The age-herald. [volume] (Birmingham, Ala.) 1897-1902, 1902-04-13
| ANITARY ENGINEER CRAY,
( who was employed by the SAM
tary Commission OF Jefferson
County, ~ ,,alra a ranort on thn


fly of vanitles-all is vanity" saith the
preacher, and so say we all of us-say it
in our individual vanity. The glory of
earthly greatness was powerless to COM
fort Queen Elizabeth in the absence of
mere personal beauty or charm of face,
and the real incentive to her warrant for
the execution of Mary of Scotland was
common jealousy of that reputed beauty
which Mary never actually possessed.
Mary was vain, tickle whimsical and she
lost her life because courtiers and syco-
plants had taught the world to believe
as true the mere fiattery, which she had
taken to heart, that she was beautiful
Elizabeth, with her few lovers bound to
her by bonds of fear, and signing for a
love that never came hated the less plain
Mary and so got rid of her by the ready
means of the headsmans axe. Doubtless
there are many women and men in the
world today who would rejoice to dispose
to of their rivals after the effective man
ner of Queen Elizabeth, and not one Of
whom would hesitate on account of that
feeble little Sunday-school fable to the
effect that the unhappy queen died cry
ing, "All my possessions for one moment
of time
To me, as to a multitude of others more
enlightened, the most interesting place in
the world is Westminster Abbey. On the
occasion of my first visit, nine consecu-
tive hours of my young time were spent
there In earnest meditation. The royal
tombs were of most absorbing fascina-
ton, first of all being the tombs of Queen
Elizabeth and of Mary of Scotland, which
are near together. They put upon me a
spell that banished for a time thought Of
other things, and long I tarried betwixt
the housed ashes OF those two women
who fill so large a space in the world 8
history and its romance.
There lie the headless trunk of the one
and the crownless head of the other, and
how immensely vain now seem their jeal-
ousies and passions of long-gone centu-
ries." I wrote Alabama that night, as
memory recalls the words across the
years.
Now and then as I stood in revery be-
tween the tombs of the two women who
figure largest in the vanity of the world,
eyes to the sepulchre of Saint Edward
hard by, where knelt many persons pray
ing and I marveled that such faith as
that was not mine-questioned myself
why l. too, was not moved to go there
and kneel with the others; questioning
that was to remain many year unan-
swered Then again would l be lost in
thoughts of Elizabeth and of Mary, their
loves, their hates. their triumphs, TRACE
dies and fates; their lovers and baters,
their glories and disasters, and-death!
BY and by there came a verger who
said it was the hour for closing the gates
to the royal tombs-those hand-wrought
and noble iron gates to the royal chapel
which have turned upon their hinges for
four hundred years. 1 gave him a gold
piece-and he brought me a camp-chair
and departed leaving me alone with Eliz-
abeth and Mary and Saint Edward and
a score of others of the great dead of the
dead centuries in whom had been exem-
plihed the dread and fear of kings. Adj
dison's words of the dead in the Abbey,
Some who died yesterday some seven
hundred years ago. struck me with liv-
ing force; and I sat there amongst the
dead kings and Queens and through tho
mind Of student-hstoria tropped they
all in endless train of gran1uer and
glory and fame.
There was no time for moralizing. ex-
cept in the momentary glimpses at the
tomb of Saint Edward, which seemed to
light itself as the shadows of the evening
fell. The saying of the preacher that "all