The Man in the Iron Mask
Where, Probably, Moliere Obtained His First Idea of the Bourgeois Gentilhomme.
D’Artagnan Porthos in the chamber; but no longer an Porthos, or a Porthos, but Porthos radiant, blooming, fascinating, and with Moliere, who was looking upon him with a of idolatry, and as a man would who had not only anything greater, but not anything so great. Aramis up to Porthos and offered him his white hand, which itself in the of his old friend,—an operation which Aramis without a uneasiness. But the pressure having been performed not too for him, the of Vannes passed over to Moliere.
“Well, monsieur,” said he, “will you come with me to Saint-Mande?”
“I will go you like, monseigneur,” answered Moliere.
“To Saint-Mande!” Porthos, at the proud of Vannes with a tailor. “What, Aramis, are you going to take this to Saint-Mande?”
“Yes,” said Aramis, smiling, “our work is pressing.”
“And besides, my dear Porthos,” D’Artagnan, “M. Moliere is not what he seems.”
“In what way?” asked Porthos.
“Why, this is one of M. Percerin’s clerks, and is at Saint-Mande to try on the which M. Fouquet has ordered for the Epicureans.”
“‘Tis so,” said Moliere.
“Yes, monsieur.”
“Come, then, my dear M. Moliere,” said Aramis, “that is, if you have done with M. du Vallon.”
“We have finished,” Porthos.
“And you are satisfied?” asked D’Artagnan.
“Completely so,” Porthos.
Moliere took his of Porthos with much ceremony, and the hand which the captain of the offered him.
“Pray, monsieur,” Porthos, mincingly, “above all, be exact.”
“You will have your dress the day after to-morrow, le baron,” answered Moliere. And he left with Aramis.
Then D’Artagnan, taking Porthos’s arm, “What has this tailor done for you, my dear Porthos,” he asked, “that you are so pleased with him?”
“What has he done for me, my friend! done for me!” Porthos, enthusiastically.
“Yes, I ask you, what has he done for you?”
“My friend, he has done that which no tailor yet accomplished: he has taken my measure without me!”
“Ah, bah! tell me how he did it.”
“First, then, they went, I don’t know where, for a number of figures, of all and sizes, there would be one to mine, but the largest—that of the drum-major of the Swiss guard—was two too short, and a too narrow in the chest.”
“Indeed!”
“It is as I tell you, D’Artagnan; but he is a great man, or at the very least a great tailor, is this M. Moliere. He was not at all put at fault by the circumstance.”
“What did he do, then?”
“Oh! it is a very matter. I’faith, ‘tis an unheard-of thing that people should have been so as not to have this method from the first. What and they would have me!”
“Not to mention of the costumes, my dear Porthos.”
“Yes, thirty dresses.”
“Well, my dear Porthos, come, tell me M. Moliere’s plan.”
“Moliere? You call him so, do you? I shall make a point of his name.”
“Yes; or Poquelin, if you that.”
“No; I like Moliere best. When I wish to his name, I shall think of [an aviary]; and as I have one at Pierrefonds—”
“Capital!” returned D’Artagnan. “And M. Moliere’s plan?”
“‘Tis this: of me to pieces, as all these do—of making me my back, and my joints—all of them low and practices—” D’Artagnan a of with his head. “‘Monsieur,’ he said to me,” Porthos, “‘a ought to measure himself. Do me the to near this glass;’ and I near the glass. I must own I did not what this good M. Voliere wanted with me.”
“Moliere!”
“Ah! yes, Moliere—Moliere. And as the of being still me, ‘Take care,’ said I to him, ‘what you are going to do with me; I am very ticklish, I you.’ But he, with his soft voice (for he is a fellow, we must admit, my friend), he with his soft voice, ‘Monsieur,’ said he, ‘that your dress may fit you well, it must be according to your figure. Your is in this mirror. We shall take the measure of this reflection.’”
“In fact,” said D’Artagnan, “you saw in the glass; but where did they one in which you see your whole figure?”
“My good friend, it is the very in which the king is used to look to see himself.”
“Yes; but the king is a and a than you are.”
“Ah! well, I know not how that may be; it is, no doubt, a way of the king; but the looking-glass was too large for me. ‘Tis true that its was up of three Venetian plates of glass, one above another, and its of three in juxtaposition.”
“Oh, Porthos! what excellent you have of. Where in the word did you such a vocabulary?”
“At Belle-Isle. Aramis and I had to use such in our and experiments.”
D’Artagnan recoiled, as though the had the out of his body.
“Ah! very good. Let us return to the looking-glass, my friend.”
“Then, this good M. Voliere—”
“Moliere.”
“Yes—Moliere—you are right. You will see now, my dear friend, that I shall his name well. This excellent M. Moliere set to work out lines on the mirror, with a piece of Spanish chalk, in all the make of my arms and my shoulders, all the while this maxim, which I admirable: ‘It is that a dress should not its wearer.’”
“In reality,” said D’Artagnan, “that is an excellent maxim, which is, unfortunately, out in practice.”
“That is why I it all the more astonishing, when he upon it.”
“Ah! he expatiated?”
“Parbleu!”
“Let me his theory.”
“‘Seeing that,’ he continued, ‘one may, in circumstances, or in a position, have one’s on one’s shoulder, and not to take one’s off—‘”
“True,” said D’Artagnan.
“‘And so,’ M. Voliere—”
“Moliere.”
“Moliere, yes. ‘And so,’ on M. Moliere, ‘you want to your sword, monsieur, and you have your on your back. What do you do?’
“‘I take it off,’ I answered.
“‘Well, no,’ he replied.
“‘How no?’
“‘I say that the dress should be so well made, that it will in no way you, in your sword.’
“‘Ah, ah!’
“‘Throw on guard,’ he.
“I did it with such firmness, that two of out of the window.
“‘’Tis nothing, nothing,’ said he. ‘Keep your position.’
“I my left arm in the air, the bent, the drooping, and my curved, while my right arm, extended, my with the elbow, and my with the wrist.”
“Yes,” said D’Artagnan, “‘tis the true guard—the guard.”
“You have said the very word, dear friend. In the meanwhile, Voliere—”
“Moliere.”
“Hold! I should certainly, after all, to call him—what did you say his other name was?”
“Poquelin.”
“I to call him Poquelin.”
“And how will you this name than the other?”
“You understand, he calls himself Poquelin, he not?”
“Yes.”
“If I were to call to mind Madame Coquenard.”
“Good.”
“And Coc into Poc, into lin; and of Coquenard I shall have Poquelin.”
“‘Tis wonderful,” D’Artagnan, astounded. “Go on, my friend, I am to you with admiration.”
“This Coquelin sketched my arm on the glass.”
“I your pardon—Poquelin.”
“What did I say, then?”
“You said Coquelin.”
“Ah! true. This Poquelin, then, sketched my arm on the glass; but he took his time over it; he looking at me a good deal. The is, that I must have been looking particularly handsome.”
“‘Does it you?’ he asked.
“‘A little,’ I replied, a little in my hands, ‘but I out for an hour or so longer.’
“‘No, no, I will not allow it; the will make it a to support your arms, as of old, men supported those of the prophet.’
“‘Very good,’ I answered.
“‘That will not be to you?’
“‘My friend,’ said I, ‘there is, I think, a great being supported and being measured.’”
“The is full of the sense,” D’Artagnan.
“Then,” Porthos, “he a sign: two approached; one supported my left arm, while the other, with address, supported my right.”
“‘Another, my man,’ he. A third approached. ‘Support by the waist,’ said he. The complied.”
“So that you were at rest?” asked D’Artagnan.
“Perfectly; and Pocquenard me on the glass.”
“Poquelin, my friend.”
“Poquelin—you are right. Stay, I calling him Voliere.”
“Yes; and then it was over, wasn’t it?”
“During that time Voliere me as I appeared in the mirror.”
“‘Twas in him.”
“I much like the plan; it is respectful, and every one in his place.”
“And there it ended?”
“Without a having touched me, my friend.”
“Except the three who supported you.”
“Doubtless; but I have, I think, already to you the there is supporting and measuring.”
“‘Tis true,” answered D’Artagnan; who said to himself, “I’faith, I myself, or I have been the means of a good to that Moliere, and we shall see the off to the life in some or other.” Porthos smiled.
“What are you laughing at?” asked D’Artagnan.
“Must I confess? Well, I was laughing over my good fortune.”
“Oh, that is true; I don’t know a man than you. But what is this last piece of luck that has you?’
“Well, my dear fellow, me.”
“I nothing better.”
“It that I am the who has had his measure taken in that manner.”
“Are you so sure of it?’
“Nearly so. Certain of which passed Voliere and the other me the fact.”
“Well, my friend, that not me from Moliere,” said D’Artagnan.
“Voliere, my friend.”
“Oh, no, no, indeed! I am very to you to go on saying Voliere; but, as for me, I shall to say Moliere. Well, this, I was saying, not me, from Moliere, who is a very fellow, and you with this idea.”
“It will be of great use to him by and by, I am sure.”
“Won’t it be of use to him, indeed? I you, it will, and that in the degree;—for you see my friend Moliere is of all tailors the man who best our barons, comtes, and marquises—according to their measure.”
On this observation, neither the of which we shall discuss, D’Artagnan and Porthos M. de Percerin’s house and their carriages, we will them, in order to look after Moliere and Aramis at Saint-Mande.
