ELIZABETHS IN HISTORY

Evening Post, Volume CVII, Issue 32, 9 February 1929, Page 21

ELIZABETHS IN HISTORY

"Royal Elizabeths: Tim Romance of Five Princesses." By E. Thornton Cook. London: John Murray.

A delightful portrait ul: the prascitt little Princess Elizabeth forms the frontispiece of the interesting book produced by Mrs. Thornton Cook, who has already written biographically of "Her Majesty: The Romance of tho Queens of England" and "Their Majesties of Scotland." The book is dedicated to the little British Princess, "with the hope that in years to como Her Royal Highness will iind pleasure in reading tho romantic stories of the five Princesses Elizabeth w>io havo left footprints in tho sands of time." Tho excellent illustrations include Queen Elizabeth when Princess, at the ago of from thirteen to fifteen, from a picture at "Windsor; Elizabeth (later Queen of Bohemia), as a child; the children of Charles 1., Mary, James, Elizabeth, and AnneJ by Vail Dyck; Elizabeth of York, from a'picture in tho British Museum; "The Sweet Princesses," daughters.of George 111., Brineesses Royal, Elizabeth and Augusta. These aro from a picture by Gainsborough. Elizabeth of York's tragic history comes first, with brief account of the murder of her two little brothers in the woods by order of Richard, tho usurper. Then the jilting by the Dauphin of France by order of his father, and finally her forced and hasty marriage, to Henry VII. Her kindness to her sisters, and her life of "anxiety and sorrow aro well told. Elizabeth, tho daughter of Henry VIII., and poor Anno Boleyn was the next, and it is shown how she arrived as a disappointment to her father, and. was the cause of bitter jealousy on the part of Mary, tho seventeen-year-old daughter of Arragon. Later, when motherless, she is found to havo been taught to sew, and to write humble letters to her fastincreasing and. succeeding stop-mothers. Several attempts were made to marry her after the death of Henry VIII., but these were frustrated partly by her own common-sense and courage. Then came the terrible time of her life while Mary was Queen, and tho wonder is that she survived the plots and anxieties that beset her before sho became queen. The Lady Elizabeth "First Dochteur of Scotland" and daughter of James VI. and Anno, a young Danish princess, was born in 1596. When her father took the English throno tho little girl was.inconsolate at leaving all her loved Scottish friends. Like tho others sho became the centre of plots of one kind and another, and was separated from her dearly loved brother, Charles, on account of political troubles which neither understood. She was a gentle and beautiful girl, acomplishcd and charming, and was sought in marriage by many suitors. Finally sho married Frederick, Count Palatine, and later became Queen of Bohemia. Much tragedy came into her lifo and she ended her lifo in England. Elizabeth Stuart, daughter of Charles L and Henrietta Maria, is the next mentioned, and tho sadness of her life began early indeed, as sho was taken- from parents and friends, and was in the care of the •Roundhead Parliament. Later she Jiud a little time of happiness with her adored father, but tho terrible timo came'when she was one of the last with him before he was beheaded, and her self-control was out of proportion to her breaking heart. Barely a week after the children had been taken to Carisbrook Castlo the attendant entered her room to find lior lying with her check pressed against a little brown Bible, in a sleep from which there was no uwakening—and this a few months before her fifteenth birthday.

Tho last Elizabeth of the stories was a (laughter of George 111. and Queen Charlotte! Sho was a beautiful and gentle girl, accomplished and artistic, but for one reason and another did not marry till she was forty-eight, and then sho became tho happy wifo of Frederick Landgrave of Hesse-Horn-borg, loved in the land of her adoption, kindness itself to the poor, and died in tho third year of Queen Victoria's reign. Each story is charmingly told, and readers will be well rewarded by renewed interest in history through this account of the earlier British Princess Elizabeths.—M.H.C.