Page:History of England (Froude) Vol 10.djvu/565

 1576.] THE DESMOND REBELLION. 545 Leicester. She married her lover immediately that she was free, and the sudden deaths of husbands at conveni- ent times throw suspicion upon wives who are in haste to profit by them. Whether Essex was poisoned must remain uncertain. The symptoms were those of violent dysentery. Nothing wrong was detected when the body was examined; but the analytical skill of the Dublin surgeons was not great, and Leicester's ante- cedents do not entitle him to a charitable construction of the doubt. The circumstances of the death were singularly touching. Notwithstanding Eathlin, Essex was one of the noblest of living Englishmen, and that such a man could have ordered such a deed, being totally unconscious of the horror of it, is not the least instruct- ive feature in the dreadful story. His bearing, when he learnt that he was to die, was described by a bystander ' as more like that of a divine preacher or heavenly prophet than a man/ ' He never let pass an hour without many most sweet prayers/ 1 He regretted that of late he had lived but a soldier's life, thinking more of his Prince and of his duty than of his God.' ' He prayed much for the noble realm of England, for which he feared many calamities.' His opinion of the religious character of his countrymen was most unfavourable. ' The Gospel had been preached to. them,' he said, ' but they were neither Papists nor Pro- testants ; of no religion, but full of pride and iniquity. There was nothing but infidelity, infidelity, infidelity ; , atheism, atheism ; no religion, no religion/ With which gloomy iteration, breaking out spasmodically as VOL. x. 35