The race of those Titans, who had worn the cuirasses of Hugues Capet, Philip Augustus and Francis the First, had already begun to disappear.

They could not help thinking he might possibly be the ogre of the fairytale, who was going to turn the whole contents of Planchet's shop into his insatiable stomach, and that, too, without in the slightest degree displacing the barrels and chests that were in it.

Cracking, munching, chewing, nibbling, sucking, and swallowing, Porthos occasionally said to the grocer: "You do a very good business here, friend Planchet." "He will very soon have none at all to do, if this continues," grumbled the foreman, who had Planchet's word that he should be his successor.
And, in his despair, he approached Porthos, who blocked up the whole of the passage leading from the back shop to the shop itself.

He hoped that Porthos would rise, and that this movement would distract his devouring ideas.
"What do you want, my man ?" asked Porthos, very affably.
"I should like to pass you, monsieur, if it is not troubling you too much." "Very well," said Porthos, "it does not trouble me in the least." At the same moment he took hold of the young fellow by the waistband, lifted him off the ground, and placed him very gently on the other side, smiling all the while with the same affable expression.

As soon as Porthos had placed him on the ground, the lad's legs so shook under him that he fell back upon some sacks of corks.