summer day, a gigantic mirror in which heaven delights to reflect sometimes
its stars, sometimes its storms.

The king was short of stature - he was scarcely five feet two inches: but
his youth made up for this defect, set off likewise by great nobleness in
all his movements, and by considerable address in all bodily exercises.

Certes, he was already quite a king, and it was a great thing to be a
king in that period of traditional devotedness and respect; but as, up to
that time, he had been but seldom and always poorly shown to the people,
as they to whom he was shown saw him by the side of his mother, a tall
woman, and monsieur le cardinal, a man of commanding presence, many found
him so little of a king as to say, -

"Why, the king is not so tall as monsieur le cardinal!"

Whatever may be thought of these physical observations, which were
principally made in the capital, the young king was welcomed as a god by
the inhabitants of Blois, and almost like a king by his uncle and aunt,
Monsieur and Madame, the inhabitants of the castle.

It must, however, be allowed, that when he saw, in the hall of reception,
chairs of equal height for himself, his mother, the cardinal, and his
uncle and aunt, a disposition artfully concealed by the semi-circular
form of the assembly, Louis XIV. became red with anger, and looked around
him to ascertain by the countenances of those that were present, if this
humiliation had been prepared for him. But as he saw nothing upon the
impassible visage of the cardinal, nothing on that of his mother, nothing
on those of the assembly, he resigned himself, and sat down, taking care
to be seated before anybody else.