Lousia Muhlbach - "Andreas Hofer"

Charles Darwin - "On the Origin of Species"

Arthur M. Winfield - "The Rover Boys in the Jungle"

Constance Skinner - "Pioneers of the Old Southwest"

New Philadelphia Book Publisher Highlights Local Talent
Book and Publishing News from Publishers Newswire(tm)

Looking for Child to be on Cover of a New Book, 'The Model Child'
PHILADELPHIA, Pa. -- The Philadelphia literary world will celebrate the launch of two new players today, April 10th: Kay Square Press, a new publishing company focused on Philadelphia-area artists, their stories, and their art; and Kay Square's first release, 'With the Rich and Mighty: Emlen Etting of Philadelphia' (ISBN: 978-0-9815129-0-7), a critical biography by Kenneth C. Kaleta.

FlatSigned Press Alleges Don Imus Remarks Damage Legacy of President Gerald R. Ford
NEW YORK, N.Y. -- Nathan Yungerberg, an accomplished model scout and professional child photographer is launching a nation-wide casting call to find the cover model for his highly anticipated book release, 'The Model Child: A Parents Guide to the Child Modeling Industry' (ISBN: 978-0-9817018-0-6).

Books: The Man in the Iron Mask

A >> Alexandre Dumas, Pere >> The Man in the Iron Mask




"Is he not a prey which will always be within your grasp?"

"Should he escape, and take to flight?" exclaimed Colbert.

"Well, monsieur, it will always remain on record, to the king's eternal
honor, that he allowed M. Fouquet to flee; and the more guilty he may
have been, the greater will the king's honor and glory appear, compared
with such unnecessary misery and shame."

Louis kissed La Valliere's hand, as he knelt before her.

"I am lost," thought Colbert; then suddenly his face brightened up
again. "Oh! no, no, aha, old fox! - not yet," he said to himself.

And while the king, protected from observation by the thick covert of an
enormous lime, pressed La Valliere to his breast, with all the ardor of
ineffable affection, Colbert tranquilly fumbled among the papers in his
pocket-book and drew out of it a paper folded in the form of a letter,
somewhat yellow, perhaps, but one that must have been most precious,
since the intendant smiled as he looked at it; he then bent a look, full
of hatred, upon the charming group which the young girl and the king
formed together - a group revealed but for a moment, as the light of the
approaching torches shone upon it. Louis noticed the light reflected
upon La Valliere's white dress. "Leave me, Louise," he said, "for some
one is coming."

"Mademoiselle, mademoiselle, some one is coming," cried Colbert, to
expedite the young girl's departure.

Louise disappeared rapidly among the trees; and then, as the king, who
had been on his knees before the young girl, was rising from his humble
posture, Colbert exclaimed, "Ah! Mademoiselle de la Valliere has let
something fall."

"What is it?" inquired the king.

"A paper - a letter - something white; look there, sire."

The king stooped down immediately and picked up the letter, crumpling it
in his hand, as he did so; and at the same moment the torches arrived,
inundating the blackness of the scene with a flood of light as bight as
day.


Chapter XVI:
Jealousy.

The torches we have just referred to, the eager attention every one
displayed, and the new ovation paid to the king by Fouquet, arrived in
time to suspend the effect of a resolution which La Valliere had already
considerably shaken in Louis XIV.'s heart. He looked at Fouquet with a
feeling almost of gratitude for having given La Valliere an opportunity
of showing herself so generously disposed, so powerful in the influence
she exercised over his heart. The moment of the last and greatest
display had arrived. Hardly had Fouquet conducted the king towards the
chateau, when a mass of fire burst from the dome of Vaux, with a
prodigious uproar, pouring a flood of dazzling cataracts of rays on every
side, and illumining the remotest corners of the gardens. The fireworks
began. Colbert, at twenty paces from the king, who was surrounded and
_feted_ by the owner of Vaux, seemed, by the obstinate persistence of his
gloomy thoughts, to do his utmost to recall Louis's attention, which the
magnificence of the spectacle was already, in his opinion, too easily
diverting. Suddenly, just as Louis was on the point of holding it out to
Fouquet, he perceived in his hand the paper which, as he believed, La
Valliere had dropped at his feet as she hurried away. The still stronger
magnet of love drew the young prince's attention towards the _souvenir_
of his idol; and, by the brilliant light, which increased momentarily in
beauty, and drew from the neighboring villages loud cheers of admiration,
the king read the letter, which he supposed was a loving and tender
epistle La Valliere had destined for him. But as he read it, a death-
like pallor stole over his face, and an expression of deep-seated wrath,
illumined by the many-colored fire which gleamed so brightly, soaringly
around the scene, produced a terrible spectacle, which every one would
have shuddered at, could they only have read into his heart, now torn by
the most stormy and most bitter passions. There was no truce for him
now, influenced as he was by jealousy and mad passion. From the very
moment when the dark truth was revealed to him, every gentler feeling
seemed to disappear; pity, kindness of consideration, the religion of
hospitality, all were forgotten. In the bitter pang which wrung his
heart, he, still too weak to hide his sufferings, was almost on the point
of uttering a cry of alarm, and calling his guards to gather round him.
This letter which Colbert had thrown down at the king's feet, the reader
has doubtlessly guessed, was the same that had disappeared with the
porter Toby at Fontainebleau, after the attempt which Fouquet had made
upon La Valliere's heart. Fouquet saw the king's pallor, and was far
from guessing the evil; Colbert saw the king's anger, and rejoiced
inwardly at the approach of the storm. Fouquet's voice drew the young
prince from his wrathful reverie.

"What is the matter, sire?" inquired the superintendent, with an
expression of graceful interest.

Louis made a violent effort over himself, as he replied, "Nothing."

"I am afraid your majesty is suffering?"

"I am suffering, and have already told you so, monsieur; but it is
nothing."

And the king, without waiting for the termination of the fireworks,
turned towards the chateau. Fouquet accompanied him, and the whole court
followed, leaving the remains of the fireworks consuming for their own
amusement. The superintendent endeavored again to question Louis XIV.,
but did not succeed in obtaining a reply. He imagined there had been
some misunderstanding between Louis and La Valliere in the park, which
had resulted in a slight quarrel; and that the king, who was not
ordinarily sulky by disposition, but completely absorbed by his passion
for La Valliere, had taken a dislike to every one because his mistress
had shown herself offended with him. This idea was sufficient to console
him; he had even a friendly and kindly smile for the young king, when the
latter wished him good night. This, however, was not all the king had to
submit to; he was obliged to undergo the usual ceremony, which on that
evening was marked by close adherence to the strictest etiquette. The
next day was the one fixed for the departure; it was but proper that the
guests should thank their host, and show him a little attention in return
for the expenditure of his twelve millions. The only remark, approaching
to amiability, which the king could find to say to M. Fouquet, as he took
leave of him, were in these words, "M. Fouquet, you shall hear from me.
Be good enough to desire M. d'Artagnan to come here."

But the blood of Louis XIV., who had so profoundly dissimulated his
feelings, boiled in his veins; and he was perfectly willing to order M.
Fouquet to be put an end to with the same readiness, indeed, as his
predecessor had caused the assassination of le Marechal d'Ancre; and so
he disguised the terrible resolution he had formed beneath one of those
royal smiles which, like lightning-flashes, indicated _coups d'etat_.
Fouquet took the king's hand and kissed it; Louis shuddered throughout
his whole frame, but allowed M. Fouquet to touch his hand with his lips.
Five minutes afterwards, D'Artagnan, to whom the royal order had been
communicated, entered Louis XIV.'s apartment. Aramis and Philippe were
in theirs, still eagerly attentive, and still listening with all their
ears. The king did not even give the captain of the musketeers time to
approach his armchair, but ran forward to meet him. "Take care," he
exclaimed, "that no one enters here."

"Very good, sire," replied the captain, whose glance had for a long time
past analyzed the stormy indications on the royal countenance. He gave
the necessary order at the door; but, returning to the king, he said, "Is
there something fresh the matter, your majesty?"

"How many men have you here?" inquired the king, without making any other
reply to the question addressed to him.

"What for, sire?"

"How many men have you, I say?" repeated the king, stamping upon the
ground with his foot.

"I have the musketeers."

"Well; and what others?"

"Twenty guards and thirteen Swiss."

"How many men will be required to - "

"To do what, sire?" replied the musketeer, opening his large, calm eyes.

"To arrest M. Fouquet."

D'Artagnan fell back a step.

"To arrest M. Fouquet!" he burst forth.

"Are you going to tell me that it is impossible?" exclaimed the king, in
tones of cold, vindictive passion.

"I never say that anything is impossible," replied D'Artagnan, wounded to
the quick.

"Very well; do it, then."

D'Artagnan turned on his heel, and made his way towards the door; it was
but a short distance, and he cleared it in half a dozen paces; when he
reached it he suddenly paused, and said, "Your majesty will forgive me,
but, in order to effect this arrest, I should like written directions."

"For what purpose - and since when has the king's word been insufficient
for you?"

"Because the word of a king, when it springs from a feeling of anger, may
possibly change when the feeling changes."

"A truce to set phrases, monsieur; you have another thought besides that?"

"Oh, I, at least, have certain thoughts and ideas, which, unfortunately,
others have not," D'Artagnan replied, impertinently.

The king, in the tempest of his wrath, hesitated, and drew back in the
face of D'Artagnan's frank courage, just as a horse crouches on his
haunches under the strong hand of a bold and experienced rider. "What is
your thought?" he exclaimed.

"This, sire," replied D'Artagnan: "you cause a man to be arrested when
you are still under his roof; and passion is alone the cause of that.
When your anger shall have passed, you will regret what you have done;
and then I wish to be in a position to show you your signature. If that,
however, should fail to be a reparation, it will at least show us that
the king was wrong to lose his temper."

"Wrong to lose his temper!" cried the king, in a loud, passionate voice.
"Did not my father, my grandfathers, too, before me, lose their temper at
times, in Heaven's name?"

"The king your father and the king your grandfather never lost their
temper except when under the protection of their own palace."

"The king is master wherever he may be."

"That is a flattering, complimentary phrase which cannot proceed from any
one but M. Colbert; but it happens not to be the truth. The king is at
home in every man's house when he has driven its owner out of it."

The king bit his lips, but said nothing.

"Can it be possible?" said D'Artagnan; "here is a man who is positively
ruining himself in order to please you, and you wish to have him
arrested! _Mordioux!_ Sire, if my name was Fouquet, and people treated
me in that manner, I would swallow at a single gulp all sorts of
fireworks and other things, and I would set fire to them, and send myself
and everybody else in blown-up atoms to the sky. But it is all the same;
it is your wish, and it shall be done."

"Go," said the king; "but have you men enough?"

"Do you suppose I am going to take a whole host to help me? Arrest M.
Fouquet! why, that is so easy that a very child might do it! It is like
drinking a glass of wormwood; one makes an ugly face, and that is all."

"If he defends himself?"

"He! it is not at all likely. Defend himself when such extreme harshness
as you are going to practice makes the man a very martyr! Nay, I am sure
that if he has a million of francs left, which I very much doubt, he
would be willing enough to give it in order to have such a termination as
this. But what does that matter? it shall be done at once."

"Stay," said the king; "do not make his arrest a public affair."

"That will be more difficult."

"Why so?"

"Because nothing is easier than to go up to M. Fouquet in the midst of a
thousand enthusiastic guests who surround him, and say, 'In the king's
name, I arrest you.' But to go up to him, to turn him first one way and
then another, to drive him up into one of the corners of the chess-board,
in such a way that he cannot escape; to take him away from his guests,
and keep him a prisoner for you, without one of them, alas! having heard
anything about it; that, indeed, is a genuine difficulty, the greatest of
all, in truth; and I hardly see how it is to be done."

"You had better say it is impossible, and you will have finished much
sooner. Heaven help me, but I seem to be surrounded by people who
prevent me doing what I wish."

"I do not prevent your doing anything. Have you indeed decided?"

"Take care of M. Fouquet, until I shall have made up my mind by to-morrow
morning."

"That shall be done, sire."

"And return, when I rise in the morning, for further orders; and now
leave me to myself."

"You do not even want M. Colbert, then?" said the musketeer, firing his
last shot as he was leaving the room. The king started. With his whole
mind fixed on the thought of revenge, he had forgotten the cause and
substance of the offense.

"No, no one," he said; "no one here! Leave me."

D'Artagnan quitted the room. The king closed the door with his own
hands, and began to walk up and down his apartment at a furious pace,
like a wounded bull in an arena, trailing from his horn the colored
streamers and the iron darts. At last he began to take comfort in the
expression of his violent feelings.

"Miserable wretch that he is! not only does he squander my finances, but
with his ill-gotten plunder he corrupts secretaries, friends, generals,
artists, and all, and tries to rob me of the one to whom I am most
attached. This is the reason that perfidious girl so boldly took his
part! Gratitude! and who can tell whether it was not a stronger feeling
- love itself?" He gave himself up for a moment to the bitterest
reflections. "A satyr!" he thought, with that abhorrent hate with which
young men regard those more advanced in life, who still think of love.
"A man who has never found opposition or resistance in any one, who
lavishes his gold and jewels in every direction, and who retains his
staff of painters in order to take the portraits of his mistresses in the
costume of goddesses." The king trembled with passion as he continued,
"He pollutes and profanes everything that belongs to me! He destroys
everything that is mine. He will be my death at last, I know. That man
is too much for me; he is my mortal enemy, but he shall forthwith fall!
I hate him - I hate him - I hate him!" and as he pronounced these words,
he struck the arm of the chair in which he was sitting violently, over
and over again, and then rose like one in an epileptic fit. "To-morrow!
to-morrow! oh, happy day!" he murmured, "when the sun rises, no other
rival shall that brilliant king of space possess but me. That man shall
fall so low that when people look at the abject ruin my anger shall have
wrought, they will be forced to confess at last and at least that I am
indeed greater than he." The king, who was incapable of mastering his
emotions any longer, knocked over with a blow of his fist a small table
placed close to his bedside, and in the very bitterness of anger, almost
weeping, and half-suffocated, he threw himself on his bed, dressed as he
was, and bit the sheets in his extremity of passion, trying to find
repose of body at least there. The bed creaked beneath his weight, and
with the exception of a few broken sounds, emerging, or, one might say,
exploding, from his overburdened chest, absolute silence soon reigned in
the chamber of Morpheus.


Chapter XVII:
High Treason.

The ungovernable fury which took possession of the king at the sight and
at the perusal of Fouquet's letter to La Valliere by degrees subsided
into a feeling of pain and extreme weariness. Youth, invigorated by
health and lightness of spirits, requiring soon that what it loses should
be immediately restored - youth knows not those endless, sleepless nights
which enable us to realize the fable of the vulture unceasingly feeding
on Prometheus. In cases where the man of middle life, in his acquired
strength of will and purpose, and the old, in their state of natural
exhaustion, find incessant augmentation of their bitter sorrow, a young
man, surprised by the sudden appearance of misfortune, weakens himself in
sighs, and groans, and tears, directly struggling with his grief, and is
thereby far sooner overthrown by the inflexible enemy with whom he is
engaged. Once overthrown, his struggles cease. Louis could not hold out
more than a few minutes, at the end of which he had ceased to clench his
hands, and scorch in fancy with his looks the invisible objects of his
hatred; he soon ceased to attack with his violent imprecations not M.
Fouquet alone, but even La Valliere herself; from fury he subsided into
despair, and from despair to prostration. After he had thrown himself
for a few minutes to and fro convulsively on his bed, his nerveless arms
fell quietly down; his head lay languidly on his pillow; his limbs,
exhausted with excessive emotion, still trembled occasionally, agitated
by muscular contractions; while from his breast faint and infrequent
sighs still issued. Morpheus, the tutelary deity of the apartment,
towards whom Louis raised his eyes, wearied by his anger and reconciled
by his tears, showered down upon him the sleep-inducing poppies with
which his hands are ever filled; so presently the monarch closed his eyes
and fell asleep. Then it seemed to him, as it often happens in that
first sleep, so light and gentle, which raises the body above the couch,
and the soul above the earth - it seemed to him, we say, as if the god
Morpheus, painted on the ceiling, looked at him with eyes resembling
human eyes; that something shone brightly, and moved to and fro in the
dome above the sleeper; that the crowd of terrible dreams which thronged
together in his brain, and which were interrupted for a moment, half
revealed a human face, with a hand resting against the mouth, and in an
attitude of deep and absorbed meditation. And strange enough, too, this
man bore so wonderful a resemblance to the king himself, that Louis
fancied he was looking at his own face reflected in a mirror; with the
exception, however, that the face was saddened by a feeling of the
profoundest pity. Then it seemed to him as if the dome gradually
retired, escaping from his gaze, and that the figures and attributes
painted by Lebrun became darker and darker as the distance became more
and more remote. A gentle, easy movement, as regular as that by which a
vessel plunges beneath the waves, had succeeded to the immovableness of
the bed. Doubtless the king was dreaming, and in this dream the crown of
gold, which fastened the curtains together, seemed to recede from his
vision, just as the dome, to which it remained suspended, had done, so
that the winged genius which, with both its hand, supported the crown,
seemed, though vainly so, to call upon the king, who was fast
disappearing from it. The bed still sunk. Louis, with his eyes open,
could not resist the deception of this cruel hallucination. At last, as
the light of the royal chamber faded away into darkness and gloom,
something cold, gloomy, and inexplicable in its nature seemed to infect
the air. No paintings, nor gold, nor velvet hangings, were visible any
longer, nothing but walls of a dull gray color, which the increasing
gloom made darker every moment. And yet the bed still continued to
descend, and after a minute, which seemed in its duration almost an age
to the king, it reached a stratum of air, black and chill as death, and
then it stopped. The king could no longer see the light in his room,
except as from the bottom of a well we can see the light of day. "I am
under the influence of some atrocious dream," he thought. "It is time to
awaken from it. Come! let me wake."

Every one has experienced the sensation the above remark conveys; there
is hardly a person who, in the midst of a nightmare whose influence is
suffocating, has not said to himself, by the help of that light which
still burns in the brain when every human light is extinguished, "It is
nothing but a dream, after all." This was precisely what Louis XIV. said
to himself; but when he said, "Come, come! wake up," he perceived that
not only was he already awake, but still more, that he had his eyes open
also. And then he looked all round him. On his right hand and on his
left two armed men stood in stolid silence, each wrapped in a huge cloak,
and the face covered with a mask; one of them held a small lamp in his
hand, whose glimmering light revealed the saddest picture a king could
look upon. Louis could not help saying to himself that his dream still
lasted, and that all he had to do to cause it to disappear was to move
his arms or to say something aloud; he darted from his bed, and found
himself upon the damp, moist ground. Then, addressing himself to the man
who held the lamp in his hand, he said:

"What is this, monsieur, and what is the meaning of this jest?"

"It is no jest," replied in a deep voice the masked figure that held the
lantern.

"Do you belong to M. Fouquet?" inquired the king, greatly astonished at
his situation.

"It matters very little to whom we belong," said the phantom; "we are
your masters now, that is sufficient."

The king, more impatient than intimidated, turned to the other masked
figure. "If this is a comedy," he said, "you will tell M. Fouquet that I
find it unseemly and improper, and that I command it should cease."

The second masked person to whom the king had addressed himself was a man
of huge stature and vast circumference. He held himself erect and
motionless as any block of marble. "Well!" added the king, stamping his
foot, "you do not answer!"

"We do not answer you, my good monsieur," said the giant, in a stentorian
voice, "because there is nothing to say."

"At least, tell me what you want," exclaimed Louis, folding his arms with
a passionate gesture.

"You will know by and by," replied the man who held the lamp.

"In the meantime tell me where I am."

"Look."

Louis looked all round him; but by the light of the lamp which the masked
figure raised for the purpose, he could perceive nothing but the damp
walls which glistened here and there with the slimy traces of the snail.
"Oh - oh! - a dungeon," cried the king.

"No, a subterranean passage."

"Which leads - ?"

"Will you be good enough to follow us?"

"I shall not stir from hence!" cried the king.

"If you are obstinate, my dear young friend," replied the taller of the
two, "I will lift you up in my arms, and roll you up in your own cloak,
and if you should happen to be stifled, why - so much the worse for you."

As he said this, he disengaged from beneath his cloak a hand of which
Milo of Crotona would have envied him the possession, on the day when he
had that unhappy idea of rending his last oak. The king dreaded
violence, for he could well believe that the two men into whose power he
had fallen had not gone so far with any idea of drawing back, and that
they would consequently be ready to proceed to extremities, if
necessary. He shook his head and said: "It seems I have fallen into the
hands of a couple of assassins. Move on, then."

Neither of the men answered a word to this remark. The one who carried
the lantern walked first, the king followed him, while the second masked
figure closed the procession. In this manner they passed along a winding
gallery of some length, with as many staircases leading out of it as are
to be found in the mysterious and gloomy palaces of Ann Radcliffe's
creation. All these windings and turnings, during which the king heard
the sound of running water _over his head_, ended at last in a long
corridor closed by an iron door. The figure with the lamp opened the
door with one of the keys he wore suspended at his girdle, where, during
the whole of the brief journey, the king had heard them rattle. As soon
as the door was opened and admitted the air, Louis recognized the balmy
odors that trees exhale in hot summer nights. He paused, hesitatingly,
for a moment or two; but the huge sentinel who followed him thrust him
out of the subterranean passage.

"Another blow," said the king, turning towards the one who had just had
the audacity to touch his sovereign; "what do you intend to do with the
king of France?"

"Try to forget that word," replied the man with the lamp, in a tone which
as little admitted of a reply as one of the famous decrees of Minos.

"You deserve to be broken on the wheel for the words that you have just
made use of," said the giant, as he extinguished the lamp his companion
handed to him; "but the king is too kind-hearted."

Louis, at that threat, made so sudden a movement that it seemed as if he
meditated flight; but the giant's hand was in a moment placed on his
shoulder, and fixed him motionless where he stood. "But tell me, at
least, where we are going," said the king.

"Come," replied the former of the two men, with a kind of respect in his
manner, and leading his prisoner towards a carriage which seemed to be in
waiting.