THE MAN IN THE IRON MASK
by Alexandre Dumas
THE PROJECT EDITOR'S NOTE TO THE PG D'ARTAGNAN SERIES LINKED INDEX OF PROJECT VOLUMES:
ORDER TITLE PG ETEXT# DATES VOLUME CHAPTERS
1 The Three Musketeers 1257 1625-1628 1
2 Twenty Years After 1259 1648-1649 2
3 The Vicomte de Bragelonne 2609 1660 3 1-75
4 Ten Years Later 2681 1660-1661 3 76-140
5 Louise de la Valliere 2710 1661 3 141-208
6 The Man in the Iron Mask 2759 1661-1673 3 209-269 [Project Etext 1258 listed below, is of the same
title as etext 2681 and its contents overlap those of two other volumes: it includes all the chapters of etext 2609 and the first 28 chapters of 2681]
Ten Years Later 1258 1660-1661 3 1-104
Contents
Introduction:
Chapter I. The Prisoner.
Chapter II. How Mouston Had Become Fatter without Giving Porthos Notice Thereof
Chapter III. Who Messire Jean Percerin Was. Chapter IV. The Patterns.
Chapter V. Where, Probably, Moliere Obtained His First Idea of the Bourgeois Gentilhomme. Chapter VI. The Bee-Hive, the Bees, and the Honey.
Chapter VII. Another Supper at the Bastile.
Chapter VIII. The General of the Order.
Chapter IX. The Tempter.
1
Chapter X. Crown and Tiara.
Chapter XI. The Chateau de Vaux-le-Vicomte. Chapter XII. The Wine of Melun.
Chapter XIII. Nectar and Ambrosia.
Chapter XIV. A Gascon, and a Gascon and a Half. Chapter XV. Colbert.
Chapter XVI. Jealousy. Chapter XVII. High Treason.
Chapter XVIII. A Night at the Bastile. Chapter XIX. The Shadow of M. Fouquet. Chapter XX. The Morning.
Chapter XXI. The King's Friend.
Chapter XXII. Showing How the Countersign Was Respected at the Bastile. Chapter XXIII. The King's Gratitude.
Chapter XXIV. The False King.
Chapter XXV. In Which Porthos Thinks He Is Pursuing a Duchy. Chapter XXVI. The Last Adieux.
Chapter XXVII. Monsieur de Beaufort. Chapter XXVIII. Preparations for Departure. Chapter XXIX. Planchet's Inventory.
Chapter XXX. The Inventory of M. de Beaufort. Chapter XXXI. The Silver Dish.
Chapter XXXII. Captive and Jailers. Chapter XXXIII. Promises.
Chapter XXXIV. Among Women. Chapter XXXV. The Last Supper.
Chapter XXXVI. In M. Colbert's Carriage.
Chapter XXXVII. The Two Lighters.
Chapter XXXVIII. Friendly Advice.
2
Chapter XXXIX. How the King, Louis XIV., Played His Little Part. Chapter XL: The White Horse and the Black.
Chapter XLI. In Which the Squirrel Falls,--the Adder Flies. Chapter XLII. Belle-Ile-en-Mer.
Chapter XLIII. Explanations by Aramis.
Chapter XLIV. Result of the Ideas of the King, and the Ideas of D'Artagnan. Chapter XLV. The Ancestors of Porthos.
Chapter XLVI. The Son of Biscarrat. Chapter XLVII. The Grotto of Locmaria. Chapter XLVIII. The Grotto.
Chapter XLIX. An Homeric Song. Chapter L: The Death of a Titan. Chapter LI. Porthos's Epitaph. Chapter LII. M. de Gesvres's Round. Chapter LIII. King Louis XIV. Chapter LIV. M. Fouquet's Friends. Chapter LV. Porthos's Will.
Chapter LVI. The Old Age of Athos. Chapter LVII. Athos's Vision. Chapter LVIII. The Angel of Death. Chapter LIX. The Bulletin.
Chapter LX. The Last Canto of the Poem. Epilogue.
Footnotes
Introduction:
3
In the months of March-July in 1844, in the magazine Le Siecle, the first portion of a story appeared, penned by the celebrated play-wright Alexandre Dumas. It was based, he claimed, on some manuscripts he had found a year earlier in the Bibliotheque Nationale while researching a history he planned to write on Louis XIV. They chronicled the adventures of a young man named D'Artagnan who, upon entering Paris, became almost immediately embroiled in court intrigues, international politics, and illfated affairs between royal lovers. Over the next six years, readers would enjoy the adventures of this youth and his three famous friends, Porthos, Athos, and Aramis, as their exploits unraveled behind the scenes of some of the most momentous events in French and even English history.
Eventually these serialized adventures were published in novel form, and became the three D'Artagnan Romances known today.
Here is a brief summary of the first two novels:
The Three Musketeers (serialized March--July, 1844): The year is 1625. The young D'Artagnan arrives in Paris at the tender age of
18, and almost immediately offends three musketeers, Porthos, Aramis, and Athos. Instead of dueling, the four are attacked by five of the Cardinal's guards, and the courage of the youth is made apparent during the battle. The four become fast friends, and, when asked by D'Artagnan's landlord to find his missing wife, embark upon an adventure that takes them across both France and England in order to thwart the plans of the Cardinal Richelieu. Along the way, they encounter a beautiful young spy, named simply Milady, who will stop at nothing to disgrace Queen Anne of Austria before her husband, Louis XIII, and take her revenge upon the four friends.
Twenty Years After (serialized January--August, 1845): The year is now 1648, twenty years since the close of the last story. Louis XIII has died, as has Cardinal Richelieu, and while the crown of France may sit upon the head of Anne of Austria as Regent for the young Louis XIV, the real power resides with the Cardinal Mazarin, her secret husband. D'Artagnan is now a lieutenant of musketeers, and his three friends have retired to private life. Athos turned out to be a nobleman, the Comte de la Fere, and has retired
to his home with his son, Raoul de Bragelonne. Aramis, whose real name is D'Herblay, has followed his intention of shedding the musketeer's cassock for the priest's robes, and Porthos has married a wealthy woman, who left him her fortune upon her death. But trouble is stirring in both France and England. Cromwell menaces the institution of royalty itself while marching against Charles I, and at home the Fronde is threatening to tear France apart. D'Artagnan brings his friends out of retirement to save the threatened English monarch, but Mordaunt, the son of Milady, who seeks to avenge his mother's death at the musketeers' hands, thwarts their valiant efforts. Undaunted, our heroes return to France just in time to help save the young Louis XIV, quiet the Fronde, and tweak the nose of Cardinal Mazarin.
The third novel, The Vicomte de Bragelonne (serialized October, 1847--January, 1850), has enjoyed a strange history in its English translation. It has been split into three, four, or five volumes at various points in its history. The five-volume edition generally does not give titles to the smaller portions, but the others do. In the three-volume edition, the novels are entitled The Vicomte de Bragelonne, Louise de la Valliere, and The Man in the Iron Mask. For the purposes of this etext, I have chosen to split the novel as the four-volume edition does, with these titles: The Vicomte de Bragelonne, Ten Years Later, Louise de la Valliere, and The Man in the Iron Mask. In the first three etexts:
The Vicomte de Bragelonne (Etext 2609): It is the year 1660, and D'Artagnan, after thirty-five years of loyal service, has become disgusted with serving King Louis XIV while the real power resides with the Cardinal Mazarin, and has tendered his resignation. He embarks on his own project, that of restoring Charles II to the throne of England, and, with the help of Athos, succeeds, earn-
ing himself quite a fortune in the process. D'Artagnan returns to Paris to live the life of a rich citizen, and Athos, after negotiating