's pride;
Behold illustrious Queen — "
when his progress was not less suddenly than unpleasantly interrupted by a freak of
the mischievous urchin, Cupid, who, having finished his game of marbles, and lighted
a piece of paper by the assistance of Diana's pipe, slily insinuated it into the
river god's left hand, as it hung dangling beneath his urn. Little expecting to be
thus surreptitiously set on fire, father Thames, uttering a cry of surprise and pain,
let fall the pitcher, which was smashed into a hundred pieces, and bounded forward a
good clothier's yard at a single leap. No sooner, however, had he discovered the
little incendiary, who betrayed himself by a shriek of laughter, than with fury in
his looks he blustered out an oath, much too combustible for so aqueous a divinity,
and commenced an immediate pursuit for the purpose of
inflicting a summary vengeance. In less than a minute the offender had run twice
round Africa, crossed Europe, scudded behind the back of Asia, and swung round the
front of America; but Scamander when he pursued the runaway Achilles was not more
swift or unrelenting than father Thames in his chace of the unlucky Cupid, who having
thrown away his wings that he might fly the faster, at length bolted across the
terrace through a postern gate that led into the inner court, his pursuer followed
close upon his heels, and both were presently out of sight and hearing. Ere the
laughter occasioned by this incident had subsided among the rest of the party to whom
the fugitives belonged, their attention was arrested by a company of horsemen riding
towards the palace at full speed, and leaving a long cloud of dust behind them. As
they galloped past the end of the terrace, in order to wheel round towards the
gate-house, it was evident they had travelled far and fast, and through a different
tract of country from that which surrounded Nonsuch; for both horses and riders were
splashed with mud and mire, over which a white powdery dust had settled, until it had
become impossible to distinguish the colour of either steed or garment, although it
was sufficiently evident from their accoutrements, feathers and bearing, that the
leading cavaliers were officers. At the head of the band, mounted on a fleet barb,
was a young gallant, who, as far as could be judged
from the great rapidity with which he passed, possessed singular beauty of form and
feature, and appeared to be a most graceful and accomplished horseman. Four others,
although they rode a little way behind him, seemed by their gestures to be his
friends and companions, and at a distance of ten or twenty yards was the rear of the
cavalcade, consisting of grooms and other attendants. Without relaxing his speed
until he reached the entrance of the great gatehouse, the leader of the troop threw
himself hastily from his horse, and hurried into the court with the air of one whose
rank and station authorized him to pass, even into the residence of royalty, without
let or question; although the yeomen of the guard looked somewhat anxiously at one
another, as if they ought to have demanded his purpose before they suffered him to
enter. At the portal which formed the entrance to the queen's dwelling apartments,
and through which the stranger would have speeded in the same unceremonious manner as
before, the pages, gentlemen ushers, and others, who were clustered about the doors,
and who were startled at the appearance of such a soiled and bespattered figure,
forcing himself, as it were, into the private chambers, drew up and opposed his
progress, enquiring at the same time who he was, and what he wanted. "Gentlemen,"
said the stranger, impatiently waving his hand for them to fall back, "my purpose brooks not delay, and I beseech you not
to parley with me but to give me free passage. What! am I so changed by a little mud
and dirt that ye know me not for the Earl of Essex, Master of the Horse, and of the
Ordnance, and the Lord Deputy?" So saying, and without giving them time to recover
from their surprise, he passed through the midst of them, and began to ascend the
stairs.
Labouring under heavy imputations for his misconduct in Ireland, from which country
he had suddenly returned, notonly without leave, but in positive disobedience to the
commands of his royal mistress; relying upon her well-known affection for his pardon,
and complete restoration to favor, if he could once gain access to her, and
apprehensive that if he failed in this object his enemies would ensure his disgrace
and ruin, the impetuous earl had ridden post both day and night, without
communicating his purpose to a single individual, except a few of his particular
adherents, and having thus far successfully triumphed over all obstacles, he was not
likely to be impeded by the pages and chamberlains whom he encountered in the private
apartments, as he hurried through them. Gazing in utter amazement at such a
bespattered figure, making the floors ring to his heavy riding boots as he stalked
onwards towards the queen's bedroom, some stood aloof, concluding that he had
explained his errand to the yeomen below; while others
placed themselves in his way, and informed him that the Queen had not yet come forth:
but he either passed them, or put them aside, with the air of one who would not be
disobeyed, and thus traversed the presence chamber, and the waiting room of the maids
of honor, several of whom were not a little alarmed at the sight of such an
inexplicable apparition. Neither noticing their startled looks, nor heeding their
eager whispers, the adventurous Earl pursued his way, and never stopped till he came
to the Queen's bed-room, the door of which he undauntedly opened, walked in, and
closed it behind him.
Elizabeth was newly risen, and her locks were hanging in disorder about her face. She
was incapable of fear, but her surprise was not without agitation at the first sight
of a heated and bemoiled stranger thus intruding into her bed-room, and she was on
the point of calling out for her chamberlain, when Essex rushed forward, threw
himself upon his knees, and humbly implored her pardon. The sound of his well-known
voice, the humility of his language, and, above all, the sight of one whom she still
loved, kneeling at her feet, and looking up to her with flushed and imploring
features, so won upon her unprepared heart, that she held out both her hands to him
to kiss, listened with a kind aspect to all his excuses, and gave him a more cordial
reception than even his fondest hopes had ventured to anticipate. Weak as a woman, although great and illustrious as a sovereign,
she now suffered the former character to predominate, and Essex, who with all his
headstrong impetuosity was not deficient in the courtier's art, took good advantage
of the mood in which he found her. Attributing his unsanctioned return to the
impossibility of existing any longer out of the presence of a divinity, whose sight
was as vital to him as was the breath of heaven to his nostrils, he addressed her in
terms of passionate, and even romantic gallantry, talked of her excellent beauties,
though she was now in her sixty-seventh year, compared her at once to Venus and
Minerva, to a nymph goddess, and angel, quoted Latin and Greek in confirmation of his
assertions, and played his part so successfully, that leaving her after a conference
of some duration, he appeared in high spirits, and thanked God that though he had
suffered many storms abroad, he had found a sweet calm at home.
Having taken some refreshment, and attired himself in his most splendid suit, as some
atonement for the unseemly habiliments in which he had before presented himself,
Essex, who had been invited to repeat his visit to the palace, was sallying forth for
that purpose, when he was accosted by a personage, who respectfully vailing his
beaver, and presenting a letter, would have explained its object had he not been
anticipated by the Earl's exclaiming — "Ha, Will
Shakspeare! what makest thou at Nonsuch, when thou shouldst be playing the ghost to
the holiday folks in London, and easing them of their Michaelmas testers?"
The poet replied that he had come to Ewel with his friend Dick Burbage to solicit of
the Queen a Licence for their theatre, and that his gracious patron, the Earl of
Southampton, who was now unfortunately under her Majesty's heavy displeasure, had
condescended to give him a letter to his special good friend the Lord Essex,
bespeaking his influence and kind offices as soon as he should return from Ireland.
Of this happy event the bard declared that he had entertained no immediate
expectation; but having learnt, within the last half hour, that his lordship had
actually arrived at Nonsuch, he had been emboldened to deliver the letter with which
he had been thus honored. "Grammercy! master Shakspeare!" cried the Earl after
hastily glancing over the paper, "I am myself but a newly pardoned criminal, and
therefore little warranted to become a suitor; but I feel too happy in her grace's
favor not to wish to extend it to others. There are few things in which I would not
venture to pleasure the Lord Southampton: and it would like me no less to serve the
merry varlet, or the soul-stirring bard, (which shall I call thee?) whose lofty lines
ever seem to me to o'ertop all praise, 'till they are clean eclipsed by his quaint
and comic fantasies. So forward! with me to the
garden, and if I may speed your suit, it shall not lack a willing advocate."
The poet bowed his thanks, and followed at a short distance behind the Earl, who,
however, turned round and conversed familiarly with him till they entered the
gardens, which according to the prevailing taste were laid out in trim beds, formal
parterres, fountains, and successive terraces, communicating withone another by
flights of stone steps, and ornamented with vases, statues, and groupes of sculpture.
At the extremity of one of these terraces stood a little pavilion called the
Paradise, being decorated with representations of Adam and Eve, the Serpent and the
Tree of Knowledge; and having an arbour for its entrance engrailed with clustering
althaeas, jessamines, honeysuckles, roses, pomegranates, and other flowering shrubs,
all of which were in full bloom and fragrance. Within this odorous and shady bower,
the Queen, who had been observed to bestow an unusual attention that morning upon her
toilet, was seated, holding a large feather fan, and surrounded by several maids of
honor, all standing. Behind them, within the pavilion, were seen other female
attendants employed in caul work: lutes and citharas, with cards and a richly
enamell'd chess board were lying upon a marble table by their side. Upon approaching
the august figure of royalty thus picturesquely enthroned, the Earl fell upon his
knees, an act of homage which her Majesty always
exacted, even from her ministers in their audiences of business; and Shakspeare,
halting at some little distance, immediately imitated his example. Essex found a no
less gracious reception than he had experienced in the morning, for the remembrance
of his flattery had not yet passed away, and their conference had lasted for some
time when the Queen, looking towards Shakspeare, enquired whether his squire, who
seemed but young in years, had left his locks in the hands of the Irish rebels, that
he wore so bald a brow. "I much fear me that I am presumptuous and overbold," said
the Earl after having mentioned the name and object of his attendant. "I who am
myself but a petitioner for mercy and forgiveness, in thus becoming a suitor for
others; but since your majesty's condescension has so soon forgotten my offences, I
may perhaps stand better excused now than at another time, for forgetting
myself."
"So, this is the dramatic chronicler," said the queen, who had felt much interest in
his historical plays; "let him approach; we would have speech of him; and you, my
lord, may avail yourself of yonder seat, for after so long and so speedy a journey
you may well need a little rest."
Bowing as he accepted the permission thus given to him, Essex beckoned to the poet,
who approached, and concluding that he had been invited to imitate his patron, seated himself upon a low garden stool, beside the
earl, and immediately opposite to the Queen. So unusually gracious was the present
mood of Elizabeth, that she smiled at a mistake which at another moment might have
excited her indignation, and waved her hand to her attendants as a signal that they
might retire into the pavilion, a notice which they instantly obeyed. Essex, catching
the expression of the Queen's face with the alacrity of a courtier, smiled also:
while Shakspeare, perfectly unconscious that he had committed any violation of court
etiquette, read his petition with a respectful propriety, that might well atone for
his little oversight.
"Look you, Master Playwright," graciously exclaimed her majesty when he had
concluded; "your writings like us well, but touching this licence for playing more
frequently, here is our head Bearward who has been lately complaining to us most
piteously that you have become his worst enemy, for that when the flag is flying at
your theatre of the Globe, his garden is so deserted by the people, that his best
bear will scarcely pay the baiting. How say you to this?"
"I dare not misprise his calling, since it has ever found a gracious patron in your
majesty," replied the bard; "but under favour I would venture to affirm that he who
withdraws his fellow subjects from such pastimes, and
instructs them in their country's annals, and points out to their admiration the
glory of their monarchs, (than whom none have been more illustrious than your
majesty's immediate ancestors) can hardly fail to civilize and exalt the people,
though he may find it impossible to add to the renown of the sovereign."
"It is well, and wisely, and loyally urged," said the Queen, evidently pleased with
the speech; "and, by my troth! it may chance to speed the licence for which you are
our petitioner. And what led you to our musty chronicles, Sir Poet, when your
playwright's art might have found better range in the wider walks of fancy and
invention?"
"My grand-father fought with good approof in the battle of Bosworth Field," said
Shakespeare, not sorry to have an excuse for mentioning the circumstance, "and was
fortunate enough to find favour with your grace's ancestor, the valiant King Henry
the Seventh. From him and from my father I have inherited a love of loyalty and of my
country's glory; and as I despaired of doing justice to such splendid deeds as the
defeat of the Armada, and the other exploits that have glorified your grace's reign,
I was driven to record the annals of your less illustrious predeccessors."
"Beshrew me," said the Queen, in an under voice to Essex, "if I have ever heard a
varlet speak more honorably, or pithily to the
purpose. And yet," she continued, again addressing herself to Shakespeare, "if we
forget us not, thou hast somewhere ventured an allusion to our royal self. The
passage stays not with us, but we have forgiven it, though it coupled our name if we
mistake not, with some idle flower."
Elizabeth perfectly remembered the lines, though she would not appear to attach so
much importance to them, as to have thought them worthy her recollection. Essex
however, who saw the real motives of her reserve, and knew that she would be pleased
with the quotation, exclaimed, "your Majesty may pardon both the poet and myself,
when we do but recall a Midsummer Night's Dream;" and then looking passionately at
the Queen he continued:
"That very time I saw (but thou couldst not)
Flying between the cold moon and the earth,
Cupid all arm'd: a certain aim he took
At a fair vestal throned by the West,
And loos'd his love-shaft smartly from his bow,
As it should pierce a hundred thousand hearts;
But I might see young Cupid's fiery shaft
Quench'd in the chste beams of the watery moon;
And the imperial votaress passed on
In maiden meditation, fancy free.
Yet mark'd I where the bolt of Cupid fell:
It fell upon a little western flower,
Before milk-white; now purpled with love's wound,
And maidens call it, "Love in Idleness."
"It ran even thus, but I took you not, my lord, for so shrewd a remembrancer," said
the queen.
"The lines might easily have passed from out my head," replied the Earl, "but they
related to my admired sovereign, and therefore were they treasured in my heart of
hearts." He laid his hand upon his breast as he spoke; Elizabeth looked pleased,
though she noticed not the speech, but turning to Shakspeare, resumed, "we have
already passed our pardon for this liberty of your pen, wherefore we rebuke it not;
and touching the licence that you seek, it shall be even as you wish, and our
secretary shall have order to prepare the patent."
"I shall be ever bound to pray for your gracious majesty," said the poet, bowing
profoundly. "God's pity! sir; they tell me that you playwrights be but scant sayers
of your prayers, and since they are henceforward to be put up for our own well and
welfare, you shall neither lack the means to proffer them, nor a memorial of her for
whom you pray." So saying, Elizabeth took a volume from a low table that stood beside
her chair, and graciously extended it to Shakspeare with these words: "The Queen
presents you her prayer-book: you may retire."[Note to "Essex and the Maid of
Honour":] The book thus presented Shakespeare, we may suppose to be that beautiful
and rare volume, described by Dr. Dibdin in his Bibliographical Decameron, and
known among collectors as Queen Elizabeth's Prayer Book. Through the friendship of
Mr. Freeling (from a copy in his possession) the Proprietors are enabled to
present an admirable facsimile of one leaf. The extract, is part of a prayer by
the celebrated John Fox, author of the Book of Martyrs. Dr. Dibdin says, "I wish I
knew more of the private history of this elegant volume at all events if you feel
disposed to loosen your purse strings, purchase one of the earlier editions of it,
on account of the superior sharpness or truth of the outline." The Doctor adds
that the first edition is dated 1569, the second 1578, the third 1581, the fourth
1590, and the fifth 1608. [Author, Horace Smith.] Judging from the latter
command that he was not expected to express his
gratitude, the poet kissed the volume with great reverence, pressed it to his heart,
and retired from the royal presence with repeated obeisances, not less delighted at
the success of his suit, than flattered by so signal a testimony of her Majesty's
favour and condescension.
After a prolonged conference, in which he had every reason to believe that he had
completely re-instated himself in the Queen's favour, Essex also withdrew, descending
the terraces, and crossing towards a postern gate of the park. In this route he most
unfortunately encountered the fair Mrs. Bridges, one of the maids of honor, with whom
he had long been suspected of being deeply in love, and who on his account had
already been exposed to the wrath, and even the blows of her royal mistress.
Imagining himself to be screened from observation, the
enamoured Earl accosted her in such terms of fervent and high-flown gallantry as were
then in vogue among the courtiers, and placing a small collar of chrystals around her
neck, which he declared that he had brought from Ireland expressly for her wearing,
he would have detained her still longer in dalliance, had not his Innamorata hurried
away, urging the necessity of resuming her attendance upon the Queen. Although her
Majesty had been so embowered in the arbour as not to be visible to Essex, she had
unluckily been following him with her eyes, through a treacherous loop-hole of the
leaves, and with a rage-envenomed heart had witnessed the whole transaction.
It was not without a considerable struggle that she could prevent an immediate
explosion of her fury and assume a forced composure of look and voice as she
exclaimed to the approaching offender, "So, mistress! you can find time to wait upon
us when you have finished your amorous foolery with the Lord Deputy. If there be
neither treason nor immodesty in the avowal, we would fain know what passages passed
between you."
"Ay, with such haste," interposed the Queen, "that you have left your partlet all
awry."
"Nothing would dissuade his lordship," resumed Mistress Bridges, blushing still
deeper, as she adjusted her ruff, "but he must needs place this Irish carcanet around
my neck."
At this confession Elizabeth could restrain herself no longer. Quick as lightning she
bestowed upon her trembling rival a violent box on the ear, tore the collar from her
neck, dashed it to the ground, and exclaimed with a look, and voice that sufficiently
declared her to be the daughter of Henry the Eighth:
"God's death! thou hussy, thou wanton! thou gill-flirt! thou flaunting young
cockatrice! is our court and presence to be contaminated and insulted by such doings
as these? Begone! and let me never again see thy shameless face: what! did I send
this traitorous and temerarious youth to Ireland to collect carcanets for his
concubines, instead of putting chains around the rebel Tyrone. By the throne of
heaven! he shall dearly rue it. I am no Queen to be thus saucily entreated."
The terrified maid of honor shrunk away to conceal her disgrace; Elizabeth arose and
walked hastily towards the mansion, but having had a few minutes to collect herself,
and feeling probably that she had betrayed rather more violence than became her sex
and station, she turned towards her attendants, and in
a tone of assumed moderation exclaimed, "For ourself, ladies, this matter touches us
not; the disloyal minion and the frontless minx would have been forgotten in silent
scorn, but that we will neither suffer our public service to be neglected, nor the
decency of our court to be violated.
"For the latter, let the name of this flirting puppet be scratched from the list of
our maids; and touching this misproved and disobedient Lord Deputy, who has dared to
desert his post, and return from Ireland in open defiance of our orders, we will see
that he be straightway humbled; where is our secretary? let him join us forthwith in
the council room.
That same evening the Earl was committed a prisoner to his chamber, and after much
delay and numerous vacillations, occasioned by the miserable perplexity of the
Queen's mind, as she fluctuated between severity and returning tenderness, she at
length publicly disgraced him, and deprived him of all his great offices and
emoluments. Always haughty and ungovernable, and rendered alike desperate in fortune
and in mind by these indignities, the ill-fated Earl was driven to those frantic and
well known projects of rebellion which shortly afterwards conducted him to the
scaffold.
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