was marked out from the first for a great and glorious mission. As, in the words of St. Peter (ii. 22), Jesus of Nazareth had been approved of God" amongst the people by many conspicuous signs, so, according to Stephen, Moses was from his birth evidently marked out for a great mission, both by his special gifts and by his providential training. He was, if we may literally translate the expression used by the speaker, "divinely fair." It is a phrase that signifies nobility and dignity of mien, more than mere beauty of feature. It probably alludes by anticipation to his mature manhood, and we cannot help thinking that Stephen had in his mind the Jewish traditions on the subject, as well as the Old Testament phrase that "he was a proper child; for it was said that when Moses as a young man moved along the public ways, his appearance was striking that passers-by involuntarily turned round to gaze after him. There is some difference between the statement here, that he was mighty in word" as well as in deeds, and the plea of the prophet himself that he was "not eloquent," but, on the contrary, "slow of speech and of a slow tongue." But, to say nothing of the humility always attributed to Moses, the reference of Stephen is rather to weight and authority than to readiness of utterance. The future deliverer of the chosen people had all the marks of a leader and commander of men; and was, according to Stephen, conscious of being destined to a great mission; for when he went to visit his brethren, and smote an Egyptian who oppressed one of them, he thought they would have understood this as a sign that he was sent to be their leader. But "they understood not" (v. 25); nay, so far were they from accepting him as God's chosen messenger that, when he interfered to keep the peace amongst them, they reproached him with his presumption, and even threatened him with the vengeance of the Egyptians for what he had already done.

Stephen makes a point of this rejection of Moses. He first contrasts it with the signal favour of God shown to the prophet in the lonely mountain wilderness, and then he emphasizes the difference between Divine and human judgment by returning to that rejection again. "This Moses whom they refused, saying, Who made thee a ruler and a judge? the same did God send to be a ruler and deliverer by the hand of the angel which appeared to him in the bush " (v. 35). That Stephen was thinking of another ruler and deliverer whom the Jews had rejected |

with foolish scorn, is shown clearly by the words that follow: "This is that Moses, which said unto the children of Israel, A prophet shall the Lord your God raise up unto you of your brethren, like unto me; him shall ye hear." And then the speaker returns once more to the unbelief and disobedience shown by the fathers to the great national lawgiver of whom all now make their boast. "To whom our fathers would not obey, but thrust him from them, and in their hearts turned back again into Egypt, saying unto Aaron, Make us gods to go before us for as for this Moses, which brought us out of the land of Egypt, we wot not what is become of him" (vv. 39, 40). Surely Stephen was thinking of One who had ascended to a holier place than Sinai, and who was supposed to have disappeared for ever from the world. The spirit of the Master was working mightily in his servant, and Stephen's whole thoughts were so fixed upon the hidden glory of Jesus that he already fulfilled in himself the yet unwritten words of St. Paul-his "life was hid with Christ in God." And as he saw about him the signs of the base and dead superstitions. preferred by the Jews to the noble simplicity of the truth as it is in Jesus, a warmer indignation kindled in the words with which he described the similar conduct of the fathers: "And they made a calf in those days, and offered sacrifice unto the idol, and rejoiced in the works of their own hands. Then God turned, and gave them up to worship the host of heaven; as it is written in the book of the prophets, O ye house of Israel, have ye offered to me slain beasts and sacrifices by the space of forty years in the wilderness? Yea, ye took up the tabernacle of Moloch, and the star of your god Remphan, figures which ye made to worship them: and I will carry you away beyond Babylon" (vv. 41-43). Were these the people to assume airs of infallible knowledge, and to condemn the holy, loving Jesus for impiety, because his doctrines were too pure and large for the carnal understanding? They were only acting over again the part of their fathers; and as Stephen recalled the words of prophecy, he received a new insight into the long conflict between the Spirit of God and the blind selfwill of man. Beyond the types and symbols. of the Jewish religion, he beheld, as in a glass, the glory of the Lord, and he longed for the time when such an imperfect medium should be done away, in order that men might see with open face the light that was rising on the world.

approaching within a certain distance of the Court, but also from assuming the title and rank of Princess of Wales. She was ordered besides to recognise the new-born babe as entitled to both. In addition to these indignities, Anne Boleyn had had her shut up under the same roof with her own child, to whom she was strictly enjoined in all things to yield precedence. When Anne Boleyn fell, it was Elizabeth's turn to be degraded from name and dignity. Still, it is said that Mary, so far from showing rancour against the child who had been for a brief period her rival, actually pleaded her cause before their common tyrant.

Under such circumstances, Elizabeth was carefully taught by her governess, as soon as she could put two ideas together, that she must be circumspect. In a condition of perpetual alarm and uncertainty, she laid the foundation of the self-restraint, prudence, and calculation which formed through life such essential features of her character.

After a time the King deigned to take some slight interest in his two daughters, and in December, 1539, sent the Chancellor Wriothesly to give them his blessing. The Chancellor reported about Elizabeth that "she asked after his Majesty's welfare with as great a gravity as she had been forty years old"—she was then six years old--and adds, "If she be no worse educated than she now appeareth to me, she will prove of no less honour than beseemeth her father's daughter." Even then her charming manners are said to have struck all who had to do with her.

Elizabeth's first appearance in public would seem to have been at the baptism of her brother Edward, when Mary led her by the hand, and she is reported to have showed a scrupulous regard for propriety.

With this brother, whose senior she was by four years, Elizabeth for some time lived and learned together. Both were officially instructed in the creed of their father, Mary meanwhile clinging, with an obstinacy that once well-nigh brought her to the scaffold, to the Church and faith of her mother, Katherine of Arragon. Privately, however, Elizabeth was probably initiated more completely into the reformed faith by a lady of her suite, Mistress Katherine Ashley, who, being a connexion of Anne Boleyn's, naturally belonged to the party of reform.

When ten years old, for some cause or other unexplained, Elizabeth fell into disgrace, and was excluded from the presence of the King and Queen for a whole year. During her banishment, as she called it, she

gave evidence of her progress in learning by translating into English "Le Miroir de l'Ame Pecheresse," written by Marguerite de Valois, sister of Francis I. of France, which she presented to her then stepmother, Katherine Parr, with the dedicatory words :-"She has reproduced the train of thought as well as her poor mind and little knowledge would allow; but she was not ignorant that her work was ill-constructed in many places, and that nothing was done as it should have been." The Queen secured for her stepdaughter the King's pardon.

On the death of the King on January 28, 1547, Elizabeth was placed in the house assigned to the Queen Dowager, Katherine Parr, and put under her authority. For fear of Catholic contagion-though in her case it was pretty groundless-she was kept carefully aloof from her sister Mary, then thirty-one years old, and a rigid, almost fanatical, Romanist.

One feature of Elizabeth's character began to show itself when she was but just fifteennamely, a lack of delicacy—which even then laid her open to the tongue of scandal. The Lord Admiral, Sir Thomas Seymour, who had married Katherine Parr, and therefore lived under the same roof, followed her with attentions and familiarities which a delicateminded girl would have resented, but which she seemed rather to encourage. These things grew at last to such a pitch that her stepmother sent away the flirting girl to live at Cheston. Soon after the settlement there, Elizabeth wrote the following letter to her stepmother-not exactly what might be expected from an inexperienced girl of sixteen :

"Although I could not be plentiful in giving thanks for the manifold kindnesses received at your Highness's hand, at my departure, yet I am something to be borne withall, for truly I was replete with sorrow to depart from your Highness, especially seeing you undoubtful of health; and albeit I answered little, I weighed it more deeper when you said you would warn me of all evilnesses that you should hear of me, for if your Grace had not a good opinion of me you would not have offered friendship to me that way at all-meaning the contrary. what may I more say than thank God for providing such friends for me, desiring God to enrich me with their long life, and me grace to be in heart no less thankful to receive it than I am now made glad in writing to show it. And although I have plenty of

matter here, I will stay, for I know you are quick to read.

"From Cheston, this present Saturday,
"Your Highness's humble daughter,
“ ELIZABETH.

Notwithstanding the cause of separation, the two kept up a friendly correspondence, in which the Lord Admiral also took part. Katherine continued, too, to evince kind consideration for Elizabeth, constantly exhorting her to improve herself, saying that she "believed her destined by heaven to be the Queen of England." On her death-bed, however, the bitter feelings in her heart found vent in complaints regarding her husband's unkindness.

Scarcely was Katherine in her grave before Seymour began to renew his attentions to Elizabeth, and found seconders in Mistress Ashley and other members of her household. | But, though unable to conceal the gratification thus caused her, when asked "if in case the Council were willing, she would espouse the Admiral," she replied, with the circumspect or crafty vagueness which became her settled habit, "When that comes to pass, I will do as God shall put it into my mind." Yet so ingrained was her love of admiration and flirtation that she consented to repeated private interviews, and thus almost compromised, if not her word, yet certainly her honour. As it would have been an act of high treason to marry without the King's permission, and as the Royal Council viewed the Lord Admiral, on other grounds, with an evil eye, the conduct of Elizabeth gave occasion to an official inquiry, during which she displayed all the caution, strength, and craft, of which she showed herself afterwards so thorough a mistress. It was a strange position for a young girl without experience, in the power of unscrupulous men, greedy for her disgrace; exposed by turns to their dreadful threats and crafty caresses; threatened in her reputation, compromised by her giddy conduct, fearing the evidence of her people, whether true, false, or exaggerated, such as might be wrung from them by terror; anxious for their lives and for the life of the man she had begun to love." But she came out victorious. Nothing was found worthy of "blame, but a rather too decided flirtation, and the hereditary inclination to levity, which had been already so fatal to her mother, and had just drawn her into most formidable dangers." Though checked, the Royal Councillors were not convinced, and accordingly appointed Lady Tyrwhit to the

place occupied by Mistress Ashley, now dismissed for untrustworthiness. We are told that Elizabeth vented her wrath on her new duenna, and that she cried all night and lamented all the next day, as she said "the world would note her to be a great offender, having so hastily a governor appointed over her." Sir John Tyrwhit, her previous examiner, when summoned to his wife's assistance, told her that she herself, for her own honour's sake, ought to have been the first to ask for a governess; but adds, in his letter to the Duke of Somerset, "She cannot digest such advice in no way; but if I should say my fantasy, it were more meet she should have two than one."

This whole affair probably brought about a crisis in Elizabeth's development. It served as a crucible in which the thoughts and days of youth were consumed. The severe discipline of disgrace and pain threw her back upon herself. She perceived the necessity of shutting herself up, and in some degree disappearing from the world, so that her damaged honour might be repaired in silence and obscurity. In fact, a totally different character came forth, of a kind that the bestinformed would have been, a few weeks previously, far from suspecting. The dominant energy at the bottom of her Tudor soul awoke, and she became aware of her powers. The girl was merged in the woman-the statesman arose out of the infant. Without further struggles, she accepted Lady Tyrwhit as her mistress.

The Lord Admiral paid for his indiscretions with his head. When Elizabeth was informed of his execution, she is reported to have said, "This day died a man with much wit and very little judgment." But, though to her enemies she thus ironically dismissed the memory of the man who but lately had been the hero of her dreams of marriage, so painful and deep a wound was inflicted on her by the event that she fell seriously ill.

As soon as she recovered strength she threw herself again into the studies in which she had previously sought peace and solace. Of these studies it will be now well to give a connected account. As was previously mentioned, Elizabeth and Edward were at first instructed together. John Cheke and Richard Coxe taught them Latin; Jean Balmain, French; Battista Castiglione, Italian; and Roger Ascham, writing. At a later period she pursued her studies alone, William Grindall, of St. John's College, Cambridge, being for three years her teacher in Greek. His successor, in 1548, was Roger Ascham, who