Woolley's communication being dated on _Sunday_,
(the manuscript is so excessively badly written as to be almost
illegible,) shows that Elizabeth did not summon her council, and evince
her displeasure at their conduct, until Saturday, the 13th of February,
two days after she was informed of Mary's fate. Davison had been
attacked with a stroke of the palsy shortly before, and all he says of
his committal is, that he was not sent to the Tower until Tuesday the
14th, on account of his illness; though some days previous (probably on
Saturday the 10th) the queen assembled her council.
This letter also exhibits a specimen of Leicester's characteristic
meanness; for notwithstanding that he was a party to the act of
forwarding the warrant for Mary's death, as his name occurs among those
of the council who signed the letters to the Earl of Shrewsbury, the earl
marshal, and to the Earl of Kent, both of which were dated on the 3rd of
February, 1586-7, commanding them to cause it to be put into execution,
he took care to withdraw from court before Elizabeth performed the roll,
which has so justly excited the scorn of posterity. It may be also
remarked, as another example of the official duplicity of the period,
that Sir Francis Walsingham likewise affected not to have been concerned
in the affair of dispatching the warrant, as in his letter to Lord
Thulstone, the secretary to King James, dated at Greenwich, on the 4th of
March, 1586-7, less than a month afterwards, he says, "_Being absent from
court_ when the late execution of the queen, your sovereign mother,
happened," though we find that he signed both the letters just mentioned.
Pages:
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25