ELIZABETH, QUEEN OF ENGLAND. (_From painting by an unknown artist._) _Frontispiece._ LADY JANE GREY AND ROGER ASCHAM. (_From painting by J. C. Horsley._) 66 KENILWORTH IN ELIZABETH'S TIME. (_From an old painting._) 184 ELIZABETH SIGNING THE DEATH WARRANT OF MARY STUART. (_From painting by Liezen-Mayer._) 220 MARY STUART RECEIVING HER DEATH SENTENCE. (_From painting by Carl Piloty._) 246 LAST MOMENT OF MARY, QUEEN OF SCOTS. (_From painting by an unknown artist._) 260 THE SPANISH ARMADA ATTACKED BY THE ENGLISH FLEET. (_From Pine's engraving of the tapestry formerly in the House of Lords, but destroyed by fire in the eighteenth century._) 274 LAST MOMENTS OF ELIZABETH. (_From painting by Delaroche._) 288 In the Days of Queen Elizabeth CHAPTER I THE BABY PRINCESS Two ladies of the train of the Princess Elizabeth were talking softly together in an upper room of Hunsdon House. "Never has such a thing happened in England before," said the first. "True," whispered the second, "and to think of a swordsman being sent for across the water to Calais! That never happened before." "Surely no good can come to the land when the head of her who has worn the English crown rolls in the dust at the stroke of a French executioner," murmured the first lady, looking half fearfully over her shoulder. "But if a queen is false to the king, if she plots against the peace of the throne, even against the king's very life, why should she not meet the same punishment that the wife of a tradesman would suffer if she strove to bring death to her husband? The court declared that Queen Anne was guilty." "Yes, the court, the court," retorted the first, "and what a court! If King Henry should say, 'Cranmer, cut off your father's head,' and 'Cromwell, cut off your mother's head,' they would bow humbly before him and answer, 'Yes, sire,' provided only that they could have wealth in one hand and power in the other. A court, yes!" "Oh, well, I'm to be in the train of the Princess Elizabeth, and I'm not the one to sit on the judges' bench and say whether the death that her mother died yesterday was just or unjust," said the second lady with a little yawn. "But bend your head a bit nearer," she went on, "and I'll tell you what the lord mayor of London whispered to a kinsman of my own. He said there was neither word nor sign of proof against her that was the queen, and that he who had but one eye could have seen that King Henry wished to get rid of her. But isn't that your brother coming up the way?"