The Norfolk post. [volume] (Norfolk, Va.) 1865-1866, 1865-07-06
England in Elizateth's Day.

So rapidly were the English growing
in the luxuries and vices of other lands,
while they retained their native vigor
and coarse habits, that the play
wrights constantly alluded to the incon-
gruity of the fashions displayed in the
dress of dandies, to their language mix
ed of all the dialects in Europe, to ther
aptitude for every kind of dissipation, to
their skill in the sports of all nations,
and to the decay ofantiQue severity. s'We
have robbed Greece of gluttony,n says
Stephen Gasson, "Spain ofpride, France
of deceit, and Dutchland of quaffing."
But these affectations were only kind
of varnish on the surface of society. The
incidents of Court gossip show how
savage was the life beneath. Queen
Elizabeth spat one day in the midst of
her mobiles, at a gentleman who dis
pleased her. She struck Lord Essex on
the cheek. Burleigh often cried at her
ill-treatment. The lords wrangled and
even drew their swords in her presence.
Once Leicester took her handker-
chief from her lap to wipe his face at
tennis. Lady Jane Grey was starved
and beaten by her parents, and ex-
posed to such indignities that she weari-
ed of life, yet they made her one of the
best Greek scholars of the day. Here
tics were burned IN every town. Sir
Henry Sidney, as we learn from a paper
recently published by Mr.. Fronde, when
sent to quell the Irish rebels, first pro-
claimed the Queens sovereignty, and
then allowed no mercy to the recusants
He "put man, woman aud child to the
sword" while his sergeant-majors bal
anced the advantages of pillaging, or
"having some killing with q pre-
ference for the latter when they felt
themselves in humor for the chase.
The belief in witches everywhere pre-.
vailed, nor was it an uncommon village
sport to drown old women in the ponds,
and to rack suspected wizards till, for
very anguish, they confessed fictitious
crimes. Country folks conducted their
revels with a license that would shock
our modern ears. The lord OF mlsrule
led out his motely train, and ladies went
a-Maying with their lovers to the woods'
The feast of Asses and OF Fools pro-
famed the sanctuaries, nor were the
sports of Christmas 90 well suited to
celebrate Christian festival as to recall
the rights of Wooden and of Freya.--
Men and women who read Plato and
discussed the beauties Of Petrarch's po-
etry. allowed the coarsest practical jokes
and used the grossest language. They
sold farms and forests, and wore tteir
acres in the form of gems and gold lace
on their backs. But their splendid cloths
andjewels did not prevent them from in
dulging in the most untidy habits. They
would lie upon the rushes which con-
cealed the fragments of old feasts: and
they burned perfumes to sweeten cham.
bers musty with bad air. The church
itself was not respected. The nave OF
st. Paul became a rendezvous of thieves
and prostitutes. Fine gentlemen paid
sums of money for the privilege of clank-
Ing up and down it's aisles in service
time dancers and masquers, crowding
from the square ouSide in their finery,
OFTEN took the sacrament, and then ran
out TO recommence their sports. Men
were Papists and Professionals according
to the time of day-hearing mass in the
morning and sermon in the afternoon
There was no end to the extravaganza
and incongruity of elements which then
prevailed in England. Yet, in the midst
OF this confusion, rose cavaliers ike
Sidney, philosophers like Bacon, poets
like Spencer-in whom all that is pure,
elevated, subtle, tender, wise, delcate,
and learned in our modern civilization
displayed itself.