QUEEN ELIZABETH AND THE RING.
Concerning the love-token which Queen Elizabeth gave to Essex, with an intimation that if he forfeited her favor, its return would secure her forgiveness, Miss Strickland quotes the testimony of Lady Spelman, who says that when Essex lay under sentence of death, he determined to try the virtue of the ring, by sending it to the queen, and claiming the benefit of her promise; but knowing he was surrounded by the creatures of those who where bent on taking his life, he was fearful of trusting it to any of his attendants. At length, looking out of his window, he saw early one morning a boy whose countenance pleased him, and him he induced by a bribe to carry the ring, which he threw down to him from above, to the Lady Scrope, his cousin, who had taken so friendly interest in his fate. The boy, by mistake, carried it to the Countess of Nottingham, the cruel sister of the fair and gentle Scrope, and, as both these ladies were of the royal bedchamber, the mistake might easily occur. The countess carried the ring to her husband the Lord Admiral, who was the deadly foe of Essex, and told him the message, but he bade her suppress both. The queen, unconscious of the accident, waited in the painful suspense of an angry lover for the expected token to arrive; but not receiving it, she concluded he was too proud to make this last appeal to her tenderness, and, after having once revoked the warrant, she ordered the execution to proceed.