Rensselaer Semi-Weekly Republican, Volume 35, Number 84, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 26 June 1903 — WHEN QUEEN BESS LIVED. [ARTICLE]

WHEN QUEEN BESS LIVED.

Xt Is Three Centuries Since Elisabeth Reigned in Unsland. Someone who keeps track of historical dates communicates to the public the fact that on the 24th of March of next year the three hundredth anniversary of the death of Qqpen Elizabeth will be reached. It is not proposed to signalize the event in any public way, but at the same time there is.no ‘reason* why we should refrain from indulging in a backward glance at the career of this lamented royal lady. There Is no exaggeration in the statement that Queen Elizabeth was the grand old maid of ail history. Just why she failed to marry isn’t clear. It certainly couldn’t be ascribed to the fact that 'he wasn’t asked. Queens never wait to be asked. But she was red-haired and proud as Lucifer. Her nose was up in the air as high as a starched ruff could put it. And there Is no doubt that she aided this haughty pose by wearing her crown on the back of her head —in order to tilt her freckled nasal organ still higher. Why, she couldn’t have seen the mud that sappy Walter Raleigh saved jher from by making a gutter rug of jhis best cloak. He might just as well [have used a mule blanket. Nevertheless, she was a pretty fair example of a queen, as queens went In those days i —even if she did separate poor Mary iQueen of Scots from her royal head, jit was just Bessie’s way of heading off a plot against her royal person. In addition to this she was the founder of the so-called Elizabethan period in literature, an age made more or less famous by a rural dramatist of alleged distinction called Sbakspeare, as well as by a certain Lord Bacon, hvhose name seems to have suggested [the theory that he had some connection with “Hamlet,” which, being rudely rendered Into English, is "small bam.” It certainly doesn’t seem 300 years Since Elizabeth stepped down from her throne and out. But then, we are all too busy to take much heed of the pasjsage of time. Anyway, she is as dead as she ever will be and nobody would really want to call her back.