n, had he entered the council, when he negotiated a marriage
of the King's sister with the son of James I of England; next he signed
an alliance with Holland; next he sent ten thousand soldiers to drive
the troops of the Pope and Spain out of the Valtelline district of the
Alps, and thus secured an alliance with the Swiss. We are to note here
that fact, which Buckle wields so well, that, though Richelieu was a
cardinal of the Roman Church, all these alliances were with Protestant
powers against Catholics. Austria and Spain intrigued against him,
sowing money in the mountain districts of South France which brought
forth those crops of armed men who defended La Rochelle. But he beat
them at their own game. He set loose Count Mansfeld, who revived the
Thirty Years' War by raising a rebellion in Bohemia; and when one great
man, Wallenstein, stood between Austria and ruin, Richelieu sent his
monkish diplomatist, Father Joseph, to the German Assembly of Electors,
and persuaded them to dismiss Wallenstein and to disgrace him.

But the great Frenchman's masterstroke was his treaty with Gustavus
Adolphus. With that keen glance of his he saw and knew Gustavus while
yet the world knew him not--while he was battling afar off in the wilds
of Poland. Richelieu's plan was formed at once. He brought about a
treaty between Gustavus and Poland; then he filled Gustavus' mind with
pictures of the wrongs inflicted by Austria on German Protestants,
hinted to him probably of a new realm, filled his treasury, and finally
hurled against Austria the man who destroyed Tilly, who conquered
Wallenstein, who annihilated Austrian supremacy at the battle of Lutzen,
who, though in his grave, wrenched Protestant rights from Austria at the
treaty of Westphalia, who pierced the Austrian monarchy with the most
terrible sorrows it ever saw before the time of Napoleon.

To the main objects of Richelieu's policy already given, might be added
two subordinate subjects. The first of these was a healthful extension
of French territory. In this Richelieu planned better than the first
Napoleon; for while he did much to carry France out to her natural
boundaries, he kept her always within them. On the south he added
Roussillon, on the east Alsace, on the northeast Artois.

The second subordinate object of his policy sometimes flashed forth
brilliantly. He was determined that England should never again interfere
on French soil. We have seen him driving the English f