[Ten Years Later by Alexandre Dumas Pere]@TWC D-Link bookTen Years Later CHAPTER 7 2/6
The pages and people of the cardinal marched behind. Next came the carriage of the queen-mother, with her maids of honor at the doors, her gentlemen on horseback at both sides. The king then appeared, mounted upon a splendid horse of Saxon breed, with a flowing mane.
The young prince exhibited, when bowing to some windows from which issued the most animated acclamations, a noble and handsome countenance, illumined by the flambeaux of his pages. By the side of the king, though a little in the rear, the Prince de Conde, M.Dangeau, and twenty other courtiers, followed by their people and their baggage, closed this veritably triumphant march.
The pomp was of a military character. Some of the courtiers--the elder ones, for instance--wore traveling dresses; but all the rest were clothed in warlike panoply.
Many wore the gorges and buff coat of the times of Henry IV.
and Louis XIII. When the king passed before him, the unknown, who had leant forward over the balcony to obtain a better view, and who had concealed his face by leaning on his arm, felt his heart swell and overflow with a bitter jealousy. The noise of the trumpets excited him--the popular acclamations deafened him: for a moment he allowed his reason to be absorbed in this flood of lights, tumult and brilliant images. "He is a king!" murmured he, in an accent of despair. Then, before he had recovered from his sombre reverie all the noise, all the splendor, had passed away.
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