upon the good maintenance and upholding of this matter."

Queen.--"I believe nothing of, what you say concerning the dissolving of
the authority of the States. I know well enough that the States do
remain states still. I mean not to do harm to the cause, but only to
reform that which his Lordship hath done beyond his warrant from me."

And with this the Queen swept suddenly from the apartment. Sir Thomas,
at different stages of the conversation, had in vain besought her to
accept a letter from the Earl which had been entrusted to his care.
She obstinately refused to touch it. Shirley had even had recourse to
stratagem: affecting ignorance on many points concerning which the Queen
desired information, and suggesting that doubtless she would find those
matters fully explained in his Lordship's letter. The artifice was in
vain, and the discussion was, on the whole, unsatisfactory. Yet there is
no doubt that the Queen had had the worst of the argument, and she was
far too sagacious a politician not to feel the weight of that which had
been urged so often in defence of the course pursued. But it was with
her partly a matter of temper and offended pride, perhaps even of wounded
affection.

On the following morning Shirley saw the Queen walking in the garden of
the palace, and made bold to accost her. Thinking, as he said, "to test
her affection to Lord Leicester by another means," the artful Sir Thomas
stepped up to her, and observed that his Lordship was seriously ill.
"It is feared," he said, "that the Earl is again attacked by the disease
of which Dr. Goodrowse did once cure him. Wherefore his Lordship is now
a humble suitor to your Highness that it would please you to spare
Goodrowse, and give him leave to go thither for some time."