and to whom she had given sanctuary.” If the sentence was executed, not in vindication of the offended laws, but as a sacrifice to personal revenge, Elizabeth’s guilt was greatly aggravated by her extreme dissimulation in the management of the affair. She no sooner received intelligence of Mary’s decapitation, than she abandoned herself to misery and almost despair: she put on deep mourning; her council were severely rebuked; her ministers, and even Burleigh, were driven from her presence with furious reproaches. Her secretary Davison was subjected to a process in the Star-Chamber for a twofold contempt, in having revealed her Majesty’s counsels to others of her ministers, and having given up to them the warrant which she had committed to him in special trust and secrecy, to be reserved for a case of sudden emergency. But Davison’s apology, an extract from which was inserted by Camden in his Annals, has since been found entire among the original papers of Sir Amias Paulet. From this authentic source it appears, that Davison was made her unconscious agent and instrument. Those who have endeavoured to extenuate the apparent treachery of Elizabeth, have alleged that the queen of Scots kept the queen of England in continual dread of dethronement; and that if the necessity existed to take the life of the queen of Scots, it was equally necessary that it should be done with a show of reluctance, and the least possible odium to the queen of England. Such has been the defence, both of the act itself, and of the subsequent dissimulation. But it would be difficult to apologize for her proceedings against Davison, an able and honest servant, whom she disgraced and ruined, for the purpose of impressing the belief that Mary was executed without her knowledge and contrary to her intentions. Right and wrong must be differently estimated in sovereigns and ordinary persons, if the sacrifice of such a victim to the shade of Mary or the indignation of her son can be justified.