"Why, perhaps I might have ten times more pleasure in lodging you safe in the Bastille than I have now," answered De Thiery. "Oh, Monsieur de Blenau, take my word for it, age is the most terrible misfortune that can happen to any man; other evils will mend, but this is every day getting worse." The conversation between De Blenau and his companion soon dropped, as all conversation must do, unless it be forced, where there exists a great dissimilarity of ideas and circumstances. It is true, from time to time, Monsieur de Thiery uttered an observation which called for a reply from De Blenau; but the thoughts which crowded upon the young Count were too many, and too overpowering in their nature, to find relief in utterance. The full dangers of his situation, and all the vague and horrible probabilities which the future offered, presented themselves more forcibly to his mind, now that he had leisure to dwell upon them, than they had done at first, when all his energies had been called into action; and when, in order to conceal their effect from others, he had been obliged to fly from their consideration himself. A thousand little accessory circumstances also kept continually renewing the recollection of his painful situation. When he dropped his hand, as was his custom, to rest it upon the hilt of his sword, his weapon was gone, and he had to remember that he had been disarmed; and if by chance he cast his eyes from the window of the carriage, the passing and repassing of the guards continually reminded him that he was a prisoner. De Blenau was new to misfortune, and consequently the more sensible to its acuteness. Nor did he possess that buoyant spirit with which some men are happily gifted by nature--that sort of carelessness which acts better than philosophy, raising us above the sorrows and uncomforts of existence, and teaching us to _bear_ our misfortunes by _forgetting_ them as soon as possible. He had too much courage, it is true, to resign himself to grief for what he could not avoid.--He was prepared to encounter the worst that fate could bring; but at the same time he could not turn his thoughts from the contemplation of the future, though it offered nothing but dark indistinct shapes; and out of these his imagination formed many horrible images, which derived a greater appearance of reality from the known cruelty of Richelieu, in whose power he was, and the many dreadful deeds perpetrated in the place to which he was going.