They fished, and their fishing was sufficiently fortunate.
To lines bated with prawn, soles came, with numerous gambols, to bite.
Two nets had already been broken by the immense weight of congers and haddocks; three sea-eels plowed the hold with their slimy folds and their dying contortions.

D'Artagnan brought them good luck; they told him so.

The soldier found the occupation so pleasant, that he put his hand to the work--that is to say, to the lines--and uttered roars of joy, and _mordioux_ enough to have astonished his musketeers themselves, every time that a shock given to his line by the captured fish required the play of the muscles of his arm, and the employment of his best dexterity.

The party of pleasure had made him forget his diplomatic mission.

He was struggling with a very large conger, and holding fast with one hand to the side of the vessel, in order to seize with the other the gaping jowl of his antagonist, when the master said to him, "Take care they don't see you from Belle-Isle!" These words produced the same effect upon D'Artagnan as the hissing of the first bullet on a day of battle; he let go of both line and conger, which, dragging each other, returned again to the water.