CHARACTER OF CONDE.

Evening Post, Volume LXXXIX, Issue 150, 26 June 1915, Page 15

CHARACTER OF CONDE.

Reviewing a recent life of Conde (by the Hon. Eveline Godley), Tigho Hopkins writes, in an English contemporary : — The greatest military leader of the day was ako one of the best-hated men in France. A prince of th« blood, a cousin of Louis XIV., the vanity and arrogance of Conde made enemies for him everywhere. He bullied the Parliament was insolent to Anne of Austria, kept all manner of grandees waiting in his ante-chamber, and yawned in their faces when they were admitted. His pride was equal to Louis XIV. '», and seldom was^he willing to put on himself the restraint which made Louis the most polished and polite sovereign in Europe. A contemporary critic eums up his cha<racter "asa type of that of the French noble of his day. To be regarded as a brilliant conqueror in love and war, to hold the first place at Court, swaying the councils of his sovereign at his will, and receiving universal homage — these wero the selfish and only object* of his ambition." He was said, by one who knew him well, to be the hardest-hearted man in France. " Ruthless and savage (adds tho same authority), ho was also an intriguer not less unscrupulous, though incomparably less adroit, than his victorious enemy, the subtle Italian Cardinal. Thus he had all the faults of the French noble on a colossal scale ; he had also his virtues in a more extraordinary degree. Where all were brave, he was conspicuous above all for a thoughtless courage which i.othing could dismay, and to which, combined with the intense enthusiasm and rapidity of thought that inspired him on the battlefield, he owed the most brilliant of his victories." Conde's life of sixty-five years takes in tho latter part of the Thirty Years' War, the civil wars of the Fronde, the Franco- Spanish war, and the early part of the Dutch war; a life of battle, intrigue, rebellion, exile, and all manner of social activities, together with the customary affairs of gallantry.