ang, and remembered,
with feelings of bitter grief, that this crown was destined never
to adorn her head, since the king, by solemn act of Parliament, had
excluded her from the succession to the throne. [Footnote: Tytler,
p. 340] But for a few weeks this pain had been more gentle, and less
burning. Another feeling had silenced it. Elizabeth who was never to be
queen or sovereign--Elizabeth might be a wife at least. Since she
was denied a crown, they should at least allow her instead a wife's
happiness; they should not grudge her the privilege of twining in her
hair a crown of myrtle.

She had been early taught to ever have a clear consciousness of all her
feelings; nor had she now shrunk from reading the depths of her heart
with steady and sure eye.

She knew that she loved, and that Thomas Seymour was the man whom she
loved.

But the earl? Did he love her in return? Did he understand the child's
heart? Had he, beneath the childish face, already recognized the
passionate, proud woman? Had he guessed the secrets of this soul, at
once so maidenly and chaste, and yet so passionate and energetic?

Thomas Seymour never betrayed a secret, and what he had, it may be, read
in the eyes of the princess, and what he had, perhaps, spoken to her in
the quiet shady walks of Hampton Court, or in the long, dark corridors
of Whitehall, was known to no one save those two. For Elizabeth had a
strong, masculine soul; she needed no confidant to share her secrets;
and Thomas Seymour had feared even, like the immortal hair-dresser of
King Midas, to dig a hole and utter his secret therein; for he knew very
well that, if the reed grew up and repeated his words, he might, for
these words, lay his head on the block.

Poor Elizabeth! She did not even suspect the earl's secret and her own
were not, however, the same; she did not suspect that Thomas Seymour,
if he guessed her secret, might, perhaps, avail himself of it to make
thereof a brilliant foil for his own secret.

He had, like her, ever before his eyes the diamond crown on the head of
the young queen, and he had noticed well how old and feeble the king had
become of late.

As he now rode by the side of the two princesses, he felt his heart
swell with a proud joy, and bold and ambitious schemes alone occupied
his soul.

The two women understood nothing of this. They were both too much
occupied with their own thoughts; and while Catharine's eyes swept with
beaming look the landscape