policy; and the cardinal was at that
period what we now call a man of progress. In fact, the sack of La
Rochelle, and the assassination of three of four thousand Huguenots who
allowed themselves to be killed, would resemble too closely, in 1628,
the massacre of St. Bartholomew in 1572; and then, above all this,
this extreme measure, which was not at all repugnant to the king, good
Catholic as he was, always fell before this argument of the besieging
generals--La Rochelle is impregnable except to famine.

The cardinal could not drive from his mind the fear he entertained of
his terrible emissary--for he comprehended the strange qualities of this
woman, sometimes a serpent, sometimes a lion. Had she betrayed him? Was
she dead? He knew her well enough in all cases to know that, whether
acting for or against him, as a friend or an enemy, she would not remain
motionless without great impediments; but whence did these impediments
arise? That was what he could not know.

And yet he reckoned, and with reason, on Milady. He had divined in the
past of this woman terrible things which his red mantle alone could
cover; and he felt, from one cause or another, that this woman was his
own, as she could look to no other but himself for a support superior to
the danger which threatened her.

He resolved, then, to carry on the war alone, and to look for no success
foreign to himself, but as we look for a fortunate chance. He continued
to press the raising of the famous dyke which was to starve La Rochelle.
Meanwhile, he cast his eyes over that unfortunate city, which contained
so much deep misery and so many heroic virtues, and recalling the
saying of Louis XI, his political predecessor, as he himself was the
predecessor of Robespierre, he repeated this maxim of Tristan's gossip:
"Divide in order to reign."

Henry IV, when besieging Paris, had loaves and provisions thrown
over the walls. The cardinal had little notes thrown over in which he
represented to the Rochellais how unjust, selfish, and barbarous was the
conduct of their leaders. These leaders had corn in abundance, and would
not let them partake of it; they adopted as a maxim--for they, too, had
maxims--that it was of very little consequence that women, children,
and old men should die, so long as the men who were to defend the walls
remained strong and healthy. Up to that time, whether from devotedness
or from want of power to act against it, this maxim, without being
gene