Page:A Biographical Dictionary of the Celebrated Women of Every Age and Country (1804).djvu/272

258 and masculine scenes she had, in her infancy, been accustomed to, and accordingly had no taste for the employments and conversation of women. She was, on the contrary, fond of violent exercises, and such amusements as consist in feats of strength and activity; she had both ability and taste for abstracted speculations, and amused herself with languages and the sciences, particularly those of legislature and government.

While she was thus improving her infancy, by studying the art of peace, her generals sustained the glory of the Swedish arms in the thirty years wars. Attaining her eighteenth year, in 1644, she took the reins of government in her own hands, and was in every respect able to manage them. As the sovereign of a powerful kingdom, it is not strange that she was sought in marriage by almost all the princes of Europe. Amongst others, Charles Gustavus, duke of Deux Ponts, her first cousin, having served with great reputation in her armies, and assiduously cultivated her regard, ventured to pay his addresses, and propose marriage; and though she was averse to dividing her authority, she condescended to promise him, that if she ever consented to lose her liberty she would give him the preference. She had already determined, by some means, to raise him to the throne, and seems to have acted generously, by striving to inspire the people with an high opinion of his character.

Political interests, difference of religion, and contrariety of manners, furnished Christina with pretences for rejecting all her suitors; but her true motives were the love of independence, and an aversion she had conceived to marriage, even in her infancy. "Do not force me to marry," she said to the states; "for if I should