evealed before it had made any
serious headway, and John deemed it necessary to confiscate his sister's
wealth in order to make further intrigues impossible. He caused the
Princess Anna to retire to a convent and bestowed her luxuriously
furnished palace on his favorite minister, Axouchus. But the noble
nature of Axouchus recoiled at being benefited by the princess's fall,
and thought more of turning the situation to the emperor's advantage
than of enriching himself. Accordingly, he suggested to the emperor that
it would be better policy to ward off the malice of his enemies by
restoring the palace to Anna, and seeming to ignore her futile plots.
John felt the prudence of the advice, and impressed by the unselfish
devotion of his friend,--a quality most rare in late Byzantine
times,--replied in like spirit: "I should, indeed, be unworthy to reign
if I could not forget my anger as readily as you forget your interest."
Anna was reinstated in her palace.

But little is known of the rest of Anna Comnena's life. Tiring finally
of the vanities of court life, disappointed in all her intrigues for
absolute power, and becoming ever more absorbed in her literary
undertakings, she seems to have voluntarily sought the life of the
cloister and to have spent the last decades of her career in peaceful
retirement, engaged on her monumental work. She survived her brother
John, who died in 1143, and was still at work on her history in 1145.
The date of her death is unknown.

The great work of Anna Comnena is entitled the _Alexiad_, and is one of
the most important works in the voluminous collection of the Byzantine
historians. In fifteen books, it narrates the history of Alexius
Comnenus; and is a completion and continuation of a work in four books,
left by her husband, Nicephorus Bryennius. The first two books of Anna's
work treat of the rise into power of the Comneni house, and of the early
life of Alexius; the remaining thirteen are devoted to the events of his
reign.

The work of Anna, as a contribution to historical literature, has very
decided deficiencies. In spite of her professed love of truth, her
filial vanity tempts her at all times to put her father and her family
in the best light. The very title, _Alexiad_ suggests rather an
_epos_--a poem in prose--than a serious historical work, and emphasizes
its epideictic tendency. As a woman, she is impressed with the concrete
rather than the abstract, and describes brilliant stat