Bible, in which the mistakes which had been made in former translations were to be set right. After several years this new translation was finished, and is the one which is used generally in England at the present day.

3. James I. and the House of Commons. When Parliament met, the members of the House of Commons did not like what James had been doing. They thought that, as it was very difficult to find a sufficient number of clergymen who could preach good sermons, it would be better to allow them all to preach, whether they would wear surplices or not. The Commons were, therefore, not in a very good humour with the king, and they were the more displeased when they found that James wanted them to give him money. Elizabeth had been very sparing, and even stingy, but when James came to England from such a poor country as Scotland then was, he fancied that he was going to be extremely rich, and began giving away estates and money to his Scotch friends. He soon found out that if his income was greater in England than it had been in Scotland, his expenses were also much more, and that unless the House of Commons would give him money he would run into debt. The Commons, however, would not give him money unless he did what they wanted, so that they and the king did not agree very well together.

4. The Gunpowder Plot.-The Catholics were more badly treated than the Puritans. James promised that if they did not make disturbances he would not make them pay the fines which they were

bound to pay by law, but he soon broke his promise. One of their number, named Catesby, resolved to blow up with gunpowder the Lords and Commons, when they came to hear the king's speech at the opening of Parliament. In this way, both James himself, and the men who refused to alter the laws which directed the persecution of the Catholics,

would be punished. Catesby expected that James's sons would be blown up with their father, and he intended, after this had been done, to take James's little daughter Elizabeth, who was being educated in Warwickshire, and to bring her up as a Catholic Queen. If Catesby had succeeded, he would probably have been murdered, or executed for his crime long before he could get near the child; but he

Ireland had never been really conquered. A small district round Dublin obeyed the English law, but the rest of the people lived in their own way, governed by their own chiefs. Elizabeth had been afraid lest the Spaniards should take it, and she had tried to conquer the Irish chiefs. At one time she took a great quantity of land from them and gave it to Englishmen. The Irish did not like this, and some years after the defeat of the Armada they rose against her and defeated an English army. She therefore sent Essex with a larger army to conquer them. Essex marched about the country, doing nothing which was of any use, and losing most of his men. Then he came back to England suddenly when he ought to have remained in Ireland, and went straight to the Queen in his muddy clothes, without changing his dress after riding, thinking that he would persuade her to forgive him. Elizabeth did not like even her favourite to disobey her, and she sent him away to his own house, ordering him to stop there till there had been an inquiry to find out why he had come away from Ireland. Essex did not like this, and one day he and a few friends mounted their horses and rode into the city, calling on the citizens to rise to protect him. The citizens did nothing of the kind, and Essex was tried upon the charge of treason, and executed.

5. Conquest of Ireland.-After Essex came back Elizabeth sent Lord Mountjoy to conquer Ireland. He succeeded in doing it; and at the end of Elizabeth's reign Ireland was, for the first time, entirely under the English Government. But Mountjoy only conquered the North of Ireland by destroying all the

food in the country. There was a terrible famine, and a large number of the Irish people there died of starvation.

6. The Monopolies.Elizabeth had very little money. She did not like to ask parliament to tax the people, for fear of making people dissatisfied

QUEEN ELIZABETH IN THE MANTLE OF THE ORDER OF THE GARTER.

with her. At the same time she had a great many favourites whom she wished to reward, and she did it by giving them the monopoly of some article or other; that is to say, by allowing nobody but them to sell it. Of course they charged more for these things than would have been charged if anybody who liked had

6

been allowed to sell them. At last the people got angry, and the House of Commons begged her to put an end to these monopolies. The Queen at once gave way. When she knew that all her people were determined to have a thing, she never resisted them. 'I have more cause to thank you all,' she said to the Speaker of the House of Commons, than you me; and I charge you to thank them of the House of Commons from me, for had I not received a knowledge from you, I might have fallen into the lap of an error, only for lack of true information. I have ever used to set the last judgment-day before mine eyes, and so to rule as I shall be judged to answer before a higher Judge, to whose judgment-seat I do appeal, that never thought was cherished in my heart that tended not to my people's good. Though you have had, and may have, many princes more mighty and wise sitting in this seat, yet you never had, or shall have, any that will be more careful and loving.'

7. Elizabeth's Death.-This was the last time that Elizabeth spoke to her people. In 1603 she died, after a long reign of forty-five years. She had many faults, but she was a great queen. She found England divided and weak, she left it united and strong. Englishmen were proud of their country. As we look back to that time we are able to see that if they were fierce and cruel in their revenge upon Spain, the victory was one for which all the world was the better. Spain was a land of tyranny, where no man dared to speak a word against the king or the church. England was not so free as it is now,