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with the quickness of lightning she exclaimed, "Thy death or mine, oh Queen-then thus," she added, plucking from the belt of Sir Edward Warner, who stood by her side with his hands bound behind him, a dagger, and brandishing it aloft, "thus may his life be spared!"

A cry of "Treason! treason!" pervaded the dungeon, and the guards advanced between Catherine and the Queen, whose life she seemed to threaten; but ere they could wrest the dagger from her hand, she had buried it in her own bosom.

"Now, now do I claim thy promise, oh Queen!" she said, as she sunk to the earth, while the blood poured in a torrent from the wound. "Catherine Gray can no longer disturb thee-spare the life of the princely Seymour."

Her last breath was spent on these words-her last gaze was fixed upon the Queen-and pressing the hand of her husband, who was permitted to approach her, in her dying grasp, the spirit of Catherine Gray was released from all its sorrows.

The sacrifice of the unhappy lady's life preserved that for which it had been offered up. The Queen, touched with the melancholy termination of her kinswoman's existence, revoked the despotic and illegal order which she had given for the execution of Hertford, but ordered him to be conducted back to his dungeon, where he remained in close custody for a period of more than nine years. The death of Elizabeth at the expiration of that period, released him from his captivity; and then, although he was unable to restore the Lady Catherine to life, he took immediate steps to re-establish her fair fame. In these efforts he was perfectly successful: he proved before the proper tribunals the validity of his marriage, and transmitted his inheritance to his son, who was the issue of that ill-fated union.

The catastrophe of this tale is purely fictitious, and, in fact, it varies in many points from historical truth. At the period that Catherine Gray married Lord Hertford, Robert Dudley (the Earl of Leicester) was in the height of the Queen's favour. No known partiality on her side existed towards Seymour ; her objection was to Catherine's marriage with any person, as she was in the direct line of succession to the throne. Catherine lived with Hertford in the Tower, and had a second son born there; moreover her death was caused by decline, and took place at the house of Sir Owen Hopton, (Lieutenant of the Tower,) Cockfield Hall, Suffolk. She was buried in the chancel of Yoxford church.-[Edit.]

THE UNION OF THE TWO

CROWNS.

The world the temple was, the sea the ring,
The spoused pair two realms, the priest a king.
BEN JONSON.

HISTORICAL SUMMARY.

JAMES THE FIRST.

1603.-JAMES the Sixth, King of Scotland, was proclaimed King of England, by the title of James I.

The Queen arrived in England with her three children, Henry, Elizabeth, and Charles.

A conspiracy was detected against the Government in favour of the Lady Arabella Stuart, for which many suffered; amongst others, Sir Walter Raleigh was condemned, but reprieved, though not pardoned; he was confined in the Tower for many years.

The King entered into a treaty with France, to support the United States of Holland against Spain.

1604.-Great disputes arose among the Episcopalians and Puritans; but James adhered to the former, and continued to uphold the Church of England. James took the title of King of Great Britain; and English and Scotch Commissioners were appointed to inquire on what terms an union between the two nations might be effected.

A peace was concluded with Spain.

The United States lost Ostend after a siege of above three years, and a sacrifice of 120,000 lives.

1605.-The Gunpowder Plot was detected on the 4th November, the day previous to that on which it was to be executed.

1606.-All the conspirators who were apprehended were executed; and

the Parliament ordered the 5th of November to be kept as a day of thanksgiving.

1607.-The House of Commons opposed the King in all his attempts to stretch his prerogative, and issued an order for the regular printing of their journals.

1609.-The Spaniards, after a war of half a century's duration with the United States, agreed to a truce with them for twelve years, and negotiated with them as an independent people.

1610.-James created his son Henry, who was very much esteemed by the English, Prince of Wales.

Henry IV. of France was assassinated, by Ravaillac, in his own coach, in the streets of Paris.

1613.-Prince Henry died, to the great regret of the whole English nation. Frederick V., the Elector Palatine, arrived in England, and was married to the Princess Elizabeth.

Robert Carre became a great favourite with the King, who created him Viscount Rochester, and afterwards Earl of Somerset. He fell in love with the Countess of Essex; and after living with her some time, caused her to procure a divorce from her husband and marry him. Sir Thomas Overbury, having remonstrated with the latter on his connexion with the Countess, was thrown into the Tower, and afterwards poisoned. The Earl and Countess were tried and found guilty of the murder. The King spared their lives and granted them a small pension; but they languished out the remainder of their days in obscurity and infamy.

James and his Parliament disagreeing, and the latter refusing to grant the King money, he created the order of baronets, and raised two hundred persons to that rank, from each of whom he received a considerable sum of money.

1615.-George Villiers rose high in the King's favour, and in the course of a few years was created Viscount Villiers, Earl, Marquis, and Duke of Buckingham.

Mr. Hugh Middleton, a citizen and goldsmith, having obtained a patent, brought water by means of pipes into all the streets of London.

1616.-James being in great want of money, and not choosing to call a Parliament, gave up to the Dutch, for £250,000, the towns which they had placed in the hands of Queen Elizabeth, to secure to her the repayment of a loan from her of three times that amount.

1617-Sir Walter Raleigh, who had been confined in the Tower for twelve years, asserting that he had discovered, on a former voyage to the coast of Guiana, a gold mine, was at last released, but not pardoned; and undertook this voyage, with many other adventurers: but finding no mine, and plundering St. Thomas, a Spanish settlement, he was on his return committed to the Tower.

1618. The Spanish Ambassador, Gondemar, complaining of Raleigh's con

duct, in committing aggressions on the Spanish ships and colonies, the King, to please the Spanish court, with whom he wished to ingratiate himself, ordered Sir Walter to be beheaded on his former sentence.

1619.-The Protestant States of Bohemia, who had taken up arms against the Emperor Matthias, in defence of their religion, still persevered against his successor, Ferdinand II., and declaring their kingdom elective, chose Frederick V., the Elector Palatine, their King; who, pleased with his new title, marched his troops there, without consulting either the King of England, his father-inlaw, or the Prince of Orange, his uncle. James so highly disapproved of this step, that he would not allow him to be prayed for in the churches by the title of King of Bohemia.

1620-Ferdinand raised a great army, and gained an important victory at Prague; and Frederick and his family were forced to retire to Holland.

1621.—The Parliament granted the King two subsidies to assist the Elector Palatine; and then, among other grievances which they preferred, they accused the Lord Chancellor Bacon of having taken bribes. They sent him to the Tower, and declared him incapable of ever being employed again.

1623.-A marriage was negotiated between the Prince of Wales and a daughter of the King of Spain, which was delayed for some time by the death of the Pope. Buckingham, having ingratiated himself with Prince Charles, persuaded him to go over to Spain to bring home the Infanta. They wrung a very unwilling consent from the King, and departed for Spain, where they were received with great attention and cordiality; but the proper dispensation from the Pope was delayed by the death of Gregory XV. They both left Spain without having concluded the marriage.

1624-The Parliament granted the King money to carry on a war with Spain, and to recover the Palatinate.

A league was concluded with Louis XIII. of France against the whole House of Austria; and a treaty of marriage set on foot betwixt Prince Charles and Henrietta Maria, Louis's sister, whom he had seen on his way to Spain.

1625.-The King was seized with a Tertian fever, which proved fatal to him on the 27th March.

The Captives.

"A grave, a grave," Lord Barnard cried,

"To putt these lovers in ;

But lay my lady on the upper hand,

For she comes of the better kin."

LITTLE MUSGRAVE AND LADY BARNARD.

IN

N the year 1611, Highgate, which is now almost a suburb of the metropolis, was a remote and secluded village, far from the hum of business and the toils of state, and separated from the great city by numerous fair and smiling meadows and cornfields, many a gentle elevation and fertile valley, and a few scattered cottages and farm-houses, presenting an appearance of as perfect and simple rusticity as is now to be found in the most distant provinces of the island. On the brow of Highgate Hill, surrounded by extensive pleasure grounds, and commanding a noble view of London and the adjacent country, stood a stately mansion, the dwelling-house of Sir James Croft. This knight was a naval officer, whose achievements had raised him to a high place in the favour of King James the First, but who, having grown old in the service of his country, and having a taste for rural life and the fine arts, had retired to his house in Highgate, where he spent the evening of his days in tranquillity and seclusion. His house and grounds were decorated with the utmost taste and refinement. The art of landscape-gardening was then beginning to emancipate itself from the fetters of formality with which it had been so long loaded and disgraced; and although the grounds of Sir James

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