s, and implore you not to refuse to poor servants a request which
your august queen would certainly not refuse them, if they had the good
fortune to be able to lay it at her feet."

"Is it then true, madam," Sir Robert Beale asked, "that you have not yet
made a will?"

"I have not, sir," the queen answered.

"In that case, my lords," said Sir Robert Beale, turning to the two
earls, "perhaps it would be a good thing to put it off for a day or two."

"Impossible, sir," replied the Earl of Shrewsbury: "the time is fixed,
and we cannot change anything, even by a minute, now."

"Enough, Bourgoin, enough," said the queen; "rise, I command you."

Bourgoin obeyed, and the Earl of Shrewsbury, turning to Sir Amyas Paulet,
who was behind him--

"Sir Amyas," said he, "we entrust this lady to your keeping: you will
charge yourself with her, and keep her safe till our return."

With these words he went out, followed by the Earl of Kent, Sir Robert
Beale, Amyas Paulet, and Drury, and the queen remained alone with her
servants.

Then, turning to her women with as serene a countenance as if the event
which had just taken place was of little importance--

"Well, Jeanne," said she, speaking to Kennedy, "have I not always told
you, and was I not right, that at the bottom of their hearts they wanted
to do this? and did I not see clearly through all their procedure the end
they had in view, and know well enough that I was too great an obstacle
to their false religion to be allowed to live? Come," continued she,
"hasten supper now, that I may put my affairs in order". Then, seeing
that instead of obeying her, her servants were weeping and lamenting, "My
children," said she, with a sad smile, but without a tear in her eye, "it
is no time for weeping, quite the contrary; for if you love me, you ought
to rejoice that the Lord, in making me die for His cause, relieves me
from the torments I have endured for nineteen years. As for me, I thank
Him for allowing me to die for the glory of His faith and His Church.
Let each have patience, then, and while the men prepare supper, we women
will pray to God."

The men immediately went out, weeping and sobbing, and the queen and her
women fell on their knees. When they had recited some prayers, Mary
rose, and sending for all the money she had left, she counted it and
divided it into portions, which she put into purses with the name of the
destined recipient, in her handwriting, with the mone