But, with all her vagaries the Virgin Queen surely loved justice.

That quality, alone, makes a sovereign great.

Elizabeth, like her mother, Anne Boleyn, had great faith in her personal beauty; like her father, she had unbounded confidence in her powers of mind.

She took great pride in the ease with which she controlled persons.

She believed that no one was so adroit as Elizabeth Tudor in extracting secrets from others, and in unravelling mysterious situations, nor so cunning in hunting out plots and in running down plotters.