Part 12 (2/2)
Then yon desolate eerie mora.s.ses, The haunts of the snipe and the hern-- (I shall question the two upper cla.s.ses On _aquatiles_ when we return)-- Why, I see on them absolute ma.s.ses Of _felix_, or fern.
How it interests e'en a beginner (Or _tiro_) like dear little Ned!
Is he listening? As I am a sinner, He's asleep--he is wagging his head.
Wake up! I'll go home to my dinner, And you to your bed.
The boundless ineffable prairie; The splendour of mountain and lake, With their hues that seem ever to vary; The mighty pine-forests which shake In the wind, and in which the unwary May tread on a snake;
And this wold, with its heathery garment, Are themes undeniably great.
But--although there is not any harm in't-- It's perhaps little good to dilate On their charms to a dull little varmint Of seven or eight.
TARTARIN DE TARASCON [Sidenote: _Daudet_]
At the time of which I am speaking, Tartarin of Tarascon was not the Tartarin that he is to-day, the great Tartarin of Tarascon, so popular throughout the South of France. However--even then--he was already king of Tarascon.
Let me tell you whence this kings.h.i.+p.
You must know, first, that every one there is a huntsman, from the greatest to the smallest.
So, every Sunday morning, Tarascon takes arms and leaves the walls, game-bag on the back, gun on the shoulder, with a commotion of dogs, ferrets, trumpets, and hunting-horns. It is a superb sight.
Unfortunately, game is wanting, absolutely wanting.
However stupid animals may be, in the end they had become wary.
For five leagues round Tarascon warrens are empty, nests deserted. Not a thrush, not a quail, not the least little rabbit, not the smallest leveret.
And yet these pretty Tarascon hillocks are very tempting, perfumed with myrtle, lavender, and rosemary; and these fine muscat grapes, swollen with sweetness, which grow by the side of the Rhone, extremely appetising too--yes, but there is Tarascon behind, and in the little world of fur and feather Tarascon has an evil fame. The birds of pa.s.sage themselves have marked it with a big cross on their maps of the route, and when the wild-ducks, descending towards Camargue in long triangles, see the steeples of the town in the distance, the leader screams at the top of his lungs, ”There is Tarascon!--There is Tarascon!” and the whole flight turns.
In short, as far as game is concerned, only one old rogue of a hare remains, who has escaped by some miracle from the September ma.s.sacres of the Tarasconners, and who insists on living there. In Tarascon this hare is well known. They have given him a name. He is called ”The Express.”
It is known that his form is in M. Bompard's ground--which, by the way, has doubled and even trebled its price--but so far no one has been able to get at it.
At the present moment there are one or two desperate fellows who have set their hearts upon him.
The others have made up their minds that it is hopeless, and ”The Express” has become a sort of local superst.i.tion, although the Tarasconners are not very superst.i.tious and eat swallows in a salmi when they can get them.
”But,” you object, ”if game is so rare in Tarascon, what do the Tarascon sportsmen do every Sunday?”
What do they do?
Well, bless me! they go out into the open country two or three leagues from the town. They gather into little groups of six or seven, stretch themselves tranquilly in the shadow of an old wall, an olive-tree, take out of their game-bags a great piece of beef seasoned with _daube_, some uncooked onions, a large sausage, some anchovies, and begin an interminable luncheon, moistened by one of those nice little Rhone wines which make a man laugh and sing.
After that, when one has laid in a good stock of provisions, one rises, whistles the dogs, loads the guns, and the chase begins. That is to say, each gentleman takes his cap, flings it into the air with all his might, and fires at it.
He who puts most shots into his cap is proclaimed king of the hunt, and returns in the evening to Tarascon in triumph, with his peppered cap on the end of his gun, amidst yappings and fanfares.
Needless to say, there is a great trade of caps in the town. There are even hatters who sell caps torn and full of holes for the use of the clumsy. But hardly any one but Bezuquet, the chemist, buys them. It is dishonouring!
As a cap-hunter, Tartarin of Tarascon has no equal. Every Sunday morning he starts with a new cap; every Sunday evening he returns with a rag. At the little house with the baobab-tree the greenhouses were full of the glorious trophies. For this reason all the Tarasconners recognised him as their master, and as Tartarin knew the code of a sportsman through and through, had read all the treatises, all the manuals of every conceivable hunt, from the pursuit of caps to the pursuit of Bengal tigers, these gentlemen made him their great sporting justicier, and appointed him arbitrator in all their discussions.
Every day, from three to four, at Costecalde's the gunsmith, a fat man was to be seen, very grave, with a pipe between his teeth, sitting in a chair covered with green leather, in the middle of a shop full of cap-hunters, all standing and wrangling. It was Tartarin of Tarascon administering justice, Nimrod added to Solomon.
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