the titles on which the abbots and other lords founded the privileges they enjoyed within the walls of Paris.  The corporations of artisans, represented by their sworn masters or prud’hommes, appeared one after the other before the provost to make declaration of the usages in practice amongst their communities, and to have them registered in the book prepared for that purpose.  This collection of regulations relating to the arts and trades of Paris in the thirteenth century, known under the name of Livre des Metiers d’Etienne Boileau, is the earliest monument of industrial statistics drawn up by the French administration, and it was inserted, for the first time in its entirety, in 1837, amongst the Collection des Documents relatifs d l’Histoire de France, published during M. Guizot’s ministry of public instruction.

St. Louis would be but very incompletely understood if we considered him only in his political and kingly aspect; we must penetrate into his private life, and observe his personal intercourse with his family, his household, and his people, if we would properly understand and appreciate all the originality and moral worth of his character and his life.  Mention has already been made of his relations towards the two queens, his mother and his wife; and, difficult as they were, they were nevertheless always exemplary.  Louis was a model of conjugal fidelity, as well as of filial piety.  He had by Queen Marguerite eleven children, six sons and five daughters; he loved her tenderly, he never severed himself from her, and the modest courage she displayed in the first crusade rendered her still dearer to him.  But he was not blind to her ambitious tendencies, and to the insufficiency of her qualifications for government.  When he made ready for his second crusade, not only did he not confide to Queen Marguerite the regency of the kingdom, but he even took care to regulate her expenses, and to curb her passion for authority.  He forbade her to accept any present for herself or her children, to lay any commands upon the officers of justice, and to choose any one for her service, or for that of her children, without the consent of the council of the regency.  And he had reason so to act; for, about this same time, Queen Marguerite, emulous of holding in the state the same place that had been occupied by Queen Blanche, was giving all her thoughts to what her situation would be after her husband’s death, and was coaxing her eldest son, Philip, then sixteen years old, to make her a promise on oath to remain under her guardianship up to thirty years of age, to take to himself no counsellor without her approval, to reveal to her all designs which might be formed against her, to conclude no treaty with his uncle, Charles of Anjou, King of Sicily, and to keep as a secret the oath she was thus making him take.  Louis was probably informed of this strange promise by his young son Philip himself, who got himself released from it by Pope Urban IV.  At any rate, the king had a foreshadowing of Queen Marguerite’s inclinations, and took precautions for rendering them harmless to the crown and the state.