The book by Kondraty Birkin (P.P. Karataev), an almost forgotten Russian writer, offers readers a rare opportunity to feel the atmosphere of palace secrets, intrigues and scandals in Russia, England, Italy, France and other states in the period of the 16th–18th centuries.27 On September 1601, Queen Marie de' Medici deigned to give birth to a son, named Louis and declared Dauphin of the French throne. To this time and the title they added the nickname of the just (le juste) not because the newborn at his birth showed this virtue, which was not found in him even before his death, but simply because he was born in September, when the sun is at sign of scales - a symbol of justice.