city in politics. Her words were listened to at every court
in Europe. She annotated the classics, she made beautiful collections,
and she was regarded as a privileged person whose acts no one took
amiss. She died at fifty-three, and was buried in St. Peter's.

She was bred a man, she was almost a son to her great father; and yet,
instead of the sonorous epitaph that is inscribed beside her tomb,
perhaps a truer one would be the words of the vexed Pope:

"E DONNA!"

KING CHARLES II. AND NELL GWYN

One might classify the kings of England in many ways. John was
undoubtedly the most unpopular. The impetuous yet far-seeing Henry II.,
with the other two great warriors, Edward I. and Edward III., and
William of Orange, did most for the foundation and development of
England's constitutional law. Some monarchs, such as Edward II. and the
womanish Henry VI., have been contemptible. Hard-working, useful kings
have been Henry VII., the Georges, William IV., and especially the last
Edward.

If we consider those monarchs who have in some curious way touched the
popular fancy without reference to their virtues we must go back to
Richard of the Lion Heart, who saw but little of England, yet was the
best essentially English king, and to Henry V., gallant soldier and
conqueror of France. Even Henry VIII. had a warm place in the affection
of his countrymen, few of whom saw him near at hand, but most of whom
made him a sort of regal incarnation of John Bull--wrestling and
tilting and boxing, eating great joints of beef, and staying his thirst
with flagons of ale--a big, healthy, masterful animal, in fact, who
gratified the national love of splendor and stood up manfully in his
struggle with the Pope.

But if you look for something more than ordinary popularity--something
that belongs to sentiment and makes men willing to become martyrs for a
royal cause--we must find these among the Stuart kings. It is odd,
indeed, that even at this day there are Englishmen and Englishwomen who
believe their lawful sovereign to be a minor Bavarian princess in whose
veins there runs the Stuart blood. Prayers are said for her at English
shrines, and toasts are drunk to her in rare old wine.

Of course, to-day this cult of the Stuarts is nothing but a fad. No one
ever expects to see a Stuart on the English throne. But it is
significant of the deep strain of romance which the six Stuarts who
reigned in England have implanted in the English hea