t the public good and
the safety of the state. To restore the state to its pristine splendor,
we need not many ordinances, but a great deal of practical performance."

The performance appertained to Richelieu, and he readily dispensed with
many ordinances. The Assembly was favorable to his measures; but amongst
those that it rejected was the proposal to substitute loss of offices and
confiscation for the penalty of death in matters of rebellion and
conspiracy. "Better a moderate but certain penalty," said the cardinal,
"than a punishment too severe to be always inflicted." It was the
notables who preserved in the hands of the inflexible minister the
terrible weapon of which he availed himself so often. The Assembly
separated on the 24th of February, 1627, the last that was convoked
before the revolution of 1789. It was in answer to its demands, as well
as to those of the states of 1614, that the keeper of the seals, Michael
Marillac, drew up, in 1629, the important administrative ordinance which
has preserved from its author's name the title of _Code Michau_.

The cardinal had propounded to the Notables a question which he had
greatly at heart--the foundation of a navy. Already, when disposing,
some weeks previously, of the government of Brittany, which had been
taken away from the Duke of Vendome, he had separated from the office
that of admiral of Brittany; already he was in a position to purchase
from M. de Montmorency his office of grand admiral of France, so as to
suppress it and substitute for it that of grand master of navigation,
which was personally conferred upon Richelieu by an edict enregistered on
the 18th of March, 1627 .

"Of the power which it has seemed agreeable to his Majesty that I should
hold," he wrote on the 20th of January, 1627, "I can say with truth, that
it is so moderate that it could not be more so to be an appreciable
service, seeing that I have desired no wage or salary so as not to be a
charge to the state, and I can add without vanity that the proposal to
take no wage came from me, and that his Majesty made a difficulty about
letting it be so."

The Notables had thanked the king, for the intention he had "of being
pleased to give the kingdom the treasures of the sea which nature had so
liberally proffered it, for without [keeping] the sea one cannot profit
by the sea nor maintain war." Harbors repaired and fortified, arsenals
established at various points on the coast, organiz