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longer received with cheers when she appeared in public. She did not fail to notice the change in her subject's feelings towards her, and this made her excessively unhappy. A deep depression took possession of her, and though she tried to appear gay her heart was very heavy. Several attempts were made on her life from time to time as she advanced in years, but fortunately each was frustrated.
Literature made rapid strides during Queen Elizabeth's reign, particularly all that was written in Italian, which language her majesty understood well. Many dramatists rose to distinction at this period, the greatest being William Shakspeare. Spenser and Sir Philip Sidney added lustre to this reign also.
Elizabeth's last parliament was summoned in the autumn of 1601. She performed the ceremony with more than her customary display; but she was in such feeble health as to be unable to support the weight of the royal robes, and she was actually sinking to the ground when a nobleman, who stood near, caught her and supported her in his arms. She rallied and went through the fatiguing ceremony with her usual dignity and grace.
The science of medicine was in such a rude condition in the sixteenth century that the wealthy were treated with doses of pulverized jewels or gold. The poor had the best of it; for they were obliged to depend on herbs and ointments which certainly must have been more efficacious.
Queen Elizabeth had so little confidence in doctors or their prescriptions that she could not be induced to consult them even when she was very ill.
A.D. 1603. Her last sickness began in March, 1603, and when she was urged to seek medical aid, she angrily replied: "That she knew her own constitution better than anybody else, and that she was not in such danger as they imagined." She grew worse, however, and died two weeks later, in the seventieth year of her age, and the forty-fourth of her reign.
She was buried in Westminster Abbey in the same grave with her sister. Mary Tudor. Her successor, James I., erected a monument to her memory. On a slab of pure white marble the effigy of this remarkable queen lies beneath a stately canopy. Her head rests on embroidered cushions, her feet on a couchant lion. Royal robes hang around her form in classic folds, and her closely curled hair is covered with a simple cap. She has no crown, the sceptre has been broken from one hand, also the cross from the imperial orb which she holds in the other.