The reign of “Good Queen Bess” has been held in reverence, in comparison with that of “Bloody Mary,” her sister, which was stamped with infamy; and the “Elizabethan age” is one of the most illustrious in the annals of literature.
The government of Elizabeth was acknowledged to have been admirably managed, as regards her foreign policy, her wars, treaties, and alliances with other European powers. With the exception of Leicester and Hatton, her statesmen were well chosen. Lord Burleigh was her prime minister for forty years, and Sir Nicholas Bacon, and his more famous son, Francis, were among her wise and remarkable ministers.
Navigation, manufactures, and trade, made great advance during her reign. She was the first to establish trade with Turkey and Russia, and was the first sovereign who sent ambassadors to those courts. Mirrors and drinking-glasses from Venice, also porcelain and damask linen were then first introduced into England; but with all this advance forks were still unknown, and Queen Elizabeth, and her elegant belaced courtiers, and her stately beruffed dames, still ate with their fingers.
The first pair of knitted silk stockings ever made in England was presented to Queen Elizabeth in 1560 by her silk-woman. So much did she enjoy this luxury of dress, that she henceforth discarded her hose of cloth, and never after wore any other than those of silk.
Although her preceptor had described the youthful Princess Elizabeth as plain and sombre in her mode of dress, Queen Elizabeth was famous for her extravagant and showy costumes, and her great vanity regarding her appearance. So outrageous in size did her favorite ruffs become, when the fashion was adopted by her court ladies, that a royal proclamation was issued limiting them to a certain number of inches in height, Elizabeth retaining the privilege of wearing them larger and higher than any of her ladies; and bishops thundered forth their condemnations regarding the growing extravagance of dress, cautioning their hearers against “fine-fingered rufflers, with sable about their necks, corked slippers, trimmed buskins, and warm mittens. These tender Parnels” said they, “must have one gown for the day, another for the night; one long, another short; one for winter, another for summer; one furred through, another but faced; one for the work-day, another for the holy-day; one of this color, another of that; one of cloth, another of silk or damask. Change of apparel, one afore dinner, another after; one of Spanish fashion, another of Turkey; and to be brief, never content with enough, but always devising new and strange fashions. Yea, a ruffian will have more in his ruff and his hose than he should spend in a year; he who ought to go in a russet coat spends as much on apparel for himself and his wife as his father would have kept a good house with.”
“The costumes of that age were magnificent. Gowns of velvet or satin, richly trimmed with silk, furs, or gold lace, costly gold chains, and caps or hoods of rich materials, adorned with feathers, decorated on all occasions of ceremony the persons not only of nobles and courtiers, but of their retainers, and even of the substantial citizens. The attire of the ladies was proportionally splendid. Hangings of cloth, of silk, and of velvet, cloth of gold, and cloth of silver, or ‘needle-work sublime’ adorned on days of family festivities the principal chamber of every house of respectable appearance; and on public festivals these rich draperies were suspended from the balconies, and, combined with the banners and pennons floating overhead, gave to the streets an appearance resembling a suite of long and gayly dressed salons.”
Queen Elizabeth was very fond of display and gorgeous pageants, and her royal progresses were always attended with magnificent spectacles of various kinds: sometimes a splendid water procession on the Thames; again, she rode on horseback, attended by lords and ladies attired in crimson velvet, with their horses caparisoned with the same rich material.
The band of gentlemen pensioners, which was the boast and ornament of Elizabeth’s court, was composed of the flower of the English nobility, and to be admitted to serve in its ranks was regarded as a high distinction.
Music was much in fashion in Elizabeth’s court, and she excelled Mary, Queen of Scots, on keyed instruments, though Mary played best upon the lute. An instrument resembling a small guitar was much used as an accompaniment to the voice.
Elizabeth gave little patronage to painting or architecture; the former art she encouraged only so far as regarded the multiplication of pictures of herself. At length so many were the poor portraits of her which appeared, and were mostly caricatures of her royal face and person, that the queen issued a proclamation prohibiting all persons from drawing, painting, or engraving her countenance or figure, until some perfect pattern should be made by a skilful limner. But her painters did not flatter her as much as her poets.