the
court, that the queen was said to dance in her nightdress and to swear
like a trooper?

It was, indeed, largely from these rustic sources that such stories were
scattered throughout England. Peasants thought them picturesque. More
to the point with them were peace and prosperity throughout the country,
the fact that law was administered with honesty and justice, and that
England was safe from her deadly enemies--the swarthy Spaniards and the
scheming French.

But, as I said, we must remember always that the Elizabeth of one period
was not the Elizabeth of another, and that the England of one period
was not the England of another. As one thinks of it, there is something
wonderful in the almost star-like way in which this girl flitted
unharmed through a thousand perils. Her own countrymen were at first
divided against her; a score of greedy, avaricious suitors sought her
destruction, or at least her hand to lead her to destruction; all the
great powers of the Continent were either demanding an alliance with
England or threatening to dash England down amid their own dissensions.

What had this girl to play off against such dangers? Only an undaunted
spirit, a scheming mind that knew no scruples, and finally her own
person and the fact that she was a woman, and, therefore, might give
herself in marriage and become the mother of a race of kings.

It was this last weapon, the weapon of her sex, that proved, perhaps,
the most powerful of all. By promising a marriage or by denying it, or
by neither promising nor denying but withholding it, she gave forth a
thousand wily intimations which kept those who surrounded her at bay
until she had made still another deft and skilful combination, escaping
like some startled creature to a new place of safety.

In 1583, when she was fifty years of age, she had reached a point when
her courtships and her pretended love-making were no longer necessary.
She had played Sweden against Denmark, and France against Spain, and the
Austrian archduke against the others, and many suitors in her own land
against the different factions which they headed. She might have sat
herself down to rest; for she could feel that her wisdom had led her
up into a high place, whence she might look down in peace and with
assurance of the tranquillity that she had won. Not yet had the great
Armada rolled and thundered toward the English shores. But she was
certain that her land was secure, compact, and safe.