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The Three Musketeers
Twenty Years Later
The Vicomte De Bragelonne
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Twenty Years Later 77 at Prostate Health
I understand it well. Personally, I am on bad terms
with him, on account of the quarrels between Madame de
Montbazon, my mother-in-law, and Madame de Longueville. But
the Prince de Marsillac! Yes, indeed, thats the right
thing. The Prince de Marsillac -- my old friend -- will
recommend our young friend to Madame de Longueville, who
will give him a letter to her brother, the prince, who loves
her too tenderly not to do what she wishes immediately."
"Well, that will do charmingly," said the count; "but may I
beg that the greatest haste may be made, for I have reasons
for wishing the vicomte not to sleep longer than to-morrow
night in Paris!"
"Do you wish it known that you are interested about him,
monsieur le comte?"
"Better for him in future that he should be supposed never
to have seen me."
"Oh, sir!" cried Raoul.
"You know, Bragelonne," said Athos, "I never speak without
reflection."
"Well, comte, I am going instantly," interrupted the
duchess, "to send for the Prince de Marsillac, who is
happily, in Paris just now. What are you going to do this
evening?"
"We intend to visit the Abbe Scarron, for whom I have a
letter of introduction and at whose house I expect to meet
some of my friends."
"Tis well; I will go there also, for a few minutes," said
the duchess; "do not quit his salon until you have seen me."
Athos bowed and prepared to leave.
"Well, monsieur le comte," said the duchess, smiling, "does
one leave so solemnly his old friends?"
"Ah," murmured Athos, kissing her hand, "had I only sooner
known that Marie Michon was so charming a creature!" And he
withdrew, sighing.
21
The Abbe Scarron.
There was once in the Rue des Tournelles a house known by
all the sedan chairmen and footmen of Paris, and yet,
nevertheless, this house was neither that of a great lord
nor of a rich man. There was neither dining, nor playing at
cards, nor dancing in that house. Nevertheless, it was the
rendezvous of the great world and all Paris went there. It
was the abode of the little Abbe Scarron.
In the home of the witty abbe dwelt incessant laughter;
there all the items of the day had their source and were so
quickly transformed, misrepresented, metamorphosed, some
into epigrams, some into falsehoods, that every one was
anxious to pass an hour with little Scarron, listening to
what he said, reporting it to others.
The diminutive Abbe Scarron, who, however, was an abbe only
because he owned an abbey, and not because he was in orders,
had formerly been one of the gayest prebendaries in the town
of Mans, which he inhabited. On a day of the carnival he had
taken a notion to provide an unusual entertainment for that
good town, of which he was the life and soul. He had made
his valet cover him with honey; then, opening a feather bed,
he had rolled in it and had thus become the most grotesque
fowl it is possible to imagine. He then began to visit his
friends of both sexes, in that strange costume. At first he
had been followed through astonishment, then with derisive
shouts, then the porters had insulted him, then children had
thrown stones at him, and finally he was obliged to run, to
escape the missiles. As soon as he took to flight every one
pursued him, until, pressed on all sides, Scarron found no
way of escaping his escort, except by throwing himself into
the river; but the water was icy cold. Scarron was heated,
the cold seized on him, and when he reached the farther bank
he found himself crippled.
Every means had been employed in vain to restore the use of
his limbs. He had been subjected to a severe disciplinary
course of medicine, at length he sent away all his doctors,
declaring that he preferred the disease to the treatment,
and came to Paris, where the fame of his wit had preceded
him. There he had a chair made on his own plan, and one day,
visiting Anne of Austria in this chair, she asked him,
charmed as she was with his wit, if he did not wish for a
title.
"Yes, your majesty, there is a title which I covet much,"
replied Scarron.
"And what is that?"
"That of being your invalid," answered Scarron.
So he was called the queens invalid, with a pension of
fifteen hundred francs.
From that lucky moment Scarron led a happy life, spending
both income and principal. One day, however, an emissary of
the cardinals gave him to understand that he was wrong in
receiving the coadjutor so
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