was private, with curtains which could be drawn
before it, so as to screen those within from the notice of the
congregation. The queen intended, first, to go into the great closet;
but, feeling too weak for this, she changed her mind, and ordered the
private one to be prepared. At last she decided not to attempt to make
even this effort, but ordered the cushions to be put down upon the
floor, near the entrance, in her own room, and she lay there while the
prayers were read, listening to the voice of the clergyman as it came in
to her through the open door.

One day she asked them to take off the wedding ring with which she had
commemorated her espousal to her kingdom and her people on the day of
her coronation. The flesh had swollen around it so that it could not be
removed. The attendants procured an instrument and cut it in two, and so
relieved the finger from the pressure. The work was done in silence and
solemnity, the queen herself, as well as the attendants, regarding it as
a symbol that the union, of which the ring had been the pledge, was
about to be sundered forever.

She sunk rapidly day by day, and, as it became more and more probable
that she would soon cease to live, the nobles and statesmen who had been
attendants at her court for so many years withdrew one after another
from the palace, and left London secretly, but with eager dispatch, to
make their way to Scotland, in order to be the first to hail King James,
the moment they should learn that Elizabeth had ceased to breathe.

Her being abandoned thus by these heartless friends did not escape the
notice of the dying queen. Though her strength of body was almost gone,
the soul was as active and busy as ever within its failing tenement. She
watched every thing--noticed every thing, growing more and more jealous
and irritable just in proportion as her situation became helpless and
forlorn. Every thing seemed to conspire to deepen the despondency and
gloom which darkened her dying hours.

Her strength rapidly declined. Her voice grew fainter and fainter,
until, on the 23d of March, she could no longer speak. In the afternoon
of that day she aroused herself a little, and contrived to make signs to
have her council called to her bedside. Those who had not gone to
Scotland came. They asked her whom she wished to have succeed her on the
throne. She could not answer, but when they named King James of
Scotland, she made a sign of assent. After a time the counse