256 



TEE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.— SUPPLEMENT. 



waited for her outside. On her reappearance he 

 begged of her to stay at Versailles for the night 

 — next day she would hear tidings of him. On 

 the following morning he brought her just such a 

 letter from the Keeper of the Seals as she had 

 prayed for. Who was this walking Providence ? 

 A clerk's clerk, named Etienne. Whence his 

 power. The father of mischief only knew. 



A propos of the administration of law in olden 

 France, it is a mournful confession to have to 

 make that Henri IV. was not a sufficiently wise 

 and virtuous ruler to refrain from tampering 

 with the independence of his own judges. On 

 one occasion, for instance, he sent for M. de 

 Turin, who was to give judgment in the case of 

 M. de Bouillon vs. M. de Bouillon la Mark, and, 

 without preamble, said, " M. de Turin, I wish M. 

 de Bouillon to win his suit." " Very well, sire," 

 replied the judge ; " there is nothing easier : I 

 will send you the papers, and you shall decide 

 the case yourself." With which words he with- 

 drew ; when some one observed to the king, "Your 

 Majesty does not know that man — he is quite 

 bold enough to do what he has said." The king 

 sent after him ; and, sure enough, the messenger 

 found the worthy magistrate loading a porter 

 with brief-bags, and directing him to take them 

 to the palace. Tallemant des Beaux is responsi- 

 ble for the story. Henri's grandson naturally in- 

 herited this royal weakness for being to his sub- 

 jects all in all ; but even Louis IV. occasionally 

 found a man who could face him. Thus, the 

 Chancellor Voisin positively refused to affix the 

 seals to a pardon, the proposed object of the 

 monarch's clemency being known to the minister 

 to be an irreclaimable scoundrel. The king took 

 the seals and acted for the nonce as his own 

 chancellor ; then returned them to their regular 

 custodian. " I cannot accept them," replied 

 Voisin; "they are polluted." "What a man!" 

 exclaimed Louis, half impatiently and half admir- 

 ingly, as it should seem, for he threw the pardon 

 into the fire ; upon which the chancellor con- 

 sented to resume the seals. 



Louis's idea that he might, at a pinch, seal 

 his own ordinances, was not unworthy of Fred- 

 erick the Great, who was ready himself to dis- 

 charge every possible function of the body poli- 

 tic, and was at once the eye, the tongue, and the 

 right hand, of the state — occasionally, if one 

 might push the simile so far, its foot, and booted 

 foot, as the shins of the judges who would not 

 take their sovereign's view of Miller Arnold's 

 case might have testified. Probably Frederick's 

 love of doing even the official drudgery of his 



dominions may have proceeded, if we examine 

 its final cause, from much the same reason as 

 that which impelled him to labor at the com- 

 position of French verses. It was an ambition 

 (and no mean ambition had it been attainable), 

 not only to be first of all, but to be first in all 

 things. As the Homeric chieftain was proud to 

 be a stout spearman as well as a skilled leader, 

 so Frederick apparently longed to be the intel- 

 lectual as well as the civil head of the common- 

 wealth which he had almost reconstructed to its 

 foundations. Mr. Irving mentions a trait of Co- 

 lumbus which is sufficient evidence of a very 

 similar weakness in the discoverer of the New 

 World. Columbus had somewhat childishly set 

 his heart on being the first to see land with the 

 human eye, as if it were not enough glory to 

 have discovered it with the eye of science, en- 

 lightened by imagination. Such as it was, Co- 

 lumbus fancied he had achieved the lesser as well 

 as the greater distinction. His claim, however, 

 was Jdisputed by a common sailor, who, as may 

 well be imagined, had small chance of being be- 

 lieved before the admiral. Maddened with dis- 

 appointment at the loss of the splendid reward 

 which had been promised, and which he had 

 hoped to obtain, the unhappy man is said to 

 have forsworn at once his country and his faith, 

 and to have taken service with the Moors. One 

 can only hope he was never made prisoner by 

 his compatriots, for the Inquisition would have 

 made short work with him. But Columbus does 

 not come well out of the story. 



Other weaknesses of great men for doing 

 little things have proved less harmful to others 

 and to their own reputation. Among them may 

 be cited Rossini's passion for making macaroni 

 after a peculiar and, it must be admitted, an ex- 

 cellent fashion. He seemed as proud of his cu- 

 linary accomplishments as of having composed 

 " William Tell," which masterpiece, as will be 

 remembered, closed his operatic career. The 

 reason Rossini alleged for passing the last forty 

 years of his life in almost complete idleness was 

 akin to that weakness of timidity which made 

 Gerard Hamilton ' silent after his single speech. 

 "An additional success," said Rossini, "would 

 add nothing to my fame ; a failure would injure 

 it. I have no need of the one, and I do not 

 choose to expose myself to the other." 



1 It may not be generally known that, once across 

 St. George's Channel, Hamilton became more coura- 



I geous. He often spoke with effect in the Irish House 

 of Commons ; it was only at Westminster that he re- 



\ maincd mute. 



