! To see Porthos hungry, to see Mousqueton without gold lace,
imprisoned perhaps; to see Pierrefonds, Bracieux, razed to the very
stones, dishonored even to the timber--these were so many poignant
griefs for D'Artagnan, and every time that one of these griefs struck
him, he bounded like a horse at the sting of the gadfly beneath the
vaults of foliage where he has sought shade and shelter from the burning
sun.

Never was the man of spirit subjected to ennui, if his body was exposed
to fatigue; never did the man healthy of body fail to find life light,
if he had something to engage his mind. D'Artagnan, riding fast,
thinking as constantly, alighted from his horse in Paris, fresh and
tender in his muscles as the athlete preparing for the gymnasium. The
king did not expect him so soon, and had just departed for the chase
toward Meudon. D'Artagnan, instead of riding after the king, as he would
formerly have done, took off his boots, had a bath, and waited till his
majesty should return dusty and tired. He occupied the interval of five
hours in taking, as people say, the air of the house, and in arming
himself against all ill-chances. He learned that the king, during the
last fortnight, had been gloomy; that the queen-mother was ill and much
depressed; that Monsieur, the king's brother, was exhibiting a
devotional turn; that Madame had the vapors; and that M. de Guiche was
gone to one of his estates. He learned that M. Colbert was radiant; that
M. Fouquet consulted a fresh physician every day, who still did not cure
him, and that his principal complaint was one which physicians do not
usually cure, unless they are political physicians. The king, D'Artagnan
was told, behaved in the kindest manner to M. Fouquet, and did not allow
him to be ever out of his sight; but the surintendant, touched to the
heart, like one of those fine trees which a worm has punctured, was
declining daily, in spite of the royal smile, that sun of court trees.
D'Artagnan learned that Mademoiselle de la Valliere had become
indispensable to the king, that the king, during his sporting
excursions, if he did not take her with him, wrote to her frequently, no
longer verses, but, what was still much worse, prose, and that, whole
pages at a time. Thus, as the poetical Pleiad of the day said, the
_first king in the world_ was seen descending from his horse _with an
ardor beyond compare_, and on the crown of his hat scrawling bombastic
phrases, which M. de Saint