But each declined, and Athos filled in the name of D'Artagnan on the commission.
"I shall soon have no more friends. Nothing but bitter recollections!" said D'Artagnan, thinking of Madame Bonacieux.
"You are young yet," Athos answered. "In time these bitter recollections will give way to sweet remembrances."
[Twenty Years After]
In this first-rate romance, which is a sequel to "The Three Musketeers," and was published in 1845, we have D'Artagnan and the three musketeers in the prime of middle life. Their efforts on behalf of Charles I. are amazing, worthy of anything done when they were twenty years younger. All the characters introduced are for the most part historical, and they are all drawn with spirit, so that our interest in them never flags. A remarkable point in regard to these historical romances of Dumas is that, in spite of their enormous length, no superfluous dialogue or long descriptions prolong them. Dumas took considerable liberties with the facts of history in several places, as, for instance, in the introduction of D'Artagnan and his friends to Charles I., and in making his trial and execution follow as quickly on his surrender as we are made to believe in "Twenty Years After." The story is further continued in "The Vicomte de Bragelonne."
I.--The Parsimony of Mazarin
The great Richelieu was dead, and his successor, Cardinal Mazarin, a cunning and parsimonious Italian, was chief minister of France. Paris, torn and distracted by civil dissension, and impoverished by heavy taxation, was seething with revolt, and Mazarin was the object of popular hatred, Anne of Austria, the queen-mother (for Louis XIV. was but a child), sharing his disfavour with the people.
It was under these circumstances that the queen recalled how faithfully D'Artagnan had once served her, and reminded Mazarin of that gallant officer, and of his three friends. Mazarin sent for D'Artagnan, who for twenty years had remained a lieutenant of musketeers, and asked him what had become of his friends.
"I want you and your three friends to be of use to me," said the cardinal. "Where are your friends?"