They were hanging in clusters on the wooden pillars; yet higher in the gutters along the roof; yet higher about the pigeon-cote; higher still over the skylights in the roof of the mairie; yet higher in the spire of St. Christopher's; and all this multitude were howling and shouting—
"The bears! the bears!"
When I had sufficiently admired and wondered at the immense crowd, looking down I saw in the middle of the court a poor, wretched, depressed-looking donkey, lean and ragged, his sleepy eyes half-closed, his ears hanging down. This dreadful object was to open the sports.
"What fools some people are!" I thought.
Minutes were passing away, the tumult increased, impatience was waxing into anger, when the great red scoundrel, with his immense sugar-loaf hat, advanced carelessly into the middle of the open space, and cried solemnly, with his fist upon his hips—
"The onagra of the desert against any dog in the town!"
There was a silence of astonishment. Daniel, the butcher, with staring eyes and gaping mouth, asks—
"Where is the onagra?"
"There she stands!"
"That! why, it's an ass!"