And so, I present: "Mistress Puzzlebutt meets Queen Elizabeth"
If I was unnerved to be ushered so unceremoniously into the royal presence, I was distracted too by the appearance of the queen herself. I had not the nerve to meet her gaze when she entered our gates, and had seen her only from afar before, in ceremonial processions and the progresses she had so frequently made amongst the people. In the great houses I had visited, her image was everywhere, emblazoned in vivid portraits. I knew well her coppery red hair, her alabaster skin, her sharp eye, and superior mien. I had not yet reckoned with the reality of her person. At sixty-four years, she was no longer the Tudor rose of her youth. Her skin was now sagging and lined as crepe, showing spots and discolorations that even a thick plastering of white lead could not conceal. (The queen could not resist cosmetics, and wore them more thickly than any boy player in a scenario. It was a far cry from the artful and sparing application I had received from Mary Fitton.) When she smiled, her teeth were black—a legacy, it was said, of her great love of sweets. They were set off by the bright red tint she had applied to her lips, which made her mouth a crimson slash on the disc of her face. Her red hair was false, I noted, as wisps of white escaped the confines of the netting. She had small black eyes, which in their liveliness belied the edifice of age surrounding them. Her manner with her courtiers was flirtatious, as she alternately batted those lively eyes and coyly rolled them, using her fan to draw attention to her breast, which was exposed low in the manner of unmarried ladies.Consider yourself teased.
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