A dozen heads, the noblest in France, had come to the block through him.

Only two years before he had quelled Rochelle; only a few months before he had crushed the great insurrection in Languedoc: and though the south, stripped of its old privileges, still seethed with discontent, no one in this year 1630 dared lift a hand against him--openly, at any rate.

Under the surface a hundred plots, a thousand intrigues, sought his life or his power; but these, I suppose, are the hap of every great man.
No wonder, then, that the courage on which I plumed myself sank low at sight of him; or that it was as much as I could do to mingle with the humility of my salute some touch of the SANG FROID of old acquaintanceship.
And perhaps that had been better left out.

For it seemed that this man was without bowels.

For a moment, while he stood looking at me, and before he spoke to me, I gave myself up for lost.