ges, if not of his head.

The Huguenots, being first shaken into submission, saw their political
liberties torn from them by the stroke of a pen; and even while the
Catholics were making merry over this discomfiture the minister was
planning to send Henrietta, sister of the king, across the channel to
become queen of Protestant England, as wife of Charles I. But the act
of supreme audacity was to come. This high prelate of the Church, this
cardinal-minister, formed an alliance with Gustavus Adolphus, the great
leader of the Protestants in the war upon the emperor and the pope!

He allowed no religion, no class, to sway or to hold him. He was for
France; and her greatness and glory augmented under his ruthless
dominion. By his extraordinary genius he made the reign of a
commonplace king one of dazzling splendor; and while gratifying his own
colossal ambition, he so strengthened the foundations of the monarchy
that princes of the blood themselves could not shake it.

It was great, it was dazzling, but of all his work there is but one
thing which revolutions and time have not swept away: the "French
Academy" alone survives as his monument. Out of a gathering of
literary friends he created a national institution, its object the
establishing a court of last appeal in all that makes for eloquence in
speaking or writing the French language. In a country where few things
endure, this has remained unchanged for two hundred and thirty years.

But this master of statecraft, this creator of despotic monarchy, had
one unsatisfied ambition. He would have exchanged all his honors for
the ability to write one play like those of Corneille. Hungering for
literary distinction, he could not have gotten into his own Academy had
he not created it. And jealous of his laurels, he hated Corneille as
much as he did the enemies of France.

The feeble King Louis XIII. manifested wisdom in at least one thing.
He permitted this greatest statesman of his time, and one of the
greatest perhaps of all time, to have a free hand in managing his
kingdom. And whatever the pressure from the queen-mother, from cabals
and intriguing nobles, he never yielded the point, but kept his great
minister in his service as long as they both lived. This was
especially commendable in Louis because they were personally
antagonistic, and also because the queen-mother constantly used her
powerful influence over her son for his downfall.

Marie had been permi