CAPTAIN PAMPHILE, page 4
The same game went on the whole day.
Towards five o’clock in the evening, Alexandre had covered some fifteen leagues and Love more than fifty; the one was exhausted with shouting, the other with barking. As to the sportsman, he had finished his quest and, quitting them both, had gone off to shoot snipe on the Pantin marshes. All at once Love made a point!
Such a sure, firm point it was, that he might have been, like the dog of Cephalus, changed into stone. At this sight, so novel for him, Alexandre forgot his fatigue, and ran like a lamplighter, trembling all the time lest Love should break before he got within range. But there was no fear of that. Love’s feet were glued to the ground.
Alexandre came up to him, watched the direction of his eyes, and found they were fixed on a tuft of grass; under this tuft he perceived a greyish object. He judged it to be a young partridge separated from the rest of the covey; and trusting rather to his cap than to his gun, he laid the latter down, took his cap in his hand, and, approaching on tip-toe like a child after a butterfly, he clapped it over the unknown object, groped under it with the other hand, and drew out — a frog! Anybody else would have thrown the frog thirty yards away; not so Alexandre, for he reasoned that since this interesting creature had been sent to him by Providence in such a miraculous manner, there must be some hidden mystery in her destiny, and great events probably depended upon her career.
Accordingly, he put her carefully into his gamebag, brought her straight home, transferred her forthwith to a big glass jar, out of which we had eaten the last remaining cherries the day before, and poured over her head all the water left in the water jug.
All this care and attention for a frog would have seemed extraordinary on the part of a man who had obtained one in a less complicated fashion, but Alexandre knew what the capture of that frog had cost him, and he treated her accordingly.
She had cost him six hundred and sixty francs, without reckoning the gun licence.
CHAPTER IV
MADEMOISELLE CAMARGO IS BILLED TO EAT A HUNDRED FLIES, AND JADIN TO READ A PAPER
“Halloa!” said Doctor Thierry, on entering the studio the next day, “so you’ve got a new boarder?”
And without responding to the amicable growls of Tom and the alluring gestures of James, he went straight to the jar in which was Mademoiselle Camargo, and plunged in his hand.
Mademoiselle Camargo, who did not know that Thierry was a learned doctor of colossal intellect, commenced to swim round and round as fast as she could; but this did not save her from being seized in another moment by the extremity of her left hind leg, and so incontinently quitting her habitation head downwards.
“Why!” said Thierry, spinning her round as a peasant girl does a spindle, “it is, you see, a liana temporaria, so called because of these two black marks extending from the eye to the tympanum; it lives equally well in running water and in swamps; some authors give it the name of the dumb frog, because it croaks below water, whereas the green frog can only croak when out of water. If you had a couple of hundred of ‘em like this one, I should recommend your cutting off their hind legs, dressing them like fricasseed chickens, sending to Corcelet’s for a couple of bottles of good Bordeaux, and asking me to dinner. But as there is only this one, we will rest content with clearing up, with her aid and your permission, a doubtful point in science, affirmed by many naturalists, viz., that this frog can go for six months without food.”
With these words he let Mademoiselle Camargo go, and she, with the happy swing she could impart to her limbs, frolicked two or three times round her jar; and then, seeing a fly which had fallen into her domain, she made a dash up to the surface and sucked it down.
“I don’t mind you taking that,” said Thierry; “but, mind you, it is to last you for 183 days.”
For, unfortunately for Mademoiselle Camargo, the year 1832 being leap year, Science gained twelve hours from this accident in the calendar.
Mademoiselle Camargo did not appear at all disquieted by this threat, and remained boldly with her head out of water, her four legs stretched out in careless comfort and quite motionless, for all the world as though she were resting on terra firma.
“Now,” said Thierry, opening a drawer, “let us see to the prisoner’s furniture.”
He took out two cartridges, a file, a penknife, two paint-brushes, and four matches. Decamps watched his proceedings in silence and without in the least comprehending the preparations, which the doctor made as carefully as if about to perform a surgical operation. Then he emptied the powder into a snuffers-tray and kept the bullets, threw the quills and badger-hair to James, and kept the handles of the brushes.
“What devil’s work are you after now?” said Decamps, snatching away from James his two best brushes; “you are making fine hay of my studio!”
“I am constructing a ladder,” gravely replied Thierry.
In fact, he had just bored through with the file the two leaden bullets, had fixed firmly in the holes so made the brush handles, and in these handles, intended for the supports of the ladder, he fixed, crosswise, the matches, so making the rungs. In five minutes’ time the ladder was completed and let down into the bowl, in which it remained on a firm base formed by the weight of the bullets.
Mademoiselle Camargo no sooner found herself in possession of this piece of furniture than she tried it, as if to make sure of its strength, by climbing up to the top step.
“We shall have rain,” said Thierry.
“The deuce we shall,” said Decamps; “and there is my brother who wants to go out shooting again to-day.”
“Mademoiselle Camargo does not recommend it,” answered the doctor.
“How do you mean?”
“I have just made a barometer for you, dear friend. Whenever Mademoiselle Camargo climbs up her ladder, it is a sign of rain; when she descends, you will have fine weather for certain; and when she stays about half-way up, do not go out without an umbrella or a topcoat: the prediction is ‘Change! Variable weather! ‘“
“There — fancy that!” said Decamps.
“Now,” continued Thierry, “we are going to cover the top of the jar with the parchment, just as if it was still full of cherries.”
“Here it is,” said Decamps, giving him what he asked for.
“Now a piece of twine to tie it on tight.”
“There you are.”
“Then I must ask you for some wax! thank you... a light — that is right... and to make sure of my experiment (he melted the wax, sealed the knot, and applied the stone of his ring to the seal)... there!... there she remains for six months. Now,” he continued, piercing some holes in the parchment with a penknife, “now for pen and ink.”
Have you ever asked a painter for a pen and ink? No? Then don’t: for he will surely do as did Decamps — offer you a pencil.
Thierry took the pencil and marked the parchment:
“2nd September, 1832.”
Accordingly, on the evening of the party, the commencement of which we have tried to describe to our readers, exactly one hundred and eighty-three days, or six months and twelve hours, had elapsed; and during the whole of this period Mademoiselle Camargo had gone on predicting, without making the mistake of a minute, rain, fine weather, and change; this regularity was the more remarkable in that she had not since her incarceration swallowed one single atom of food.
So, when Thierry, taking out his watch, announced the expiration of the last second of the sixtieth minute of the twelfth hour, and the jar had been brought forward, a common sentiment of pity took possession of the company when they saw the miserable condition to which the poor creature was reduced through having, at the expense of her stomach, thrown such a great and important light upon an obscure point in Science.
“See,” said Thierry, triumphantly, “Schneider and Roësel were right.”
“Right, right,” said Jadin, taking up the jar and holding it at the level of his eyes. “But I am not yet convinced that Mademoiselle Camargo is still alive!”
“Oh! you must not listen to Jadin,” said Flers; “he’s always borne a grudge against Madame Camargo.”
Thierry took up a lamp and held it behind the jar.
“Look,” he said, “and you will see her heart beating.”
In truth Mademoiselle Camargo had grown so thin that she was as transparent as crystal, and you could see all the organs of circulation; it was even possible to remark that the heart had only one ventricle and one valve. At the same time these organs performed their offices so feebly, and Jadin was only mistaken to such a small extent, that it was truly not worth while contradicting him, for you would not have given the poor creature ten minutes more to live. Her limbs had wasted to threads, and the hinder part of her body seemed only attached to the forepart by the bones which form the springs whereby frogs jump instead of walking. Besides all this, on her back had grown a sort of moss, which, under the microscope, became a regular thicket of marine grasses, intermingled with reeds and flowers. Thierry, as a botanist, even said that this impalpable growth belonged to the order of the mastics and the cresses. No one disputed his statement.
“Now,” said Thierry, after each in turn had thoroughly examined Mademoiselle Camargo, “we must let her eat her supper in peace.”
“And what is she to eat?” said Flers.
“I have her meal in this box.”
And Thierry, raising the parchment, introduced into the space intended for air so many flies, each short of one wing, that he had evidently devoted his morning to catching them and his afternoon to mutilating them. We thought Mademoiselle would have enough to do to eat them in another six months; one of us even ventured to say so.
“Quite a mistake,” said Thierry, “in a quarter of an hour not a fly will be left.”
The least incredulous among us could not help giving signs of doubt at this. Thierry, strong in the success of his first experiment, replaced Mademoiselle Camargo in her usual position without deigning to answer.
He had scarcely resumed his seat when the door opened and the proprietor of the neighbouring café carried in a tray with tea, sugar, cups, and saucers. He was followed closely by two waiters carrying in a large basket, a large loaf of bread, a bun, a lettuce, and a good assortment of fancy patties and sweets. The loaf was for Tom, the bun for James, the green food for Gazelle, and the pastry for us. The animals were first attended to, and then the guests were asked to help themselves as they pleased — a plan which seems to me the best so far discovered for doing the honours of one’s house pleasantly and successfully.
There was a moment of apparent confusion, while each settled himself down according to his fancy. Tom grumbled away with his bread to his kennel; James took refuge with his bun behind the busts of Malagutti and Rata; Gazelle slowly dragged her lettuce under the table; as for the rest of us, we took a cake in one hand and a cup in the other, as is the usual custom of mankind, and in ten minutes had finished both tea and pastry. The proprietor of the café was summoned again, and appeared with his satellites.
“More!” said Decamps.
The proprietor, with many bows and respectful gestures, backed out to fulfil his instructions.
“Now, gentlemen,” said Flers, looking at Thierry with a quizzical wink and at Decamps with the respect due to the host, “while we are waiting for Mademoiselle Camargo to finish her supper and for our own fresh supply of refreshments, I propose we should fill up the interlude with the reading of Jadin’s paper. It treats of the history of the early years of James the First, whom we have all the honour to know pretty intimately, and in whom we all take so great an interest that the smallest details connected with his life acquire for us a special importance — Dixi.”
Everyone bowed in sign of consent, one or two even clapped their hands.
“James, my friend,” said Fau, who, as his tutor, was the most intimate of all of us with the hero of this history, “you see they are all talking about you. Come here.”
And to these two words he added a whistle so well known as a private signal by James that the intelligent animal, with one spring from his shelf, landed on the speaker’s shoulder.
“Well done, James; you are a very good boy to be obedient, especially when your chops are full of bun. Salute these gentlemen.”
James carried his hand smartly to his forehead in a soldierlike manner.
“And if your friend Jadin, who is about to read your history, relates any calumnies, tell him at once that he is a liar.”
James nodded his head up and down, showing he perfectly understood what he had to do.
James and Fau were in truth bound together by ties of the most harmonious friendship. On the part of the animal, especially, the affection was such as one never now finds among men; and on what did it turn? It must be confessed to the shame of the simian race, that it was not by improving the pupil’s mind as did Fénelon for the Dauphin, but rather in pandering to his vices, as did Catherine towards Henri III, that the tutor had acquired this deplorable influence over his scholar. For instance, when he arrived in Paris, James was a connoisseur in good wine: Fau made him a drunkard; he was a Sybarite like Alcibiades: Fau made him a cynic after the school of Diogenes; he had a cultivated palate like Lucullus: Fau made him into a glutton like Grimod de la Reynière. It is nevertheless true that in exchange for the loss of his morals, he had gained many physical accomplishments which made him an animal of great distinction. Thus he knew his left hand from his right, he could sham dead for ten minutes running, he could dance on the tight rope as well as Madame Saqui; he went shooting, gun under arm and gamebags on back, showed his licence to the foresters and his heels to the police-constables. In short, he was a very fascinating young roué, whose only fault was that unfortunately he had been born under the Restoration instead of under the Regency.
Thus, if Fau knocked at the street door, James would tremble with joy; when he walked upstairs, James approached instinctively. Then he would give little cries of pleasure and hop about on his hind legs like a kangaroo. When, finally, Fau opened the door, he would spring into his arms, as they still do at the Théâtre français in the Deux Frères. In a word, whatever belonged to James belonged to Fau, and he would have given him the very bun from between his teeth.
“Gentlemen,” said Jadin, “if you will take your seats and light your pipes and cigars, I am ready.”
Every one obeyed. Jadin coughed, opened his manuscript, and read as follows:
CHAPTER V
HOW CAPTAIN PAMPHILE, MASTER OF THE TRADING BRIG “ROXELANE,” FOUND BETTER SPORT ON THE BANKS OF THE RIVER BANGO THAN ALEXANDRE DECAMPS HAD ENJOYED ON THE PLAIN OF SAINT-DENIS
ON the 24th July, 1827, the brig, “Roxelane,” set sail from Marseilles to load up with coffee from Mocha, spices from Bombay, and tea from Canton. She put in, for fresh provisions, at the Bay of St. Paul de Loanda, which lies, as every schoolboy knows, about half-way down the coast of Guinea.
While the victualling was in progress, Captain Pamphile, who was making his tenth voyage to the Indies, took his gun, and with the thermometer marking a hundred in the shade, amused himself by walking up the banks of the River Bango. The captain was, excepting Nimrod, the mightiest hunter before the Lord who had ever appeared on this earth.
He had not taken twenty steps in the long grass which grows near the river before he felt his foot slip on something round and smooth like the trunk of a young tree. At the same moment he heard a sharp hiss, and ten paces from him he saw the uplifted head of an enormous boa constrictor, on whose tail he had just trodden.
Anyone but Captain Pamphile would have been somewhat frightened to find himself confronted by this terrific head, whose bloodshot eyes glared out at him like carbuncles. But the boa did not know Captain Pamphile.
“God ‘a mercy, you filthy reptile you! Do you think to frighten me?” said the captain. And as the serpent opened its great jaws to seize him, he drove a bullet slap through the monster’s palate and out at the top of its head. The serpent collapsed, dead.
The Captain first leisurely reloaded, then, opening his clasp-knife, he went to the animal and slit up its belly, separated the liver from the entrails, as the Angel of Tobias did, and, after a short search, found a small blue stone about the size of a hazel-nut.
“Good,” said he to himself.
And he put the stone into a purse in which there were already a dozen similar stones. Captain Pamphile was as learned as a mandarin; he had read “The Thousand and One Nights,” and was looking for the enchanted bezoar-stone of Prince Camaralzaman.
Thinking he had verily found it, he continued his sport. In about a quarter of an hour’s time he saw that the grass was shaking some forty paces from him, and heard a terrible growling. At this sound every beast of the forest seemed to know that the king of them all was at hand. The birds stopped singing; two gazelles, terrified, bounded away and fled for the open plain; a wild elephant, which could be seen upon a knoll a quarter of a league away, raised his trunk ready for combat.
“Pr-r-r-r! pr-r-r!” rattled out Captain Pamphile, as if he were driving up a covey of partridges.
At this sound a tiger, which till then had been crouching down, stood up, lashing his sides with his tail; it was a Royal Tiger of the largest size. The huge beast bounded forward and landed within twenty feet of the hunter.
“Ho! ho!” cried Captain Pamphile, “so you think I am going to fire at long range, do you, and risk spoiling your skin? Pr-r-r! pr-r-r!”
The tiger made a second leap, which brought him to close quarters; but just as he landed, the captain fired, and the ball pierced the animal’s left eye. The tiger tumbled over like a hare, and died on the spot.
The Captain reloaded carefully as usual, drew his knife, turned the body over on its back, made an incision, and skinned the tiger as a cook would a rabbit. Then he wrapped himself in his victim’s hide, just as, four thousand years before, the Nemean Hercules had “done — a hero from whom, as a native of Marseilles, Captain Pamphile might claim descent; then he started once more on his quest for game.
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