etter
was paraphrased by Alexander Pope, and in French by Colardeau. There
exist in English half a dozen translations of them, with Abelard's
replies. It is interesting to remember that practically all the other
writings of Abelard remained unpublished and unedited until a very
recent period. He was a remarkable figure as a philosopher and scholar;
but the world cares for him only because he was loved by Heloise.

QUEEN ELIZABETH AND THE EARL OF LEICESTER

History has many romantic stories to tell of the part which women
have played in determining the destinies of nations. Sometimes it is
a woman's beauty that causes the shifting of a province. Again it is
another woman's rich possessions that incite invasion and lead to bloody
wars. Marriages or dowries, or the refusal of marriages and the lack
of dowries, inheritance through an heiress, the failure of a male
succession--in these and in many other ways women have set their mark
indelibly upon the trend of history.

However, if we look over these different events we shall find that it
is not so much the mere longing for a woman--the desire to have her as a
queen--that has seriously affected the annals of any nation. Kings, like
ordinary men, have paid their suit and then have ridden away repulsed,
yet not seriously dejected. Most royal marriages are made either to
secure the succession to a throne by a legitimate line of heirs or else
to unite adjoining states and make a powerful kingdom out of two that
are less powerful. But, as a rule, kings have found greater delight in
some sheltered bower remote from courts than in the castled halls and
well-cared-for nooks where their own wives and children have been reared
with all the appurtenances of legitimacy.

There are not many stories that hang persistently about the love-making
of a single woman. In the case of one or another we may find an episode
or two--something dashing, something spirited or striking, something
brilliant and exhilarating, or something sad. But for a woman's whole
life to be spent in courtship that meant nothing and that was only a
clever aid to diplomacy--this is surely an unusual and really wonderful
thing.

It is the more unusual because the woman herself was not intended by
nature to be wasted upon the cold and cheerless sport of chancellors
and counselors and men who had no thought of her except to use her as
a pawn. She was hot-blooded, descended from a fiery race, and one whose