nd had seen, when he was a little child, some of the
terrible scenes of the religious wars. Peering from the window of the
chateau in the sad, desolate land of Poitou, he caught glimpses of
ragged regiments of French troops, or saw foreign soldiers in their
unfamiliar garb, intent on pillaging the mean huts of the peasantry.
Armand was sent to Paris at an early age that he might study at the
famous College of Navarre, where the youths of the day were well
equipped for court life. He learned Spanish in addition to Latin and
Greek, and became an adept in riding, dancing and fencing. When he
left the humble student quarter of the capital and began to mingle with
the crowd who formed the court, he soon put off the manners of a rustic
and acquired the polished elegance of a courtier of the period. He
spent much time in studying the drama of Parisian daily life, a
brilliant, shifting series of gay scenes, with the revelation now and
then of a cruel and sordid background.

The very sounds of active life must at first have startled the dreamy
youth who had come from the seclusion of a chateau in the marsh land.
Cavaliers in velvet and satin rallied to the roll of a drum which the
soldiers beat in martial-wise, and engaged in fierce conflicts with
each other. Acts were constantly passed to forbid duelling, but there
were many wounded every year in the streets, and the nobility would
have thought {117} themselves disgraced if they had not drawn their
swords readily in answer to an insult. Class distinctions were
observed rigidly, and the merchant clad in hodden grey and the lawyer
robed in black were pushed aside with some contempt when there was any
conflict between the aristocrats. The busy Pont Neuf seemed to be the
bridge which joined two different worlds. Here monks rubbed shoulders
with yellow-garbed Jews, and ladies of the court tripped side by side
with the gay _filles_ of the town. Anyone strolling near the river
Seine could watch, if he chose, the multicoloured throng and amuse
himself by the contrast between the different phases of society in
Paris.

Richelieu, who held the proud title of Marquis de Chillon, handled a
sword skilfully and dreamed of glory won upon battle-fields. He was
dismayed when he first heard that his widowed mother had changed her
plans for his career. A brother, who was to have been consecrated
Bishop of Lucon, had decided to turn monk, and as the preferment to the
See was in the han