Athos, Porthos, Aramis—and D'Artagnan! The names ring out in literature like a great shout, a call to adventure and romance. For the reign of Louis XIII of France was one of intrigue and danger. Cardinal Richelieu, backed by his own corps of guards and a network of spies, was the power behind the throne. And Anne of Austria, the beautiful but lonely queen, was suspected of loving England's Duke of Buckingham beyond discretion. Through this tangled web of history dash the king's three musketeers and D'Artagnan, each so alive that the story is as thrilling today as when it first took Paris by storm.

Because of his love for Constance Bonacieux, D'Artagnan and his comrades are pitted against the Cardinal himself. Their mad chase to England in the affair of the diamond aguillettes, their duels and affairs de coeur, the siege of La Rochelle, and the treachery of milady, Richelieu's agent, sweep the reader along with a power few people have ever attained.

From the dust jacket of The Rainbow Classics edition