the bitterness in which his task might involve him.

At that moment he saw approaching his friend, De Thou, who, anxious at
his remaining behind, had sought him in the plain, eager to aid him if
necessary.

"It is late, my friend; night approaches. You have delayed long; I
feared for you. Whom have you here? What has detained you? The King
will soon be asking for you."

Such were the rapid inquiries of the young counsellor, whose anxiety,
more than the battle itself, had made him lose his accustomed serenity.

"I was slightly wounded; I bring a prisoner, and I was thinking of the
King. What can he want me for, my friend? What must I do if he proposes
to place me about his person? I must please him; and at this thought--
shall I own it?--I am tempted to fly. But I trust that I shall not have
that fatal honor. 'To please,' how humiliating the word! 'to obey'
quite the opposite! A soldier runs the chance of death, and there's an
end. But in what base compliances, what sacrifices of himself, what
compositions with his conscience, what degradation of his own thought,
may not a courtier be involved! Ah, De Thou, my dear De Thou! I am not
made for the court; I feel it, though I have seen it but for a moment.
There is in my temperament a certain savageness, which education has
polished only on the surface. At a distance, I thought myself adapted to
live in this all-powerful world; I even desired it, led by a cherished
hope of my heart. But I shuddered at the first step; I shuddered at the
mere sight of the Cardinal. The recollection of the last of his crimes,
at which I was present, kept me from addressing him. He horrifies me;
I never can endure to be near him. The King's favor, too, has that about