Kabanata Kabanata 31 · V. The Night-watch in a Poison-tree Grove.

. V. The Night-watch in a Poison-tree Grove.

SWEETLY picturesque as was their new steed, our lion-hunters had to give

it up, purely out of consideration for the red cap, of course. So

they continued the journey on foot as before, the caravan tranquilly

proceeding southwardly by short stages, the Tarasconian in the van, the

Montenegrin in the rear, and the camel, with the weapons in their cases,

in the ranks.

The expedition lasted nearly a month.

During that seeking for lions which he never found, the dreadful

Tartarin roamed from douar to douar on the immense plain of the

Shelliff, through the odd but formidable French Algeria, where the old

Oriental perfumes are complicated by a strong blend of absinthe and the

barracks, Abraham and “the Zouzou” mingled, something fairy-tale-like

and simply burlesque, like a page of the Old Testament related by Tommy

Atkins.

A curious sight for those who have eyes that can see.

A wild and corrupted people whom we are civilising by teaching them our

vices. The ferocious and uncontrolled authority of grotesque bashaws,

who gravely use their grand cordons of the Legion of Honour as

handkerchiefs, and for a mere yea or nay order a man to be bastinadoed.

It is the justice of the conscienceless, bespectacled cadis under

the palm-tree, Maw-worms of the Koran and Law, who dream languidly of

promotion and sell their decrees, as Esau did his birthright, for a dish

of lentils or sweetened kouskous. Drunken and libertine cadis are they,

formerly servants to some General Yusuf or the like, who get intoxicated

on champagne, along with laundresses from Port Mahon, and fatten on

roast mutton, whilst before their tents the whole tribe waste away with

hunger, and fight with the harriers for the bones of the lordly feast.

All around spread the plains in waste, burnt grass, leafless shrubs,

thickets of cactus and mastic--“the Granary of France!”--a granary void

of grain, alas! and rich alone in vermin and jackals. Abandoned camps,

frightened tribes fleeing from them and famine, they know not whither,

and strewing the road with corpses. At long intervals French villages,

with the dwellings in ruins, the fields untilled, the maddened

locusts gnawing even the window-blinds, and all the settlers in the

drinking-places, absorbing absinthe and discussing projects of reform

and the Constitution.

This is what Tartarin might have seen had he given himself the trouble;

but, wrapped up entirely in his leonine-hunger, the son of Tarascon went

straight on, looking to neither right nor left, his eyes steadfastly

fixed on the imaginary monsters which never really appeared.

As the shelter-tent was stubborn in not unfolding, and the compressed

meat-cakes would not dissolve, the caravan was obliged to stop, morn and

eve, at tribal camps. Everywhere, thanks to the gorgeous cap of Prince

Gregory, our hunters were welcomed with open arms. They lodged in the

aghas’ odd palaces, large white windowless farmhouses, where they

found, pell-mell, narghilehs and mahogany furniture, Smyrna carpets

and moderator lamps, cedar coffers full of Turkish sequins, and French

statuette-decked clocks in the Louis Philippe style.

Everywhere, too, Tartarin was given splendrous galas, diffas, and

fantasias, which, being interpreted, mean feasts and circuses. In his

honour whole goums blazed away powder, and floated their burnouses in

the sun. When the powder was burnt, the agha would come and hand in his

bill. This is what is called Arab hospitality.

But always no lions, no more than on London Bridge.

Nevertheless, the Tarasconian did not grow disheartened. Ever bravely

diving more deeply into the South, he spent the days in beating up the

thickets, probing the dwarf-palms with the muzzle of his rifle, and

saying “Boh!” to every bush. And every evening, before lying down, he

went into ambush for two or three hours. Useless trouble, however, for

the lion did not show himself.

One evening, though, going on six o’clock, as the caravan scrambled

through a violet-hued mastic-grove, where fat quails tumbled about in

the grass, drowsy through the heat, Tartarin of Tarascon fancied he

heard though afar and very vague, and thinned down by the breeze--that

wondrous roaring to which he had so often listened by Mitaine’s

Menagerie at home.

At first the hero feared he was dreaming; but in an instant further the

roaring recommenced more distinct, although yet remote; and this time

the camel’s hump shivered in terror, and made the tinned meats and arms

in the cases rattle, whilst all the dogs in the camps were heard howling

in every corner of the horizon.

Beyond doubt this was the lion.

Quick, quick! to the ambush. There was not a minute to lose.

Near at hand there happened to be an old marabout’s, or saint’s, tomb,

with a white cupola, and the defunct’s large yellow slippers placed in a

niche over the door, and a mass of odd offerings--hems of blankets, gold

thread, red hair--hung on the wall.

Tartarin of Tarascon left his prince and his camel and went in search of

a good spot for lying in wait. Prince Gregory wanted to follow him, but

the Tarasconian refused, bent on confronting Leo alone. But still he

besought His Highness not to go too far away, and, as a measure of

foresight, he entrusted him with his pocket-book, a good-sized one, full

of precious papers and bank-notes, which he feared would get torn by the

lion’s claws. This done, our hero looked up a good place.

A hundred steps in front of the temple a little clump of rose-laurel

shook in the twilight haze on the edge of a rivulet all but dried up.

There it was that Tartarin went and ensconced himself, one knee on the

ground, according to the regular rule, his rifle in his hand, and his

huge hunting-knife stuck boldly before him in the sandy bank.

Night fell.

The rosy tint of nature changed into violet, and then into dark blue.

A pretty pool of clear water gleamed like a hand-glass over the

river-pebbles; this was the watering-place of the wild animals.

On the other slope the whitish trail was dimly to be discerned which

their heavy paws had traced in the brush--a mysterious path which made

one’s flesh creep. Join to this sensation that from the vague swarming

sound in African forests, the swishing of branches, the velvety-pads of

roving creatures, the jackal’s shrill yelp, and up in the sky, two or

three hundred feet aloft, vast flocks of cranes passing on with screams

like poor little children having their weasands slit. You will own that

there were grounds for a man being moved.

Tartarin was so, and even more than that, for the poor fellow’s teeth

chattered, and on the cross-bar of his hunting-knife, planted upright

in the bank, as we repeat, his rifle-barrel rattled like a pair of

castanets. Do not ask too much of a man! There are times when one is

not in the mood; and, moreover, where would be the merit if heroes were

never afraid?

Well, yes, Tartarin was afraid, and all the time, too, for the matter

of that. Nevertheless, he held out for an hour; better, for two; but

heroism has its limits. Nigh him, in the dry part of the rivulet-bed,

the Tarasconian unexpectedly heard the sound of steps and of pebbles

rolling. This time terror lifted him off the ground. He banged away both

barrels at haphazard into the night, and retreated as fast as his

legs would carry him to the marabout’s chapel-vault, leaving his knife

standing up in the sand like a cross commemorative of the grandest panic

that ever assailed the soul of a conqueror of hydras.

“Help! this Way, prince; the lion is on me!”

There was silence. “Prince, prince, are you there?”

The prince was not there. On the white moonlit wall of the fane the

camel alone cast the queer-shaped shadow of his protuberance. Prince

Gregory had cut and run with the wallet of bank-notes. His Highness had

been for the month past awaiting this opportunity.