Eliza Brilliant as was the reign of the so-styled virgin queen, beth of England, it was disgraced by foibles and crimes wholly feminine. Her favorites, with the exception of the two Cecils, were selected entirely with regard to personal appearance, and, though Raleigh, in addition to his beauty, possessed all the attributes of a hero of romance, and Essex was brave as Ajax of old, her conduct towards both, especially her indignation at the marriage of the former, shows that her affection was more than Platonic, and that the passions of the slighted woman made her lay aside the policy of the queen. Her persecution of Mary Queen of Scots, at variance as it was with the dictates of policy and her own reputation with posterity, was owing to her envy of her fair cousin's being the mother of an heir, whilst she had no one on whom to bestow her legitimate affections. It was the happy contrast which her reign afforded with those of her father and sister, which made it, in the eyes of the people, comparatively a reign of freedom, whilst the memory of the anarchy existing during the short career of her brother, Edward VI., induced them to look with respect on a sovereign who had a will of her own. Thus we will find in all history that monarchs are not liberal or illiberal, wise or the reverse, as compared with any fixed standard of excellence, but owe their reputation to the contrasts afforded by those who precede and follow them. No wonder, then, that placed between a bigot and a fool, a woman of good mind and quick perceptions appears in the light of an angel. At the death of Louis XII. all who had shared the sufferings of Anne of Austria hoped likewise to participate in her triumph, and looked to her regency as the means of securing fortune for themselves. When, therefore, they found Mazarin more powerful than ever, they resisted his overtures and commenced that intermitting civil war known as the Fronde from the slings with which the frondeurs adorned their hats, and which were taken as the emblems of their party. Thus an attempt to throw ridicule upon them gave them what they desired-an individuality and a name. This device was similar in its nature to that which was adopted in the Dutch revolution, when the deputies being called Geux, or beggars, by the court, hailed the reproach as a title of honor, and used as the livery of their household the garb of the mendicant with the motto, "Faithful even to the beggar's sack." So also in our own day, under a desire of its enemies to bring it into contempt, the great Democratic party of America, from a little incident at one of the meetings at Tammany Hall, the home of its sachems, where the lights having been extinguished each member was found provided with a box of self-illuminating matches, then a modern improvement, received by a witticism of the Whigs, the name of Loco-foco. This epithet, intended as a slur, is really one of which it may be justly proud, importing as it does, that the party possesses within itself a principle of light which enables it to rise Phoenix-like above temporary defeats, and be the great representative of the sentiments of the masses. This war of the Fronde differs from other civil wars, in being aimed not against the sovereign, nor a particular party, but being simply an attempt to get rid of an unpopular minister whose only strength consisted in the hold he had gained on the Queen mother. It was emphatically a woman's war, and exhibited female intrigue in all its bearings. Madame de Longueville, the sister of the great Condé and the mistress of the Prince de Marcillac, afterwards known as Duke de la Rochefoucault, whose apophthegms have given him a literary reputation which is still untarnished, was the head of the cabal. Mademoiselle de Montpensier, the richest of her time, eldest daughter of the Duke d'Orleans, who was perpetually swaying between a desire for matrimony and a fear of not making a sufficiently exalted alliance, till at the age of fifty she gave up half her fortune to be allowed to marry privately the eccentric Laugun, tells, in her memoirs, how she fired the first cannon which thundered from the Bastile on the troops of the Court party, whilst Madame de Chevreuse brought to bear against the Queen all the contracted spite of slighted friendship, and enlisted on her side Henri Paul de Gondi, the great agitator of his day, afterwards known as Cardinal Retz. To these women, brought up in luxury, wearied of the monotony of quiet, the civil war presented attractions of no ordinary nature, enabling them as it did to gratify their vanity by giving orders as sovereigns, and to receive the reports of generals, and assist at their deliberations. Although they were rather successful than otherwise, still, having formed no fixed plan they were glad as soon as the novelty wore off, to make their peace without stipulations, and retire from the contest as they commenced. Indeed, the women only conspired for amusement, and the men to gratify the wishes of the ladies; or as La Rochefoucault, speaking of his own relations with Madame Longueville, says, "Pour meriter sa foi, Pour plaire à ses beaux yeux, Je l'aurais fait aux dieux." Hence the fact of one woman being on the throne, commanding armies, and wielding real power, made all the other women restless till they could participate in the pleasures of government; and not being able to do so in a legitimate way, they plunged their country into the horrors of civil war. The fact that women can occasionally step forth, clad in armor, and shame the trembling men to a sense of duty, as did the Maid of Orleans, the Empress Maria Theresa, and the Maid of Saragossa, proves, that to be effective, such examples should be rare, and that they are only justified by strong emergencies. During the early years of his reign, Louis XIV., though surrounded by women who, from attachment to his person, as the gentle La Vallière, or from ambition, as the haughty Montespan, had broken through the restraints of morality, never permitted them to interfere with State policy. But the war of the Spanish succession coming upon him in his old age, when Madame de Maintenon had, by a studious reserve, induced him to lean upon her sound mind for counsel and sympathy, and the sudden and mysterious deaths which removed in quick succession almost all the legitimate descendants and immediate successors of the "grand monarque," leading him to fear that in France his race might become extinct, probably induced him to lay aside his former policy, disregard his numerous sworn abandonments of his claims for himself and family to the crown of Spain, and endeavor to engraft a scion of the Bourbons on the throne founded by Ferdinand and Isabella. There are events in the life of Madame de Maintenon which history has never been able to explain; her early education in a tropical climate, where the passions are ardent and active, hardly accords with the calm calculation which could induce a young girl to devote the flower of her youth to nursing an aged poet of whom she was the nominal wife. The high-toned religion of the foundress of Saint Cyr, is scarcely in keeping with her having been for years the governess of the natural children of Madame de Montespan, and the confidante of her amours. The calmness and sternness with which she commanded her mistress to retire from the court, in order to make way for her own elevation, seem to show that hers was one of those strong minds, capable of watching for years for the hour of triumph, and concealing their blow under a tranquil exterior. Her well-known affection for her pupils, especially the Duke de Maine, their elevation, through her instrumentality, to the rank of princes of the blood, capable of taking the crown after the legitimate heirs of Louis-a concession wrung from the king when on a bed of sickness, and contrary to his wishes and better judgmentthose deaths of his legal children and grand-children, so horribly sudden as to induce the suspicion of poison, and that suspicion pointing to the Duke d'Orleans, first prince of the blood, and nearest collateral heir to the throne, all seem to indicate that she possessed the nature of a Lucusta. Whilst her expiatory offering to heaven, in the form of the splendid establishment of Saint Cyr, erected for the education of the daughters of poor but noble houses, the care she took to preserve the primitive simplicity of its inmates, by allowing none but the purest of Biblical female characters to form the heroines of the dramas represented by them for the edification of the court, her persecution of the virtuous Fenelon for his slight heresies, her insisting on a private marriage, to sanctify her relations with the king, at an age when those relations might well be considered Platonic, all point her out as one of the greatest enigmas of history. Had she been the saint her admirers would picture her, how explain her intimate relations with the Princess des Ursins, a woman of notorious and patent immorality? May we not rather believe that her true history still remains to be written, and that some future historian, in the hitherto undiscovered records of those days, will bring to light facts which will give a new color to her actions, and prove that, though when swayed by lofty impulses, women approach the angels, they are, when yielding to a master passion, capable of a refinement of wickedness which men never attain. As every great general finds an equally distinguished one rise up to oppose him, so, rarely does a woman take the reins of government, but some equally strong-minded specimen of her sex appears on the other side. To De Maintenon and Des Ursins were opposed Queen Anne, and the Duchess of Marlborough, the latter of whom ruled her mistress and her husband with despotic sway, and surviving all contemporaries, lived to be the early patroness of Lord Mansfield, the greatest of English jurists since the time of Lord Coke. The house of Austria is the strongest instance in the world of that saying laid down by Blackstone, that "marriage gives as good a title as descent or purchase." From the time that Rudolph of Hapsburg laid the foundation of the greatness of the family, each generation had, with its brides, brought new provinces to their dominion. When the Emperor Charles VI. found himself with no son to succeed him, he was anxious to settle on his daughter what would otherwise have gone to the nearest male relative. The Pragmatic Sanction procured him the consent of the German powers; and Prussia, by the change of her title from an electorate to a kingdom, together with an increase of territory, guaranteed the arrangement. No sooner, however, was Maria Theresa called to succeed, than France took advantage of the confusion, to humble the house of Austria; and Frederick, forgetful of pledges, seized upon Silesia. In Maria Theresa we meet with a woman worthy the admiration of her sex. Called into action from the necessity of the case, she excited that sympathy which gave her the means of defeating her foes; and had her husband possessed a mind of ordinary calibre, would have gladly yielded to him the cares of State. As it was, she had him crowned Emperor, always avoided the reputation of being a strong-minded woman, and gloried in performing the gentler duties of her sex. Great must have been the exigencies of state, which could induce such a woman to address Madame de Pompadour with the title of "my cousin ;" absolute the power of the latter in France, to enable her to receive such a distinction. Thanks, however, to her relations with the Duke de Choiseul, Madame de Pompadour was enabled to preserve such an apparent acquaintance with the movements of foreign courts, and the workings of State policy, as gave her the reputation of a woman of mind, as well as beauty. The Countess du Barry, however, who succeeded at her death, was of a still lower grade; before her presentation at court, it was thought necessary to ennoble her by marrying her to some person with a title, and the ruined Count de Barry accepted the offer. Good-nature was her only virtue; and the reckless manners which she introduced, greatly helped to break the prestige of royalty, and pave the way for that great revolution which, much as it has been decried, washed out in blood many abuses which could not otherwise have been got rid of. It is rather singular that she, democratic as she was, should have been numbered amidst the victims of the guillotine. The influence exercised by Maria Antoinette on the mind of her husband, almost succeeded in withholding from us that generous French aid without which we might have succumbed to the power of England; and when our allies returned to their homes, shouting the joys of liberty, women headed the mob which stormed Versailles, and brought the placid Louis XVI. a captive to Paris. The career of two Catharines of Russia shows the evils of female sovereignty under even the most favorable circumstances. The second was a woman of vast mind, great goodnature, and strong powers of application, yet the Memoirs of the accomplished Segur show how she was perpetually hampered by the favorites, whom her female impulses induced her to intrust with power beyond their abilities. Conspicuous amongst the women of her day stands Christina of Sweden, daughter of the great Gustavus Adolphus. She was instructed in all the learning with which the most cultivated men of her time were acquainted; great expecta |