La comtesse de Charny Author:Alexandre Dumas Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: CHAPTER III. THE MONARCHY IS SAVED. Several weeks after the execution which we have just described, — into the details whereof we entered, in order to fore... more »warn our readers what gratitude may be expected from kings and princes, towards those who sacrifice themselves in behalf of such royal patrons, — a man, riding a dapple-gray horse, was climbing slowly up the avenue at Saint Cloud Palace. This slowness must be attributed neither to the lassitude of the rider nor the fatigue of his horse. That neither the one nor the other had taken more than a short trip, it was easy to see ; for the foam which escaped from the horse's mouth was not the result of over-riding, but rather of hard restraint. As to the horseman, one could see, at first sight, that he was a gentleman; and his entire dress was not only free from dirt, but attested the precautions taken to preserve his garments from the mud which covered the road. What retarded the horseman was the deep thought wherein he was evidently absorbed, and possibly his wish not to reach his appointment until a certain hour, which had not yet sounded. He was a man about forty years old, whose powerful ugliness did not conceal his greatness of character. He had a head disproportionately large, bloated cheeks, a face seamed by the smallpox, an animated expression,eyes with latent lightning, a mouth accustomed to deliberate irony and biting sarcasm. Such was the aspect of this man, destined, as one instinctively felt, to occupy a large place and make a great noise in the world. His whole physiognomy, however, seemed covered with a veil, thrown over it by one of those organic maladies against which the most vigorous temperaments struggle in vain. His complexion was dull and gray. His eyes were weary and red. His jaws were overw...« less