Rensselaer Semi-Weekly Republican, Volume 41, Number 76, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 11 June 1909 — The Action and Plot In Richelieu. [ARTICLE]

The Action and Plot In Richelieu.

A few ambitious conspirators, a fool king, a sweet and lovely maiden, an energetic, intrepid, statesman-like prime minister are the abundant materials out of which Bulwer-Lytton constructed his classic drama, Richelieu, so full of action, life and interest. The play rests on an historical foundation, the last and the boldest of four conspiracies (1642) directed by deluded and disappointed noblemen against the Cardinal-minister of state, who. had made France the first nation of the world. The scene is the French capitol. The play opens with the laying of the plot of the conspiracy by Baradas and the Duke of Orleans. Richelieu, the minister, is to be assassinated, King Louis XIII dethroned by one aid of the Spanish arms under Bouillion. Richelieu in good season learns of the treacherous plot through his faithful detectives that he has stationed throughout the realm and even in foreign courts, and he prepares to repel the insidious treason. De Mauprat goes to the Cardinal’s mansion on a secret mission for the conspirators. While there he falls under the Cardinal’s influence, forsakes the conspirators and receives in marriage Richelieu’s ward, Julie, far-famed for her beauty and loveliness, with whom the king and the chief conspirator are also in love. DeMauprat leaves the castle won to the cause of Richelieu.

In the second act the plot thickens. Baradas learns of DeMaupret’s change of colors and the marriage of Julie. He now forges a letter from the king to the effect that his royal highness would divorce them and take to himself the youthful beauty. De Mauprat falls into the vile snare and takes it upon himself to end the Cardinal’s career. In the meantime the Cardinal has obtained written evidence of the conspiracy against minister and king. By some misfortune it is wrested from him but he regains it later to save the day to himself. In the third act the murderous attempt is made upon the Cardinal’s life. De Mauprat’s courage fails him at the , critical moment. He cannot strike the deadly blow when his eyes meet those of the man who more than once had saved the would-be assassin’s head from the block. Instead of murderer he becomes the rescuer and protector of the aged Cardinal.

The fourth act assumes the death of the prime minister and prepares for the new order of things. In the last act the Cardinal again appears as one risen from the dead, the papers of the conspirators are produced, the king sees by whom he has been duped, the Cardinal is reinstated, the traitors are sentenced to the scaffold or life imprisonment. France is saved and that nation again knows that “there is one above who sways the harmonious mystery of the world even better than prime ministers.’’

After being forty-four hours in the Mississenewa river, near Pearson’s mill, the body of Charles Leslie Smith, 85, of Mier, Grant coqnty, was discovered by William Hardacre, a brother-in-law. The body had drifted one-half mile from the dam, where the drowning occurred. Hundreds of men from Wabash, Grant and Miami counties dragged the river. Heroism was shown by Marshal Smith, oi Bunkerhill, a wealthy brother, who, after swimmers had refused to grapple for the body at the dam, rigged up a cable and boat and when no one else would venture over the dam did so himself in safety under the discouragements of the others.