Page:Biographical and critical studies by James Thomson ("B.V.").djvu/75

SAINT-AMANT 59 betrayed Saint- Amant ! The god has rendered his most ardent worshipper into the hands of his foes ! It is ineffably humiliating, not so much even for the god as for the mortal with his firm faith in the god. M. Ch. Livet ejaculates, Horresco referens ! as for my- self, I can only avow that in my humble opinion the Et tu Brute of Caesar is scarcely so magnanimous and touching. To end this tragic episode, it may be added that he promptly summed up his experiences of our nation in a poem entitled, " Albion ; heroic-comic caprice." Either because this was too virulent, even for that time, or because France was growing rightly afraid of an England waging war against its king, the publication was not hazarded. That it was written con amore^ which in this case means con odio, the conclusion sufficiently attests. With the date 12th February, 1644, we read the grandiose epigraph, Cest fait, " It is done ; " as if he would say, with the most savage energy, " I have finished and anni- hilated this infamous England, in which they not only rebel against their anointed sovereign, but also sacrilegiously rob Saint-Amant when he is divinely drunk." In 1645 we find him again at Paris, Montreuil hav- ing succeeded d'Harcourt as ambassador to England. This brings us to his connection with the famous Marie de Gonzague, daughter of the Duke of Mantua, who became so singularly the wife of two successive kings of Poland, these being brothers. It is not here the place to recount her life ; but it may be remarked that she was beautiful, witty, and adventurous, and was more or less involved in the conspiracy against Richelieu headed by her lover, Cinq-Mars. In 1645