Christine's line of argument is that the many must not be condemned for the shortcomings of the few, and that even when God made the angels, some were bad. She goes on to answer the charge that books are full of the condemnation of women, by the simple remark that books were not written by women. Where is the shade of the worthy Christine to-day? Does it walk the earth with a flag of triumph or a laurel wreath whilst its sisters in the flesh are writing on every subject in heaven and earth and sea? 'De nos jours, le

monde est aux femmes !'

Is it marvellous, asks Christine, that a woman-'une chose simplete, une ignorante petite femmellette,' as she expresses it— should be betrayed by man, when even the great city of Troy was, and when all the books and romances are full of the betrayal of kings and kingdoms? And if woman is not constant by nature, why should Jean de Meun, in The Romance of the Rose, devise so many tricks to deceive her, seeing that it is not necessary to make a great assault upon a feeble place? Then she deftly turns the tables on the other sex, reminding each that he is the son of his mother, and that—

Se mauvaise est il ne peut valor rien,
Car nul bon fruit de mal arbre ne vient.

And so on to the end, all is argument and banter. The repute of her letter must have travelled quickly, for whilst Christine was still combating with dissentients, an epitomised rendering of it appeared (1402) in English from the pen of Hoccleve, the pupil of Chaucer, entitled, 'The lettre of Cupide, God of Love.'

Later, Christine writes La Cité des Dames, an account of the building of an imaginary city which is to enshrine all the heroic deeds of women. This has been aptly called 'The Golden Book of Heroines.' It may certainly be considered her masterpiece on her favourite subject. Her wonderful sense of justice, her ideas on the education of women, her discrimination as to the part women should take in public affairs, and other matters too diverse to be dealt with here, make it a marvellous résumé of statesmanship as far as it goes. It is a real Utopia. Perhaps to Christine it was a glimpse of the Promised Land! As we read her views on the education of boys and girls together, in this happy city, we feel that she might be discussing with us the problems of to-day. She says that if boys and girls are taught the same subjects, girls can, as a rule, learn just as well, and just as intelligently, as boys, and so on. In this conclusion she forestalls the learned Cornelius Agrippa, a doctor and philosopher of the sixteenth century, one of the most original and remarkable men of his time, who boldly asserts that sex is merely physical, and does not extend to soul or rational power.

Of her poetical writings on love and the sexes, perhaps the most enchanting is Le Livre du Dit de Poissy. In it she takes us, on a

bright spring morning, with a joyous company, from Paris to the royal convent of Poissy, where her child is at school. She describes all the beauties of the country, the fields gay with flowers, the warblings of the birds, the shepherdesses with their flocks, the willow-shaded river bank along which they ride, the magic of the forest of St. Germain, a little world apart of greenery and shade, filled with the song of nightingales. Laughing and singing by the way, they reach the convent gate. Then follows a description of the beautiful carved cloisters, the chapter-house, the nuns' dress and their dormitory, the garden scented with lavender and roses, with one part, where small animals are allowed to run wild, left uncultivated, and the ponds well stocked with fish. As the day wanes, they bid farewell to the nuns, who offer them gifts of purses and girdles, embroidered in silk and gold, worked by their own hands. They return to the inn where they are to spend the night, and, after supper, wander forth to listen to the nightingales, then dance a carole, and so to bed. The ride back to Paris in the morning, during which the discussion on the sexes is introduced, is painted with the same impressionist touch, and it is with real regret that we take leave of these happy folk as they alight in Paris city from their stout nags.

Another similar discourse, Le Débat de Deux Amants, has for setting a gala entertainment at the magnificent dwelling in Paris of the Duke Louis of Orleans, brother of the king. He had married Valentine Visconti, daughter of Gian Galleazo Visconti, founder of the Certosa, near Pavia, a princess well versed in pomp and splendour. It is on a day in May, the garden is gay with gallants and fair ladies. We hear the minstrels play, and watch some of the company, decked with garlands, dancing under the trees. In the palace there is music and singing. Christine is seated, in a tapestried hall, with one or two esquires who prefer to discourse of love to joining in the jollity. After a time the talk turns on fickle men, and Christine brings forth from her vast storehouse of knowledge classical and mediæval examples. As she mentions Theseus, and recalls his baseness to Ariadne, she points to the tapestry on the wall before them, where the story is woven. This little touch makes the scene very real to us, for the record of the purchase of this tapestry, with the price of twelve hundred francs paid for it, may still be found amongst the royal inventories.

There is such a volume and variety of works from Christine's pen that it is no easy task, under limited conditions, to make a fair selection. One of the most significant, since it deals with a subject on which she was wont to dwell, is La Mutation de Fortune. In it she writes, as it were, with her heart in her hand, telling first of the sore havoc Fortune has wrought amongst those most dear to her. Then she turns to the world in general, not, however, in the spirit of the pessimist, but rather in that of the philosopher. She well knows

that Fortune is no blindfolded goddess turning writhing humanity on a wheel, but a something rooted in ourselves, and she has pity for 'la povre fragilité humaine.'

Once again, with her versatile gifts, she turns from philosophy to a treatise on military tactics and justice, Le Livre des Faits d'Armes et de Chevalerie. However devoid of interest, except as a landmark in the history of military strategy and customs, this work may be to-day, it was thought of sufficient importance in the reign of our Henry the Seventh for the king to command Caxton to make a translation of it, and it was quoted as an authority in the reign of Henry the Eighth. Considering the nature of its contents, this seems quite an extraordinary tribute to the judgment and ability of the writer.

But the misery of France is ever increasing. Ceaseless civil war and foreign invasion impoverish the people, and make desolate the land. The dissolute Court is extravagant, and filled with discord. Christine, fired with patriotic fervour, once more makes an effort, which proves to be her final one, to arouse the pleasure-loving nobility to some sense of its obligations to the nation. Le Livre des Trois Vertus, and Le Livre de la Paix, appear one after the other. In the former, which she dedicates to the Dauphine, Margaret of Burgundy, her theme is the influence a princess may and should have on Court life; in the latter, the duties of princes to the people.

But it is too late. The sand in the hour-glass is running low. Disaster follows upon disaster, until the final blow is struck at Agincourt (1415), where the flower of the French nation is cut off, and princes of the blood are carried away into exile. Christine, with bleeding heart, and worn with trouble and disappointment, retires to the convent of Poissy, perchance to find peace and consolation within its tranquil walls, and to implore heaven's aid for her sorestricken country. For fourteen years no sound from her reaches the outside world. Then, inspired by the glorious advent and deeds of Joan of Arc, with all her old passion she pours forth a final hymn of praise and thanksgiving to the woman who has at last aroused France. to patriotism, and so dies in peace.

ALICE KEMP-WELCH.

M. CLEMENCEAU AS WRITER AND

PHILOSOPHER

FEW men are better known than M. Clemenceau. He has been before the public for nearly forty years during one of the most interesting, though not—unfortunately-the most glorious periods of French history; and his dash, his wit, his go, together with his savage logic, have made him an exceptionally conspicuous figure on the political stage. It is curious that his literary achievements should be so seldom spoken of. M. Clemenceau has written nearly a dozen volumes, on a variety of subjects, and some of them were undoubtedly successful, if passing through six, eight, or ten editions means success for a book. Yet M. Clemenceau, as a writer, is not well known; people hardly ever quote from his books, many cultivated readers have only a vague idea even of their existence, and, in short, they cannot be said to help their author much, in any manner. On the other hand, we see that M. Deschanel, with not a tithe of Clemenceau's originality, is in the French Academy for three or four volumes by which no publisher seems to have become very rich. (A strange enigma at first sight, yet not very difficult to solve.) In the case of the exPresident of the Chamber and would-be President of the Republic we see a man of slender power aiming at literary celebrity, as he used to aim at success in Society, well connected, and making the most of his old advantages in the interests of his new ambition. The result is such as clever management of this sort can lead to, viz. the paltry celebrity called notoriety.

In the case of Clemenceau, it is clear that the man, far from serving the writer, simply outshines him. One suspects that such a fiery Radical can only write to further his political action, and one is right—and I must add'at once that this entire devotion to his ideal ought to be his chief glory-but one forgets that a man of such remarkable parts cannot be quite the same when he speaks and when he writes; that there is more effort to define himself on the part of a man who takes up his pen and strives to give full expression to his thought; and, in short, that most men of action are best explained by their writings.

This will be felt by whoever chooses to look into M. Clemenceau's works. The man appears before the reader's eyes with all his perfections and limitations-some of them unknown or only dimly apprehended-and his formula becomes clear and easy. In his books, as in his life and in his politics, M. Clemenceau appears to be an impassioned individual, whose characteristic is energy fed by a domineering ideal, but the ideal is that of the poet rather than of the philosopher, and this fact accounts for the mobility with which he has been so often twitted.

Most of M. Clemenceau's volumes consist of articles reprinted from the numerous papers to which he used to contribute. Some of them are a mere jumble, as if the journalist's drawers had been turned, such as they were, into the Press, instead of the waste basket, and they are often wretchedly got up. The worst in this respect. is a fat brochure on the Dreyfus affair, at sight of which I experienced the same depressed feeling as the author himself once felt, at an inn where the landlady thought to please him by immediately turning the talk to the unfortunate Captain. But all these books possess in common the quality of being deeds, not words, and they are written in the crisp eighteenth-century French, which holds the reader spellbound even when the matter is not quite to his taste. Three of them, Le Grand Pan, La Mêlée Sociale, and the novel entitled Les Plus Forts ought to give their author high rank in modern literature, and possess, in a higher degree than their fellow volumes, the charm of adding as many touches as they have pages to M. Clemenceau's portrait.

Nothing is so unfortunate for a man as to go by a nickname. For many years M. Clemenceau has been called the overthrower of Cabinets, and numbers of people imagine him only as a grim, saturnine misanthropist, sneering and snarling sceptically in a corner of the Chamber or the Senate, and rising from his bench at long intervals just to deal a deadly blow at a Prime Minister, no matter whether it be Gambetta or only M. Combes.

No fancy can be so remote from the truth. M. Clemenceau is neither a sceptic, nor a Nitzschean, nor a harsh ironist, nor a destructive politician. He is, on the contrary, more or less, the reverse of all that. Above all, he is not a sceptic. The form of scepticism affected in France during the past thirty years has been mostly the graceful, easy, and lazy dilettantism which has Renan for its father and M. Anatole France for its most complete exponent. Sceptics of this stamp are generally too fastidious to launch out on the muddy political shallows, and too averse from a plain aye or nay to expose themselves to the ridicule of adopting a system. Now M. Clemenceau not only has revelled in politics from his youth, but he never loses an opportunity of avowing a system, and this system is no other than hard and fast materialism, the materialism of forty years ago in all its crudeness, narrowness, and overweening finality.