My favourite passage in The Three Musketeers so far

[Rhoderic]

I just reached this bit this evening, and I must say the casual humor of it struck me as very well-written. This passage is just a casual anecdote told by one of the supporting cast and shouldn't spoil anything else in the book:



"Lord, monsieur!  There is nothing more easy," said Mousqueton,
with a modest air.  "One only needs to be sharp, that's all.  I
was brought up in the country, and my father in his leisure time
was something of a poacher."

"And what did he do the rest of his time?"

"Monsieur, he carried on a trade which I have always thought
satisfactory."

"Which?"

"As it was a time of war between the Catholics and the Huguenots,
and as he saw the Catholics exterminate the Huguenots and the
Huguenots exterminate the Catholics--all in the name of
religion--he adopted a mixed belief which permitted him to be
sometimes Catholic, sometimes a Huguenot.  Now, he was accustomed
to walk with his fowling piece on his shoulder, behind the hedges
which border the roads, and when he saw a Catholic coming alone,
the Protestant religion immediately prevailed in his mind.  He
lowered his gun in the direction of the traveler; then, when he
was within ten paces of him, he commenced a conversation which
almost always ended by the traveler's abandoning his purse to
save his life.  It goes without saying that when he saw a
Huguenot coming, he felt himself filled with such ardent Catholic
zeal that he could not understand how, a quarter of an hour
before, he had been able to have any doubts upon the superiority
of our holy religion.  For my part, monsieur, I am Catholic--my
father, faithful to his principles, having made my elder brother
a Huguenot."

"And what was the end of this worthy man?" asked d'Artagnan.

"Oh, of the most unfortunate kind, monsieur.  One day he was
surprised in a lonely road between a Huguenot and a Catholic,
with both of whom he had before had business, and who both knew
him again; so they united against him and hanged him on a tree.
Then they came and boasted of their fine exploit in the cabaret
of the next village, where my brother and I were drinking."

"And what did you do?" said d'Artagnan.

"We let them tell their story out," replied Mousqueton.  "Then,
as in leaving the cabaret they took different directions, my
brother went and hid himself on the road of the Catholic, and I
on that of the Huguenot.  Two hours after, all was over; we had
done the business of both, admiring the foresight of our poor
father, who had taken the precaution to bring each of us up in a
different religion."



It captures the kind of scoundrel behaviour in this book so well, I just had to post that  

[zbyshko]

Rhoderic!

thank you - i had almost forgot that passge.  very funny!

ralph

[PeteMurray]

It really is an amusing passage. Three Musketeers is, for my nickel, the funniest of Dumas' books, precisely for passages like that!