"Affronted? No; but you have no consideration. You're a Robin Hood, an exterminator! if you look at one partridge, you kill four! You sleep with your rifle, turn your game-bag into a nightcap, and shave with a couteau-de-chasse!"
"May be so! but let us have the fact."
"The fact! Then I hate your long-tailed dogs, and your detestable flights of noisy birds! Let me have them one by one, like larks in the plain of St. Denis, and I'll soon clear the province for you."
"Upon my word, Adolphe, we should have something to thank you for!"
"I tell you what, Henri; those partridges, after all, are trumpery things to kill. 'Tis mere hurry that prevents my hitting them. Don't imagine I am frightened! If you wish to give me real pleasure, let us go to India and shoot a lion or a tiger;—give me a chance with an elephant!"
"Willingly; but allow me to suggest, that if we set out for India, we shall not get back in time for dinner."
"We will keep in Europe, then; but, at least, show me some game worthy of me. A serpent—I will cut him in two at a stroke. A bull—I will soon send a brace of balls into him."
"Well done! just like a Parisian."
"Parisian! Pray what do you mean by that?"
"A boaster, if you prefer the word."