This is a 7 bit file without accents, we will also do an 8 bit.





The Princess de Montpensier

By Mme. de Lafayette.



Introduction. By Oliver.C.Colt.

This story was written by Madame de Lafayette and published
anonymously in 1662. It is set in a period almost 100 years
previously during the sanguinary wars of the counter-reformation,
when the Catholic rulers of Europe, with the encouragement of the
Papacy, were bent on extirpating the followers of the creeds of
Luther and Calvin. I am not qualified to embark on a historical
analysis, and shall do no more than say that many of the persons
who are involved in the tale actually existed, and the events
referred to actually took place. The weak and vicious King and
his malign and unscrupulous mother are real enough, as is a Duc
de Montpensier, a Prince of the Blood, who achieved some
notoriety for the cruelty with which he treated any Huguenots who
fell into his hands, and for the leadership he gave to the
assassins during the atrocious massacre of St. Bartholomew's day.
He was married and had progeny, but the woman to whom he was
married was not the heroine of this romance, who is a fictional