Page:Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition, v. 20.djvu/646

Rh 622 R O H R O H much the best of his meditative poems, as elegant and finished in diction as the Memory, and much more incisive in thought and touching in sentiment. His last, longest, and most interesting published work was Italy, the first instalment of which was published in 1821 and the last in 1834. It is said that, when the publisher complained that the public would not buy Italy, Rogers affirmed that he "would make them buy it" ; and, calling in the aid of Turner and Stothard, he produced the sumptuous illus- trated edition at a cost of 15,000. Apart from these adventitious charms Italy has much greater general interest than any other of Rogers's poems, and is likely to be read for long, if only as a traveller's companion. The style is studiously simple ; the blank verse has quite an Eliza- bethan flavour, and abounds in happy lines ; the reflexions have a keen point ; and the incidental stories are told with admirable brevity and effect. Passages of prose are inter- spersed, wrought with the same care as the verses, and the notes are models of interesting, detail concisely put. For the last five years of his life Rogers, who had been extremely active till his eighty-eighth year, was confined to his chair in consequence of a fall in the street. He died in London on 18th December 1855, in his ninety-third year. Only very fragmentary records are preserved of the brilliant gatherings at breakfast and dinner in his house. Fragments are to be gleaned in the diaries of Byron, Moore, Sydney Smith, and others. Recollections of his table-talk were published in 1856, and a volume of his Recollections of celebrities in 1857. A complete Life is understood (1885) to be in preparation, with Mr P. W. Clayden as editor. Mr Hay ward's essay is the most complete account of Rogers hitherto published. (w. M.) ROHAN, HENKI DE (1579-1638), a general and writer of eminence and one of the last and best representatives of the independent French noblesse, was born at the chateau of Bleins in Brittany on 21st August 1579. His father was Rene II., count of Rohan, and head of a family which had hardly a superior in France for antiquity and distinction, and which was connected with most of the reigning houses of Europe. Rohan was by birth the second son, but his elder brother Ren6 dying young he became the heir of the name. He appeared at court and in the army at the age of sixteen, and was a special favourite with Henry IV., after whom, failing the house of Conde, he -might be said to be the natural chief of the French Protestants. Having served till the peace of Vervins, he travelled for a considerable time over Europe, including England and Scotland, in the first of which countries he re- ceived the not unique honour of being called by Elizabeth her knight, while in the second he was godfather at Charles I.'s christening. On his return to France he was made duke and peer at the age of twenty -four and married Marguerite de Bethune, Sully's daughter, receiving lucra- tive appointments. After the assassination of Henry IV., which was a great blow to him, Rohan fought with success at the siege of Jiilich. But from this time onwards he was for the greater part of many years either in active warfare against the Government of his country, or in active though peaceable opposition to it. For a time, however, he abstained from actual insurrection, and he endeavoured to keep on terms with Marie de' Medici ; he even, despite his dislike of De Luynes, the favourite of Louis XIII., re- appeared in the army and fought in Lorraine and Piedmont. It was not till the decree for the restitution of church property in the south threw the Bearnese and Gascons into open revolt that Rohan appeared as a rebel. His authority and military skill were very formidable to the royalists, forced them among other checks to raise the siege of Montauban, and brought about the treaty of Montpellier (1623). But Rohan did not escape the re- sults of the incurable factiousness which showed itself more strongly perhaps among the French Huguenots than among any other of the numerous armed oppositions of the 17th century. He was accused of lukewarmness and treachery, though he did not hesitate to renew the war when the compact of Montpellier was broken. Again a hollow peace was patched up, but it lasted hardly any time, and Rohan undertook a third war, the first the events of which are recounted in his celebrated Memoirs. This last war (famous for the siege of La Rochelle, in which, however, Rohan's brother Soubise, not Rohan himself, was principally concerned) was one of considerable danger for Rohan : he was condemned to death, and a great reward was offered for him dead or alive. Nor at the close of the war did he think it best to remain in France, but made his way to Venice. Here he lived quietly for some time and is said to have received from the Porte the offer of the sovereignty of Cyprus. It is more certain that his hosts of Venice wished to make him their general-in-chief, a design not executed owing to the peace of Cherasco (1631). Soon afterwards Rohan was again called to serve his lawful sovereign. Richelieu had had experience, though not friendly experience, of his abilities, and when France began once more to take a vigorous part in the Thirty Years' War Rohan was appointed to the task of occupying the Valtelline, and thus cutting off the communication between Germany and Italy. He was entirely successful and re- peatedly beat both the imperialists and the Spaniards. But, despite this service, Rohan was still thought dangerous to the peace of France owing to his influence with the Huguenots, and objection was even made to his residence in Geneva. He therefore joined Bernhard of Saxe-Weimar, and was serving in his army when he met with the wound which caused his death at Rheinfelden on 14th March 1638. His body was buried at Geneva and his arms solemnly bequeathed to and accepted by the Venetian re- public. Rohan's wife was a woman of talent and energy, though she did not escape scandal. His younger brother Benjamin, generally known as Soubise, was, like him, a famous Huguenot leader. His daughter and only re- cognized surviving child, named Marguerite, carried the honours of Rohan into the Chabot family. What has chiefly preserved Rohan's memory is not his military achievements, though they were remarkable, nor his political posi- tion, though it was high, but his admirable Memoirs. These cover the civil wars in three books, while a fourth contains the narrative of the Valtelline campaigns ; and they rank among the best products of the singular talent for memoir-writing which the French aristo- cracy of the 16th and 17th centuries possessed. Alike in style, in clearness of matter, and in shrewdness of thought they deserve very high praise. The first three books appeared in 1644, that on the Valtelline War not till 1758. Some suspicions were thrown on the genuineness of this latter, but it would seem groundlessly. Rohan also wrote Le Par/ait Capitaine, an adaptation of the military pre- cepts and examples of Csesar to modern warfare ; an account of his travels ; a political tract, L'lnUret des fitats et des Princes de la, Chrttientc, &c. The Memoirs, which alone have continued to be reprinted, may be conveniently found in the collection of Michaud and Poujoulat, voL xix. ROHAN, Louis RENE EDOUARD, CARDINAL DE (1734- 1803), prince de Rohan -Guemenee, archbishop of Stras- burg, the hero of the scandal of the diamond necklace, and a cadet of the great family of Rohan (which traced its origin to the kings of Brittany, and was granted the precedence and rank of a foreign princely family by Louis XIV.), was born at Paris on 25th September 1734. Members of the Rohan family had filled the office of arch- bishop of Strasburg from 1704, an office which made them princes of the empire and the compeers rather of the German prince-bishops than of the French ecclesiastics. For this high office Louis de Rohan was destined from his birth, and soon after taking orders, in 1760, he was nominated coadjutor to his uncle, Constantino de Rohan-