The things we do!

The answer came from Versailles to
the cane-brakes--from Versailles, where, amid scenes "which no European
court could rival," the "greatest of France, princes, warriors,
statesmen," were gathered week after week in the "Halls of Abundance,
Venus, Mars and Apollo," from Versailles to the half-starved little group
sitting in exile by the gulf, far from abundance, without love, in dread
of Mars, and with no arts of Apollo save the sound of the wind in the
trees and the moan of the sea: "Have I expelled heretics from France in
order that they should set up a republic in America?"
One has reminded us that while Iberville was making almost futile attempts
with the half-hearted support of his government to establish this colony
at the mouth of the Mississippi, Peter the Great was beginning to lay the
foundations of St. Petersburg in as unpromising a place--a barren,
uncultivated island which was a frozen swamp in winter and a heap of mud
in summer, in the midst of pathless forests and deep morasses haunted by
wolves and bears.


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