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gaze to stare into the empty air like unto one utterly bereft of reason; and being moved with pity to behold so gallant a man, and one withal, who was the best dressed gentleman in all her court, in so sorry a plight, she presently went up to him and placed her hand upon his shoulder, saying kindly, "Sir Walter! what aileth thee?" whereupon, with a long drawn sigh that seemed to come from the very bottom of his heart, he lifted up his eyes to her face, and then, as if struck with a sudden recollection, he sunk down his head, and did hide his face in his palms, with a groan so hollow and sepulchral, that her majesty thought he was about to give up the ghost.

"Nay, nay, take not on so-take not on so, Sir Walter. We mean thee no harm, be assured," said the queen, now in a very trepidation; which assurance was comfortable enough to her forlorn captain of the guard; but who, nevertheless, with a most pitiful accent exclaimed

"Let me die at your majesty's feet, for I am unworthy to live, having angered so good a mistress."

"Odds pittikins, man, think not of dying," replied the queen in her most gracious tone.

"In sad truth, if I be deprived of the most delectable happiness of gazing on such exquisite perfection as hath so oft delighted mine eyes, I am

utterly undone. I have no desire to live," continued he very movingly. At which the queen was not a whit displeased, for, it is out of all contradiction, she had vanity enough to believe, that the deprivation of the beholding her charms would produce so fatal an effect.

"Despair not-and if we find that thou still deservest our esteem, thou shalt have no cause for fear,” said her majesty in a manner she thought likely to put him into some hope. "Rise, Sir Walter Raleigh, and return with us to the palace -we will enquire into this matter."

"I am rooted to the earth," replied he, in the most sorrowful voice that ever was heard. "The fear of your majesty's displeasure hath fixed me to the ground. I have no power to move. How much would those wretched traitors rejoice who, to get me into disgrace, envying me your majesty's good opinion, that I prize as Jason did his Medea, and which, as she taught him to tame the brazen footed bulls, and cast asleep the watchful dragon that guarded the golden fleece, hath inspired me to like honourable and famous deeds,-to witness the very piteous straight to which I am reduced by the effect of their contemptible trick to slander the most excellent, chaste, and beauteous princess that ever did adorn this sublunary world."

"Dost think 'twas a trick?" enquired she earnestly.

"How could it be else, please your majesty ?" replied Sir Walter, albeit he knew all the time, having, from a better sense of hearing, heard more than the queen, that the conversation alluded to his amour with Mistress Elizabeth Throckmorton, though he could not distinguish to whom the voices belonged; but seeing that her majesty had fancied that it was in allusion to her, was resolved to take advantage of that mistake. "Is not your majesty well known, with all the superlative accomplishments of the nine immortal daughters of Jupiter and Mnemosyne, to unite with them the exquisite truth and modesty of the goddess Veritas and the Vestals and how could those villainous traducers, whoever they be, give utterance to so notorious a calumny, unless it were, that I should reap disadvantage thereby; but relying on your majesty's noble qualities and proper sense of what is due to your own dignity, I feel convinced, that the paltry trick will be regarded with the contempt it doth deserve-only awaiting your majesty's pardon, without which I am naught, to release me from this right painful and unhappy posture."

"Rise, Sir Walter Raleigh-thy pardon is granted thee, and there is our hand upon it," said the queen, in her most gracious manner giving him her hand, the which he did again press to his lips, but in a style more respectful than before.

"We'll think no more of these paltry tricksters— but will shew them how little we can be affected by their villainous yet most contemptible slanders." Then did she very kindly raise him from the ground, and return to the withdrawing room conversing with him all the way on matters relating to his projected voyage in a way, the friendliness whereof, he had rarely experienced.

CHAPTER V.

Ambition is a vulture vile

That feedeth on the heart of pride,
And finds no rest when all is tried;
For worlds cannot confine the one,
The other lists and bounds hath none;
And both subvert the mind, the state,
Procure destruction, envy, hate.

DANIELL.

Against bad tongues goodness cannot defend her
Those be most free from faults they least will spare,
But prate of them whom they have scantly known,
Judging their humours to be like their own.

SIR JOHN HARRINGTON.

"My Lord of Essex, you may account me your true friend in this business," said a dwarfish and ill favoured person soberly clad, to a handsome and gorgeously dressed gallant-having remarkable dark eyes, and a rich glossy beard very full at the bottom-as they sat over against each other in a chamber hung round with abundance of ancient

armour.

"I think I may, Sir Robert Cecil," replied he, addressed as the Earl of Essex, looking moodily all the time, as if there was something that mightily

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