Rotrou, his sometime rival with his piece of Venceslas, and ever tenderly attached to him, had died, in 1650, at Dreux, of which he was civil magistrate.

An epidemic was ravaging the town, and he was urged to go away.

"I am the only one who can maintain good order, and I shall remain," he replied.

"At the moment of my writing to you the bells are tolling for the twenty-second person to-day; perhaps to-morrow it will be for me; but my conscience has marked out my duty.

God's will be done!" Two days later he was dead.
Corneille had dedicated _Polyeucte_ to the regent Anne of Austria.