o act some scene in a
dress like this," (for she was clad in white like a priest,) "should you
regard it as a crime to behold it?[77]" Was the queen here making the
apology of her own compliances under the reign of her sister, or was she
generously furnishing a salvo for others? In any case, the sentiment, as
coming from the heroine of protestantism, is extraordinary.

[Note 77: Reidani "Annal." Vide Bayle's "Dictionary," art.
_Elizabeth_.]

An ineffectual remonstrance, addressed by Elizabeth to the king of
Spain, was the only immediate result of this attempt of the Provinces
to engage her in their concerns. She kept a watchful eye, however, upon
their great and glorious struggle; and the time at length came, when she
found it expedient to unite more closely her interest with theirs.

England now enjoyed profound tranquillity, internal and external, and
our annalists find leisure to advert to various circumstances of
domestic history. They mention a corporation formed for the
transmutation of iron into copper by the method of one Medley an
alchemist, of which the learned but credulous sir Thomas Smith,
secretary of state, was a principal promoter, and in which both
Leicester and Burleigh embarked some capital. The master of the Mint
ventured to express a doubt of the success of the experiment, because
the adept had engaged that the weight of copper procured should exceed
that of all the substances employed in its production; but nobody seems
to have felt the force of this simple objection, and great was the
disappointment of all concerned when at length the bubble burst.

About the same time the famous Dr. Dee, mathematician, astrologer, and
professor of the occult sciences, being pressed by poverty, supplicated
Burleigh to procure her majesty's patronage for his infallible method of
discovering hidden treasures. This person, who stood at the head of his
class, had been early protected by Leicester, who employed him to fix a
lucky day for the queen's coronation. He had since been patronized by
her majesty, who once visited him at his house at Mortlake, took lessons
of him in astronomy, and occasionally supplied him with money to defray
the expenses of his experiment. She likewise presented him to some
ecclesiastical benefices; but he often complained of the delay or
non-performance of her promises of pensions and preferment. On one
occasion he was sent to the continent, ostensibly for the purpose of
consulting physi