He now gave way to that despondency which so often accompanies bodily suffering.

He felt certain that his own dissolution was near, and on that subject his only anxiety was that he might see his wife before he died.

He had, since the power of speech had been restored to him, more than once asserted that the cause of the royalists was desperate, and had, by doing so, greatly added to the difficulties by which Henri was now surrounded.

He did not, however, despair; nothing could make him despondent, or rob him of that elastic courage which, in spite of all the sufferings he had endured, gave him a strange feeling of delight in the war which he was waging.
An immense concourse of people gathered round the waggon, as de Lescure was lifted from it and carried up to the bedroom, which had been prepared for him; and they showed their grief at his sufferings, and their admiration of his character as a soldier, by tears and prayers for his recovery.

The extreme popularity of M.de Lescure through the whole war, and the love which was felt for him by all the peasants concerned in it, proved their just appreciation of real merit; for he had not those qualities which most tend to ingratiate an officer with his men.
He could not unbend among them, and talk to them familiarly of their prowess, and of the good cause, as Henri did.