creening criminals,--nor a modern soft juryman,
to suffer his eyes to be blinded by quirks and quibbles to the great
purposes of law,--nor a modern bland governor, who lets a murderer loose
out of politeness to the murderer's mistress. He hated crime; he whipped
the criminal; no petty forms and no petty men of forms could stand
between him and a rascal. He had the sense to see that this course was
not cruel, but merciful. See that for yourselves. In the eighteen years
before Richelieu's administration, four thousand men perished in duels;
in the ten years after Richelieu's death, nearly a thousand thus
perished; but during his whole administration, duelling was checked
completely. Which policy was tyrannical? which policy was cruel?

The hatred of the serf-mastering caste toward their new ruler grew
blacker and blacker; but he never flinched. The two brothers Marillac,
proud of birth, high in office, endeavored to stir revolt as in their
good days of old. The first, who was Keeper of the Seals, Richelieu
threw into prison; with the second, who was a Marshal of France,
Richelieu took another course. For this Marshal had added to revolt
things more vile and more insidiously hurtful: he had defrauded the
Government in army-contracts. Richelieu tore him from his army and
put him on trial. The Queen-Mother, whose pet he was, insisted on his
liberation. Marillac himself blubbered, that it "was all about a little
straw and hay, a matter for which a master would not whip a lackey."
Marshal Marillac was executed. So, when statesmen rule, fare all who
take advantage of the agonies of a nation to pilfer a nation's treasure.

To crown all, the Queen-Mother began now to plot against Richelieu,
because he would not be her puppet,--and he banished her from France
forever.

The high nobles were now exasperate. Gaston tied the country, first
issuing against Richelieu a threatening manifesto. Now awoke the Duke
of Montmorency. By birth he stood next the King's family: by office, as
Constable of France, he stood next the King himself. Montmorency was
defeated and taken. The nobles supplicated for him lustily: they looked
on crimes of nobles resulting in deaths of plebeians as lightly as the
English House of Lords afterward looked on Lord Mohun's murder of Will
Mountfort, or as another body of lords looked on Matt Ward's murder of
Professor Butler: but Montmorency was executed. Says Richelieu, in his
Memoirs, "Many murmured at this act,