The Comte de la Fere, who had remained a young man to his sixty-second year; the warrior who had preserved his strength in spite of fatigue; his freshness of mind in spite of misfortune, his mild serenity of soul and body in spite of Milady, in spite of Mazarin, in spite of La Valliere; Athos had become an old man in a week, from the moment at which he lost the comfort of his later youth.

Still handsome, though bent, noble, but sad, he sought, since his solitude, the deeper glades where sunshine scarcely penetrated.

He discontinued all the mighty exercises he had enjoyed through life, when Raoul was no longer with him.

The servants, accustomed to see him stirring with the dawn at all seasons, were astonished to hear seven o'clock strike before their master quitted his bed.

Athos remained in bed with a book under his pillow--but he did not sleep, neither did he read.