"Let us judge--let us judge," replied the Queen, hastily; "but from the moment she appears, Sir Sydney, I request of you to observe her minutely, that we may have her description, if she is worth it." This order being given, and some little conjuration made, as Rosamond was only a short distance from London, she made her appearance in a second. Even at the door, her beauty charmed every one, but as she advanced she enchanted them; and when she stopped to be gazed at, the admiration of the company, with difficulty restrained to signs and looks, exhibited their high approbation of the taste of Henry II. Nothing could exceed the simplicity of her dress--and yet in that simplicity she effaced the splendours of day--at least to the spectators. She waited before them a long time--much longer than the others had done; and as if aware of the command the Queen had given, she turned especially towards Sydney, looking at him with an expressive smile. But she must go at last; and when she was gone,--"My lord," said the Queen, "what a pretty creature! I never saw anything so charming in my life. What a figure! what dignity without affectation! what brilliancy without artifice!--and it is said that I resemble her. My lord of Essex, what think you?" My lord thought, would to Heaven you did; I would give the best steed in my stable that you had even an ugly likeness to her. But he said, "Your majesty has but to make the tour of the gallery in her green robe and primrose petticoat, and if our magician himself would not mistake you for her, count me the greatest ---- of your three kingdoms." During all this flattery with which the favourite charmed the ears of the good Queen, the poet Sydney, pencil in hand, was sketching the vision of the Fair Rosamond. Her Majesty then commanded it should be read, and when she heard it, pronounced it very clever: but as it was a real impromptu, not one of those born long before, and was written for a particular audience, as a picture is painted for a particular light--we think it but justice to the celebrated author not to draw his lines from the venerable antiquity in which they rest, even if we had the MSS. copy; but we have not--which at once finishes the business.