Page:A general history for colleges and high schools (Myers, 1890).djvu/620

554 not live out the year that marked this calamity, which she most deeply deplored.

The Queen.—Elizabeth was the daughter of Henry VIII. and Anne Boleyn. She seems to have inherited the characteristics of both parents; hence the inconsistencies of her disposition.

When the death of Mary called Elizabeth to the throne, she was twenty-five years of age. Like her father, she favored the reformed faith rather from policy than conviction. It was to the Protestants alone that she could look for support; her title to the crown was denied by every true Catholic in the realm, for she was the child of that marriage which the Pope had forbidden under pain of the anathemas of the Church.

Elizabeth possessed a strong will, indomitable courage