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Coppee, Henry

"English Literature, Considered as an Interpreter of English History Designed as a Manual of Instruction"

It
is not her high abstraction of justice, Sir Artegal, who does the
murderous deed, but his man _Talus_, retributive justice, who, like a
limehound, finds her hidden under a heap of gold, and drags her forth by
her fair locks, in such rueful plight that even Artegal pities her:
Yet for no pity would he change the course
Of justice which in Talus hand did lie,
Who rudely haled her forth without remorse,
Still holding up her suppliant hands on high,
And kneeling at his feet submissively;
But he her suppliant hands, those _hands of gold_,
And eke her feet, those feet of _silver try_,
Which sought unrighteousness and justice sold,
Chopped off and nailed on high that all might them behold.
She was a royal lady, a regnant queen: her hands held a golden sceptre,
and her feet pressed a silver footstool. She was thrown down the castle
wall, and drowned "in the dirty mud."
"But the stream washed away her guilty blood." Did it wash away
Elizabeth's bloody guilt? No.


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