After Elizabeth: The Death of Elizabeth and the Coming of King James. Leanda Lisle de

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Название After Elizabeth: The Death of Elizabeth and the Coming of King James
Автор произведения Leanda Lisle de
Жанр Историческая литература
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Издательство Историческая литература
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isbn 9780007394395



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complaining desperately to Cecil about ‘the poverty of the state, the continuance of charge, the discontentment of all sorts of people’.67 She told the French ambassador, the Comte de Beaumont, that she was weary of life. Then, sighing as her eyes filled with tears, she spoke of Essex’s death, how she had tried to prevent it and failed.68

      By August Elizabeth’s pains had gone to her hip. Defiantly she continued to hunt every two or three days but a Catholic spy writing under the name ‘Anthony Rivers’ reported that a countrywoman who saw her on her progress had commented that the Queen looked very old and ill. A guard terrified the woman by warning that ‘she should be hanged for those words’. Courtiers, however, were less easily intimidated and whispers about the succession were on everyone’s lips.69 The spy described how James’s agents were working hard to gather support from powerful families offering ‘liberty of conscience, confirmation of privileges and liberties, restitution of wrongs, honours, titles and dignities, with increase according to desert etc’. Individuals were responding with shows of affection: ‘for the most part it is thought rather for fear than love’. He named Cecil as one such, adding, ‘all is but policy it being certain he loves him as little as the others’.70 It is now believed that the spy ‘Rivers’ was William Sterrell, Secretary to the Earl of Worcester, which would have placed him at the heart of Elizabeth’s court.71 His letters to Persons and others make it clear that few actively wanted a Scots king and he reported that a group of courtiers were planning to marry Arbella Stuart to Beauchamp’s seventeen-year-old elder son, Edward Seymour ‘and carry the succession that way’. To all outward appearance, however, it was business as usual.

      In October 1602, Cecil entertained Elizabeth at his new house on the Strand and presented her with ten gifts, mostly jewels. She left in excellent spirits, refusing any help to enter the royal barge. As she climbed aboard, however, she fell and bruised her shins badly. It left her in considerable pain. She began to talk of moving from Whitehall to the comforts of Richmond Palace, but in the end the lassitude of depression had kept her at Whitehall where Harington had found her weeping at Christmas.

      Now that Elizabeth’s godson was certain she was dying he intended to follow the Tract on the Succession sent to James in Scotland with a New Year’s gift, the traditional time for giving presents. He designed a lantern constructed as a symbol of the dark times of Elizabeth’s last years and the splendour that was to come with James’s rising sun. It was engraved with the words: ‘Lord remember me when thou comest into thy kingdom,’ and a little underneath, ‘After the cross, light.’72

       CHAPTER TWO

       ‘A babe crowned in his cradle’

       The shaping of the King of Scots

      WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE is said to have written Macbeth to flatter James. It certainly did not flatter Scotland. The play, which was first performed in 1606, depicted a violent, medieval country inhabited by witches. It was supposedly set in the eleventh century but as Shakespeare knew, many at the English court believed the picture held true of the Scotland of their day – and not without some reason. For the most part Scottish society was divided between feudal lairds and their tenantry. What meagre surpluses the land produced were used to feed the lairds’ private armies before any remainder could be traded in the towns. These consequently remained small and trade was underdeveloped, while an inordinate amount of energy was expended on the detection and killing of witches. There were, however, signs of growing wealth and improvement.1

      The