 at length cast up in the vale of adversity.—Endued with eloquence,

taste, science, sense, and sensibility, he now resigned himself to the charms of philosophy, poesy, and the mathematicks. Innocent and tranquil resources, to which the mind must ever turn when disappointed, if blest with powers capable of relishing them. The Cecils never thought Essex more dangerous. Age and infirmity now made Elizabeth anxious for peace abroad, and tranquillity at home, and there wanted only a meeting between her, and the much altered Earl, to re-establish him in her favour: but that meeting his enemies entered into a league to prevent; and began, by winning Elizabeth's physician to order the Earl of Essex into the country.—An artifice so refined as his liberation was not immediately discovered to be policy by any party; and the Queen, lulled into a belief that she could honorably receive him when he should return, suffered him to depart without an audience.
Wearied of wars, camps, and political jealousies, and discussions, the melancholy

Essex desired in freedom only the solitude he found; when Tracey returned with the astonishing news that the mistress he still adored yet existed.—Fatal news to his future repose!—The impossibility of openly claiming Ellinor, revived, with his passion all his dangerous and precarious projects.—Every other effort to obtain her was made without success, ere he secretly applied to the King of Scots; who always knew his own interest too well to grant any favour without having secured an adequate return. James ardently desired to be nominated as the successor of Elizabeth by herself, and had not spared bribes, promises, or flattery, to interest those around her whom he thought likely to influence her choice. The unhoped solicitation of the man whose courage and ambition James most feared, was a circumstance of importance. Uninformed of the real name or characters of the prisoners Lord Essex so eagerly desired to recover, the King of Scots sent the Laird of Dornock notice to guard them more strictly. The vehement tem

per of Essex made him always resign to the prevailing-object, every other interest: but a treaty like this could not be carried on so secretly as to escape the suspicious eyes of the ministers. With what malignant joy did they silently watch its progress, till the moment when its publication would inflame the Queen to their wishes!
Essex now once more thought it his interest to be busy, admired, and popular: he relapsed into all his old habits, and having gained the Queen's permission, returned to London. Far, however, from profiting by this
