il with
morions or steel caps. Here too were to come the Gentlemen Pensioners,
resplendent in scarlet, to "run with the spear;" and hundreds of
men-at-arms were set at every point to give garish bravery to all.
Thousands of citizens, openmouthed, gazed down the long arenas of green
festooned with every sort of decoration and picturesque invention. Cages
of large birds from the Indies, fruits, corn, fishes, grapes, hung in
the trees, players perched in the branches discoursed sweet music, and
poets recited their verses from rustic bridges or on platforms with
weapons and armour hung trophy-wise on ragged staves. Upon a small lake
a dolphin four-and-twenty feet in length came swimming, within its belly
a lively orchestra; Italian tumblers swung from rope to bar; and crowds
gathered at the places where bear and bull-baiting were to excite the
none too fastidious tastes of the time.

All morning the gay delights went on, and at high noon the cry was
carried from mouth to mouth: "The Queen! The Queen!"

She appeared on a balcony surrounded by her lords and ladies, and there
received the diplomatists, speaking at length to the French Envoy in
a tone of lightness and elusive cheerfulness which he was at a loss
to understand and tried in vain to pierce by cogent remarks bearing
on matters of moment involved in his embassage. Not far away stood
Leicester, but the Queen had done no more than note his presence by
a glance, and now and again with ostentatious emphasis she spoke
to Angele, whom she had had brought to her in the morning before
chapel-going. Thus early, after a few questions and some scrutiny, she
had sent her in charge of a gentleman-at-arms and a maid of the Duke's
Daughter to her father's lodging, with orders to change her robe, to
return to the palace in good time before noon, and to bring her father
to a safe place where he could watch the pleasures of the people. When
Angele came to the presence again she saw that the Queen was wearing a
gown of pure white with the sleeves shot with black, such as she
herself had worn when admitted to audience yesterday. Vexed, agitated,
embittered as Elizabeth had been by the news brought to her the night
before, she had kept her wardrobers and seamstresses at work the whole
night to alter a white satin habit to the simplicity and style of that
which Angele had worn.

"What think you of my gown, my lady refugee?" she said to Angele at
last, as the Gentlemen Pensioners parade