ace, for these inscriptions, which I have read, are in bad Latin.
This monument, which is very rich and even elegant in itself, is placed
upon the site of the destroyed house of the assassin Chatel. The most
ignorant of your Parisians knows this circumstance, which he has learnt
from family traditions. It is good that the people see every day before
their eyes this solitary pyramid, which teaches how King's assassins are
punished and what is done with the houses in which they were born.

"King Henri IV., for all his gaiety, had wits enough for four; he left
the pyramid standing, like those indulgent people who compromise a great
lawsuit, but do not on that account destroy the evidence and documents.

"This monument, besides, is the work of the Parliament of Paris; that
illustrious assembly has raised it, and perhaps your Majesty might seem
to accuse justice by destroying what it has once done for a good cause."

The King smiled at the conclusions of the lady in waiting, and said to
both of us: "This is between us three, I pray you, ladies; I will keep
Pere de la Chaise amused with promises some day."

Madame de Maintenon, for a brief time in her first youth a Calvinist,
cherished always in the bottom of her heart a good share of those
suspicions that Calvin's doctrine is careful to inspire against the
Jesuits.

On the other hand, she retained amongst the Parliament a large number of
friends whom she had known formerly at M. Scarron's, the son of a
counsellor of the chamber. I understood that in those circumstances she
was well pleased to prove to the gentlemen of Parliament that the
interests of their house were kept in good hands, and that she would not
abandon her friends of the Place Royale and the Marais for all the
Jesuits and all the pyramids in the world.

The Parliament, which was informed of her conduct and fidelity, bore her
infinite good-will for it. The first president, decorated with his blue
riband, came; to express his formal thanks, and begged her to accept in
perpetuity a key of honour to the High Chamber.

[In famous and unusual causes, princes, ambassadors, and keys of honour
came and occupied the lanterns, that is to say, elegant and well
furnished tribunes, from which all that passed in the grand hall of the
Parliament could be seen.]

The Jesuits, for perseverance and tenacity, can be compared with spiders
who repair, or start again every instant at a damaged or broken thread.
When thes