to remove him. And in the final struggle which now began,
Fitzurse, as before, took the lead. He approached with his drawn sword,
and waving it over his head, cried, "Strike, strike!" but merely dashed
off his cap. Tracy sprang forward and struck a more decided blow.

* * * * *

The blood from the first blow was trickling down his face in a thin
streak; he wiped it with his arm, and when he saw the stain, he said,
"Into thy hands, O Lord, I commend my spirit." At the third blow, he
sank on his knees--his arms falling, but his hands still joined as if
in prayer. With his face turned towards the altar of St. Benedict, he
murmured in a low voice, "For the name of Jesus, and the defence of the
Church, I am willing to die." Without moving hand or foot, he fell fiat
on his face as he spoke, and with such dignity that his mantle, which
extended from head to foot, was not disarranged. In this posture he
received a tremendous blow, aimed with such violence that the scalp or
crown of the head was severed from the skull, and the sword snapped in
two on the marble pavement. Hugh of Horsea planted his foot on the neck
of the corpse, thrust his sword into the ghastly wound, and scattered
the brains over the pavement. "Let us go--let us go," he said, in
conclusion, "the traitor is dead; he will rise no more."

DEAN STANLEY.

[Note: _Thomas Becket_ (1119-1170). Chancellor and afterwards Archbishop
of Canterbury under Henry II.; maintained a heroic, though perhaps
ambitious and undesirable struggle with that king for the independence
of the clergy; and ended his life by assassination at the hands of
certain of Henry's servants.]

* * * * *

THE DEATH OF ELIZABETH

The triumph of her lieutenant, Mountjoy, flung its lustre over the last
days of Elizabeth, but no outer triumph could break the gloom which
gathered round the dying queen. Lonely as she had always been, her
loneliness deepened as she drew towards the grave. The statesmen and
warriors of her earlier days had dropped one by one from her council
board; and their successors were watching her last moments, and
intriguing for favour in the coming reign. The old splendour of her
court waned and disappeared. Only officials remained about her, "the
other of the council and nobility estrange themselves by all occasions."
As she passed along in her progre