ANNE OF AUSTRIA, daughter of Philip IL of Spain, was b. in 1602, and in 1615 became the wife of Louis XlII. of France. The marriage was so far from being a happy one, that the royal pair lived for 23 years in a state of virtual separation—a result due chiefly to the influence of cardinal Richelieu, whose fixed determination to humble the house of Austria, led him to spare no means for alienating the affection of Louis from his queen, by representing her as ever involved in the most dangerous conspiracies against his authority. The naturally grave and phlegmatic disposition of the queen was not calculated to counteract the hostile influence of the great minister. On the death of the king in 1643. A. became queen-regent, and evinced her discernment by as her minister cardinal Mazarin, by whose able management the young king (Louis came, on attaining his majority, into possession of a throne firmly established on the ruins of parties. The character of A. had much influence in molding that of her
son. She displayed the same cold and haughty temper, combined with the power to charm by a condescending grace, the same love of pomp and power, and the same skill in the choice of able instruments, thus compensating for the want of genuine personal greatness. She died in 1666. Two curious personal peculiarities of this queen are men tioned by biographers—her antipathy to roses, so strong that while passionately fond of flowers and perfumes, she could not endure even the picture of a rose; and the extra ordinary delicacy of her skin, which made Mazarin remark, that "if her majesty were condemned to the infernal regions, her hell would be to sleep in brown hollands."