The Three Musketeers
HarperCollins is proud to present its new range of best-loved, essential classics.‘I do not cling to life sufficiently to fear death.’Adventurous and spirited in tone, The Three Musketeers is considered one of the greatest historical French novels. When Athos, Porthos and Aramis befriend a young and determined country boy d’Artagnan, together they confront the scheming King’s Minister, Cardinal Richelieu and the female spy Milady who threaten to undermine the King. Swashbuckling, romantic and often humourous, Dumas’ novel is a timeless tale of friendship and intrigue.
Читать The Three Musketeers онлайн беплатно
THE
THREE MUSKETEERS
Alexandre Dumas
CONTENTS
Chapter 1 The Three Presents of M. DâArtagnan, the Father
Chapter 2 The Antechamber of M. de Treville
Chapter 4 The Shoulder of Athos, the Belt of Porthos, and the Handkerchief of Aramis
Chapter 5 The Kingâs Musketeers and the Cardinalâs Guards
Chapter 6 His Majesty King Louis the Thirteenth
Chapter 7 The Domestic Manners of the Musketeers
Chapter 9 DâArtagnan Begins to Show Himself
Chapter 10 A Mousetrap of the Seventeenth Century
Chapter 11 The Intrigue Becomes Confused
Chapter 12 George Villiers, Duke of Buckingham
Chapter 13 Monsieur Bonancieux
Chapter 15 Civilians and Soldiers
Chapter 17 The Bonancieux Household
Chapter 18 The Lover and the Husband
Chapter 19 The Plan of the Campaign
Chapter 21 The Countess de Winter
Chapter 22 The Ballet of âThe Merlaisonâ
Chapter 26 The Thesis of Aramis
Chapter 29 The Hunt after Equipments
Chapter 32 An Attorneyâs Dinner
Chapter 34 Concerning the Equipments of Aramis and Porthos
Chapter 35 All Cats are alike Gray in the Dark
Chapter 36 The Dream of Vengeance
Chapter 37 The Ladyâs Secret
Chapter 38 How, without disturbing himself, Athos obtained His Equipment
Chapter 41 The Siege of La Rochelle
Chapter 43 The Red Dove-Cot Tavern
Chapter 44 The Utility of Stove Funnels
Chapter 46 The Bastion of St. Gervais
Chapter 47 The Council of the Musketeers
Chapter 50 A Chat between a Brother and Sister
Chapter 52 The First Day of Imprisonment
Chapter 53 The Second Day of Imprisonment
Chapter 54 The Third Day of Imprisonment
Chapter 55 The Fourth Day of Imprisonment
Chapter 56 The Fifth Day of Imprisonment
Chapter 57 An Event in Classical Tragedy
Chapter 59 What happened at Portsmouth on the Twenty-third of August, 1628
Chapter 61 The Carmelite Convent of Bethune
Chapter 62 Two Kinds of Demons
Chapter 64 The Man in the Red Cloak
Chapter 67 A Message from the Cardinal
Classic Literature: Words and Phrases Adapted from the Collins English Dictionary
On the first Monday of the month of April, 1625, the small town of Meung, the birthplace of the author of the âRomance of the Rose,â appeared to be in a state of revolution, as complete as if the Huguenots were come to make a second siege of La Rochelle. Many of the townsmen, observing the flight along the high street, of women who left their children to squall at the doorsteps, hastened to don their armour, and, fortifying their courage, which was inclined to fail, with a musket or a partisan, proceeded towards the inn of the Jolly Miller, to which a vast and accumulating mob was hastening with intense curiosity.
At that period alarms were frequent, and few days passed without some bourg or other registering in its archives an event of this description. There were the nobles, who made war on each other; there was the king, who made war on the cardinal; there was the Spaniard, who made war on the king; then, besides these wars, concealed or overt, secret or public, there were bandits, mendicants, Huguenots, wolves, and lackeys, who made war on the whole world. The townsmen always armed themselves against the bandits, the wolves, and the lacqueys; frequently against the nobles and the Huguenots; sometimes against the king; but never against the cardinal or the Spaniard. From this custom, therefore, it arose, that on the aforesaid first Monday in the month of April, 1625, the burghers, hearing a noise, and seeing neither the yellow and red flag, nor the livery of the Duke of Richelieu, rushed towards the inn of the Jolly Miller. Having reached it, every one could see and understand the cause of this alarm. A young manâ
But let us trace his portrait with one stroke of the pen. Fancy to yourself Don Quixote at eighteenâDon Quixote peeled, without his coat of mail or greavesâDon Quixote clothed in a woollen doublet, whose blue colour was changed to an undyable shade, a shade between the lees of wine and a cerulean blue. The countenance long and brown; the cheek-bones high, denoting acuteness; the muscles of the jaw enormously developedâan infallible mark by which a Gascon may be recognised, even without the cap, and our youth wore a cap, adorned with a sort of feather; the eye full and intelligent; the nose hooked, but finely formed; the whole figure too large for a youth, yet too small for an adult; an inexperienced eye would have taken him for the son of a farmer on a journey, had it not been for the long sword, which, hanging from a leathern belt, banged against the heels of its owner whilst he was walking, and against the rough coat of his steed when he was mounted;âfor our youth had a steed, and this steed was at the same time so remarkable as to attract observation. It was a Beaunese sheltie, of about twelve or fourteen years of age, yellow as an orange, without any hair on its tail, but abundance of galls on its legs, and which, whilst carrying its head lower than its knees, making the application of a martingale unnecessary, yet managed gallantly its eight leagues a day. Unfortunately, these useful qualities of the steed were so well concealed under its strange coat and eccentric gait, that at a time when every one knew something of horses, the apparition of the aforesaid sheltie at Meung, which it had entered about a quarter of an hour before, by the gate of Beaugency, produced a somewhat unfavourable sensation or impression, which extended even to its master. And this impression was the more painful to young dâArtagnan (for that was the name of the Don Quixote of this second Rozinante), that he could not conceal from himself the ridiculous light in which he, albeit so good a horseman, was placed by such a steed. He had, therefore, sighed deeply when he accepted the gift from M. dâArtagnan, his father: he knew that such a beast was worth about twenty francs. It is true that the words which accompanied the present were above price.
