"He at least pretends to be so, as well as every thing else; but I am sure that he would be found wanting in that as in every thing else, and he shoots because it is fashionable and not because he cares for it."
"He is wrong," said Arnold, "for shooting is one of the most exciting amusements I know of."
"Are you a sportsman, sir?" inquired De Brévannes.
"We have such excellent sporting in Germany that it is impossible not to have a taste for it. There is one class of sport, too, of which I am passionately fond, and which, perhaps, is not much known in France."
"What sport is that, sir? I can inform you, for I have liked, and still like, sporting excessively."
"Wild-fowl shooting. We have in Germany such splendid flights of aquatic birds."
"You like wild-fowl shooting!" exclaimed De Brévannes, after a moment's reflection, as if a sudden light broke in upon his thoughts.
"To madness, sir! Have you much of this sport in France?"
"Yes we have; and I may add, that I have some of the best in the country at my house in Lorraine."
"Yes," interposed Bertha, naïvely, "and it was only this morning that M. de Brévannes's steward wrote him word that there was at this time an extraordinary flight of——I forget the name of these birds," she added, with a smile.