e power of him who desires to
reign."

Louis turned round sharply. The voice which had pronounced these words
was that of Anne of Austria. The king started, and advanced towards
her. "I hope," said he, "your majesty has paid no attention to the vain
declamations which the solitude and disgust familiar to kings suggest to
the happiest dispositions?"

"I only paid attention to one thing, my son, and that was, that you were
complaining."

"Who! I? Not at all," said Louis XIV.; "no, in truth, you err, madame."

"What were you doing, then?"

"I thought I was under the ferule of my professor, and developing a
subject of amplification."

"My son," replied Anne of Austria, shaking her head, "you are wrong not
to trust my word; you are wrong not to grant me your confidence. A
day will come, and perhaps quickly, wherein you will have occasion to
remember that axiom:--'Gold is universal power; and they alone are kings
who are all-powerful.'"

"Your intention," continued the king, "was not, however, to cast blame
upon the rich men of this age, was it?"

"No," said the queen, warmly; "no, sire; they who are rich in this age,
under your reign, are rich because you have been willing they should
be so, and I entertain against them neither malice nor envy; they have,
without doubt, served your majesty sufficiently well for your majesty to
have permitted them to reward themselves. That is what I mean to say by
the words for which you reproach me."

"God forbid, madame, that I should ever reproach my mother with
anything!"

"Besides," continued Anne of Austria, "the Lord never gives the goods
of this world but for a season; the Lord--as correctives to honor and
riches--the Lord has placed sufferings, sickness, and death; and no
one," added she, with a melancholy smile, which proved she made the
application of the funeral precept to herself, "no man can take his
wealth or greatness with him to the grave. It results, therefore, that
the young gather the abundant harvest prepared for them by the old."

Louis listened with increased attention to the words which Anne of
Austria, no doubt, pronounced with a view to console him. "Madame," said
he, looking earnestly at his mother, "one would almost say in truth that
you had something else to announce to me."

"I have absolutely nothing, my son; only you cannot have failed to
remark that his eminence the cardinal is very ill."

Louis looked at his mother, expecting some emotion in