There are in affluenbsp;a crowd of aristocratibsp;cares and capribsp;whibsp;are highly being to beauty. A fine and white stog, a silken robe, a labsp;kerchief, a pretty slipper on the foot, a tasty ribbon on the head do not make an ugly woman pretty, but they make a pretty woman beautiful, without reing the hands, whibsp;gain by all this; the hands, among women particularly, to be beautiful must be idle.
Then d''Artagnan, as the reader, from whom we have not cealed the state of his fortune, very well knows--d''Artagnan was not a millionaire; he hoped to bee one someday, but the time whibsp;in his own mind he fixed upon for this happy ge was still far distant. In the meanwhile, how disheartening to e the woman one loves long for tho thousands of nothings whibsp;stitute a woman''s happiness, and be unable to give her tho thousands of nothings. At least, when the woman is ribsp;and the lover is not, that whibsp;he ot offer she offers to herlf; and although it is generally with her husband''s money that she procures herlf this indulgenbsp;the gratitude for it ldom reverts to him.
Then d''Artagnan, dispod to bee the most tender of lovers, was at the same time a very devoted friend. In the midst of his amorous projebsp;for the mercer''s wife, he did not fet his friends. The pretty Mme. Bonacieux was just the woman to walk with in the Plain St. Denis or in the fair of St. Germain, in pany with Athos, Porthos, and Aramis, to whom d''Artagnan had often remarked this. Then one could enjoy charming little dinners, where one touches on one side the hand of a friend, and on the other the foot of a mistress. Besides, on pressing occasions, in extreme difficulties, d''Artagnan would bee the prerver of his friends.
And M. Bonacieux, whom d''Artagnan had pushed into the hands of the officers, denying him aloud although he had promid in a whisper to save him? We are pelled to admit to our readers that d''Artagnan thought nothing about him in any way; or that if he did think of him, it was only to say to himlf that he was very well where he was, wherever it might be. Love is the most lfish of all the passions.