What was that Saxon heart,[1] so full of noble rage,
          He, whom thine own decrees drove from his heritage? 
          Who, with his gallant few, full many a deed hath done
          Within thine own domains, and many a laurel won? 
          Who, wasting not his strength in strife with granite walls,
          Routs thee in open field, and lo! the fortress falls? 
          Who, taking just revenge for loss of all his own,
          Compressed thy boundaries, and cut thy frontiers down. 
          How many virtues in that prince’s[2] heart reside
          Who leads yon free-set[3] people’s armies in their pride,
          People who boldly spurned Ibere and all his laws,
          Bravely shook off his yoke and bravely left his cause? 
          Francion, without such aid, thou say’st would helpless be;
          What were Ibere without thy provinces and thee?

GERMANIQUE.

But I am of his blood:—­own self same Deities.

EUROPE.

All they are of my blood:—­gaze on the self-same skies
Do all your hosts adore the Deities we own? 
Nay, from your very midst come errors widely sown. 
Ibere for chief support on erring men relies
Yet, what himself may do, to others he denies. 
What!  Francion favor error!  This is idle prate: 
He who from irreligion thoroughly purged the state! 
Who brought the worship back to altars in decay;
Who built the temples up that in their ashes lay;
True son of them, who, spite of all thy fathers’ feats,
Replaced my reverend priests upon their holy seats! 
’Twixt Francion and Ibere this difference remains: 
One sets them in their seats, and one in iron chains.”

[1] Bernard of Saxe-Weimar. [2] Prince of Orange. [3] The Hollanders.

Already, in Mirame, Richelieu had celebrated the fall of Rochelle and of the Huguenot party, bringing upon the scene the King of Bithynia, who is taking arms

                         “To tame a rebel slave,
          Perched proudly on his rock washed by the ocean-wave.”

As epigraph to Europe there were these lines:—­

          “All friends of France to this my work will friendly be;
          And all unfriends of her will say the author ill;
          Yet shall I be content, say, reader, what you will;
          The joy of some, the rage of others, pleases me.”

The enemies of France did not wait for the comedy, in heroic style, of Europe in order to frequently say ill of Cardinal Richelieu.