found a subsidy so unpopular that he gave it up; and the people, in return, allowed him to cut off as many heads as he pleased, besides those in his own family.

Good Queen Bess, who, I know, is your idol in history--" "To be sure!--she knighted my ancestor at Tilbury Fort." "Good Queen Bess struggled hard to maintain a certain monopoly; she saw it would not do, and she surrendered it with that frank heartiness which becomes a sovereign, and makes surrender a grace." "Ha! and you would have me give up the stocks ?" "I would much rather the stocks had remained as it was before you touched it; but, as it is, if you could find a good plausible pretext--and there is an excellent one at hand,--the sternest kings open prisons, and grant favours, upon joyful occasions.

Now a marriage in the royal family is of course a joyful occasion! and so it should be in that of the King of Hazeldean." Admire that artful turn in the parson's eloquence!--it was worthy of Riccabocca himself.

Indeed, Mr.Dale had profited much by his companionship with that Machiavellian intellect.
"A marriage,--yes; but Frank has only just got into coattails!" "I did not allude to Frank, but to your cousin Jemima!".