Her being abandoned thus by these heartless friends did not escape the notice of the dying queen. Though her strength of body was almost gone, the soul was as active and busy as ever within its failing tenement. She watched every thing—noticed every thing, growing more and more jealous and irritable just in proportion as her situation became helpless and forlorn. Every thing seemed to conspire to deepen the despondency and gloom which darkened her dying hours.
The queen's voice fails.
She calls her council together.
Her strength rapidly declined. Her voice grew fainter and fainter, until, on the 23d of March, she could no longer speak. In the afternoon of that day she aroused herself a little, and contrived to make signs to have her council called to her bedside. Those who had not gone to Scotland came. They asked her whom she wished to have succeed her on the throne. She could not answer, but when they named King James of Scotland, she made a sign of assent. After a time the counselors went away.
The chaplains.
The prayers.
The queen's death.
At six o'clock in the evening she made signs for the archbishop and her chaplains to come to her. They were sent for and came. When they came in, they approached her bedside and kneeled. The patient was lying upon her back speechless, but her eye, still moving watchfully and observing every thing, showed that the faculties of the soul were unimpaired. One of the clergymen asked her questions respecting her faith. Of course, she could not answer in words. She made signs, however, with her eyes and her hands, which seemed to prove that she had full possession of all her faculties. The by-standers looked on with breathless attention. The aged bishop, who had asked the questions, then began to pray for her. He continued his prayer a long time, and then pronouncing a benediction upon her, he was about to rise, but she made a sign. The bishop did not understand what she meant, but a lady present said that she wished the bishop to continue his devotions. The bishop, though weary with kneeling, continued his prayer half an hour longer. He then closed again, but she repeated the sign. The bishop, finding thus that his ministrations gave her so much comfort, renewed them with greater fervency than before, and continued his supplications for a long time—so long, that those who had been present at the commencement of the service went away softly, one after another, so that when at last the bishop retired, the queen was left with her nurses and her women alone. These attendants remained at their dying sovereign's bedside for a few hours longer, watching the failing pulse, the quickened breathing, and all the other indications of approaching dissolution. As hour after hour thus passed on, they wished that their weary task was done, and that both their patient and themselves were at rest. This lasted till midnight, and then the intelligence was communicated about the palace that Elizabeth was no more.
King James proclaimed.
Portrait of James the First.
In the mean time all the roads to Scotland were covered, as it were, with eager aspirants for the favor of the distinguished personage, there, who, from the instant Elizabeth ceased to breathe, became King of England. They flocked into Scotland by sea and by land, urging their way as rapidly as possible, each eager to be foremost in paying his homage to the rising sun. The council assembled and proclaimed King James. Elizabeth lay neglected and forgotten. The interest she had inspired was awakened only by her power, and that being gone, nobody mourned for her, or lamented her death. The attention of the kingdom was soon universally absorbed in the plans for receiving and proclaiming the new monarch from the North, and in anticipations of the splendid pageantry which was to signalize his taking his seat upon the English throne.
King James I.